Em Oneshot - Blog Posts

Your Muse

Eddie Munson x Artist!reader

Summary: Eddie finds out what the little secret you’ve been hiding in your sketchbook is.

Warnings: Just fluff I think

Wordcount: 2,332

Eddie knows that you love to draw.

Since the day he met you, you have always had a pen or pencil in hand, doodling whenever the opportunity presented itself. Worksheets, no matter the class, filled to the brim with messy sketches of whatever came to your mind. Palms covered in hearts and flowers from when you got bored listening to your teachers' lessons. But most of the time you would dig into your backpack to retrieve the mysterious little black book that you spent most of your time drawing in.

It was a thing that you never let anyone look at what filled the pages of your sketchbook, not even Eddie had seen the inside of it, and as your best friend he'd be lying if he said he wasn't curious about what exactly you were hiding. On more than one occasion, though he hates to admit it, he had thought about taking a peek at the, what he presumed were promiscuous, pages of art you spent so much of your precious time working on but the thought alone made him feel an inkling of guilt that he just couldn't get passed.

“What are you drawin’ this time, huh?” Eddie’s question ends in a prolonged yawn; he’s laid back comfortably in your bed trying to take a nap but the scratch of your pencil against rough paper keeps his curiosity piqued enough to overcome his exhaustion from school for the time being. He stretches like a cat along the length of your bed and his feet dangle off the edge, toes wiggling after being still for so long.

You're sitting at your desk hunched over in a way Eddie is sure must be uncomfortable, but he doesn’t say anything because he knows his posture isn't much better. He tries to glance over the top of your shoulder for a chance to see what exactly your drawing but he wasn’t nearly quiet enough because you’re quick to shut the book before his eyes can even break over the hill of your shoulder and all he can do is grunt in annoyance in correspondence to your secrecy. A deep rumble releases from the depth of his chest before he roughly plants his face into your pillow. The smell of your shampoo is enough to make him forget his previous irritation.

Spinning in your chair to face him you smile in amusement, “Why are you so nosey? Wayne didn’t teach you to mind your manners or somethin’?” You're teasing him and he knows it, he lifts his hand just enough to flash you his middle finger and the melody of the giggle you let out in response to his antics makes the beat of his heart accelerate to an alarming rhythm and his stomach flutter with the most vicious of butterflies. He's never been more grateful for a pillow because he’s sure that the heat that’s spreading along the skin of his face is causing his cheeks to redden an embarrassing amount. He can’t believe that just the sound of your laugh has him practically falling to your feet in absolute devotion. He turns his head to glare at you but finds that the glowing smile stretched along your lips, lifting the apple of your cheek which further rounds your face, has his own face softening into a gentle grin that almost matches the brightness of yours. 

Eddie continues to look at you even as you turn away to gently guide your fingers along the worn leather of your sketchbook, there is a look of uncertainty that flashes in your eyes and if Eddie wasn’t paying close attention to you like he always does he wouldn’t have noticed. He makes an effort to change the subject, “We should order in some pizza or something, I’m fuckin’ starving.” 

“Aren’t you always?” Eddie swats your thigh just barley from how you spin your chair to avoid his hand, grumbling words you assume to be comebacks.

You laugh again and despite your previous comment you get up to make the call for your usual pizza with no argument, somewhat of a tradition when Eddie comes over, and dig into the bag Eddie had haphazardly tossed on the foot of your bed when he first got to your place for his wallet; you paid last time so it’s his turn.

The door to your room creaks almost eerily when you open it to step out and creaks again when you close it; he hates that sound. For a while Eddie doesn’t move, just lays comfortable listening to the faint sound of your voice in the kitchen as you order the food. Eddie wishes you had made the call closer so he can hear the sound of your honeyed voice even if it wasn’t aimed at him.

He looks around your room regardless of the fact that he’s been in there more than his own room as of late. His probing eyes find their way to your desk and on your desk, just as you had left it only moments ago, is the little black sketchbook he was always so curious about.

It was wrong, his desire to grab it so he could selfishly get a glimpse of something that was absolutely none of his business. It was a breach of privacy but he had never had such an opportunity, the book was almost always in your line of sight never fully giving someone the chance to open it. He looks at the door, ears straining to see if you were on your way back to the room, but he hears nothing and so, with shaky hands, he stretches his arm across the gap between your bed and the desk and gently grabs the book. The guilt pours in almost immediately and he sighs in frustration. In truth he doesn’t know why he’s so adament on finding out what’s in it, he guesses that maybe he doesn’t like that you feel the need to hide something from him- or maybe he was just greedy, wanting to know everything there was to know about you so that he may keep you closer to his heart more than you were to anyone else's-, he was pretty sure you trusted him he just wasn’t sure why you didn’t with this.

You’ve had no problem letting him have his quick glances at other drawings; the little butterflies you’d draw with precision along the lining of homework, or the randomly drawn eyes in between sections of your notes, why was this so different?

Eddie sighs once more before placing the book back onto your desk, taking care to place just as it was. 

The door opens just as Eddie lays back down and his heart almost bursts out of his chest at how quickly you did it. He still feels that sliver of guilt when you move to giddily plop yourself beside him, letting your fingernails rub at his scalp and rake through the tangles in his unruly hair with a pretty little grin sat perfectly etched into your face. He face plants into the pillow again.

“I almost looked through your sketchbook,” for some reason Eddie’s never felt more full of shame, “I didn’t though.” He says the last part sternly as if to reiterate that you can trust him enough not to try again. 

You stay relatively quiet, hand still making its way through the frizzy waves, fingers curling the hair around themselves in an attempt to create curls. Eddie usually enjoys your random spurts of touchiness, revels in it, because it only happens once in a blue moon- when you’re too comfortable to register the way you’re touching him so intimately, but right now it does very little to quiet his nerves in the way he hoped it might. He wonders if you're mad at him.

The silence is deafening, he’s not sure why he said anything at all, the undeniable need to hold himself accountable when it comes to you is aggravating. Even with the reputation of someone like him it was incredibly hard to lie to you. The time he snuck a bite of your lunch abruptly crosses his mind, he remembers how it took all of ten seconds of your frowning stare for him to give in and stop blaming Henderson.

The thought is thrown out the window when he feels your body cuddle up to him, “It’s you.” you whisper the words so quietly he almost misses it.

His head turns to you, for what seems like the nth time tonight, only to find you already looking at his face close enough he can feel the warmth of your breath against his shuttering lips. You’re so close, maybe too close because he’s sure you can see the way his pupils dilated and the way his nose goes a little red in correspondence. 

Eddie’s brows furrow, “What’s me?”

Your eyes dart to look at everything but his eyes, you look at the crease formed from confusion between his brows and the way it makes his button nose scrunch a little, the smile lines that are prominent even without his usual smug grin, you look at the pink of his lips and the way the skin peels from how often he bites at them, you do see the way his pupils dilate and how his nose gets red, “The drawings in the sketchbook- their all drawing of you.”

At first he just watches you, brown doe like eyes looking for signs of deceit or sarcasm as if he thinks you’re seconds away from laughing in his face and telling him “It was a joke” because he doesn't want it to be. He wants to know if you look at him the way he looks at you. He needs to know if you notice how the corner of his eyes crinkle when he laughs the way he notices the way your eyes shine like gold in the light of the morning sun. Do you take notice of the beauty mark that lays hidden under the shield of his eyelashes the way he takes note of and admires every visible mark and scar that litters your face and body? Do you see Eddie the way he sees you? He hopes you do.

The breath he takes before speaking is uncharacteristically shakey compared to the usual confidence he holds in his chest, “Yeah?” 

Your confirming hum, even with it being laced with uncertainty, has his heart soaring to heights of tenderness he has never felt before. He brings his hand to your face and lets his ringed fingers, calloused and scarred, delicately trace the features he swears were sculpted by some sort of deity before letting it settle against your warming cheek with an adoration that could make even the coldest of hearts leap. His touch is so filled with irrefutable love that it could be mistaken for worship in the purest of forms and God does it make your heart ache with a passion like no other.

The euphoric feeling of exhilaration that fills the both of you and the room has you both giggling like children, pressing your foreheads together at the ridiculousness of the situation, everything not having fully settled in your minds.

This natural feeling of contentment between the two of you is all Eddie ever craves. He hoped almost everyday for moments like this- to be the reason you light up with laughter even in moments of seriousness.

“So… Am I like your muse or something? Cause y’know I’d be totally flattered.” The words are muttered as to not disrupt the intimacy of the moment but the teasing tone of his voice is there and a smirk that has his smile lines deepening, a sight you treasure, inches across his flushed face. When you jokingly begin to roll away from him in response to his mocking his hands press firmly into the dip of your waist to keep you close, he couldn’t even possibly think of being more than a foot away from you right now and he’d never pass up the chance to hold you close.

Eddie rubs his nose against yours, his hair tickles your collarbone, “I think you basically confessed to me by the way, sweetheart.”

You think your best friend is the only person in the world who would still crack jokes during times like this. You cuddle your face closer to his letting your lips brush against his just enough to make his breath hitch, “Oh yeah? Maybe you just have an ego and think I confessed to you. I gotta admit Munson, that's a little presumptuous of you.” Your fingers brush a little of his dark hair out of the way.

His hand moves from your waist to your cheek to the back of your neck to tangle his fingers into the hair by the base, “Well maybe I’m feeling a little egotistical.” The kiss he then places on your lips is nothing short of intoxicating, a gentleness that doesn’t exclude the devastating hunger he feels for you. It’s all consuming and all him. His lips are softer than you imagine and as his tongue slides against the seal of your lips for permission to enter you can taste the faintness of the cigarette he had smoked before getting to your place. His tongue dances with your own sensually instead of dirtily and slowly instead of frenzied like he wanted you to feel every ounce of absolute passion he felt. You pull him impossibly closer, hands clenched tightly into the tattered fabric of his metallica t-shirt, only pulling away when you’ve both run out of breath.

Heavy breathing fills the silence of your bedroom and even with his exasperation Eddie trails his lips across your cheek and along your neck like he never wants to stop. “You should pose for me the next time I draw you.”

“I could pose naked.” He giggles immaturely just at the thought.

“Never mind, you ruined it.”

the curse of the designated driver

eddie munson x waitress!fem!reader

Eddie is less than thrilled when you get invited to tag along to an outdoor concert with him and his friends.

WC: ~5.6k

Warnings: 18+ MDNI, Eddie and Reader are in their 20s, mostly Eddie’s POV, light angst, smut, swearing, reader gets harassed/groped at a concert, weed and alcohol use, brief piv sex, sunshine x grumpy, one-sided enemies to lovers

A/N: Been thinking about going to a concert with Eddie and how he’d probably find me annoying ;)

Eddie couldn’t explain it.

He couldn’t quite put his finger on what it was about you that bothered him so much. All he knew was that life had been better before you’d shown up back in town and taken a summer job at his favorite diner.

Before then the place had been dull and quiet, staffed with only a short order cook and an ancient waitress who hardly spoke a word other than the odd grunt here and there when the boys asked for a refill of their drinks.

But just as the snow and ice began to thaw, you’d arrived as if carried on the warm spring breeze, infiltrating the drab space with your exceedingly sunny disposition.

Eddie had never been a big fan of change and your sudden appearance in the diner irked him — your presence like an invasive tendril that wrapped itself around his chest, squeezing tight until he couldn’t breathe.

Like all creatures of habit, the boys had their favorites.

Their favorite booth in the back where they could be as rowdy as they wanted without eliciting angry glares from the old men who sat at the counter reading their newspapers and nursing endless cups of coffee.

Their favorite dishes — the exact same food order every week, cooked to greasy perfection and served piping hot on sturdy white dinner plates that had seen better days.

And to Eddie’s dismay, the boys had recently discovered their new favorite waitress — one who was assigned to their preferred booth with an infuriating regularity.

Every Friday evening you greeted their group with a smile so bright that it lit up your whole face, almost as if you were genuinely happy to see them. Then you’d proceed to chat and joke around with the guys like you were all old friends, asking them questions about their lives as though you actually cared.

And every single traitorous member of the Hellfire Club bought into your cheerful facade.

Well, all except one.

Before long, Eddie stopped looking forward to the outings that had once been an enjoyable post-Hellfire tradition, dread sinking like a lead weight in his stomach every time he pulled into the diner parking lot.

Sometimes he would sit outside in his van for a few minutes and watch your silhouette in the restaurant’s front window. The outline of your body backlit by fluorescent light causing his heart to race and his palms to get sweaty — an obvious stress response to an unwanted intruder.

And you were an intruder.

He hated the sweet way you smiled down at him every time you asked him what he wanted, even though you had to know by then that he never ordered any food. Since you’d come around he barely had an appetite.

He despised how you’d stand there waiting for his answer with a teasing smirk on your perfect lips, forcing him to play your little game while your eyes twinkled and danced with mischief; pen in hand, nose crinkled in amusement.

Detested the way you said his name in a voice that was as soft as the down of a dandelion before it’s stolen by a gentle summer breeze.

“Do you want anything, Eddie?”

A loaded question. He wanted so many things in life, but most of all he wanted to be free. Free from his agony. Free from the curse of your suffocating presence.

But he couldn’t exactly say that to you, could he?

You always listed off the daily specials to the table in a pointless exercise, the soothing lilt of your voice making Eddie’s stomach twist in knots of discomfort.

“Escargot. Chef Salad. Foie gras—”

“Those aren’t on the menu,” he’d interrupted one day, glaring up in annoyance at your smiling face.

“I know.” You had grinned, eyes alight as you gave him a saucy little wink. “Just wanted to check if you were listening.”

Since he never ordered anything, you’d gotten in the habit of bringing him a tall glass of ice water and teasing that it was on the house for being the designated driver.

You giggled every damn time you set it down in front of him and he’d sigh and roll his eyes, never once giving you the satisfaction of taking a sip.

He would have rather died of thirst.

Eddie wasn’t sure who you thought you were, but you weren’t going to just waltz into his life and win him over with some cheesy jokes and mindless chit chat like you had with the rest of the Hellfire crew.

He wasn’t so easy.

The trouble with the concert had started the same way everything always did with Henderson — he just opened his mouth and the words had poured out without any forethought or consideration for their implications.

While the teen’s impulsiveness was normally seen as an endearing quality by his friends, Eddie hadn’t been impressed. Not at all.

The guys were extra wound up that night, talking non-stop about their upcoming plans — an outdoor rock concert that was taking place the following evening in a field about an hour outside town.

Eddie had organized the road trip and even though the lineup only consisted of a few metal cover bands, it still promised to be a fun way for them to kick off the beginning of summer. It wasn’t exactly Madison Square Garden, but it was enough to keep Eddie satisfied until he could afford to travel and see real metal bands in the city and beyond.

The boys had been excitedly filling you in on their plans while you took their usual food orders, and your reaction to their news had taken Eddie by surprise.

“Oh, I’m so jealous! I wish I could have gotten a ticket but they sold out before I had a chance.”

You stuck out your lower lip in what Eddie imagined might have been an adorably playful pout — if it had been anyone but you.

“No way!” Dustin had smiled, his clever mind working a mile a minute. “Our friend Steve just found out he can’t make it, so we have an extra ticket. You should come!”

Eddie’s heart pounded in his chest, pumping hard and fast as his eyes darted to his friend in a silent plea for him to shut the fuck up for the love of all that was good and holy.

You gave a quick shake of your head. “No, I wouldn’t want to intrude.”

But Dustin insisted.

“The lady said she can’t,” Eddie hissed under his breath from between bared teeth. “Let it go.”

But Dustin had never let anything go in his life and he certainly wasn’t about to start when someone was in need. A damsel in distress? Forget about it.

“What about the ratio?” Dustin asked, looking over at Eddie with bright-eyed innocence.

Dustin then looked up at you to explain. “Our friend Steve always insists on a one adult to three teen ratio whenever we travel anywhere together, ever since we had an incident last summer.”

“Ratio, huh?” You held back a giggle as Eddie ran a hand down over his face in exasperation. He was finished fighting. He knew Dustin would never give it up.

“Eddie’s driving us all there in his van. He can pick you up,” Dustin offered as Eddie shot him another deathly glare that went unnoticed by the overly helpful teen.

“Well, if it’s okay with Eddie.” You glanced at the grumpy metalhead who gave a reluctant nod without meeting your eyes, his shoulders sagging under the weight of resignation.

You wrote your phone number down on your notepad and tore off a little strip of paper and handed it to Eddie. “Here’s my number. In case you need to call.”

He tucked it into his jacket pocket, not because he ever planned to use it, but because he didn’t want to toss it away right in front of you. That would have been rude.

“Gates open around eight, so we’re leaving town a a little early. Where do you live?” Eddie asked, looking down at the ice cubes floating in his glass. His mouth was suddenly much too dry, but he refused to give in and take a drink. Refused to let you have that little victory.

You told him the address to your apartment building and he nodded in recognition. “Yeah, I know where that is. We’ll be there at six-thirty. Don’t be late.”

After leaving the diner and dropping of the guys, Eddie grumbled to himself the whole drive home, hands clenched on the steering wheel as fumed about the fact that you were going to ruin everything.

Living in a small town meant he didn’t get many chances to see live metal shows and now instead of enjoying himself he was going to be stuck babysitting you, all thanks to Dustin and his big mouth.

Steve Harrington may have had his faults, but the prospect of hanging out with him for a few hours at a concert was much better than the imagined hell of being trapped with you.

Anything would have been better.

Fuck.

The next evening when Eddie pulled up outside your building at six-thirty sharp, he was surprised to see that you were already outside waiting.

You were leaning up against a lamp post looking like a vixen straight out of a heavy metal music video — your bland diner uniform replaced by a pair of frayed cutoff jean shorts, a red bustier and black leather jacket adorned with shiny silver zippers.

When you saw the van approach, you waved and bent down to grab the backpack that was sitting at your feet. As you walked towards them, Eddie couldn’t help but think you looked just like a real life rock n’ roll goddess, all legs and cleavage and blinding smile.

“Holy shit.”

One of the guys in the back let out the exclamation in wonder as they watched you approach the vehicle with their mouths hanging open, and Eddie turned his head over his shoulder to issue a stern warning.

“Shut the fuck up. Not a single word about it.”

Eddie had made the guys all sit in the back, leaving the passenger seat free for you — something that he’d told Dustin was punishment for his blabbermouth the night before. He’d never intended to make you sit in the back, but it helped him get his point across. Not wanting to piss Eddie off any further, the guys heeded his curt command.

The van was silent as you opened the passenger door and climbed inside.

“Hey, guys.” You ignored your cold reception from Eddie and turned to speak to the teens in the back, lifting your eyebrows up and down and giving them a wicked smile. “Ready to have some fun?”

They all grinned and nodded, while tossing worried glances in Eddie’s direction. You noticed how none of them looked directly at you or said a single word.

You scrunched your nose at the strange behaviour of the normally rambunctious group, then turned and fastened your seatbelt as Eddie put the van in gear and headed out onto the road.

The whole drive out of town Eddie was silent as you chatted with the younger guys. He kept an iron grip on the steering wheel while telling himself over and over not to look at you. Told himself not to steal a glance at the way your chest was pushed up in that top or at the smooth skin of your legs revealed in your cutoff shorts.

It was the worst hour and ten minutes of his life.

When you finally arrived at the gate to the venue, he pulled the van into the improvised parking lot that had been cordoned off in the field just to the side of the main road.

“We’re going to have to walk a little ways in to the concert site,” he said turning to you. “Hope you don’t mind a hike.”

“Nope, that’s why I’ve got these puppies.” You pointed to your high top sneakers. “I always dress prepared for an outdoor concert. Cute on top and functional on the bottom.”

He heaved a sigh as he opened his door. The night had barely even begun and he could already tell it was going to be unbearable.

As you walked up the dirt road that lead to the site, the younger guys started to rush ahead and mingle with the different groups of people they recognized from school.

Eddie called out to their retreating backs for them meet him back at the van after the show if they got separated. Gareth gave him a thumbs up before he and the other boys disappeared into the crowd.

So much for the ratio.

“I guess I’ll stick with you, if that’s okay?” you asked and Eddie nodded while looking straight ahead, his heart filled with the hopelessness of despair.

“So you’re a big fan of Dio, huh?” You asked gesturing to the back of his battle vest.

“Yeah.” He nodded, certain you had no idea who that was.

“He’s a better vocalist but I still prefer Ozzy with Sabbath,” you said ever so casually and Eddie had to fight hard to play it cool.

“To some that’s a controversial opinion. Not to me, but to some.”

You hummed in agreement and he let out an impressed chuckle despite himself.

As the two of you walked on, you continued to talk about music and to Eddie’s surprise your taste wasn’t completely horrible. You actually knew a lot more about metal than he’d expected.

“Metallica are my favorite, but I really like Iron Maiden and Accept,” you told him. “There's just something about a guy with a deep, raspy singing voice, you know?”

He nodded, unsure of why hearing you say that made him feel funny.

“Do you still have a band?” you continued. “ You had one back in High School. Corroded Coffin, right?”

He sucked in a harsh breath, trying to reign in his surprise that you knew about his band.

He remembered you from high school, one of the cute and friendly girls who never would have given him the time of day, or so he had assumed.

“Uh yeah, we play at the Hideout every week. You should come see us sometime.”

Instant regret curdled in his stomach as soon as the thoughtless words passed his lips. Why the fuck had he said that?

“We’re not very good or anything, so don’t get your hopes up,” he rushed to add as you giggled at his modesty.

You looked over at him with a playful grin. “I’d like to see you play. Sounds like fun.”

He breathed a deep sigh of relief even though he knew you were just being nice.

You were nice.

When you reached the concert site at the top of the hill, the field was already swarming with people. After you went through the gate and before you headed into the thick of the crowd, Eddie turned to you and held out his hand.

“Hold onto me okay? So you don’t get lost.”

You held on tight as he led you towards the front of the crowd, weaving through the writhing sea of bodies until you got to a spot to the side with a good view of the stage.

As Eddie looked around to get his bearings, he realized that he was still holding onto your hand and quickly dropped it, shoving his into the safety of his jacket pocket.

Dusk was just starting to settle on the horizon and the smell of weed and cheap beer permeated the noisy crowd.

The roadies were on stage doing a final tune up when you pulled out a joint that you’d concealed in your top, one place that the guy at the gate had the decency not to search. You held it up and your lips curled into a grin. “Care for some refreshments?”

Eddie smiled despite himself as you placed the joint between your lips. He pulled out his lighter and lit the end as you inhaled deeply. Then he watched as you exhaled a perfect smoke ring up toward the darkening sky before passing him the joint.

“Just hold it like a cigarette and no one will notice,” you instructed.

Maybe you weren’t as terrible as he’d thought.

The first act was a Metallica cover band and when you heard the opening notes of Master of Puppets you bounced up and down, then turned and grabbed onto his arm. His cock twitched when he felt your nails dig into the leather.

“I love this song!”

He gave you a knowing grin, resisting the urge to tell you that he could play the whole song from memory. Maybe someday he’d surprise you and play it for you.

He let his mind wander for just a second and thought about what it would be like to play for you in his room, with you sitting on his bed looking up at him the same way you were looking at the musicians on the stage.

It was strange how easily he could picture it.

“They’re fucking amazing,” you yelled over the noise and he smiled, bobbing his head along to the music. Glancing over every once and while during the show to watch the radiant joy on your face.

Fucking amazing.

A few hours later when the show was over, you both trudged back to the van, staying close as you moved through the throngs of people heading down the path from site, still high on the excitement of the show.

Seemingly out of nowhere an inebriated guy with a shaved head came tumbling through the crowd behind you and snaked his arm around your waist, pulling you back against his chest. You looked over at Eddie with a helpless expression as you struggled to wriggle free of his grasp, jamming your elbow into his side to no avail.

“What’s your name sweet thing?” You registered the scent of stale beer on his breath as it fanned over the side of your face.

“Hey, asshole! Get your hands off my fucking girl.”

Eddie’s eyes were alight with a fire you’d never seen before, his jaw set in determination as he gripped the man’s collar and shoved him backwards away from you, nearly knocking him off his feet.

The man chuckled as he backed off and threw his hands up in surrender. “Sorry, man. Thought the little lady was alone.”

Eddie moved to push him again, but you stopped him with a hand pressed to his chest and the drunk guy wandered off, patting Eddie on the shoulder with a chuckle as he passed.

“Good for you, man.”

Eddie watched him walk away with an indecipherable expression on his face before he quickly turned to you.

“Are you okay?” he asked, adrenaline still pumping through his veins. The sight of that guy grabbing you had made him feel out of control, his whole body wired like a coil under pressure.

“Yeah.” You sounded a little shook up, but you gave him a grateful smile. “Thanks. It’s not easy at these shows sometimes…too much macho energy, you know?”

He nodded, ashamed that you had to deal with bullshit like that just to enjoy live music.

The rest of the way back to the van you kept close to each other, your shoulders nearly touching as you walked.

When you got back to the parking lot the others still hadn’t arrived, so you waited outside the van together. Eddie had a smoke and you drank some water from the thermos you’d left in your bag.

“Want a drink?” You offered, and he gratefully accepted, taking a long swig and sighing with relief. He hadn’t realized how thirsty he was.

“Thanks, I needed that.” He handed it back to you.

You nodded as you took it from him and twisted on the cover. “Well, I kind of owe you for helping me out back there.”

He looked at your face lit only by moonlight, your eyes so soft and sweet. The way you were looking at him made him start to feel a little dizzy.

“Anytime.” His gaze lowered to the ground and he kicked at the dirt with the toe of his sneaker, unsure of why it was suddenly so hard to look at you.

“It’s funny because nobody who knows you would ever believe it, would they?”

“Huh?” He glanced up with a furrowed brow, not quite following your line of reasoning.

“That I was your girl.” You leaned back against the van, speaking with such carefree ease that your words caught him off guard. “I know you think I’m annoying. You don’t hide it very well.”

Underneath the breezy delivery Eddie detected a note of something else. Was it hurt? Fuck.

Fuck.

“I’m not—I don’t think that.” He moved a little closer, as if decreasing distance between you could somehow bridge the dejection in your voice. He caught a whiff of your perfume, a scent that had haunted him for so long but that he hated a little less in the moment.

“You don’t?” You sounded surprised.

He leaned in close enough that his battle vest brushed against your chest and you straightened up slightly, your breath coming out a bit faster as your back pressed against the cool exterior of the van.

“No.” His tongue darted out to wet his bottom lip while his eyes dipped to your mouth. “I actually really—”

Before he could say anything else your head turned toward the sudden flurry of activity over his shoulder as the younger guys arrived back at the van.

“Holy shit! That was crazy, right?” Dustin slapped Eddie on the back, his voice still at top volume due to the ringing in his ears.

Eddie stepped back and in an instant the moment between the two of you was broken, shattered like the glass that shone on the surface of the parking lot.

You gave Eddie a wry grin before you turned to walk around the van, then opened the passenger door and got inside.

During the ride home in the dark you were quiet, eventually lulled to sleep by the gentle motion of the van. Eddie glanced over at you and saw that you had kicked off your muddy sneakers and curled your bare feet underneath you.

He turned down the radio and told the guys in the back to keep it quiet.

About twenty minutes outside town he stopped for gas and before he got back in the van, he took off his battle vest and gently laid it over you.

When he got back to Hawkins, he took the guys home first, making the longer trek through town to drop them off and then circled back to your place.

When he pulled up outside your building he lifted his battle vest and shook your arm to wake you, stirring you from a dream that faded as soon as you opened your eyes.

“Oh, we’re already here?” you asked fuzzily, looking around the empty van as you realized you’d slept the whole way home. “Sorry, the weed must have really knocked me out.”

He chuckled softly and told you that you had no reason to be sorry.

You slid your sneakers back on and grabbed your bag, then reached out to open the door. But you hesitated, your fingers flexing on the metal handle.

“This was really fun. Thanks for letting me tag along,” you said and he nodded, unable to find the right words to fit the moment.

You paused a little longer and he kept his eyes locked on your hand that still rested on the handle. He held his breath.

“I know it’s late, but would you like to come in? I have some beer,” you offered hopefully.

He quickly shook his head and frowned. “Nah, I’m good.”

Eddie wasn’t sure why he said what he said. He wanted to go inside with you. He’d never wanted anything so badly in all his life.

You looked a little embarrassed and he knew that he should say something to explain why he couldn’t stay. A little white lie to soothe the crinkle in your brow.

Instead he just sat there as you opened the door. You gave him a weak smile. “Ok, then. I guess I’ll see you around.”

He watched you walk inside your building, regret exploding like fireworks in his chest. You never looked back, but he waited until you were safely inside the front door before he started up the van.

He turned the stereo back up. Iron Maiden to soothe his nerves.

Then he drove out onto the street and headed towards home. He only made it a few blocks from your place before he pulled the van over to the curb and slammed on the brakes.

He dug around in his jacket pocket until he found the slip of paper that you’d given him the night before.

He turned it over in his hands, wondering how long it would take to find the nearest payphone. There was no way you’d already be asleep. It had only been a few minutes since he dropped you off.

He almost gave in to the urge to call you before self-doubt settled in like a heavy fog, clouding his thoughts and convincing him that you’d only asked him to be polite. You didn’t like him in that way. A girl like you was an impossible dream and he needed to wake up.

He shoved your number back into his pocket and pulled the van away from the curb. Heading towards home and away from the thing he really wanted.

For an entire week Eddie was tormented by that little piece of paper. He spent hours tracing your number with his fingertips and wondering if he should call.

He picked up the phone a few times and got close to dialing, but could never bring himself to go through with it. He felt like a nervous teenager at the prospect of talking to you.

It was ridiculous.

When Friday night finally rolled around and the Hellfire Club headed into the diner, Eddie had a pep in his step and felt lighter as he headed through the door. He wouldn’t have admitted it to any of the guys but he was excited to see you.

You approached their table with your usual smile, but when it came time to ask for everyone’s order, you skipped over Eddie before tucking your notepad away.

“I won’t bother you guys with the specials tonight.”

When you brought out everyone’s food, Eddie waited for your little water routine, but it never happened.

He cleared his throat as you turned to walk away and you paused, an eyebrow arched.

“Is there something else?”

He stared back at you with wide brown eyes, unsure of what to say. That he wanted you to tease him? That he wanted your attention? When he saw the slight annoyance on your face he shook his head and you walked away.

Well, that hadn’t gone as well as he’d expected.

As the guys enjoyed their food while loudly recounting the night’s campaign, Eddie was only half-listening, distracted by a sickly feeling that crept up his spine and settled in his chest. He wasn’t sure why he felt so strange. He’d finally gotten what he’d always wanted— to be left alone. For you to stop your little cheerful charade. But for some reason, it didn’t feel right.

When it came time for the bills, you handed them out to the other guys, once again avoiding Eddie’s heavy gaze.

“See you next week,” you said sweetly as you walked away.

Once outside, the guys all piled into the van, stomachs full and ready to head home for the night. Eddie sat there for a minute with his hands braced on the steering wheel, staring up at the moving shadows in restaurant’s window.

He turned his head over his shoulder and told the guys he had to run back inside for a second. Mumbled out barely coherent words about how he’d forgotten something as he slammed the driver’s side door.

When Eddie walked inside, you were still busy wiping down their table. You looked up in surprise, confusion written all over your face.

“Why are you here?”

Eddie walked up to where you stood, close enough that the denim of his vest almost touched your name tag. “I don’t think you’re annoying. That night after the concert, I just…I wanted to come in. I don’t know why I didn’t.”

Your eyes grew wide but you didn’t say anything, so he kept talking to fill the silence. “I’m sure you hate me right now, but I don’t think I can live with that.”

He reached out to cup your cheek, and you didn’t flinch or turn away.

Instead, you smiled. “I don’t hate you, Eddie.”

He leaned in closer, lowering his voice as he brought his lips next to your ear so that the old men at the counter couldn’t overhear him, his warm breath raising goosebumps on the bare skin of your arms.

“Let me make it up to you. Tonight. I’ll do anything you want.”

A warm light rekindled in your eyes as you nodded. “I get off at ten.”

When Eddie followed you into your apartment his first impression was that it was cozy, with walls and shelves filled with a hodgepodge of plants and posters and art. Your home was colorful and unique, in a way that reminded him of you. Even your mismatched furniture seemed to fit together perfectly.

“I’m just going to go change out of this.” You gestured to your uniform. “Help yourself to the beer in the fridge.”

So he did. As he closed the refrigerator door, a small tabby cat came and rubbed up against his leg.

“I see you’ve met Stevie.” You giggled when you saw him holding your kitten and scratching a finger under her chin as she purred up a storm. She was such a flirt. You smiled as you watched them, radiant in just your cotton t-shirt and old sweatpants. Seeing you dressed so casual felt strangely domestic to Eddie. In a good way.

He followed you into your living room where he saw your impressive collection of records. He slipped one out of its jacket and put it on the turntable. “This one really wails.”

As you sat close together on your couch, your beers were soon forgotten as Eddie told you a little about his past, and how he’d ended up living with his uncle. You told him about how you’d left Hawkins for college right after high school, but how that didn’t quite work out. That you weren’t sure what you wanted to do with your life.

He finally had to ask the question that had been on his mind for days.

“The other night you said you remembered Corroded Coffin from high school. How?”

You shyly admitted that you’d had a bit of a crush on him back then, but he didn’t believe you.

“Nah,” he scoffed, looking anywhere but your eyes.

“Hmm, I did.” You nodded. “I thought you were really cool.”

He gave you a bashful smile, blatantly ignoring your use of past tense. “Why didn’t you say anything?”

You shrugged. “I don’t know. You were older and in a band. You had long hair and you were so….out there. I figured you wouldn’t give someone like me the time of day.”

In that moment Eddie wished he could find a time machine and do it all again. He wondered how different his life would have turned out if he’d had that knowledge.

Then he thought of how he’d treated you when you started working at the diner. Knowing what he did, it made him feel even worse.

“Do you think you’ll stay in Hawkins?” he asked in what he hoped was a casual voice.

You shrugged. “I don’t know. I haven’t decided yet.”

“I know someone who really hopes you do,” he said softly, his eyes impossibly big and brown.

You bit your bottom lip and moved ever so slightly closer on the couch. “Yeah?”

He nodded, his eyes glued to your lips. “Uh huh. Dustin’s a really big fan.”

He let out a wild, throaty laugh when you playfully slapped his arm. He grabbed your hand to stop you and leaned forward, impulsively pressing his lips to yours and then pulled back after a few seconds to give you a searching look.

“Sorry. Was that okay?”

When you nodded, he kissed you again, deeper than before, his large hand gripping the back of your neck to pull you close.

“I want to make you feel good. Can I do that?” he whispered in your ear, and you stood up and wordlessly led him by the hand to your bedroom.

And he kept good on his promise, pushing you down onto your bed, his warm body over yours like a missing piece finally falling into place.

He worshipped every inch of your body using his skilled hands and his mouth, taking his time to pull each pretty sigh from between your lips.

When he finally pushed inside you, to him, it felt like the very first time. All of his past forgotten, like nothing had existed before you.

He’d been given a second chance to make things right and he wasn’t going to waste it. He was done running from what he wanted. Was finished running away from you.

He murmured soft words of praise as his hips rolled over and over into yours, your nails running down his back, sighing with every deep thrust. You felt so good around him and the way you cried out his name was like music to his ears. Like a song written just for him.

Afterwards as you lay there wrapped together in the pale light streaming through your window, he looked over at you with heavy, half-lidded eyes and smiled.

He knew in that moment that he’d do anything he could to keep you by his side — promise you the moon and the stars if you’d say you’d be his girl.

Thank you for reading! 🖤

Eddie Taglist 🏷️: @madelynraemunson @mrsjellymunson @hippiegoth97 @princesssunderworld @kellsck @hiimjulie @theold-ultraviolence

dividers by @/saradika-graphics

Liar, Liar

Boyfriend!Eddie Munson x Reader

Summary: Eddie is the type to lie about how you two met just for fun.

Word Count: 1.8K

Warnings: 18+ mdni, Eddie's a silly goose, mentions of a Christian missionary trip but reader can be any religion because I think it’s even funnier if reader is like Muslim or something and Eddie’s trying to say you two met on a Christian mission trip, Eddie’s a liar for fun lol, one use of Y/N, Wayne is the best uncle, talk of dildos, sex shops, sex talk, circumcision mention, I think that's it, oh yeah and Eddie's middle name is Jeanette-ask me more about that if you're brave enough.

A/N: quickly written so forgive any mistakes pls. Half-baked concept turned into a half-baked drabble dressed as a oneshot. Below is the song I reference in this piece.

Masterlist

Eddie loves to lie about how you two met just for fun. He comes up with a different story for every person who asks, so nobody truly knows how you guys really met. 

It doesn’t matter who he’s talking to—he’s going to lie. The elderly woman with the bright pink hair waiting your table at the diner makes the mistake of asking. She notices you and Eddie sharing the milkshake you ordered and can’t help the coo that leaves her overlined lips. “Aw, you two are so cute! How’d you kids meet? School?”

Failing to restrain your deep sigh, you know what she just triggered. Eddie excitedly sits up in the booth, a wide grin stretched across his face. You poke your straw around the large milkshake glass, giving yourself something to do so you don’t feel like an accomplice in his lies. 

“No, actually. Funny story,” he reaches across the table, trapping your hand in a vice grip that would look like sweet affection to anybody else, “we met on a mission trip in the Amazon Rainforest." He pauses to look at you wistfully, completely undeterred by your refusal to meet his eyes. "Yeah, we fell in love trying to turn Green Iguanas toward Christianity—those dirty sinners.” 

The smile never leaves his face as your poor waitress’s smile turns downward, a befuddled frown taking its place. Unfortunately—and sometimes very fortunately—Eddie is a motormouth, so he continues. You’re looking anywhere but at the confused woman or your lying boyfriend.

“I always say, truly nothing brings young adults together like the Lord and reptiles.” He lifts his free, ringed hand up in a praising manner.

The sight of your boyfriend 'praising the Lord' has you fighting not to snort out loud. Yeah, Eddie ‘The Freak’ Munson—looking like that—met you on a mission trip for Christianity. He’s never even left Hawkins. 

The waitress titters, backing away from the table, “Yes, well–” 

She doesn’t even bother to make up an excuse, instead, she promptly turns around, leaving you two alone. Eddie shrugs, letting your hand go, resuming his theft of your fries. Shaking your head, you suck your teeth as you look at his scavenging.

“Eddie, why’d you do that?”

Your boyfriend looks at you with wide, innocent eyes. “Do what? She asked,” he shrugs dismissively. 

-

It doesn’t matter if it’s a stranger asking or friends—he’s going to lie. When Gareth and Jeff finally asked, about a year into your relationship, you knew it was a bad move.

“So how did you guys meet? I don’t think we ever got the story. You just always mentioned you were talking to ‘this girl’ and then boom, you had a girlfriend,” Gareth comments.

Jeff adds, looking at you, “Yeah, it’s not like there’s many people in Hawkins we don’t know, and we never saw you before Eddie brought you in.”

Opening your mouth to respond, Eddie beats you to it. “We crossed paths at a sex shop outside of town,” he starts, voice raising like he’s telling a tale as old as time. Knowing exactly what this is, you sigh and press your lips into a thin line.

Gareth and Jeff’s eyebrows are practically to their hairline at Eddie’s admission. They’re looking to you to corroborate as your boyfriend continues, you begrudgingly nod. 

“She was reaching for the double sided twelve incher, so was I…We couldn’t help but chuckle as our fingers brushed.” He’s reminiscing fondly like he’s retelling a meet-cute from a Hallmark movie and not the monstrosity he’s cooked up in that awful head of his. “And boys,” he pauses, watching the two guys lean forward in disbelief, “that night, we decided to share it.”

“Jesus Christ,” you mutter under your breath, rubbing a frustrated hand down your face. 

Gareth shakes his head, “Nuh unh, no way, dude.”

“Yeah, you’re so bullshitting us, you dick,” Jeff argues.

Eddie blanches at their reactions—playing up his indignation. An offended hand rests over his heart, jaw dropped as he looks at his two closest friends. “Bullshitting you? Me? I would never! I resent that accusation!” 

Gareth scoffs, “Oh yeah? Well if it’s true, then Y/N will tell us.”

All eyes land on you, causing another deep sigh to escape your lips—one that only comes with dating Edward Jeanette Munson. You lazily swing your head to meet Eddie’s imploring eyes, pursing your lips as you look back to his friends. With a deadpan expression and a monotone voice, you corroborate his story. “Yes, that night we both partook in the pleasures of a double sided dildo.” 

Curling your lips in frustration, you try not to roll your eyes at Eddie’s ‘ahem.’ Taking his cue, you finish robotically, “Lady and the Tramp style.” 

Gareth and Jeff groan, upset that they had to hear that and even more upset that you supported his obvious lie. 

“She said it, not me!”

-

Sometimes, Eddie doesn’t even bother to make things up—he’ll just plagiarize other stories. When Wayne finally asked how you two met, you were eager to see what bullshit he’d make up. Surely his uncle, of all people, isn’t going to believe him…

“Well, she was coming to the Catskills with her family, I was the dance teacher. Everybody called her ‘Baby’ that summer and she couldn’t find it in herself to care.” 

Wayne shoots you a look that says, ‘Are we believing this shit?’ You only shrug, rolling your eyes in response—it’s best to let Eddie finish. He’s like a wind-up toy, once he starts, he has to finish or he'll never shut up. 

“Now, here’s where it gets good—she had no interest in the art of dance. But when tragedy struck, and my partner fell ill with an unsuspecting pregnancy, she decided to step in.” He’s really amping up the drama for this lie, spinning a detailed yarn like he would when DM’ing. 

Watching Wayne shake his head, you finally step in. “Eddie, that’s the plot of Dirty Dancing.

Your boyfriend has the gall to look affronted at your comment, a hand over his heart in offense—his classic move. “I don’t know what movie you speak of, but if there was some kind of ‘film,’” he mocks, “that resembles our love story, then I think I’m going to have to lawyer up.” 

Wayne speaks up, “Ed, I’ve got a couple notes.”

“Yeah, shoot.”

“First of all, you know damn well you’re too poor for the Catskills. You ain’t even got enough money for the ‘Dogskills’–”

You snort at the crack and the way Wayne is going in on his nephew. Eddie shoots you a frown, muttering out a quiet, “Okay, well that was unnecessary.”

“Second of all, your story telling could use a bit o’ work. It’s–what’s that fancy word you say, hon?” 

Perking up at his question, you supply the word with a smirk, “Derivative.” 

“Yeah, that,” his uncle motions to you before looking back at your boyfriend. “You’d think six years o’ high school and that little game you play would teach you how to create an unpredictable endin’.”

Eddie scoffs at the insult, grumbling out a bitter, “I hate when you two gang up on me.”

Wayne stands from his place on the couch, pulling you up as well. A weathered arm around your waist and a rough hand in yours, he dances you around the room. “Yeah, well if you weren’t so stupid sometimes, we wouldn’t have to. Oh, won’t you stay just a little bit longer.” 

You giggle at Wayne’s attempt at a shrill voice, mocking Maurice Williams and the Zodiacs’ song from the soundtrack of Dirty Dancing. 

Eddie wishes he could be mad, but he can’t stop the grin spreading across his face as he watches his best girl and his uncle haphazardly dance around the cramped living room. 

-

When he tells Steve, he picks another movie—and he gives up on making it realistic. 

“Well, we met when I helped rescue her from this floating ship called the ‘Death Star.’ It was this whole thing—I ended up kissing her cause I was jealous of her relationship with Han–” he pauses, frozen at the slip of the very notable name, “–sel, Hansel, her German friend.” 

You chuckle at his shitty save and the unimpressed look on Steve’s face, but you both let him keep going. 

“And you know, I just told her I couldn’t contain my feelings any longer,” he shrugs, looking at the dead eyes you and Steve give him. 

Deciding to goad him, Steve asks, feigning interest, “And then what happened?”

Eddie looks up as if thinking before shrugging again with pursed lips. “Well, here we are. Been together ever since.” 

Smiling at the obvious details he’s leaving out, you meet Steve’s light eyes. “You didn’t…” shaking his head as if thinking of what to say, Steve continues probing, “I don’t know, find out any relationship-altering details?” 

“Nope! Not that I can think of,” Eddie answers plainly. 

Steve continues pushing with barely contained amusement at Eddie’s incessant denial. “You didn’t…compare family trees?”

Throwing the man a chiding look, Eddie shakes his head. “Steve, I think you’re thinking of Luke and Leia from Star Wars. That’s not us,” he motions between you and him. “That’s a movie,” he sounds out the word like Steve is stupid, clearly ruffling some feathers. “It’s not real.”

-

When Eddie tells Robin your relationship origin story, Steve happens to be there too—so he picks a different movie. 

“As you know, I’m originally from the other side of the tracks,” so far so good, “and she was a rich, mysterious woman I found utterly appealing despite my obvious chemistry with Steve—who I’ve fondly nicknamed Ducky.” Annnnd he’s lost you. 

Robin listens with a raised brow and an amused smile. You watch with a smirk as Steve shakes his head, unamused at being roped into the lie—you can’t help but feel validated after being the sole accomplice for so long. 

“Then she asked me out,” Eddie continues, gesturing to you, “It seemed almost too good to be true, then I started realizing there were some big differences in our economic and social class tendencies.”

Snorting, Robin stops his story. “Eddie, that’s literally the movie Pretty in Pink. Also, you made yourself the girl character. You could’ve chosen to be ‘suave Andrew McCarthy,’ and you chose to be a girl.” 

Indignant, Eddie holds up a correcting finger, “Okay, first of all, that’s not what I’m talking about. But if I were to choose that movie, I would totally be Andy because she’s sick as fuck, takes no bullshit, and wears cool clothes.” 

-

Bonus:

“We actually met in front of the Indiana State Capitol protesting circumcisions. She was holding a sign that said, ‘Save Our Foreskin,’ and I was like, ‘Hey, baby, you wanna see mine?’”

“And that worked?” 

“No, actually. She did move forward with getting a restraining order against me. But once the seventy days were up, I went to her house on a court mandated apology and we just got to talking about music and found that we had a lot in common.”

Tag List: @defututus @ratsematary @american-idiot-jpg @glassbxttless @justalotoffanfiction @savybabyyy @thepinkpanther83 @sorayasworld @slaytheusurper @dangerousnbeautiful @hellmastereddie @ali-r3n @lilithera0 @tlclick73 @joonbread @jesterghuleh @bellalillyrose @bigboymoozz @am0iur @pastelpoppies @lionkingshiddenmessage @girlwedontcare

a real piece of art

e.m x reader, 2.8k

summary: eddie has some time to kill, and you might just be his new favourite distration. includes: art history student!reader, meet cute, eddie's an absolute dork warnings: mentions of nudity in artwork and allusions to a young eddie who is very excited by the prospect.

a/n: this came to me as i stared blankly into the void of my coffee machine this morning. i'm incapable of proofreading as per usual. i could be convinced to do a part two

Eddie had no business being here. This was an art gallery for crying out loud! He couldn’t remember the last time he’d stepped in one, save that one unfortunate field trip in middle school where he’d been caught ogling a half naked sculpture in front of half the class. Sue him, he’d never seen a naked girl before, and he really had to give credit to the artist because he couldn’t look away. He’d been called a perv for a good year after that, and he’d never thought to visit another gallery again. 

Until now, that was. He was due for a practice and soundcheck in what he thought was only an hour, but somewhere along the line Jeff had got the time wrong, leaving Eddie stuck in Chicago with nothing but his ego to keep him company. Eddie had kicked himself for the mistake – who rehearses at 10 am anyways? There was a silent agreement that Gareth would be handling the bookings next time, where Eddie might be able to actually stay in bed until a reasonable hour. 

He’d thought to burrow down in a cafe for a little while, but the snooty businessmen and shrill giggles of the barista had sent him fleeing. The environment wasn’t conducive to good thinking anyways. He figured a little solace would do him some good, maybe give him some hard earned inspiration to turn into music for the band. So with coffee in hand, he’d taken to the streets, wandering idly as the strings of bodies moved in tandem, dodging and weaving the tracks of Tuesday morning commutes. It might have been enough for him had his jacket not been too thin for the sudden drop in temperature. Worn denim with steamed patches was hardly enough to break the piercing gusts of wind, and even his sweltering coffee in hand could not keep his hands from shaking. Looking around, Eddie felt out of luck. Cafe’s seemed too busy, and he had no real desire to start wandering shops nearby, so what was there left to do? 

$14 later, Eddie puffed a relieved sigh as the warmth of the gallery enveloped him, that trembling cold slowly dissipating from his veins until his hands no longer felt like ice. He figured he’d have taken any sanctuary, though he had been hoping maybe for a Library. At least then he could have bunkered down somewhere with a book. What did you even do at a gallery anyways?  He didn’t see much point in wandering around, scanning his eyes over paintings that seemed a million years old. He didn’t get art. Music was his art, after all. Even as he started to walk, all the pieces seemed to bleed together for him. Acrylics and oils and gouache melted into the blur of faces and places and things. Sure, they looked pretty, but Eddie couldn’t see why anyone would waste their time to sit and paint something like this, let alone stare at it for hours. 

He passed through room after room like this, brows furrowed, arms crossed as he tried to puzzle out the meaning. Music and melody had meaning, lyrics filled with the words people couldn’t seem to say any other way. The sounds of instruments were sounds of heartbeats, of head rushes and blood flow and heart aches and burning desires – paintings couldn’t do that, could they? 

Wandering into a smaller room, Eddie found himself caught as his eyes fixated on perhaps the only worthwhile piece of art he had seen all morning. There you were, perched somewhat uncomfortably on the plush leather seat in the room's centre, head resting delicately into cupped palms, your elbows propping you up into a figure he was sure was only meant for statues. You looked like one of the Greek ones, he thought, all soft and graceful curves, pretty lines and prettier expressions. There was a notebook in your lap, though Eddie couldn’t begin to make out what the blurry pen strokes might have  noted at this distance. 

You seemed so lost in thought as you stared at the piece directly before you, eyebrows knitted in concentration to match the deep set focus of your eyes, and Eddie, despite himself, was lost in you. 

It was a horrifying notion to realise he was back in this same situation again, entirely different and yet all the same. Here he was, stuck motionless, staring helplessly at something beautiful, something entirely foreign to him. Naked breasts had been enough to melt a twelve year old Eddie’s mind, but this Eddie, now grown, was entirely transfixed for another reason. Never in his life had just looking at a person knocked the wind right out of him. This was beyond attraction, he thought. Beyond a pretty face and a beautiful body and all those hormones that made people spin. You were all of that, and so much more. 

How he knew that seemed entirely out of reach, but the thought settled in him all the same. 

Eddie watched the subtle angle of your head, the way you tried to see from a different perspective, before fixating your attention on your notebook once more, scribbling away furiously at stained parchment. 

All better judgement seemed to leave him as he approached, slow and long strides to avoid the echoes of boots against floorboards in such vastness. His body took residence beside the lounge, standing tall at the opposite end, arms crossing as he tried to see what it was that had you so fascinated. 

Cheese. Bread. Nuts of some kind. He tilted his head as you had, browns furrowing in confusion. Still cheese. Still bread. Still nuts of some kind. He let out a defeated huff. 

“Are you okay?” 

He hadn’t expected you to speak, let alone notice him, but when he turned his chin towards you he was met with a curious expression. You were even more captivating up close, as it turned out, so much so that he could not decide what captured his attention more. The soft bags of sleepless nights hung low under your eyes, your cheeks flushed with a dusty sort of colour that only the artifice of candies could achieve, your cheeks indented so delicately with the lines of so many smiles that had come before. 

It was embarrassing in his eyes that he was still gawking, and even more embarrassing that you had to ask your question a second time. 

“Oh– yeah. I mean… yeah. Sorry. Was I being too loud?” 

The soft shake of your head was accompanied by an even gentler smile, and Eddie felt his shoulders ease a fraction away from his ears. 

“No, not at all. Just seemed like a forlorn sigh.” You pointed out, uncrossing your legs to lower your feet to the ground. 

Eddie’s brow raised, his tone lilting with amusement. “Forlorn, huh?” 

You shrugged, though Eddie could see the slow creep of embarrassment flush your cheeks, your hand lifting to rub at it absentmindedly. “Yeah, I guess. It was just the first word that came to mind.” 

Eddie was smiling before he knew what he was doing. “I like it. Forlorn. Like it’s from a poem, or something.” 

A soft hum of contemplation fell from your lips, your pen scratching nervously in the margins of your notebook, patterns of stars falling into the sea of words below. “Could be. Poets are meant to be all crestfallen and stuff.” 

He actually laughed at that, something sounding like a punched out breath leaving him, his eyes crinkling delightfully at the corners. 

“Are you a writer or somethin’? You don’t just hear people saying words like that every day. Gotta know them by trade.” 

You shrugged again, tucking a loose strand of hair behind the curve of your ear. “Student, actually. Art history, so I guess fancy words are part of the curriculum.” 

It seemed strange to be meeting you like this, like someone high above had heard his complaints only to send him an angel to set him straight. An art student; maybe you could teach him a thing or two. 

Eddie gestured to the seat beside you, flat palm dampened nervously at the prospect of speaking to someone so pretty, so much more learned than him. You nodded shyly, not bothering to adjust as he took up the empty space beside you, his elbows propping on his knees for comfort. 

“Can I ask you something, then? Since all of this is your thing.” 

You closed your notebook, folding your legs beneath you once more as you fixated your attention on him – something Eddie was sure no man could ever tire of wanting from you. “Sure”. 

“Why are you staring at this one? Out of all the pictures in this place, what makes cheese so interesting.” 

The astonished little chuckle that left you was something sacred, golden and warm and louder than he had anticipated. You could put that laugh to song. Maybe he would. 

“It’s not the cheese,’ You clarify, your smile never shifting from your lips, “though it looks great, doesn’t it? Looks real.” 

Eddie took in the piece once more, letting his eyes trace over the food to take in the finer details. It was true; it looked real. He could see the shadows, the cracks in the bread, the crumbs that had fallen onto the platter below. He realised it mustn’t have been easy to make something so real. It felt like a snapshot. 

Oh fuck, do I get art now? 

“Yeah, it looks real. Kinda crazy real, actually. How do they get it looking like that?” 

“It’s different for different people. This one’s by Peeters, and no one’s sure where she learned to paint, but she was one of the only female professionally working artists of the 17th century. She was a big deal.” 

Eddie tilted his head towards you. “Is that why you like her, then?” 

You shook your head, scrunching up your nose. “It’s very impressive, but it’s not the only reason. I was looking for her signature.” 

Eddie did not need to clarify himself, the confusion that etched across his face spoke volumes, leaving you to laugh again in amusement. 

“A lot of artists leave signatures so you know a work is theirs. Sometimes it’s their name, or an item, or a seal – sometimes it’s on the back, sometimes it’s made to look part of the picture. She writes her name down at the bottom, see?” 

You leaned in a little closer to Eddie, lining up his gaze with your own so you could point out a flourish of cursive in the corner. Drawn into you, Eddie could not help but lean into your orbit, his eyes following the line of your finger to its destination. “Oh yeah. Musician’s do that too, y’know. Chuck in a riff or a line or something to leave their mark.” 

“Seems like it’s an artist's thing. I think it’s pretty cool.” 

Eddie liked the insinuation that musicians were artists. He’d met too many people in his life who’d thought otherwise, who did not understand the value of art. He supposed he was one of them, though. He’d been ratting on the art around him only five minutes earlier. 

“You like music, then?” He asked, eagerness in his voice betraying the cool persona he was hoping to achieve. 

“I love music.” You confirmed, hands busily occupying themselves by twiddling the pen in your lap once more. “I wish they played music here. Imagine looking at all the art and listening to songs that fit. There’s these big dramatic paintings a few rooms over that are just begging for a rock instrumental to accompany it, and the cheese…” you trailed off, seemingly embarrassed to have been so caught up in the idea. “I feel like I'd be lost in it forever.” 

Eddie closed his eyes for the briefest moment, letting the vision of your little dream settle in his mind. He could get around that, art and music together – two worlds colliding. It seemed all the more enticing to think you would be there too, humming away as you watched the paintings and he watched you. 

“I think it sounds brilliant. You tell me when you’re building this fancy gallery and I’ll be the first one there.” 

He might have died at the sincerity with which you smiled. No heart was meant to withstand such adoration brimming inside of it. 

“You know, I–” you paused, garnering some courage to find the words, “the signature I was talking about before? That wasn’t the one that had me looking at this. The cheese, I mean.” You gestured vaguely towards the canvas before you, though Eddie was unwilling to peel his eyes from the work of art before him. 

“Yeah? What had you looking, then?” He couldn’t believe that for the first time in his life, Eddie actually cared about what was splayed across a canvas. Whatever it was that intrigued you so, he was aching to know. 

“She painted herself in the reflection of the lid on the jug. Up the top… see?” Adjusting the items in your lap, you slowly rose to your feet, extending a hand out to drag the boy up with you. Eddie faltered only for a second, contemplating whether this one single touch would make or break him. Would the sweat of his palms disgust you? He was so nervous to talk to you, after all, to take this chance. He swallowed, slipping calloused fingers into your own until he felt unperturbed digits grasp his own, your expression unphased as you guided him towards the wall. 

You both paused a foot short, your free hand pointing upwards to guide his flittering eyes. Lo and behold, painted so delicately into the reflection of the jug, was a face staring back at him. His hand squeezed your own with untapped excitement, and Eddie’s mouth dropped. 

“Holy shit, that’s so cool. That’s really her?” 

You nodded, squeezing his hand back. “Yeah, that’s Clara.”

It was silent for a beat, the two of you soaking in the image before you; the woman in and amongst all the pieces of a life lived so long ago. It was a moment in history, much like the one the two of you were caught in now. 

Eddie marvelled helplessly, unsure what seemed to amaze him more; all these details that he never would have noticed if it weren’t for you, or the fact that you, a complete stranger, were still holding on to his hand as if it were something normal. For the briefest moment, he wondered if this could be normal, you and him. 

“I think this is the ultimate signature in a painting, just writing yourself into the story like that. It’s such a small thing, but… it changes everything, doesn’t it?” You broke the silence, voice a little dream like as you spoke. Eddie could only nod dumbly, a contented smile spreading across his face. 

“You wouldn’t wanna show me more of these, would you?” 

Eddie couldn’t stand the idea that you might walk away after this, back to your own life that until now had been so far away from his own. He wanted to walk the whole gallery with you, your hand in his, your voice whispering sweet nothings about the history and details of the world around you. 

The sheer excitement that crossed your features was an expression unmatched, never before seen. It was like he had asked you the one question you had been waiting for your whole life. Maybe you had been. Maybe no one had ever taken interest in the thing you seemed to love so much. He knew what that was like after all, his music had not been everyone's cup of tea. 

Maybe it could be yours.

“Oh, I– really?” 

“Only if you want to. I spent my whole time here trying to work out what made this stuff so special; I think you might be the one to show me. I’ll buy you coffee as thanks, if you like. I mean… I’d like to take you out for coffee.” 

He felt like a bumbling idiot, pausing to breathe an embarrassed chuckle. “You can also tell me to get lost at any time.” 

Eddie wasn’t sure if you noticed the way your hand seemed to tighten in his own, the movement causing his heart to beat in unsteady rhythms. It was something so small that seemed to shift his entire world – your hand holding his. 

Your head tilted with a smile. “You never said your name, y’know.” 

“Eddie.” He breathed out a little too fast. He’d have to kick himself later for it, because right now, he was too fixated on the way his foolishness seemed to make you smile all the wider. 

“Eddie.” You echoed, turning your body to face his own. “I’d love a coffee.” 

It took everything in him not to fist bump in triumph, his body aching to wriggle with the excitement that was slowly taking over muscle by muscle. How the hell had his morning turned out this good? 

“Sounds like a date, then.”

(images not mine)

“Still Life with Cheeses, Almonds and Pretzels” by Clara Peeters (ca. 1615)

charmed

e. munson x reader, 3k

summary: eddie comes home from a long day at work to discover wayne has a pretty surprise for him includes: established!eddie x reader, wayne being the sweetest paternal figure, mumblings of a found family, wayne manifesting a daughter in law by years end warnings: afab reader, non descript

a/n: writing from the boys perspective is always way more fun. i have so many thoughts about wayne and eddie's relationship.

Eddie had intended to be home earlier, a far cry earlier than the 9:30 that blinked hazily on his vans dashboard as he pulled in before the trailer. He was meant to be home hours ago, hoping to enjoy a Friday night the way that a young person ought to – out with the people he loved. Instead he sat in his driver's seat, covered in oil and grime and god knows what else from under the hood of some deadbeat richman from the other side of town. The apprentice had fucked the repair of a rather pricey car, one that was to be picked up first thing monday, and Eddie didn’t have it in him to let the little guy drown under the barrage of abuse from an intimidating customer. 

So he stayed back, and now he was paying the price. Dinner would have been long over by now, and it was unlikely that Wayne was still home at such an hour. He usually had the night shift on this pay cycle, but Eddie couldn’t tell one from another these days. The lights were still on, his indication that he’d gotten his weeks wrong. 

Worn leather boots beat against the gravel as he trekked towards the door, hand running through the curls that hung low on his forehead; wild, in desperate need of a trim. He was spent, body weary and limp from the extra strain. He wanted to call his friends, to call you, to ask for good company, but he knew even now he was too tired to go anywhere. 

The door was unlocked, so he slipped into the warmth of the trailer with an involuntary shiver, eyes blinking tiredly to spot the figure propped up on the couch. Wayne. Beer in hand, chin shadowed with stubble; Eddie’s hero, if anyone were to ever ask. The old man was his favourite person, whether he knew it or not. 

Wayne gave a gruff smile, tilting his chin up at his nephew. “Long day, boy?” 

“Yeah.” Eddie breathed, voice more gravelly than he’d realised. “Got stuck back, sorry I didn’t call.” 

Wayne shrugged. “I figured, though there’s a surprise in your room f’you.” 

A surprise? Eddie couldn’t possibly guess what. “You’re joking.” 

Wayne simply smiled in response, shaking his head. “You go have a look ‘n tell me if I’m joking. Just be quiet about it.” 

Eddie gave a quizzical sort of look, boots resounding against the floorboards as he moved towards the room, a quick mumble from Wayne catching his attention again. 

“Quieter than that.” 

Eddie scoffed, his demeanour still playful despite his disbelief. He took more careful steps this time, readjusting the band wrapped clumsily around his bound tresses, trying to alleviate the steadily subsiding headache from two hours ago. Wayne had never been much of a secret keeper, nor was he one for dramatics. He was a pragmatic, realistic, nonfrivolous sort of man, which made that excitable little sparkle in his uncle’s eyes all the more amusing. Wayne didn’t play tricks, but Eddie couldn’t help but feel he was walking into one. 

With a slow turn of his door handle, Eddie eased the gap open, his eyes scanning the silent dark until his gaze settled upon the mountain of blankets upon his bed. There, buried under three blankets of comfort, was you. It might have been hard to tell under any other circumstances, but even half asleep and exhausted out of his mind, Eddie knew he could recognise your silhouette anywhere. He softened instantaneously, body slackening slightly under the slow wave of adoration that overcame him. You were here to see him. Talk about a surprise, he hadn’t expected to see you today, and now he felt his ribs pressing in tightly together, chest constricting with a glad sort of giddiness. 

He was gentle in closing the door again, his smile bemused at his now grinning uncle. “And how’d my girl end up in there, hm?” 

He toed off his boots, movements suddenly precise and careful under the presence of your company. Even through the closed door, he had no desire to rouse you just yet. Not until he was ready, clean and showered and shed of all other obligations, able to dedicate himself to your company. 

“She came by at 5,” Wayne explained, turning down the quiet shout of the television set with a well worn remote, “thought you’d be home soon, wanted to surprise you. I told her she was welcome t’wait, thinkin’ you’d be round earlier. But y’weren’t, so we had some dinner.” 

Wayne paused, nudging his chin towards the fridge, which Eddie took to mean there was leftovers waiting for him inside. He began rustling through, finding what was left of a roast and vegetables wrapped up neatly in foil. It was a little more extravagant than he had expected, and Eddie chalked that up to your aid in the kitchen. He could see the container of biscuits on the counter, too, with little hearts and flowers piped onto the tops. Pinks and blues and reds and whites, this wasn’t a house for sweets and softness, though Eddie welcomed your charms in any way he could get them. He sat at the table to feast, unbothered to even reheat the feast. 

Wayne continued on. “Thought she might go lookin’ for y’, but we got a’talking. She’s a real sweet thing, y’know, made a real effort to chat. Even offered to sit down ‘n watch a game with me, thought I didn’t have the heart t’put her through it. Ended up watchin’ some Antiques Roadshow thinkin’ she’d like it better; you ever seen me watchin’ that before? I ain’t never had much care, but we had good fun.”

“No shit!” Eddie piped up, astounded by the softened edges of his Uncle. You’d charmed him, he thought, with your curious questions and kind smiles. For Wayne to sit down and talk to anyone was a miracle, one that only an angel could perform. His Angel. 

“We got guessin’ and everythin’.” Wayne added, wiping roughly at his smile. “Seemed tired, though, so I told her to crash in your room. She’s been out maybe half an hour.” 

Astounded was an understatement. Eddie had brought girls home before he met you, though none had bothered to exchange more than polite pleasantries with his Uncle. He’d never been serious about them, so he’d never thought much of it, and then came you. Three months into this new connection, a relationship born of spring flowers and whisky nights and loud music and soft touches. Eddie had never been serious until now, until you, and now he couldn’t picture being anything else but. 

He was glowing, beaming from ear to ear. “So you like her, then?” He was so hopeful in his question, a sincerity Wayne only ever saw reserved for the most heartfelt of Eddie’s dreamings. 

“I do.” Wayne announced, washing down his contentment with another swig of his beer. “I hope y’re serious ‘bout her, she’s real soft on you, and I think she’s a good one. Seems to make you happy enough, you ain’t mopin’ nearly so much these days.” 

Eddie rolled his eyes, groaning with faux annoyance, rolling foil into a tiny ball to toss across the room, missing Wayne by a good foot of space. “I don’t mope.” 

“I don’t mope my ass, kid, you mope plenty. Just not anymore.” He was laughing now, worn lines creasing at the corners of his eyes. “I said she should come back f’dinner another night, we can all eat together. She was tellin’ me ‘bout this story she was readin’, and I’ll be damned if I don’t know how it ends.” 

Eddie knew how this story ended; it ended with you. It began with you, too. It was all you, he couldn’t see any other ending for him. 

“Yeah, that sounds good, old man.” He was doing his best to stomach the meal, but his words were caught around hastily eaten mouthfuls half chewed and uneasy to swallow. He’d give himself heartburn if he wasn’t careful, and it would have been worth it. 

Eddie took a moment to pause, swallowing thickly, belching unceremoniously in a way he was glad you weren't there to witness. “I am serious, y’know, about her. Real serious. I got a good feeling.” 

“Yeah?” Wayne questioned, sinking back into the sofa. 

“Yeah. She could be the one; ain’t that somethin’? I always thought it was bull when people said you just know, but…” he laughed with astonishment, “I think I just know.” 

“Well shit,” Wayne exclaimed, clearing his throat, “that’s real good, Ed’s. You just be good and treat her nice. Be a gentleman.” 

Eddie wasn’t too sure he knew how to be a gentleman, but somehow, he knew you liked him all the same. He didn’t need to be anything but himself around you, and that was a one in a billion kind of feeling,

He was quick in his cleaning, fumbling around the kitchen to pack away a still soaking plate, his mind skating over the plastic drying rack by the sink entirely. “I’m bein’ good, I swear.” 

“Bullshit.” Wayne teased, shaking his head. He braced himself on his knees, slowly rising to his feet with a groan. “I’m goin’ to bed. Tell her she’s welcome to stay whenever she likes, okay? Show her where the spare key is.” 

“I will.” Eddie nodded, barely able to fight his slow building excitement. He could feel himself getting restless, hands flexing just at the thought of holding you. “G’night, Wayne.” 

“G’night son.” He echoed back, disappearing into the quiet of his own room. 

Eddie made sure to lock up on his way, switching off the tv and lights as his own sort of wind down ritual. They’d be on all night if he wasn’t careful, and he’d spied the last bill long enough to have a mind for the electricity now. Besides, he needed to be calm when he woke you. He’d half frightened you to death last time he came barrelling in. 

Once again, he retreated towards his room, slipping into the dark like a shadow of the night, slowly shucking his way out of his overalls to kick to the side of the room. He didn’t mind staining his sheets with oil, but not you; you were something worth caring for. He knew he should have showered, but the sweat on his skin could hardly deter him from the need he had to be close to you, to ease away the troubles of his way with the balm of your skin against his, your whispers ringing in his head. 

He fumbled his way to the edge of the mattress, your sleeping body facing away from him to the back wall of the room. He peered a little closer into the darkness, a sliver of moonlight cascading across the bare curve of your shoulder, arm wrapped around something small, something fuzzy…

“Well shit, Ted, what’re you doing in here?” Eddie hadn’t thought to consider where the ragdoll cat had scampered off to. Teddy had been adopted only a few weeks after Eddie came to live with Wayne, his Uncle’s way of easing the boy into this entirely new world together. Teddy had been his childhood companion, and by the way he was burrowed into the pudge of your stomach, purring louder than a car engine, Eddie could see you’d won him over too. 

The cat barely stirred, rather giving him a grumbled sort of chirp at being disturbed, before wriggling his way further under the blankets. You, however, made the softest of whining noises that left Eddie’s heart near strangling in his chest. He lifted a ring clad hand to that moonlight shoulder, brushing callouses across the line of freckles that dusted your skin, watching as your eyes began to flutter open, head turning slightly to face him. 

“Eddie!” No one in the world had ever been so enthusiastic to see him before, not one. His name wasn’t the kind to roll off the tongue, to be begged for or shouted out or held tenderly on someone's lips. Never before, but the way your mouth wrapped around the letters seemed to change the word entirely. Nothing had ever sounded so tender, so wanting, so pleased. You were always pleased to see him, a feeling he never had to doubt when he could see it so plainly reflected in your irises. 

“Honey.” He cooed back, tugging up the corner of the bedsheets to slip beneath them, curving his body to fit the shape of your own, nudging his knee between your two just to feel your skin pressed against his own in every possible way. The hair on his body was just as wild as the hair on his head, but nothing felt like home to him more than the brush of your skin to the mess of his. “Fancy seeing you here.” 

You exhaled a lengthy yawn, muffling the sound into his pillow with a hum. Your hair, once styled, now seemed mussed and flattened under the weight of your head. His bed linens were already tattooing precious creases into sleep warmed skin. You were too beautiful for him to even comprehend. 

You turned in his arms, careful not to disrupt the grumbling cat beside you despite your eagerness. He felt arms press their way around him, your nose nuzzling at his chin. “Wayne let me in. I hope that’s okay.” 

Literally nothing else could have been more okay in his mind. It was perfect. This was perfect; coming home to you. “Come by anytime, baby. I’m just sorry I wasn’t back sooner. I made you wait.” 

You shook your head. “I didn’t mind. Wayne’s really cool. He kept me company.”

“So I heard.” His voice was edged with an air of amusement, his hand lifting to brush back the strands of hair falling across your face, leaving his palm to cup at the plush of your cheek, his eyes admiring even in the dark. “Antiques Roadshow?”

You let out a giggle. “We panicked! I was trying to make a good impression, and he suggested it so I thought why not. Honestly it was pretty fun, I could totally watch another episode.” 

“Mm.” His lips met the button of your nose dotingly, his voice slackening to a syrupy smoothness. “He’s impressed, I’m impressed; you’ve got us Munson men wrapped around your pretty little finger. Even Teddy’s on your side.” 

“I do not!” You chided, helpless against his onslaught of affection. He left you preening and giddy, a little lightheaded when he loved on you like this, and Eddie never had any intention of stopping. “Teddy just wanted a cuddle.”

“Him and me both.” Eddie asserted, snaking his other arm beneath the arch of your waist, wrapping around the small of your back to tug you in further, his smile resoundingly bright at the way you hummed happily. “We’re not too young to be asleep by 10, are we?” 

The way you eased into the very fabric of him, your bodies so close and so connected, wrapped tightly in the warmth of his room, was enough assurance to him that you were just as content here as he was. “No. I’m not leaving this spot. You just got home, and I’m all sleepy, and Ted’s gonna get mad if we move.” 

Ted chirped an affirmative sound, leaving Eddie to rasp a laugh. “Well we can’t make Teddy mad, can we. Gotta stay here all night with my girl.” 

You chuckled softly in turn, your voice quieting under the weight of exhaustion. “I was meant to keep you company, but I’m so sleepy.” Another yawn parted your plush lips, leaving Eddie with no choice but to press his own to the corner once they came back together again. 

“You are keepin’ me company. Think I’ll sleep a bunch better with you keepin’ me warm. I’ll take you on a date tomorrow, hm? After a big sleep in?” 

“You’re so sexy when you talk like that.” You mumbled, your lashes fluttering shut to rest against your cheeks. “I’d kiss you stupid if I could move.” 

Besotted was not a strong enough word for what Eddie felt in that moment, but he was overwhelmed with the urge to litter a smattering of kisses from the edge of your cheekbone to the corners of your forehead, each one softer than the last, lulling you into that sweet place of slumber you were already drifting towards. 

“Kiss me stupid tomorrow. Sleep, sweetheart.” You didn’t need to be told twice. Within moments, Eddie watched the light in your flicker to a dim, pale glow, your breathing evening out to something unhurried. Peaceful. It didn’t matter to him that he had only had those brief moments with you tonight. Five minutes with you was enough to chase away all the strife of a day otherwise written off in his mind. And that was what his life had been missing, after all. Someone who made going to sleep at 10pm look like the greatest moment of his life. He wanted to keep you to himself, a greedy kind of possessiveness stirring in his gut, for as long as he was able, knowing full well that less than twelve hours from now, Wayne would without a doubt be waiting to make you both breakfast on his morning off. 

Like he said, you had all the Munson boys charmed.

Julie

Based on the song Julie by Emily Kinney, give it a listen!

BestFriend!Eddie Munson x Reader

Summary: Eddie wants you to meet his new girlfriend, Julie. You don’t think she’s right for him, but who is? 

A/N: I'm back from my little break. The blurbs you saw the past couple of days were scheduled. Sorry if your name is Julie, let’s pretend it’s not for the purposes of this fic. I was listening to old Emily Kinney songs and my favorite came up, then I had this idea. Two things: let’s pretend Hawkins is big enough to have taxis, and ‘skeeters’ as in the old Midwest way of saying mosquitos—you’ll get that when you read. 

Word Count: 5k

Warnings: angst with a happy ending, flufffff, presumed unrequited love, big tension-filled love confession–it’s yummy nummy guys fr, emotional cheating? (eh, kinda but not really, and not on reader, Eddie’s not a cheater tho), they wanna make out so bad, they’re so stupidly in love I hate them, friends to lovers, mentions of weed smoking, Eddie’s made-up religion. 

I’m staring at the ground as she walks right by

You’re staring at me mad ‘cause I refuse to say hi

I’m just staring into space ‘cause all I got on my mind

Elevator kisses, summer, summertime

Elevator kisses, you and I

–Julie by Emily Kinney

Masterlist

You’re sitting at the bar—your usual spot with Eddie at the Hideout—waiting to meet his new girlfriend. He’s about ten minutes late, but that’s not out of the ordinary for your best friend. In your thirteen years of knowing him, he’s only been early for an event twice—never exactly on time. Suffice it to say, he’s not changing much for this new girl. 

Halfway through your Amaretto Sour, you feel a tap on your shoulder. Turning around, you spot an out of breath Eddie—frizzy hair, band tee, and ripped jeans as per usual. 

“Hey!” Sliding off the cracked leather cushion on the metal stool, you throw your arms around the man for a big hug. “How are you? Where’s–,” Your voice trails off as you look past him for the girl he has yet to introduce you to—the girl he swears is cool and that you’ll like, the girl whose presence is notably lacking in the busy bar.

“Julie,” he finishes for you, “She’s outside, actually.” 

A confused smile inches up your lips as your brows furrow at his cringing face. “What, are you casing the place for her? I don’t bite,” chuckling, you try to lighten the obvious discomfort he’s displaying. 

“Uh–well, I just came in to tell you we’re gonna have to rain check.” Eddie’s ringed hand rubs the back of his neck, a nervous habit you know he’s had since at least grade school when you met him. 

Huffing out a quiet laugh, you cock your head, bewildered, “What?” 

He’s here, he just said she’s here, so why can’t she come in and you can all get this over with? Then you can go home and cry about it later. You had plans—ice cream already in the freezer and a VHS of Dirty Dancing ready to go. 

“Um–I guess I–forgot to mention that the Hideout is a bar—or at least, I–I didn’t think I needed to specify—and she doesn’t like bars.” 

One look at his face tells you he wishes he didn’t have to do this. He’s clearly embarrassed and sorry for putting you out like this. Inviting you to a place just to show up late and then tell you to go home—that there won’t be any hanging out to be had tonight. 

“Oh, does she not drink?” You could understand that, not everybody who can drink alcohol likes to drink alcohol. You know they make a mean Shirley Temple here—perks of confidently bellying up to the bar as a very apparent freshman in high school.

Eddie’s voice jumps a few octaves at the question, “Mm–no, she does.” 

Eyebrows raising, eyes alight with mirth, you can’t help but laugh at the circumstances. First of all, what a confounding situation. She drinks; she just doesn’t want to step inside a bar, apparently. Surely she knows she’s here to meet you—her new boyfriend’s longest friend. Typically that invokes the desire to be on one’s best behavior—the approval of the best friend is a huge step in a budding relationship. 

And second of all, she appears to be making Eddie do this. She won’t come into the establishment even for a thirty second interaction. A quick, ‘Hi, good to meet you! I’m Julie! Sorry, but bars aren’t my scene—for whatever reason—and I was wondering if you’d like to move this party to a secondary location?’ It doesn’t sound that hard as you run through the scenario in your head, but you don’t know the girl. Maybe she’s allergic to cigarette smoke and decades-old out-of-date jukebox music.

“So…,” you drawl, pursing your lips, hoping Eddie will take the hint and explain. 

“I guess she just hates bars,” he shrugs, looking even more sorry than before—if that’s even possible. 

Snorting, you can’t believe the Eddie Munson is dating a girl who’s too good to step inside a bar. The boy who practically grew up playing music on the Hideout’s rickety stage and made his first few bucks being a barback is dating a girl who hates bars—so much so, that she refuses to enter them. Okay. That’s a choice…

“Did you tell her that sitting at the bar and shootin’ the shit is the seventh commandment of the religion you founded—the one you made me baptize into? Made a whole deal about it and everything. Does she know you and I plan to be just like Bobby and Jim—old bar flies interrupting kids’ conversations to say, ‘When I was your age–,’” you put on your best old person voice, wiggling a ceremonious finger. 

That finally gets a genuine smile out of him—even a laugh. The sight makes you smile too, you’ve never been able to stop yourself from sharing in his joy. 

“You know, I guess I forgot to give her that rundown,” he quips before the lighthearted humor leaves his eyes again, a rueful smile taking its place. “Listen, I’m really sorry about this. I wish I could stay, I’ve missed just grabbing a pint and throwing peanut shells at the people who black out.”

 Taking in his face, he looks so sad, so sorry—it makes you want to fix it. 

“Yeah, you’ve gotta try and beat my high score. Last time Ricky woke up when you got ‘im, would’ve pushed me out of the lead if you hadn’t thrown so hard,” you giggle, remembering the way the old man shot up, grumbling, ‘Damn, skeeters,’ causing you and Eddie to whip around, facing the other direction to avoid suspicion. “If you wanna stay, you can just call Julie a car. Wave down a taxi and come have a drink,” you suggest, suddenly feeling extremely timid while talking to the boy you’ve known since grade school. 

He looks like he wants to stay, but the regret never leaves his eyes. As he opens his mouth to respond, the bartender cuts him off, placing a full pint down on the bar next to you—Eddie’s usual. “Hey, Ed, good to see ya, boy! You know, you shouldn’t leave such a pretty lady unattended,” he playfully chides, jabbing at Eddie’s perpetual tardiness. 

Tom’s been the bartender at the Hideout for as long as you can remember. He’s watched you and Eddie grow up, serving you two since high school. The old man was basically the only adult in town who’d spare you hooligans any attention. An eccentric himself, he enjoyed listening to your and Eddie’s rantings and ravings.

His comment warms your face, you duck your head to avoid seeing your best friend’s reaction. Something about the comment makes it sound like you’re Eddie’s girl—like he shouldn’t leave his girl waiting, lest you be scooped up by another man. 

“Yeah, Tommy? She got a couple suitors,” he asks, chuckling at the old man’s warning.

Well, now you just feel embarrassed. 

Eddie finds it funny. He clearly didn’t read into Tom’s comment the way you did. Or if he did, he’s ignoring the insinuation. Because it’s untrue. You’re not Eddie’s girl. Maybe you used to be. At least, that’s what everybody would always say—never believing the ‘best friend excuse.’ 

Tom, ever your biggest fan, nods enthusiastically. “Oh, a few of ‘em! Told ‘em they gotta get through you first. Y’bet your bottom dollar that scared ‘em off.” 

Feeling done with this joke, you turn to Tom, raising your now empty glass. “Can I get another, Tommy?” 

“Comin’ right up, sweets.” 

With the older man now away and occupied, you look at Eddie again. “You’ve even got a drink waiting for you now. If you want to…stay…”

Shooting you an apologetic smile, Eddie pulls out his wallet, plucking out a few dollar bills to leave on the bar top. “I’m sorry, sweetheart. I think I should just take her home. Don’t wanna fuck up too early into the relationship,” he jokes, but it falls flat—along with the hopeful smile on your face. 

“Yeah…wouldn’t want that.”

You think you actually would like that. You’d like that very much. As long as the fuck up leads to a break up—that works just fine for you. 

“How about tomorrow? We were gonna go on a double date with Steve and Jess, but you can come too. We’ll invite Robin, it’ll just be a group dinner then and you can meet her—she’s cool, I promise!”

The idea of going on a failed double date with Eddie and his new girlfriend sounds like your worst nightmare—right up there with presenting a project naked in high school. But he looks so hopeful. Those damn big, wet eyes of his are looking extra puppy dog-ish this evening. He clearly feels awful about tonight and probably won’t give up until he feels he’s made it up to you. 

Unable to stifle your sigh, you force a smile on your face, “Sure.”

Pumping his fist, he puts his hands on your cheeks, gently shaking your face. “Thank you! You are the best! Enzos, tomorrow at seven.” He pulls your head in for a wet smooch on the forehead—his classic move when you begrudgingly agree to do his bidding. 

You’ll kick yourself for it later, but you close your eyes to relish the feel of his lips on your skin. It’s not where you’d like them, but you’ll take what you can get. Opening your eyes as he pulls away, you spot a random man standing behind him, tapping his shoulder. 

“Hey, are you Eddie?” 

Eddie turns slightly, sees the stranger, and positions himself in front of you. You wonder if he did that on purpose or if it’s a habit—either way, it makes your heart flutter. 

“Yeah…”

The stranger looks annoyed when he conveys the message. You think you would be too if you were enlisted by a random woman to go corral her boyfriend.

“There’s a blonde lady outside lookin’ for you. Said to tell you, ‘Get your ass back out here or I’m leaving.’ And, hey, word of warning, dude,” the man leans into Eddie, “She doesn’t seem all that pleased with you right now.” 

The man walks off leaving a mildly shocked Eddie and a more shocked you. She really does not want to step foot in this damn bar, does she? 

Eddie seems to shake off the interaction, turning to you quickly and speaking like the past twenty seconds didn’t happen. “Enzos at seven, say you’ll be there,” he points at you, expectant gaze unmoving from your face. 

“Okay,” you shrug, unsure why he seems to think you’d ditch. You totally would, but you don’t know why he thinks you would. 

Backing up toward the exit, his reprimanding finger never falls. “Say it,” he demands, eyebrows raising, waiting for you to agree. 

“Okay, I’ll be there,” you grumble, less than enthused that he’s pushing it so hard. 

“Perfect! See you then!” 

Letting out another sigh, you turn back to the bar. “Tom, where’s that drink?”

༶•┈┈୨♡୧┈┈•༶

You seem to be the first to arrive at Enzos—no sign of Steve, Robin, or Eddie. Unsure of what to do, you wait outside for them. You don’t have to wait long though, Steve pulls up with Jess and Robin only five minutes after you. 

“Hey, where’s Eddie,” Steve asks, arm wrapped securely around his long time girlfriend. 

Offering your friend a tight-lipped smile, you shrug, “Not here yet.” 

“I didn’t know he’d even be late to his own plans. Thought it was just everybody else’s he didn’t respect,” Robin quips, looking around the busy parking lot. 

“Kind of makes you feel better though, doesn’t it? Like it’s not just you?” Steve laughs at Jess’s comment. Her point makes you smile for the first time all day, she’s right and you appreciate her candor. She’s been a great addition to the group since the end of high school—fits right in with all the ribbing that goes on. You wish you could hope the same for Julie, but the other night already put a bad taste in your mouth. 

“You met his girlfriend the other night, right?” You swear Robin could be a mind reader, she’s always asking exactly what you hope she doesn’t. 

“Uh, was supposed to, yeah.” 

Your response makes the group frown. “Supposed to? So it didn’t happen,” Steve asks, shaking his head with the question.

Sucking your teeth, you consider how much you should share. You don’t want to sway anybody’s opinions of the girl before they’ve met her. Hell, you haven’t even met her—but it feels like you know all you need to know. 

“Uh–no. It did not happen,” you respond stiltedly. “Apparently she doesn’t like bars.” 

Robin’s head jerks back like she’s been slapped, a scowl on her face. “Has she heard of Munsianity?” 

Jess speaks up, setting her reaction aside to gather context. “Sorry, Munsianity?”

Steve answers for you and Robin, “Yeah, it’s this stupid made-up religion Eddie created in high school. Made us all unconsenting apostles.” 

“Well, I actually really enjoyed the sacraments,” Robin counters, nodding approvingly at the fond memories. 

“Sacraments?” 

Poor Jess. Steve’s apparently slacking on his lore lessons. 

This time it’s you who answers her, “Weed shotgunning, the Great Hotbox of ‘86, forced horror movie marathons, etcetera. It did have good benefits, though. Half-off rides, all that free weed…” 

Robin scoffs, “Yeah, half-off rides for us. You got them for free, never had to haggle over gas money.” 

The reminder of your special treatment as his best friend makes you smile. But then you remember last night and the smile fades as fast as it came. 

Steve snorts, “You know, we should be happy that Eddie became a mechanic. He had the makings of a very concerning cult leader. Would’ve been so niche and under the radar even the Feds wouldn’t be able to catch ‘im.” 

“You better believe it, big boy! Feds ain’t got nothin’ on the Munsons—well except for–my father who they do have detained right now. So they’ve got one thing on the Munsons, but nothing anybody’s missing,” Eddie shrugs, a wild grin spread across his face. 

Surprise and introductions rush through the group, Eddie’s hand never leaves the short blonde girl’s waist as she politely greets everyone. When it’s your turn, you can barely manage a tight-lipped smile and a nod—eyes never moving past her shoulders after your initial look when they walked up. 

Thankfully, Julie doesn’t seem all that talkative—not going out of her way to make your acquaintance. Your eyes are firmly planted to the ground as Steve tries to small-talk the girl, but any attempt to know her more is interrupted when Robin complains about her rumbling stomach. Steve confirms Eddie’s reservation name and leads the group inside. 

Jess seems to have gotten through to the blonde as they follow after Steve and Robin, chit chatting about their choice of shoes for the evening. You and Eddie are the last ones left in front of the restaurant. You can feel his burning gaze on the side of your face as you dig the toe of your Reeboks deeper into the gravel—remembering how, as kids, you used to run barefoot over rocky terrain like this, spending so much time outside without shoes that you both developed hobbit feet, the toughened skin impervious to the sharp rocks.

“What the hell was that,” he hisses, cocking his head incredulously.

Eyes still not lifting from the riveting dusty, white gravel, you shrug, “What was what?”

“You didn’t say, ‘Hi,’ you barely even made eye contact! You’re supposed to be my rock here. You’re supposed to help me make sure the evening goes well.” 

Eyebrows raising at his admission, you finally meet his gaze—his eyes are notably less angry now. You didn’t know you had a job to do tonight—convincing everyone to like his girlfriend no less. 

“Sorry,” you mutter, unsure of what else to say. 

“S’fine, let’s just go inside.”

The night goes as smoothly as an awkward introductory dinner can. Jokes are thrown around—everyone seems to laugh except Julie. Stories are shared at Eddie’s expense, earning cringed looks from the blonde. It’s like everyone is trying their best to pull her out of what you hope is just a shell—maybe she’s great once you get to know her—but you seem to be the only one willing to acknowledge how awful this dinner is going.

Steve uncomfortably coughs after Julie berates Eddie for his decision to order a second beer, Robin subtly kicks your foot under the table when you scowl at the blonde’s snippy tone, Jess quickly changes the subject to the gold jewelry the girl wears—successfully distracting her. 

Clearly, everyone is witnessing the consistent clashing of personalities, but no one is reacting accordingly. It makes you feel insane—like you’ve gone through the looking glass and Eddie’s decided he’d like a girlfriend who hates him. 

Zoning out for the rest of the dinner, you bide your time until you can escape—pushing the food around on your plate and rubbing the condensation off your glass. You only perk back up when you hear Steve and Eddie bickering over who will cover the bill. A smile almost makes its way onto your face, but then Julie speaks up, patting Eddie’s chest. “Eddie will pay for it, won’t you, baby? He just got a raise at the shop and he’s making so much more now.”

The scowl returns at her not-so-subtle brag to Steve and Jess. Apparently, she hasn’t been listening—otherwise, she would’ve caught on to Steve’s complaints about his job at the firm where he’s a partner, making far more than Eddie does. Also, it’s not her money to spend, nor is it hers to brag about. Eddie’s very clearly uncomfortable with her comment and you’re opening your mouth to speak before you know what you’re going to say. 

Robin beats you to it though, she sees right through you, “Thank god, you’ve been working there long enough! Congrats, dude.” 

Eddie mutters a quiet, ‘Thanks,” as he hands the card to the waiter. 

༶•┈┈୨♡୧┈┈•༶

The goodbye’s are even more awkward than the hello’s. You avoid Julie like you did before, but this time you don’t feel Eddie’s angry eyes on you. Sparing a look at your best friend, you notice he seems tired, his mood deflated compared to how he appeared before the dinner. 

Surprisingly, Julie leaves first out of the two of them, offering Eddie a clipped goodbye. Steve must look just as confused as you feel because Eddie mentions how she wanted to drive separately in the case that he ‘drank too much.’ You have to physically stop yourself from blanching at his words. If she thinks two beers is too much, she would’ve hated Eddie in high school.

Robin, Steve, and Jess all say their goodbyes, promising to hang out again soon. With just you and Eddie left, the ground becomes incredibly interesting again. You can feel his eyes on you as you wait for him to speak up first.

“What, do you not like her?” 

His immediate attitude grates on your nerves, causing you to meet his scrutinizing eyes. “Do you?”

She’s not a very pleasant girl and he seemed to be embarrassed every time she spoke tonight. How can he ask you if you like her with the way he seemed to regret the whole event? Your intonation seems to piss him off even more, overcompensating in his response—you hope. 

“Of course I do!” 

You shrug, pursing your lips, “She seems fine.”

Eddie must be looking for a fight because he doesn’t drop the subject. “You barely even spoke to her, you didn’t look at her at all! How would you know if she seems ‘fine’?”

Throwing your hands up in annoyance, you shake your head at him incredulously, “What do you want from me, Eddie?”

Matching your frustration, he shrugs his shoulders, bobbing his head expectantly, “I don’t know, I guess I want my best friend to like who I’m dating because I care about your opinion!” The statement may have come across sweeter if he hadn’t yelled it angrily. 

Chewing on your lip, you meet his exasperated eyes, muttering lowly, “You want my opinion?”

“Yes! Of course, I always want your opinion.”

Resigning yourself to the situation, nowhere to divert the conversation to—you can’t help but tell the truth, you’re tired of pretending. Letting out a sigh, you force a neutral mask to fall over your face, “You shouldn’t be with her.”

“What?” 

That was clearly not what he was expecting you to say. He figured you didn’t jive with her given how little you chose to interact, but he didn’t know you’d go this far. 

“If you stay with her, you’re a fool.”

That pisses him off again. Eddie never liked being told he’s done something wrong, especially when he didn’t know or intend it. And now it feels like his best friend is telling him she’s disappointed in his choices. 

“What the fuck are you talking about? You just met her! You didn’t bother getting to know her! What are you seeing that I’m not?” 

The last sentence is closer to the boy you grew up with. He trusts you implicitly and he wants to know what he’s missing here, what is he overlooking? 

“I mean, I bet she’s smart and you keep saying she’s so cool but…”

“But what?” 

The sadness in your eyes is breaking through your mask as you look at your oldest friend—the man you love. Suddenly it’s like a dam breaks, all the thoughts you’ve saved come spewing out. 

“You deserve someone who brings you happiness and accepts you—all your flaws included, and if you think that that’s Julie, then you’re wrong. You deserve to laugh until your stomach aches, and you deserve to spend your money how you want, and you deserve to feel desired. You deserve to be loved. And if you think she can give you that, I suggest you think again before you get any further.” 

Eddie’s brown, button eyes are as wide as saucers by the time you’re done. His mouth opens and closes, unsure how to respond to all of that. “I…don’t know what to say…”

Feeling bare and see-through—like cellophane, tears flood your waterline. You didn’t mean to say all of that and you feel mortified at his poor excuse for a response. Swallowing the lump in your throat, you throw your hand out to him, gesturing to his frozen figure. “Well, you wanted my opinion and there it is. Do with it what you will.” 

You’re done. You’ve exposed yourself enough for one night so you walk past him, ready to find your car and escape this insufferable bubble of truth. 

His voice carries as you brush past him, the words make you stop. “If not Julie, then who?”

Brows furrowing, turning your head to just barely see him in your peripheral vision, you take in the rigid expanse of his back. “What?”

Eddie turns around with a calculating gaze, roving over your sad face. You can almost see the cogs turning in his brain, he’s catching on and it makes you want to run away, but your feet won’t move.

“If you don’t think I should be with Julie, who do you think I should be with,” he asks slowly, head cocking as he studies your soul through your wet eyes.

Those wet eyes widen for a fraction of a second before you shrug dismissively, “I don’t know.”

Gravel crunches under his shoes as he steps closer to your body, closing the distance you tried to create. “No, come on, sweetheart. You have such a strong opinion,” he goads, “Surely you’ve thought the whole thing through. Who should I be with?”

Your silence is deafening. Melting under his rapt gaze, you look anywhere but those damn eyes. His next question throws you completely off. 

“How’s Connor?”

The way he asks it is simple and pleasant, but you know better. It’s a weighted question given the subject of the conversation. 

“We broke up,” you mutter, still avoiding your best friend’s eyes, thankful you can’t see his reaction to the break up of your long time boyfriend—the one Eddie never seemed to get along with. 

“When?” His voice is low and calculated. He doesn’t sound angry, he just sounds like a lawyer performing a line of funnel questioning—hoping he can back you into a corner of truth. 

Kicking your toe into the gravel again, you mutter the answer shamefully, “Two weeks ago.” 

If the circumstances were normal, Eddie would’ve been told immediately, but they weren’t, so he wasn’t. 

“Why didn’t you tell me?” 

Sucking in a deep breath, you let it out at the same time as your quiet answer, “Didn’t think you’d wanna know.” 

Bullshit. It’s bullshit. You know it, he knows it, the universe knows it. 

“Why didn’t you tell me,” he repeats, voice somehow even lower, like he’s closing in on the truth if you’d just cooperate. 

Scoffing, you shake your head, glancing up at his dark eyes, “I just told you, I didn’t think you’d–”

“That’s not what I’m talking about, sweetheart. Why didn’t you tell me?” He repeats the question for a third time, firm voice slowing down on every word. 

Grasping at straws, scrambling for any deflection you can, you avoid his eyes again. “Tell you what?”

“How you feel.” 

Oh. That.

You could do this all night, though. You’ve had years of practice on how best to annoy Eddie. “About Julie? I just told you how I feel.” 

That’s not what he meant and you know it. His nostrils flare as his lips form a tight line across his face. You know you’re about ten seconds away from a verbal lashing, but you’d take that over this awful conversation any day. 

But the angry words don’t come. He just keeps staring at you in silence for a full minute, scrutinizing every tiny reaction—every twitch of your brows, every narrowing of your eyes, every nervous chew of your lips. It feels like torture. You can’t move. Your stupid feet won’t save you, and he won’t talk. Damn him for knowing how to break you down.

“I didn’t think it would matter,” you rush out, huffing an annoyed breath at the revelation. 

Suddenly quick to respond now, Eddie’s face screws up in outrage, his unsteady voice hisses out, “Of course it matters. If I had to sit around and watch you with him for another minute, I would be doing the same thing you are now!” 

Jerking your head back at his admission, you take offense to the insinuation that you’re trying to break him and Julie up. You are. But you resent the insinuation. 

“Well, it doesn’t matter because you have a girlfriend,” you accuse, as if he’s not painfully aware of that fact—as if it’s not the only thing holding him back from kissing the life out of you. 

Scoffing at your rebuttal, he throws his arms up in exasperation. “I had to go out and meet somebody! I had to…get you out of my head. If I had to spend another second around you when you’re not mine to have—I would’ve gone insane!” 

He’s shouting it as if you’re the one purposefully making him daydream about his best friend, as if you’ve maliciously planted the seeds of his own destruction. 

At this point you’re just bickering like you used to, but now it’s about untimely romantic feelings for each other and not who gets to pick the movie. Crossing your arms, you throw him an annoyed look, “Well, you’re acting pretty insane already, so.”

He blanches at that being what you gathered from his confession of feelings. Groaning loudly through gritted teeth, he shakes his hands at you, “God, you’re a lunatic, you know that? I’m tryin’ to tell you I’m in love with you and you’re playing ‘Who’s Being More Stupid’?” 

“Well, you’re acting like I made you fall in love with me when really, I’ve been waiting for you to get your head out of your ass and tell me that since we were in eighth grade!” 

You two must look insane to the patrons leaving the restaurant—two strangers arguing in the parking lot about who loves each other more and for how much longer.

“If that’s true, then why’d you go and date that dill weed?” 

Guffawing at his response, you look at him like he’s off his rocker. “What was your argument again? I had to go meet somebody,” you deepen your voice, mocking his earlier confession. 

Stepping toe-to-toe with you, he leans into your face, “You piss me off!” 

Chest huffing with angered breaths, you copy his movements, leaning into him, nearly nose-to-nose, “You piss me off!”

Labored breaths leave matching open mouths, his eyes dart down to your gloss covered lips. “I really wanna kiss you,” he breathes out with barely restrained desire. 

Roving eyes dart from his obsidian gaze to his pink lips, stuttered breaths form desperate words, “Go break up with your girlfriend.” 

Eddie’s head bobs forward on its own accord, hungry lips crawling for home on yours, but he won’t let your relationship start with cheating. “Okay.” 

“Okay.” 

Having to consciously tell his feet to step back, he removes himself from your intoxicating orbit, nodding his head with heavy breaths. “Okay.”

Missing the loss of his body heat, you copy his nod—self-restraint is virtuous and necessary, but god, do you want to rip his clothes off in the middle of this parking lot. “Okay,” you repeat—the only word your trance allows you to form.

“I’ll be right back. Wait for me at your place, okay?” He’s backing up, demanding finger hovering in the air, pinning you to your word. 

A nervous grin spreads across your face, “Okay.” 

You watch as he keeps his eyes on you for as long as he can until he has to turn around to find his van. Letting out a sigh, trying to calm the rapid beat of your heart, you laugh to yourself, “Okay.”

A/N: I'm easing back into writing after losing the motivation so quickly on a random day. I got v sad and v depressed all at once, but this was the first idea that got me to write again. Like, reblog and comment if you enjoyed it. Lmk if you like my work because it helps to keep me writing.

Tag List: @defututus @ratsematary @american-idiot-jpg @glassbxttless @justalotoffanfiction @savybabyyy @thepinkpanther83 @sorayasworld @slaytheusurper @dangerousnbeautiful @hellmastereddie @ali-r3n @lilithera0 @tlclick73 @joonbread @jesterghuleh @bellalillyrose @bigboymoozz @am0iur @pastelpoppies @lionkingshiddenmessage 

Thinking about Rockstar!Eddie marrying his high school sweetheart.

Descriptions of pregnant reader at one point, Eddie wanting to knock reader up because he’s a horn dog and he can’t help himself, and one throw away line about him eating reader out.

Pt. 2

Masterlist

Here are my thoughts:

There’s a stigma behind marrying your high school sweetheart, people usually think it’s a bad idea because ‘you’ve barely been out in the world.’

‘Plenty of fish in the sea,’ fish of which he hasn’t seen yet. Fish he might be tempted by. So he shouldn’t put all his eggs in one small town, ‘Midwest-pretty’ basket.

But what if he knew he loved that basket right from the start. Okay I’ll drop the basket metaphor. He met you right as his band was taking off, he saw you around in high school but he didn’t know you. Boy, did he want to know you.

He was making the drive every weekend to Indianapolis to play shows, his band gaining more traction and in talks with a label for a record deal. It was the tail end of his time in Hawkins, finally on his way out of what he deemed to be the hell-hole he must’ve deserved from a past life faux pas. Of course, he had to take a little souvenir for his troubles. And that’s when he met you!

He knew he loved you so he never let you go, took you every where he went right from the start. From the weekend trips to Indianapolis, to the tour buses heading to new states every week. From the motel stays, to the Ritz Carlton penthouses. It was his lucky guitar, his songwriting notebook, his favorite lighter, and you. Pager, wallet, you. That was his mantra before leaving to go anywhere. He made sure he had his pager on his person for when his team needed him, his wallet to get into bars, you to soothe the soul.

A lot of people didn’t get it. He could have any girl he wanted. Hell, half the US population of young women had pictures of him pinned to their walls! Centerfolds from magazine shoots he did. But he had your picture in his wallet. Not that he ever needed it, you were with him no matter where he went.

Club, you’re there. Bar, you’re there. Show, you’re front row between the barricade and the stage- safe, just how he likes it. His hotel room after the show, you’re there. His heart, you’re there. His dreams, you’re there. His future, you’re there.

Sometimes stupid magazines would ask him stupid questions about his love life. He didn’t keep you hidden, he loved to show you off. You were his forever arm candy- at least that’s what he loved to call you. Or his ‘permanent date.’ His ‘eternal plus one.’ You would tell him ‘honey’ or ‘babe’ is just fine. He always does the most when it comes to you. He’d bend over backwards just to make you smile.

But those magazines- the reporters would say things like, “I’m sure you get along just fine, we saw the bras being thrown on stage,” or, “I’m sure you’ll be having a great night after this momentous win at the Grammy’s, you’ll be bringing home more than just the Grammy judging by the amount of women calling your name right now.”

He hated it. It was as if nobody heard him, ever. He’s always going on about you! My girl this, my wife that. People should know by now he’s locked down. And he likes it that way. What, does he have to tattoo it to his forehead?! I mean he’s got your name tattooed under his collarbone for Christ’s sake! He thanks you in every speech, before his own band!!!! Hell, he’d take your last name if he hadn’t already made a name for himself. That’s how badly he wants the world to know he’s yours.

You don’t mind the presumptive reporters or the horny groupies, he gives you nothing to worry about. But he hates it, he gets so upset when reporters or groupies overstep. It’ll be over his dead body before he lets anybody disrespect you or his marriage to you. That shit is sacred to him.

He doesn’t just love you, he needs you. You keep him sane. Being revered as a god every night can cross a man’s wires, alright. With you, he’s not a god. He’s your boy. He’s the boy you fell in love with. You make him pick up his dirty socks off the floor and you cook him dinner. He’s a Grammy award winning multi-millionaire and you still make him pump your gas for you. God, he loves you.

You take no prisoners on trivia night and you give him heart palpitations every time you herd the band to the press interviews. He has no other option but to display his never ending devotion to you by constantly re-proposing any time you make him swoon.

You’re bitching Gareth out for being late to sound check because when sound check goes late, you can’t catch your shows on cable in the hotel suite you and Eddie have booked for this tour stop.

He loves when you mother-hen them, it makes him feel all sorts of fuzzy feelings and some real naughty ones too- god he wants to get you pregnant so bad. He can see it now- his little rockstar wife waddling around the stadiums, the beautiful dresses cascading over your bump on the red carpets. Maybe then people will leave him alone about all the women he could have, if he’s laid his claim on you in the most fundamental, human way.

He has to shake the thoughts of you growing a mini-him out of his head before he starts developing permanent heart eyes and a hard on. As you huff and walk towards him after a very thorough verbal lashing at Gareth, he’s in love and amused. You have a point, Gareth’s lateness was inconsiderate and he’d much rather have time with you on the couch in the hotel room before the show possibly eating you out real nasty like, rather than sound checking right up to the doors opening for showtime.

As you reach him ready to let him know you’ll be in the front row of the bowl seats while he sound checks, he quickly grabs your hands and drops to one knee. Nobody around you bats an eye, this happens a lot. Eddie’s proposing to his wife again, must be Tuesday.

You frown at his sudden drop, you know what this is, but he picks the weirdest times to do this.

“Please, god, marry me. You’re so hot when you bitch Gareth out, I could watch it forever.” He’s almost desperate in the way he says it to you.

You finally crack a smile and huff out a laugh, he’s so stupid sometimes but he’s your stupid.

“Yeah baby, I’ll marry you again. We can both bitch Gareth out together, forever.” You say, laughing.

“Oh come onnnn, guys!” Gareth’s over by the amp with his brow furrowed in a desperate plea, looking defeated.

You and Eddie just laugh. You’re it for him, alright. He’s certain nobody could bitch out his friends as well as you, nobody could keep a bit going as well as you, nobody could support him as well as you, nobody could satisfy him as well as you, nobody could love him as well as you.

He’s seen the women, he’s seen a little too much of the women- a lot of them loving to flash him as if it will make him freeze mid-show and go, “her.” He’s never wavered in his devotion to you, he’s never crossed that line. On the rare occasion that you’re not with him, he’s coming off stage right to the nearest pay phone.

His label tries to get him to do promotional photos for the band’s new album with women all over him. He’s told them no countless times. The other guys in the band can do whatever they want with whoever models they want, but if he’s gonna be forced to pose with a hot chick, it’s gonna be you. He certainly has made them bring you on set. Those are his favorite promo pictures, they’re framed in y’all’s mansion.

He’s also had you star in numerous music videos for them. Songs he writes about you.

He didn’t need to take a lap around the world, meet every hot chick just to know you were the one. That’s what people expected him to do. As if that was of any interest to him. No, you were the only thing that has ever interested him. He’s pretty certain that even if you decided to up and leave him one day, god forbid, he’d still be yours until the end of time. Of course, he’d grovel and put up a fight if you really tried to leave him. But then he’d accept it because he loves you no matter what. He’d never let you go in his heart, though.

He’s changed his mind- actually, he’s decided he’d become a thousand times worse if it were to happen. You’d never hear the end of him. That’s how sure he is that he’s supposed to be with you and you’re supposed to be with him. Yeah, that’s his forever right there.

Luckily he doesn’t have to start working on finding a private investigator to follow you around, you could never get rid of him and he knows that. He just likes to remind you he’ll become the most annoying nuisance of a threat if you did. Constantly crying on national television wishing you to come home, showing up to new dates saying the kids miss you- the kids you don’t have, a million embarrassing, lame tattoos of you. He’ll get a poorly done rendition of your face on his chest.

All of that is enough to sway you to stay with him forever. That, and your genuine love and care for him. But mostly the threat of an awful tattoo of your face because you’re really not a picture person, you’re better in video form.

A/N: if you made it this far be for real- did you enjoy it? These are my thoughts of rockstar!eddie, like everything just spilled out, it’s like that gif of the quill writing while on fire. I just think he’d be so devoted to his girl. His girl, his girl, his girl.

I wrote this because I wanted to write it but I’m also lowkey insecure about whether people find anything I put out interesting.

Lucky Me

single dad Eddie Munson x single mom Reader

A follow up to Meet the Parents 

You have thought, over the last few weeks, about how serendipitous this whole thing is, how the universe’s mysterious ways brought you here - to Hawkins, to the Hideout that night, to Eddie’s bed, and now this bench, watching your daughters play together.

After your one night stand, you arrange a play date and a date date. 

Word Count: 18.5k

Contents: Two love-struck sweethearts (I reccomend reading MtP first). This is not intended for minors, 18+ Oral (M&F receiving), PinV sex, some public groping, Eddie Munson’s filthy (magic) mouth. Eddie & Reader are both single parents. Parent-death mention. Reader suffers a bit with anxiety/gets overwhelmed. No physical descriptors for reader, but mentions wearing Eddie’s t-shirt to sleep in. Food & alcohol TW. Modern AU.

Note: I am incapable of brevity; I am a yapper. But I’ll cut to the chase - writing this has been a silver lining to a lot of change and crap days over the last few months, I started writing this in early January and here we are. I really hope you enjoy this one, and thank you for being patient with me!

Eddie Munson fics | dividers by @saradika-graphics

Your New Year started, as the previous one had - watching the clock and calendar reset to 0:00 as fireworks popped and sparkled beyond your window. The television volume is turned low, not to wake the sleeping girl beside you in her ‘Happy New Year’ hairband and pink pyjamas, sugar-crashed and rosy-cheeked. 

Hazel had wanted to stay up for midnight, but she was drowsy-drunk by nine-forty-five and after an early countdown you found on YouTube, she was asleep in your bed after ten. You did not need to be won over or convinced for a sleepover with your favourite person tonight; you would rather be here with her to kiss her warm forehead as the bells rang than rattling around downstairs alone or away from her at some party of sweaty bodies and strangers. 

Downstairs there are gold streamers to clean up, plates stained with pizza sauce and melted cheese and glasses sticky with the dregs of ‘fancy cocktails’ (a mix of juice and ginger ale that had Hazel giggling and delighted and dancing around the living room). They can wait until morning. Right now, you are content to settle to sleep next to her, feeling cautiously hopeful for what the year will bring. 

Your phone buzzes a few times with texts from friends and family, to be ignored ‘til morning for the most part. And then you see his name among the notifications, the bat emoji and the sweet words and your stomach flips and fizzes. 

Happy New Year sweetheart x

Eddie Munson has a consistent track record of making you feel flush all over in the few short weeks that you have known him. 

The timestamp reads 0:01; you feel tingling excitement that you were on his mind so soon into the new year.

It’s 0:03 when you text him back, and you wonder if he gets that same tightening feeling in his gut when he waits for your reply, like you do with him. 

Happy New Year Eddie xx 

Your brain buzzes as you consider double texting, adding in something sweet about him and Fae having a wonderful new year, but before you can type anything, he has messaged back. 

I hope you and Hazel had a fun night x 

You feel warm all over, smiling involuntarily at his sweetness, and send back a selfie of you both from your party for two earlier in the night - matching smiles and sparky dresses, just coz, and another of Hazel twirling in said sparkly dress.

We partied hard 🥂 bed by 10 😎 How was your NYE? X 

That familiar old feeling of anxious excitement and anticipation of texting a boy has found you again since your night and morning spent in Eddie Munson’s company. You have only seen him twice since; once at the girls’ dance recital and once in Bradley’s, when the girls spotted each other and had a high-pitched, excited reunion in the chip aisle (even though they had seen each other just two days before in school). You have spoken to him every single day since that morning in Munson’s, texts that turned into phone calls and FaceTimes. It had been mostly PG (mostly), but your shared simmering want barely contained as you spoke quietly lately into the night. 

Eddie returns a picture of Fae tucked up asleep under Wayne’s arm on the sofa, the older man with his eyes closed and head tipped back. A second picture of Eddie with a party blower between his lips and streamers in his hair follows. 

Party for one. The lightweights fell asleep before the countdown 🙄

The pictures warm your heart, and you can’t help but go back to the picture of Eddie for a few seconds more before another text follows. 

Can I call? x

Heart thudding quicker, you look down at sleeping Hazel, how her body moves with deep peaceful breaths. Her light sleeping phase has passed, now your daughter could sleep through a marching band most mornings.

You have already decided to tell him yes when he texts again. 

No worries if you’re too tired. Just wanted to hear your voice Hope that’s not too cringe x

You are so endeared by him and put him out of his misery with a quick tap of your thumb. His voice is velvet on the other end of the phone. 

“Hey there,” he murmurs. You can’t see his face but can hear the curved smile on his plush mouth. 

“Hi. Happy New Year.” 

“Happy New Year. I wanted to say it properly. You two looked like you had a fun time.”

Smiling fondly, you look down at Hazel again and brush her hair back with a mother’s gentle touch. 

“We did. She almost made it to ten thirty. We’re having a sleepover in my bed tonight, so she didn’t feel like she was losing out on any fun. I hope you’re not too lonely with the Sleeping Beauties?” 

Eddie laughs low in his throat. You imagine him looking at Fae and Wayne with his warm brown gaze. “Nah, they tried to stick it out. Can’t blame ‘em. Wayne made burgers and then we did sundaes for dessert, like a build-your-own kinda thing. Food comas all ‘round.” 

Their evening sounds comparably cosy to your own - homemade pizzas and the last of the Christmas chocolate to accompany Shirley Temples topped with extra cherries. 

“That sounds lovely, Eddie.” 

There are a few beats of silence, only breathing and the sound of distant fireworks. Eddie is the one to break it. 

“I’d love to see you soon. I wanna see a lot more of you this year, if you want that too.” 

Your chest feels tight in a good way, like your heart has grown too big for your ribs. Maybe Eddie can hear its sped-up thudding on the other end of the phone. 

“I do want that. I’m still looking forward to that date you promised me, Munson.” Eddie’s low laugh is music to your ears. 

“Maybe… Could we meet with the girls soon? On the second, maybe if you’re not busy? We could meet at the park over near the library, get some coffee. Let the girls run around and play fairies or whatever they do.”

Before Eddie can word vomit any more, you say yes. No hesitation. The thought of seeing Eddie coupled with Hazel’s excitement for a play date is too lovely to turn down. 

“I’d love that, Eddie. The second is good for me.” 

“Yeah?” 

“Yeah.”

“Cool. Great.” You can hear his grin. “This isn’t our actual date, by the way. I have a plan for that.” 

In your mind, you imagine his grin melting into the smooth smirk that tempted you when you first met. 

“Oh, you do?” 

“Oh, I do. Are you free next Friday? I have a capable and willing ‘sitter on hand - he comes included with the date. The girls could sleep over here. If you’d prefer to arrange your own, that’s cool. Wayne offered so… up to you.” 

He really had been planning this whole thing out. Your mind starts to race into your own planning mode, looking through your mental calendar and wondering if Hazel would be okay with a sleepover. Eddie’s voice brings you back to the moment. 

“You don’t need to answer now. I’m trying to be more organised this year. A resolution kinda. Tell me when we meet up, yeah?” 

“Yeah. Thank you, Eddie. I’m looking forward to it.” You want to say more, consider zipping your lip and swallowing down the words before you make it weird or too much. Decide, fuck it. “I can’t wait to see you.”

Eddie breathes out relief. “Me too. Me too, sweetheart.” 

You talk for a few more minutes before saying good night, wish each other another Happy New Year and sweet dreams. Hazel slumbers on next to you, and you settle down to sleep with a smile on your face. 

January second is not as bitterly cold as you had feared it might be. Bundled in hats and coats, scarves and gloves, you let Hazel pick the music for your short drive to the park with the playground that she always asks to go to. 

Your girl buzzes and bounces with excitement, smiley-faced in the rearview mirror. 

“I’m sooooo excited to see Fae!”

You catch her eye in the mirror and smile.“I bet she is so excited to see you too, honey.” 

“And we’re getting hot chocolate after we play! To warm up.” Hazel parrots what you had told her earlier, as excited by pink and white marshmallows and extra whipped cream as she was about the play date. 

Hazel talks and you listen, answering her unending curiosity about everything; if there will be other kids there (maybe), will Fae have her sparkly boots on (I think she will, let’s wait and see), if Hazel can have sparkly rainboots (let’s look next time we’re in Target). Her own boots (shiny red) knock against each other as you get closer to the park, excitement flowing off of her in buckets as your belly flutters with anticipation.

You swing your car next to Eddie’s black truck and try not to wince when Hazel squeals her joy. Fae sits in the passenger seat, waving both hands at her friend - by the slightly pained look on Eddie’s face, she is as high-pitched as Hazel is. 

“It’s Fae!! Hi Fae! Mom, let's goooo! I want to see my Fae!” she chirps. 

You share a smile with Eddie through the window, warm-cheeked despite the chilly day, and wrangle Hazel out of her seat so she can embrace her friend. Ten days without seeing each other was apparently unbearable, and they hug and squeal and jump like best friends parted for decades. 

Eddie lingers, watching you watch them, and reaches to squeeze your arm. A little more than two casual parents chaperoning playtime, and so much less than either of you crave. You had been spoiled by his touch and closeness that morning, only slightly satiated by his thigh and arm pressed against yours as you watched the girls prance and twirl at their dance showcase. 

The squeeze dulls the ache and makes it worse all at once. 

“Hey.”

“Hi.”

The weight of whatever it is between you is more than it has any right to be after the little time you had spent together - even though most of that time was having sex and sleeping together as strangers. Whatever it is, though it is laden with desire and cautious hope, does not feel heavy when you are sharing the load with Eddie. 

“Daddy, come on! Let’s rock and roll!” Fae beams, holding Hazel’s gloved hand in her own. 

“Mommy, can we go in now? Pleeeeease?” Hazel asks. 

Your respective Mini Me’s wear matching puppy-dog eyes and bounce in time on booted feet as they await permission (and assistance) to open the gate and start their imagination games. 

Fae Munson has never failed to put a smile on your face. The more you get to know her Dad, you see how much of him she has soaked up into her own self: their shared unbidden laugh, the spark of mischief when they want to push buttons and tease (always in good nature and never ever mean). She reminds you of starlight, breathtaking and sparkling, to your daughter's sunshine-brightness - they are a perfect pair. 

“Okay, okay. Chill for a sec,” Eddie laughs, wobbling his daughter’s head fondly, his hand spread wide like a spider over her lilac beanie. He holds the gate open, gentlemanly as you remember, and falls into step with you as the girls scurry on. “Pick a nice bench for us. I wanna check the slide is dry - Fae got a wet butt on it last time and she was not impressed.”

Fae is already telling Hazel about the horrors of the aforementioned wet butt - a horror of her own impatience and Eddie’s sleepy-headedness after staying up texting a certain someone late into the night. 

He winks at you before following after the girls, calling ‘wait for meeee’ in a girly voice that makes them squeal-laugh and pick up the pace toward the swings to leave Eddie straggling.

You pick a spot with a good view of the girl's realm to roam, but far enough away that they will feel independent and you can soak up your time with Eddie. He checks the swing seats and the slide, dried by the kids who had played earlier that morning and jogs back to you after giving them both a boost onto the jungle gym. You had no time to quadruple-check your appearance in your front camera - not that this was your date.

His smile widens when your eyes meet, and he slows down a touch to enjoy the vignette of you on the bench in the winter sun, glowing and gorgeous. Ethereal, breathtaking. Eddie kind of cannot believe that you are real; you are here, and you like him (at least he is pretty damn sure you do). 

You are warmed through by his gaze and fight the self-conscious feelings that creep in. You have thought, over the last few weeks, about how serendipitous this whole thing is, how the universe’s mysterious ways brought you here - to Hawkins, to the Hideout that night, to Eddie’s bed, and now this bench, watching your daughters play together. 

Eddie sits next to you, thinks about pulling you against his side to keep you warm. He knows he cannot, not yet, but maybe someday. 

“It’s good to see you,” he says. The sunlight shows flecks of gold in his dark brown eyes and the few silver strands in his dark stubble and hair, and you can see the warm vapour of his voice in the chilly air. 

“You too, Eddie. I’m really glad we’re doing this.” There’s an unspoken ‘for the girls’ and a more obvious ‘so that I could see you in the flesh and not just on my phone screen’ that hangs in the air between you. Neither of you needs to say it out loud. 

He smiles and knocks his shoulder against yours gently, radiating warmth and his spicy-warm scent. “S’better in person. Not that I don’t like texting with you, seeing you on FaceTime.”

There’s this familiarity between you, forged over text and video calls and a shared yearning for more that has been roadblocked by your responsibilities and real life. 

Feeling brave, you wonder aloud, “Is it just me, or does this not feel awkward and weird? Like, at all…”

You watch his smile spread, his dimples deepen. A wash of relief releases the slight tension in his shoulders and on his brow. 

“Not just you. We’ve talked most days though… And what’s this, like our fourth time meeting? I think we’ve broken the ice, sweetheart.” Eddie raises his brow, smirking in a way that lets you know that he is remembering that first night and the morning after. 

Warmth floods your cheeks and your belly, letting yourself remember how his hands felt on your body, how he took you apart and held you back together again. 

“Yeah. Yeah, we smashed that ice, huh?” 

His laugh is a smokey, throaty chuckle, bursting from his plush mouth. “Yeah, we did.”

It sets you off, a laugh that you try to haul back, but the seal is broken now, and you have well and truly dashed any iota of awkwardness that may have lingered. Like teenagers who should not be laughing but cannot stop, it gets funnier again just as you stop. The girls look over, curious about their parents shared laughter, and you both wave back at them as you try to settle yourselves. 

“Fae was so damn excited to see Hazel today. She woke me at seven - seven goddamn am. I can just about get her up for school, and then she wakes up at seven on the holidays,” Eddie says, watching them play together. 

“Mm, Hazel too. Seven thirty, but she hasn’t stopped talking about it since I told her she had a play date with her bestie.” 

Your daughter’s laugh blends with Fae’s, both perched in the basket swing that sways back and forth gently. It won’t be long until one of you is called up to push them higher than they can manage themselves.

“I’m glad she met Fae. Having a friend has helped her settle a lot.” Your eyes stay on the girls as you speak, and Eddie’s eyes are on you. “It was hard at first, she missed her old school, her friends, everything. I felt really awful about moving her entire life; she was so quiet, and I felt like the worst Mom ever.”

Your head turns to look at Eddie. “And then she met Fae, and she was like sunshine again. Brighter than ever.”

A warm smile spreads across his handsome face. His hand covers yours, a quick squeeze before retreating again.

“Faerie Dust,” he says, quiet voiced. “She’s good at making things better and she doesn’t even realise it.”

You match his smile, laughing quietly at the marvel that is Fae Munson. “Faerie Dust. Suits her, Eddie.”

“Doesn’t it just,” he says, glancing over to make sure the girls are still okay. “I’m glad she was there for Hazel. Fae… It’s not that she never had friends, but she’s never had a best friend. Not until Little Miss Sunshine over there.”

You feel tears pressing at the back of your eyes, happy relief to match your smile. It is one of those moments, those Mom Moments, when the difficult days and boundless motherly love are affirmed by realising that your kid is just as amazing to other people as she is to you.  

“M’glad she could be that for Fae.”

Eddie squeezes your hand; he gets it. Eddie understands the relief of knowing he is raising someone who is filled with boundless goodness and kindness. 

This time, he does not take his hand away so quickly. Alongside the adoration and pride for his imp of a daughter that fills his heart, there is a growing whisper of more-than-fondness for you and Hazel too. 

You sit in easy silence for a few moments, just watching the girls with their heads together, their giggling and giddy mischief make you both smile. The call comes then (as you knew it would), Fae hollering over at her Dad to come and push them in the swinging basket. She tacks on ‘please!’ and you can see Hazel’s excitement to finally experience the long-fabled crazy-high-swing-pushing that her friend had told her all about.

“Duty calls.” Eddie stands, shares a smile that makes your cheeks warm and the butterflies swoop, and saunters across to them, bringing his mechanic’s strength that earned him the ‘best swing pusher’ title.

With both girls holding on tight, you try not to white-knuckle the bench beneath you as you watch Eddie pushing them in a high swooping arc. Hazel’s little face is wide open and full of joy and her laughter blends with Fae’s delighted whooping. 

You see how Eddie is careful not to push too hard, too high, and how he keeps his body agile and strong to catch the swing again before pushing again. His face is animated as he teases the girls, kind-heartedly asking if this is high enough for them before sending them forward again before they can answer. It is easy to let your mind drift and remember his bare arms, dark ink and pale skin and the way they felt wrapped around you. 

“Mom, look!” 

Hazel’s delighted squeal brings you back to now, making your heart rate spike in a whole other way than your memories had. 

You wave over as she swoops up high once more, “Wow, that’s the highest ever!”

Soon, they are giggle-drunk and beg for Eddie’s mercy, and he only toys with them for a little while before slowing them to a stop, spinning them around a few times until they have had enough. When the girls feel steady-footed again, he helps them down to race each other to the jungle gym to climb and conquer the crow's nest at its highest point. You don’t miss how Fae hugs him quickly, foregoing first place for a little piece of her Dad.

Once more, you watch Eddie make his way to you; his cheeks have a rosy glow from the exertion of swing-pushing. Beneath your winter layers, your body yearns to have him close to you again - partly to steal his warmth but mostly because you miss the way you felt when he held you, hugged you, mapped the sweet and soft spots of your body like he wanted to memorise all of you. 

“What’s that look for?” Eddie asks, slowing to stand in front of you. 

“What look?” you ask, trying to play cool and not smile and flush hot-all-over like a teen with a crush. 

Eddie leans in closer, just enough that you can smell his cologne and spearmint gum, hear his stage-whisper.

“Like you want to eat me.”

The heat of his gaze and the way his lips curve in a wolfish smile bring you back to that night in the Hideout, his quiet deep voice takes you back to one particularly flirty FaceTime call long after bedtime. 

You stop yourself from saying “because I do” by sinking your teeth into your lip, barely stifling a smile of your own. 

Pleased with himself, Eddie retakes his seat next to you and lets his arm rest along the back of the bench, angling his body toward you. 

“I was thinking about our date.” 

You feel just as pleased with yourself when you see his smooth smile sparkle with something more boyish and exciteful, less suave than before. He had been building up to ask you.

“Yeah?” 

“Mmhm. I’m looking forward to it.”

When you shift your eyes away from Hazel and Fae and meet Eddie’s eye, your attempt to play it cool and his barely contained excitement spark like flint, cool exteriors cracking your faces into a shared smile. Both soothed by the simmering excitement you share. 

“Me too,” Eddie says, his mind racing to pull together his ideas for a great first date and pin them down. 

“Claudia’s going to take Hazel for the night.” 

Your cheeks heat up at the memory of Claudia Henderson’s intrigued smile and the flash of excitement that made her eyes sparkle when you asked if she would mind having Hazel overnight again. She didn’t pry, but made you promise her that you would be safe and relax, and to call her if you needed an SOS. 

Eddie’s fingers brush against your arm, a barely there touch through the layers of sweater and coat.

“I’ll pick you up at seven-thirty?”

It’s more than okay, and you have to stop yourself from blurting it out. You temper yourself from being too eager, too enamoured by this man planning a simple date. Later on, your brain will buzz with what to wear and whether you will stay the night with Eddie again, and you will fight that doubting voice that tries to dull the shine of this and ruin your excitement.

“That sounds great, Eddie. Seven-thirty is perfect.” 

Behind the leather and the wash-worn Metallica hoodie, the thermal beneath, Eddie’s heart is pounding and his stomach feels fluttery in a way it has not since he dated Fae’s mom. He thought that part of him was long gone, broken and buried.

“I can’t fuckin’ wait,” he says quietly. “I like spending time with you.”

Your heart is in your throat, and behind his smile, you see a glimpse of the same fears that rattle around your head. Your bodies are like two brackets on the bench, facing each other and holding between you the fragile buds and blooms of whatever this is, familiar and brand new all at the same time.

“Me too. I haven’t had something to look forward to in a long time,” you say, quietly sharing a secret in a mirror image of your daughters together at the top of the jungle gym. “Something that’s just for me. Y’know?”

You are fairly certain that he knows exactly what you mean, and you watch his shoulders sag ever so slightly, letting go of a breath that had been stuck in his throat.

“Yeah. I know that feeling, sweetheart.” 

The girls steal your attention again, waving and calling for both of you so that you will watch them go down the big slide, Hazel first and Fae shortly after. 

Soon, their patience for hot chocolate will wear thin and they will forget the playground in favour of sweet talking and puppy dog eyes with fluttery lashes, asking if it’s time for a treat yet. But until then, they are content to play and share secrets, whisper their shared wonder about what you and Eddie are laughing about.

The return to school and work is silver-lined by your date, a beacon of light in those dark and cold January days. You have promised Hazel a trip to Target for sparkly rain boots on Saturday, fuelled by Mom Guilt for leaving her on Friday night and dressing it up as her own glittering finish line to get through the first week of back-to-school. 

The week crawls by in work, doing inventory and taking a few eager and early Valentine's Day orders, planning a trip to the wholesalers in Bloomington before the Big Day and scheduling consultations with the brides and businesses who want the most special arrangements for the most loved-up day of the year.

With the lazy days and late nights of Christmas behind you, your texts and FaceTimes with Eddie are peppered through your workdays and tired evenings, sending little check-ins and anecdotes about customers in the florist and the garage and keeping each other company on video calls while Eddie folds laundry and you load the dishwasher. He has peppered your conversations with little hints about your date: dinner in the next town over so you can escape the bubble of Hawkins but be close enough for any parent emergencies. His excitement has matched yours, his nerves too, and he is counting down the days until he can see you again.

When you see Wayne in the dance studio parking lot on Thursday, there is an extra twinkle in his eye when he asks about your week and wishes you a late ‘Happy New Year’. There’s something of it, a Munson brand of mischief and magic, that reminds you of Eddie. He doesn’t tease or give you the shovel talk but quietly tells you to have a good time just as the girls are released back to you at six pm. 

All week, you have carried your excitement with you, tucked safely in your sternum beneath your cosy winter sweaters and your work apron. It is a different kind of simmering excitement and fear than you had felt that first morning with Eddie. As you fall asleep on (what Eddie has dubbed) Date Eve, cheeks still aching from smiling as you flirted hard with the mechanic over text, you imagine it as blowing soapy bubbles with Hazel in the garden when she was smaller. The slow blow, growing the bubble bigger and bigger with bated breath. Will it pop and leave your cheeks wet and eyes stinging, or will it float and shimmer iridescent in the sky? When your brain finally slows down, allows you to relax enough to drift off, you dream of Hazel’s baby laugh and the sun on your skin and bubbles flying up into the blue sky. 

You wake on Friday feeling like all of the water in your body has been swapped from still to sparkling. You make breakfast sandwiches with egg and cheese and stow a packet of Mini M&Ms and a little note for Hazel in her lunch box. Hazel is delighted by your extra good mood, singing ABBA and Shania Twain and Love Shack with you in the car, asking (full of innocence) if this is ‘that Friday Feeling’ she had heard grown-ups talk about.

You bring doughnuts into work and share your good mood with your co-workers who ask if you have heard from ‘your guy from the bar’ over the holidays. An unsubtle ‘maybe’ as you arrange a bouquet for a new mom sets them off, excited to know more and playfully frustrated by your elusive answers. You focus on the butter-yellow arrangement and avoid saying too much, smiling too much, or gushing about how you’re seeing him later today.

They already know. 

Eddie wanted to get you flowers for your date; he knew you had a particular love for them, one that brought you all the way to Hawkins to manage Ivy Lane Floral Boutique and restart your life in a new town. When he knew you were meeting a supplier earlier in the week, he swung an early lunch and called in to order a simple bouquet with a few ideas of what he wanted, helped along by your coworkers. They kept the order a secret, not wanting to spoil the surprise, off the books and safely stashed away from the other orders in the back. Most importantly, they will make sure you’re busy with something else or already gone home when he comes in to collect it later on. 

All day, you wait for something to dampen your sunny mood. A call from the school or a text to cancel or announce a change of plans or a change of heart. Something to drag you down, back to cold reality. Something.

There is no cloud to eclipse the sun, no rain to stop play. 

You leave work, pick Hazel up, make dinner for her, and pack her off to Claudia’s without a hitch - no tears, no “I want to stay with you, Mommy!”. You squeeze her extra tight when she lets you and thank Claudia for the hundredth time before heading home for your everything shower and a fortifying glass of wine. 

Time moves too quickly and then not at all as you wait for seven-thirty. There are discarded outfit picks and shoe options around your room, and your bathroom bin has black-smeared cotton pads and Q-Tips from an eyeliner mishap and laddered tights that caught on your rings. You look in the mirror, smoothing your hands over the bumps and dips that stand out and re-thinking the black skirt and sweater topped with an oversized leopard bomber (your Christmas gift to yourself). It felt too much and not enough, rethinking your lipstick and the chunky boots and how you had styled your hair. 

You’re just about to change back into black jeans when Eddie’s knuckles meet your front door. 

Your heart sparks and spikes with excitement. One more look in the mirror; deep breath, relax your shoulders, smooth your skirt one more time. You know you look good.

On the other side of your door, Eddie is vibrating with excitement and the sharp chill of a winter breeze. He can hear your footsteps as you make your way to him, checks his breath again and makes sure he’s not crushing your flowers in his sweaty palm. 

“Hi.” 

You’re a vision, haloed by the hallway light in the doorway. Like a painting he would have pored over in high school art history. 

“Hey.” 

Standing on your doorstep in black leather and charcoal, the porch light makes his curls glow like a halo. Eddie looks edible. 

It takes a moment for you to see the flowers, a bouquet of sweet-smelling deep reds, complimentary blushes and soft tones, a pop of purple.

“You look amazing,” he says, his smile is boyish and you can’t mistake the hunger in his eyes, see how his gaze lingers on where your skirt hugs your hips and the sheer black tights wrapped around your legs. After not-so-subtly checking you out, he remembers to be a gentleman. “I got you these. I know it’s probably crazy to get flowers for a florist…” 

“Eddie, they’re lovely. Thank you. Come in for a sec and I’ll get a vase.” 

When the door is closed, you take a moment to feel the weight of ‘this is really happening’ and the realisation that Eddie is in your house and you haven’t tidied much at all. You had accounted for every possible part of tonight, except this.

“Nice place,” he says, looking around at the maximalism of your style and the touches of parenthood until he simply has to get his eyes back on you. 

“We’re still making it ours, a few boxes left to unpack in the guest room.” 

Your hands cover his, feeling the chill carried from inside and the body-warm chunky metal of his rings as you take the flowers. You recognise them all, lilac, delphinium, ranunculus and rose, recognise their varieties and their meanings. Eddie had done his homework. 

“I love them, Eddie. Thank you.” 

Standing toe to toe, you breathe in the scent of him and close the chasm to kiss his cheek. 

“And thanks for supporting a local business.” 

His cheeks flame and dimple as you take the flowers and slip past in a haze of rich perfume, beckoning him to follow with that smile of yours. 

Hummingbird wings beat hard in your chest as Eddie follows you to the kitchen. You ask how Fae is and how the first week back to school went for them as you fill a vase for your bouquet to rest in. 

Eddie watches you easily move around the kitchen, admiring the bouquet as you untie the brown paper wrappings and lovingly make the flowers at home in the vase. His cheek is scorched from where your lips had grazed him, and yet he somehow manages to not sound like a bonehead as he answers you. 

He can’t tear his eyes away long enough to be nosy about how your house looks, if you have any pending DIY jobs you might need a helping hand with (he knows you are more than capable, wouldn’t want to offend with an offer to bang a nail in your wall). 

There is no prize for catching him looking at you. Eddie doesn’t hide his awe-filled and hungry gaze that makes you warm all over. 

Despite the heat, you bundle yourself in your scarf and wool bomber, and check that your bag has everything you might need for the night (and the morning). 

“Ready?”

“Ready.” 

Eddie smiles and steps closer, both of your black boots toe to toe again, and fixes your scarf slightly as an excuse to touch. 

“Perfect.” 

You resist ducking your head, decide to be brave instead of shy, and slip your hand onto the buttery leather wrapped around Eddie’s arm. 

“Not so bad yourself.”

You watch his gaze drop to your lips and the not-so-subtle way he moves millimetres closer. 

Drawn together to meet each other halfway, it can’t be deciphered who kissed who first, a product of mutual longing. Melted together by your kitchen island, you share your breath and your lip stain with Eddie.  

There are fireworks behind your eyes and trapped in your veins. After weeks of waiting and wanting, you are both finally put out of your misery. 

You can taste the want on Eddie’s lips, his tongue. A man long starved of the affection he deserves, scared to ask for it and try again. He has wanted and waited too, with itchy fingers and a twisting need in his gut, all because of you. The memory of you laid out on his sheets, remembering your body and the taste of you, had almost driven him wild. Now he has you held safe in his hands, and you have him too. You don’t want to stop. You don’t have to stop. 

But you do. As easy as it would be to walk blindly upstairs, finding and fumbling your way to bed, you both want more than sex. So much more. 

Kisses slow, lips smile. You give in to wanting and share one more kiss, let it linger.

“I really wanted to do that,” Eddie whispers, tipping his head forward against you. 

“Me too.” 

You thumb gently at his stained mouth, giggling at the mess you have made of him before he has even bought you dinner. 

“That colour suits you,” you whisper, before spilling into more giggling laughter, heads together. 

Eddie returns the favour, attempting to tidy the smudges and making it slightly worse. Best left to your expertise. Within moments, you look like perfection once again, no bleeding lines or spilled-over stains. 

“Better?” 

He takes a moment, gives you an exaggerated once-over before nodding. “I liked it messed up. But yes.”

“Like ‘Eddie Woz Here.’” 

Your eyes flash, siren-like. 

Eddie likes the sound of that, likes the look in your eyes too.

“Careful. Or I’ll mess it up again.”

“I hope you do.” 

Eddie’s head tilts back, eyes on the ceiling instead of you. “Oh, I’m in so much trouble with you. Fuck.” 

He does not sound too pressed about that, nor does he look too annoyed with that smile on his face. You’re emboldened by his playfulness.

“C’mon, Munson. You promised to wine and dine me. Let’s go before I need to fix my makeup some more.”

His face is split in a grin, pure delight to see this fun and feisty side of you that he had met in The Hideout, the same sweet woman with a devilish side that he had got to know more and more with every text. He does his best to ignore the stirring in his gut when you call him ‘Munson. ’ 

Waylaid by one more kiss by the front door, you are soon on your way to Bedford with the clock ticking down to the dinner reservation Eddie had made. The thirty-minute drive goes by in a blink, catching up on how your respective Fridays had been and checking in about things the other had mentioned during the week on your calls and in your texts, all soundtracked by Eddie’s loud rock music turned at a low volume.

He squeezed your knee at a few stoplights, and you covered his hand on the gear stick as you cruised down the IN-37. You did not miss how his cheeks looked even more red in the glow of taillights and how his dimples deepened in a way that made your tummy twirl with fondness.

Once his black Ford truck is parked safely in a little lot within walking distance from your restaurant and your activity for the evening, Eddie rounds the bonnet to open your door and offer you a hand.

“A gentleman. I better thank Wayne for raising you right.” 

Eddie smiles and squeezes your hand, keeping a hold of it as he clicks the lock and tucks the key away. 

“My Mom was big on good manners, but Wayne? He’s somethin’ else.”

Eddie had mentioned that he had lost his Mom young, alluded to the fact that his Dad was absent (and not the best when he was around). His love for his Uncle was clear, and from your interactions with Wayne long before you met Eddie, you know that it is returned in spades.

“That man can swear like a sailor though. Don’t let the smile and Southern Charm fool you.” 

There is a sparkle in Eddie’s eyes beneath the streetlights as you walk towards your destination, a little Mexican restaurant that shares its warm glow and spiced aroma from a tucked-away spot just off the main drag of Bedford. 

The air is cool, but Eddie’s warm hand makes it all feel warm and glowing. The small town feels different in the dark, looks different. You had viewed a house on the outskirts before finding your home in Hawkins, only saw the centre of town when you were trying to follow the Google Maps directions to the too-small house on the back end of town. 

You tell Eddie all about it as he navigates for you both, making sure you don’t need to dodge other pedestrians or lamp posts as he listens to your story. You realise halfway through just how boring it is and trail off. He squeezes your hand like he can read your self-chastising thoughts. 

“Well, I’m glad it was a shitty house. Hawkins is poky, but I think you fit in just fine, sweetheart,” he says, knocking your shoulders together. 

He winks at you when you look up at him, makes your gut somersault in such a pleasant way. 

“You can tell you’re not from there though,” he says. And when you try to decipher why, he simply smiles and says, “You’re way too pretty to be from Hawkins, honey.”

Your shoulder knocks against Eddie’s arm in playful retaliation.

“You’re so full of it, Munson.”

There is no malice laced in your words, and Eddie can tell it is your shields going up. He can see how you have turned in on yourself, self-conscious and self-sabotaging behind a bashful smile. 

“I mean it,” he says, squeezing your hand in a double time beat, “And not in the ‘everyone in Hawkins fucks their cousins’ way. Some do. I’ll show you my yearbook sometime, woof.” Eddie stalls your meandering pace a few feet away from the door of the restaurant. 

“I’ve never met anyone like you. You’re gorgeous, and you’ve got somethin’ real beautiful in here,” he says, tapping the centre of your chest. “You’re one of a kind.”

That part of you that ruins everything wants to duck your head beneath your wrapped-up scarf and brush him off, but the part of you that has been nourished by getting to know Eddie over the last few weeks, the part that you thought had withered away beyond revival, feels so much stronger, braver, brighter. 

You pull him closer so you can kiss his cheek, rest your head against his as you will the right words to come out of your mouth.

“You don’t have to say anything back,” he whispers. “Just needed you to know that’s how I think of you.” 

Pulling back a little to look at you again, hoping you will not duck your head or dodge his eye, Eddie smiles softly. “I don’t have any expectations here. I like you, I think you like me. But I’m okay to take it at our own pace. Even if it’s kinda ass-backwards.”

The truth of it makes you laugh, how this all started with pure lust and how it has blossomed into something that could be beautiful.

“I do like you, Eddie. It scares me a little just how much I like you.” 

You kiss him again, a sweet brush of lips that makes you both crave more.

“And I will like you even more once I’ve had a taco and a margarita.”

His laugh is loud, echoing into the dark evening and pulling attention from passers-by. 

“Food motivated, I can work with that.” 

Eddie cups your face with gentle hands and kisses you again until you’re smiling against each other's mouths, not caring that you’re in the middle of the street, blocking up the sidewalk.

The tacos are perfectly spiced and fresh with housemade tortillas and hot sauces, wedges of lime on the side, and the margarita you order has that perfect balance of sharp citrus and smokey tequila. The little table tucked away in the back has been the perfect spot to get to know each other more and more, picking back up the threads of conversations that were better explained in person rather than over the phone.

You both leave the bones of your past relationships mostly buried, a mutual unspoken agreement. It is enough, for now, to say that your relationship with Hazel’s Dad ended because he had found other things and other women he wanted to do instead of being a partner and a father. Eddie tells you that Fae’s Mom was his on-and-off girlfriend, that they were firmly off when he was told there was a baby on the way; he wanted to make something work and she didn’t want any part of it. There is so much more both of you can say, but tonight is not about the past.

Instead, you talk about books and films, Eddie tells you more about his love of music and how he got into D&D. You stash away the little tidbits of Eddie-lore for yourself. He asks about when you got into floristry, about the city you lived in before moving to Hawkins. Eddie isn’t shy about asking you things and you love that, love that he listens. He is a rare gem and you want to keep him all for yourself. It feels comfortable and easy, and you give as good as you get when he flirts with you and shares bites of creamy elote in exchange for a taste of your margarita. 

He tells you about how he wants to see the ocean one day, take Fae to dip their toes in the briny tide. His Mom had promised him she would take him one day, but they never had the money or the chance, and then it was too late. 

“Fae looks really like my Mom,” he says. “It spooks Wayne sometimes.”

The thought and the one that follows it make you smile, “So that means you must look like your Mom too.” 

You see a flash of boyish pride as Eddie nods. He tempers his smile with a bite of salty tortilla chip smothered in guacamole. When he shows you the photo on his phone - a picture of a picture with a hit of his thumb in the corner - you see the resemblance to Fae in his mother’s carefree smile, the sparkle in her eyes caught by the camera as she holds her little boy. 

“Beautiful,” you murmur, taking another moment to look at her before shifting focus to the four-year-old version of the man sitting in front of you. Rosy cheeks, smiling up at his Mama with his shiny milk teeth. He takes your breath away.

“Eddie, you little cherub!”

“Butter wouldn’t melt, huh?” 

He smiles, pushing down that heart-aching feeling he still gets when he thinks of her. More than once since meeting you, Eddie had wished he could tell his Mom all about you, gush and let her tease him a little about having a crush. Wayne, as always, had picked up the slack.

By dessert, you have promised him some wildflower seeds for bee-obsessed Fae, and Eddie’s been holding your hand since you passed his phone back. Your face hurts from smiling as you share horchata crème brûlée and sugar-dusted churros with hot chocolate sauce, even though your stomach is full and your skirt feels tighter than it had earlier. 

Eddie had switched to soda halfway through the meal so he could get you both back to Hawkins safely, but he feels more love-drunk than any buzz from beer could give him. His cheeks have that same rosy hue as the picture he showed you.

Your attention is pulled to the cinnamon sugar caught on his lower lip line. It has evaded the swipe of his tongue, chasing the taste of sweet and rich desserts. 

“Do I have something on my face, sweetheart?” he asks, catching your gaze fall to his mouth for the fifth time. 

“Yeah, you have a little…” Tapping your own lip, you watch a flicker of amusement cross his face. “C’mere, I’ll get it.” 

Your hand cups his cheek across the small table, reaching and leaning toward each other to meet in the middle. Your thumb grazes his lower lip, brushing away the sparkling spiced sugar, but neither of you move away. A second more purposeful slow drag of your thumb along Eddie’s lower lip sparks like a match; the hot flame is reflected in his eyes and catches on the embers of want that have settled low in his gut all evening, all week, longer. 

“Got it,” you whisper, feeling the same heat. 

“Thanks.”

Eddie’s voice is smokey and low, just loud enough for you to hear. He leans into your palm, presses his lips to your thumb. His eyes never leave yours.

Taking your hand as it falls away from his jaw, Eddie places another kiss on your knuckles and you can feel your heart hammering hard behind your ribs, hear it race in your ears. You are so focused on him that you barely register when he signals for the bill. He cannot see how your thighs squeeze together (not for the first time that night) beneath the table.

“So, did the taco and marg help?” he asks, leaning forward a little more. 

Puzzled, too mesmerised with want to get it, it takes another little prompt before you can answer. 

“Out there, you said you’d like me even more after a taco and a margarita…” Eddie’s smile is teasing in a fun way, wolfish and cool.

“Mmhm, the tacos were great. Best margarita I’ve had in years.” You mirror him, leaning in closer to say, “The company was my favourite part.”

Eddie laughs low in his throat, just for you to hear. “I thought so too. You’re somethin’ else.”

He is enamoured, nay entranced, by you as you hold his gaze, letting the fire burn between you for a moment until the server comes with the bill and card machine, asking if the food was okay, if you have had a good night. 

Eddie takes charge of the bill as you hype up the margs, promise you will come back again. You don’t see the tip he left, but the look on your server's face and her smiley ‘thank you so much’ tells you all you need to know. 

“Ready to head out?” he asks, tucking his card away again. 

As you stand to put your jackets back on (of course he holds your bomber for you to slip back into), you catch a table of younger women eyeing his broad shoulders and the shape of his arms, hear their whispers of ‘where do I find one like that’ and, ‘damn, he’s fine’. 

He does not let on if he has heard but drops a kiss on your lips once you’re wrapped up for the cold weather again before getting into his own leather jacket. Once his curls are freed from his collar, he pats down the pockets for his keys, wallet and phone before reaching for your hand.

You nab two lollipops from the hostess station, one each (and you don’t have to share them with the girls or worry about hard candy and their teeth), and step back out into the cool night air.

“So we have a choice to make.”

When you look up at Eddie, he has a faux-serious look on his face, and you can see the vapour of his breath in the air. 

“My place or yours?” 

You catch him, not for the first time, off guard, and he cracks out a delighted little laugh. 

“I was going to ask if you wanted to check out the arcade bar down the street or call it a night, but I do like how you think, sweetheart.” 

Full. Body. Cringe. 

“Oh…my god. Wait there for a sec, I’m going to walk in traffic.”

Eddie drags you back by your waist as you pretend to make for the quiet main road. “Nope, no way,” he laughs, winding his arms around you to lock you safely against his chest. Your arms wrap around his middle, locking him against you for warmth and just because you can.

You can still catch his aftershave beneath the lingering scent of warm spices as your cheek rests against his strong chest. 

“I thought that’s what you were going to ask,” you murmur, peering up at him.

“I was; you just got there first.” Eddie smiles, feeling the gentle stroke of your fingertips on the small of his back. “Either way, mine or yours, now or later, if it’s what you want, baby, I’m not ready to say goodnight yet.”

He kisses your forehead, soothing your racing mind. 

“I do. I’ve been thinking about it,” you whisper. “You know I have, Ed.” 

Some of your texts and late-night phone calls had toed that line, barely keeping a lid on your composure and need at the sound of his voice, but each time, you or Eddie had been interrupted by one of the girls about a bad dream or a glass of water.

“I know, baby. I know, me too.” His fingers drift beneath your chin, tilting your face up for a single searing kiss. 

“S’still early. We have plenty of time, no rush,” he murmurs, still in kissing distance. “Will we check out the arcade for a little bit? See if you can beat me on Mortal Kombat?”

You pull back a little, raising your brows at him in a way that makes his jeans a little bit tighter, “Oh, I know I can beat you on Mortal Kombat.”

Eddie scoffs, smiles that wolfish way you like. “You have no idea who you’re talking to. Palace Arcade’s reigning Mortal Kombat II champ two years running. You’re going down”

“Only two?”

For all your fighting talk, your arms are still wound around each other’s bodies. Instead of marching each other right to the arcade, you savour the physical closeness you have both craved and smile against each other's lips as you trade kisses and sass-filled barbs back and forth. 

A sharp breeze from the east is what separates and sends you toward the neon sign for Token across the quiet street, seeking warmth and a definitive answer to who is the supreme of vintage arcade games. 

You pay for the first two drinks and your play cards - two palatable low-alcohol beers and plenty of game credit to thoroughly kick Munson’s ass at every game in the place, including Dance Dance Revolution. Eddie picks air hockey to warm you both up; despite your shared lack of athleticism, you both show off your parental reflexes honed over years of catching sippy cups before they fall and protecting little heads en route to something that will leave a bump or bruise. He beats you by two points, tries not to be too smug about it. 

As you wait for Mortal Kombat to free up, you take turns on Pac-Man and savour the feeling of Eddie’s arm around your shoulders, murmuring directions and trying to steer you into the path of a bright blue ghost. His breath tickles your neck and the weight of his hand on your hip feels like it belongs there. You give as good as you get when it’s his turn, skimming your fingertips along the back waistband of his jeans before they tip-toe into his pocket. Eddie forgets about swallowing up the flashing yellow dots in favour of stealing a kiss that leaves you breathless, leaving Pac-Man himself to be swarmed by the colourful Ghost Gang. 

When it’s your turn again, Eddie ups the ante on distracting you now that the dam has broken. Warm breath and spiced praise whispered against your neck, ‘That’s it, good girl’ drag your mind into the gutter and soaks the gusset of your date-appropriate panties. Pressed close behind you, one hand on your hip and the other on the machine, the solid weight of him is the only thing stopping you from melting into a puddle at his feet. 

Your fairly public foreplay ebbs and flows as you move through the games, shelved in favour of playful trash-talk during two-player Mario Kart and Crazy Taxi, back on again when you find the Addams Family pinball machine, distracting whispers and wandering hands, lingering touches. Everyone else is too distracted by flashing lights and having their own competitive fun to notice or care. 

It’s not all flirtation (but it mostly is); there are sweet moments too and this feels so much more than a first date. You agree on the fact that Gomez and Morticia are relationship goals, and when Eddie spots a Dungeons & Dragons: Tower of Doom game you are flooded with cuteness aggression at his excited little gasp and boyish smile. 

“I’ve only seen one of these once before. I can’t believe they have it,” he says, his body fizzing with excitement. 

“You wanna play it? They might be done soon..?” 

Eddie eyes up the three players holding court at the machine, deep in gameplay. It makes him feel fond, reminds him to arrange something with the Hellfire guys sometime soon. 

“They’re in it for the long haul, I think. Anyway, I’ll be here all night if I start,” he says, shrugging. “I didn’t know they had this. Fuckin’ cool.”

“Well, if they move off you can show me, yeah?” His smile widens and he is barely holding on to reality, utter disbelief that you’re real and you care about his interests. 

Eddie lifts his phone out of his pocket and aims to snap a picture to send to the guys. 

”Hey. Stand in,” you insist. “Show off with your bounty.”

He brushes aside the whisper of embarrassment and hands over his phone. You snap a few pictures of him, beer in one hand and the other firing the devil horns, he sticks his tongue out for one. You catch another of him smiling wide (more at you than posing for the picture). 

“Much cuter than a guy holding a fish he just caught,” you tease. 

“Me? Cute. Psh, get outta here.” 

He thumbs through the photos, struck with some sort of nostalgia at how he can see more of his younger self after an evening with you than he has in a long time, despite the silver strands in his hair and his stubble and the lines around his eyes. He vows to send the pictures into the group chat tomorrow and tucks it away again so his attention is fully on you again. 

Pulling you closer so he can kiss you, Eddie feels a little giddy about how easily these moments of affection have blossomed between you over the last few hours. 

“Not as cute as you.” He does one more kiss on your nose. 

“Hey. Let me compliment you, Eddie.” 

He looks into your eyes, guided by your gentle fingers on his cheek. 

“I mean it. I know it’s hard to, but I think you’re cute.” You can see him fighting a scoff, an eye roll, so you pinch his chin gently and wobble his head. “I can keep going. You’re fucking hot, and you’re funny and you’re so kind. I don’t know how you’re real.” 

He cracks a smile, forces himself not to duck his head even though his shoes seem pretty interesting. He’s not used to this, having someone be sweet to him like you are, like you have been since you met. 

“I’ll try to take the compliments, thank you,” he murmurs, melting a little when you smile, proud of him and a little proud of yourself too. “I promise I’m real.” 

“Lucky me.” 

You reward him, kissing him straight on the lips as positive reinforcement. 

“Now I’m going to kick your cute ass at Mortal Kombat. It’s finally free.” 

If you weren’t so down bad for him, Eddie’s delighted victory over you might be a turn-off.

Alas, you have a thing for nerds.

Back out on the street almost an hour later, he bounces on his feet and mimes poor imitations of the moves he had doled out as Raiden, beating you (as Kitana) fair and square. 

Even when he’s playfully rubbing your face in it, promising he will go easier on you next time, you feel so far gone on him that it makes you ache. You have been carrying that pleasant tenderness in your chest and between your thighs all damn night.

Eddie’s glee is contagious, and you find yourself almost doubled over laughing at his antics as you head for the car. The cool air stings your too-warm cheeks as you walk hand-in-hand, your shared laughter ringing out and pulling attention from other pairs and groups bar-hopping and heading home for the night. The buzz from the cocktails has long passed, and yet you still feel a dizzying high from Eddie’s company. 

Closer to the car, Eddie quietens down a little and squeezes your hand. “Tonight’s been great,” he says, smiling softly. 

“I thought so too. You’re one hell of a date, Eddie. I’m glad we did this.” 

Your meandering pace slows as you near the truck, coming to a stop around the passenger side. 

“Me too, sweetheart.” Eddie ducks his gaze for a moment before looking back at you, you can feel his warmth and sincerity. “I meant what I said on New Year, when I called. I really want to keep seeing you this year. You… I really like you, and I don’t want to complicate what the girls have, but I want to try this with you. We can take it slow as you like.” 

There is an edge of nervousness that you have not seen much of all night, glimpses here and there swiftly covered by a joke or flirtation. But under the silvery moon, Eddie’s showing you his heart.

Your own heart beats hard and fast in your chest, endeared and excited by him, by the future. 

“I meant it too, Ed. I’d like that. I like you.”

His hands settle on your waist, and you instinctively drape your arms around his leather-clad shoulders. 

“So I can take you out again sometime?”

“Mhm. You better.”

He smiles so widely that it’s almost impossible to kiss you like he wants to, messier and less coordinated but full of want and elation.

“M’a lucky guy,” he whispers.

The solid body of the truck is cool against your back, a stinging contrast to Eddie’s warm chest as you crowd up close to each other. His tongue swipes against the plush of your lower lip, asking for permission already granted. The quiet moan that sticks in his throat as your tongues brush together makes you throb with want. Between the truck and the breadth of his strong shoulders, you are a willing prisoner to lust and desire, wanting to touch and be touched.

Your brain feels scrambled, loose wires on the fritz, as you make out and touch each other like two teens on borrowed time. Adults on borrowed time, real life and its joys and mundanity looming again.

“Your place.” 

Whispering breathlessly against his kiss-abused mouth, Eddie hums a quiet affirmative and can’t resist pulling your hips against his one more time before breaking the kiss. 

“Fuck. Yeah, yeah. Anything you want.”

He fumbles for his keys as your fingers trail down his shoulders, over his chest and down down down to his belt. 

“Anything?” 

Eddie nods, eyes fluttering shut as you cup him through his jeans. 

“Anything. Everything.”

He manages to unlock the car, a feat of determination and multitasking as you play with him. 

“I knew you were trouble.” 

Even as he playfully chastises you, his hips push forward in an involuntary roll seeking more more more of your warm, teasing touches.

You kiss his lower lip, trail your mouth down the dark grown-out stubble on his jaw. “You like it.”

You don’t see how his eyes almost cross when you kiss his neck, graze your teeth along the tendon and soothe the sting with your sweet tongue.

“Fuck, I do.” 

It is only when you hear other voices drifting through the almost empty lot that you manage to tear yourself away from each other, your hands above the belt again. Eddie presses one last firm kiss to your mouth, like a promise; ‘this isn’t over and you’re so in for it’ without saying a word. He opens the car door, a little less gentlemanly about where he lets his hands wander as he helps you into the passenger seat this time.

You feel a little giddy as you catch him adjusting himself as he rounds the hood, catching your eye through the windshield. 

“Minx,” he murmurs as he slips into the seat.

If you both did not have so much to lose, it would be a no-brainer to pull over to some shady lay-by and pick up where you had left off. But Eddie’s fresh bedsheets and the plum lace beneath your clothes deserve to be enjoyed. 

At red lights, he leans over to steal a kiss, leaving you wanting more when it turns green. You try to get your own back, tracing the inner seam of his jeans with painted fingernails until he warns you to behave yourself. The denim feels too tight and tighter still when he catches the way you squeeze your thighs together at his firm words. 

“Knew you were a real temptress beneath the flowers and sunshine.” 

He had said that one night on the phone, and the memory of his velvety voice in your ear had been stashed away in your bedside drawer for lonely nights. 

Now you had the real thing again, and you were going to savour it. 

You had both checked your phones before leaving the arcade, making sure there were no calls or texts missed from Wayne or Claudia. No emergencies; you have until morning to enjoy each other. 

It’s late, but not quite midnight, when he parks in his driveway on Birch Avenue. If any of his neighbours are up late enough to peer out of their curtains to see you hot-foot it hand in hand into the house, you don’t notice, nor do you care. 

Eddie makes light work of the lock, clinging on to his composure until he can close and lock it behind you again, encasing you both in the bubble of his cosy home all over again. Something like relief floods your body as you take in the familiar sight of Eddie and Fae’s shoes by the door, the lived-in loveliness of their house. 

And Eddie feels it too, he likes how you look in the low light of his front hallway - a little less put together than you had been when you left your house, perfectly unwound by the fun and flirtation of your evening together. 

There is this pregnant pause, a bubble of easy silence as you both just take it all in. When you catch Eddie’s eye, catch him looking, you smile and pull him into you again as you rest back against the door. 

Your lips meet in a slow kiss, much less frantic and boiling hot than before, and yet the press of Eddie’s leg between your thighs, bunching up your skirt, stokes the fire burning inside you. Like a slow match strike, you drag your hips and savour the pleasurable friction.  

Eddie takes advantage of your slackened jaw and slides his tongue against yours, swallowing down the sweet noises you can’t keep a hold of as you pull him tighter against you. 

His jacket is the first thing to go, pushed off his shoulders and down onto the floor. Your scarf follows, then your own jacket as you move blindly, as one, toward the stairs. 

After almost falling on his ass at the first step, Eddie breaks the kiss to lead you up to his room. You could probably find your way, but keep holding his hand as he leads you into the lamp-lit haven of his bedroom. 

His sheets are deep green this time; they look brand new and so soft. Before you can inspect them any further, Eddie’s hands are back on your hips. 

“Y’okay?” 

“Never better.” 

Another smiling sweet kiss moves you closer to the bed. It yields beneath his weight and yours as you straddle his lap; all decorum about keeping your skirt unbunched and tidy has long gone. Wide ringed hands take advantage of the gathered-up fabric, encouraging the push-and-pull friction you both crave. 

You feel him, solid and hot and straining against his denims. Since your hands wandered earlier in the night, you knew you wanted him in your mouth and nothing could change your mind. 

Eddie chases your mouth when you pull back; his eyelids are heavy, lips wet and red. You watch his brows pinch as you get a hand on him again, see his jaw slacken and feel as his legs widen to give you all the space you need. 

You find that spot on his neck again, the little nook that made him go almost crossed-eyed earlier, and soak in the breathy ‘fuck’ and the pulse and kick beneath your stroking fingers. Kissing lower, you pull gently at the neck of his fine knit charcoal sweater so you can nip Eddie’s collarbone, breathing in the musk of his cologne and the barely-there metallic tint of the chains around his neck. 

There’s a gorgeous pink hue across his cheeks and nose when you look up at him again, a dopey smile that makes you feel fond and urges you to kiss him again. Just one and you move away, leaving him pouting, wanting more, feeling greedy. With his hand on himself, missing your touch, he can’t look away as you rid yourself of the skirt and top. The shape of you in your bra and tights and boots makes him feel crazy. 

“Look at you. Pretty girl.” 

He spies the shape and shadow of matching plum lace beneath your tights as the boots come off. You’re not even trying to be sexy, not trying to tease him as you remove each layer, but he feels wild with desire anyway. 

Eddie is back on you once your tights have been dropped onto the pile of discarded clothes, his hands roaming over your hips and midriff, smearing wet kisses to your shoulders and chest. You feel his appreciation for the Third Love set (that had been long relegated to the back of your drawer) in the intensity of his gaze and the reverence of his touches.

If you’re brain could manage a coherent thought that’s not Eddie Eddie Eddie, you might realise that no one has ever desired you like this man. He’s not shy, nor is he coy or cocky about how he wants you; he just does. 

There are more messy kisses as you work his belt and jeans open, broken only when Eddie whips his sweater off. You feel an almost Pavlovian throb between your thighs at the metallic clinks of buckle and button. In his black tank top and open jeans, low on his hips, with nothing to hide his straining briefs and bulked-up arms, your mouth waters. 

You get stuck on his arms for a moment, the uncovered ink and firm muscles from his work hefting tyres and car parts all day. Giving in to impulse, you press wet kisses along the ‘one ring’ tattoo that wraps around his bicep and the cobweb that caps off his shoulder. 

“You’re unreal,” he whispers, bringing your mouths together again and getting his itchy hands back on you, the squish of your hips and the butter-soft lace. 

“Take your pants off.” 

You smile against his mouth when he moans, swearing quietly that you’re definitely trying to kill him. 

“No, I just want to get my mouth on you,” you promise, finger-tipping along the band of his underwear. 

“Jesus, that mouth.” 

His smile is sunshine, cheeks dimpled and rosy as he pinches your face so your lips pucker for his kisses. 

You won’t complain; kissing him has quickly become a top-five favourite thing to do, and you want as many as possible before you must part ways and go back to real life again in the morning. 

“Off. Please.”

Eddie decides he might, for the first time in his life, start doing as he’s told - well, as long as you’re the one telling him. You, with your kiss-swollen lips and siren-eyes. He would do whatever you asked, and not simply because your hand is holding his cock. 

His jeans come off, caught briefly by his still-on boots - that made you both laugh until you knelt between his legs to help untie his boots and free his ankles of tangled denim. 

He’s half expecting you to come back up to him, even though you look so pretty between his thighs. Like a flower or a jewel or something else poetically beautiful and precious in between his hairy thighs, doodled in dark ink. Less poetically, he thinks you’re hotter than any adult film or fantasy he could come up with, even on his loneliest nights. 

“You don’t have to…”

He wants you to (of course he wants you to) but doesn’t want you to feel like you owe him anything because he ate you out last time. Twice. 

“I know. I wouldn’t if I didn’t want to, Ed. Been thinking about it.” 

And you had been. More than you thought possible, more than you ever had with any other man you had been with before. 

Your cheeks are warm at your own admission, and Eddie’s are pink to match. Inside his head, he is whooping and cheering himself on. Being wanted, craved like this, is alien to him and he almost does not know what to do with himself.

“Can you pinch me real quick? I think I’m in some sorta dream or something.” 

A quick graze of teeth against his inner thigh confirms that he is, in fact, awake and alive, and you are real and past ready to get your mouth on him. He is almost embarrassed by the noise that escapes his mouth - part moan, part hiss, part giggle - but right now he is simply too turned on to give a shit about playing it cool. 

Not trying to stall, just to be considerate, Eddie passes you one of the extra pillows on his bed for your knees and gives you one more kiss before letting you do, at last, what you want to him. 

In your cosy space between his knees, you take a moment to marvel at the thick bulge trapped in black boxer briefs. You know it’s pretty, remember the way it felt splitting you open when he pushed slowly inside. Butterfly-gentle kisses weave your path up to the waistband and along the dark happy trail that guides you to your prize; the slight pudge to his belly makes your mouth water. You catch the hitch in Eddie’s breath when your nails bite briefly into the soft parts around his hips, dragging the briefs down out of sight and mind.

Just as nice as you remembered, the comedian in your brain wonders if there’s a lipstick to match the warm pink tip. If Eddie could muster the courage to look at you (he will, he just needs a sec), he might have caught the way you smiled at your own private joke. Instead, he feels your warm fingers and that smiling mouth against him before your tongue swirls just right.

He’s done for. 

You can’t deny how that wrecked sound from him makes you throb between your legs. It only spurs you on though, taking him in your mouth. Hot and heavy and thick enough to make you slow down, not choke yourself too soon, you hold no regret for your fixated thoughts this week. 

Eddie feels like a dumb seventeen-year-old again, not believing his luck that a pretty girl wants to do this with him and too horny-dumb to hold back his little noises or run his mouth. 

“Oh fuck, yes.” His voice is wrecked-raspy; he grabs at the duvet, white-knuckled and trying his best to keep his hips still for you.

When he feels strong enough, brave enough, to look at you (fairly confident he won’t expire or embarrass himself), he is sure that you’re straight out of a fantasy or a dream. The slow and determined bob of your head and smudged mascara beneath your eyes, the stretch of him beneath your cheek, and your body wrapped in that maddeningly perfect plum lace. 

When you look up at him, teetering on that line of too much, too deep, he’s already looking at you. Eddie looks utterly fucked; pink cheeks and flushed chest, wild hair and lips almost bruised from his own teeth. 

You’re fairly sure that it is your own involuntary moan that makes him gasp ‘fuck!’ in that wrecked way. Eddie forgets about keeping his hips still, thrusting forward to chase pleasure, enough to make you choke a little bit.

His fucked-out brain is a beat behind as you cough, spluttering as you pull back to catch your breath.

“Shit, sorry. Sorry.”

Even when you promise him it’s fine, Eddie is reverent about how he wipes your tears. 

You silence him with a quick kiss, covering his hands on your hot, damp cheeks as he holds you like a treasure. 

“Ed, it’s fine.” You kiss him one more time, slower. “It’s fine.”

Before you can get back to it, Eddie grabs a kiss of his own, slow and long, and drops his head against yours. 

“Sorry.”

“Stop apologising.”

Both smiling again, you are certain that a man has never been so deserving of having his soul sucked out through his dick. 

You would be honoured to be the one to do it.

Eddie catches the way your hips drag slightly against the pillow and almost bites through his lip. A little pressure takes the edge off, just right but not enough all at the same time; waiting can make it more fun. Every moment is fun with Eddie.

Before taking him in your mouth again, you coax his fingers away from nearly ripping the duvet and bring your joined hands to rest on his thigh. He is almost distracted by the sweetness of it until he feels your mouth again, all thoughts overridden by the velvety warmth of your tongue. 

His murmured praise for you, the breathy little noises he cannot keep behind his lips, only spurs you on more. They turn you on more too. 

When you have found the rhythm again, using your tongue and that sweet suction to make his eyes roll back, you lift your joined hands and guide him to hold your head.

“Fuuuck,” he breathes, husky and low. 

He’s not pushy about it, does not change up anything you’re doing, but you both lean into that extra layer of trust that has opened up between you. If anything, he is even more giving with his praise for you, how good you’re making him feel and how pretty you look for him. 

Eddie loves how he can feel that fluttering feeling when he tips against your throat, the snug heat of it; he soaks up the wet wrecked sounds and the sparkling tears on your cheeks until he feels too close too quickly. 

“C’mere. Come up here to me.” His voice is just short of pleading; he needs to get his hands back on you, wants to make you feel good too. 

“Everything okay?” you ask, hands on his thighs. The rough edge to your voice makes him tingle. 

“Fuckin’ peachy. S’just…been awhile. Didn’t want to come yet.” 

Kitten licking the tip again, a wet kiss to his belly, you feel a little devious. “Oh, good.”

Perched back on the bed and back in his lap, you cannot get enough of each other. Eddie is just about careful enough not to rip your lace when he gets his mouth on your chest, wet kisses and nipping teeth. The sound of your voice bouncing on the bedroom walls when he pushes your panties to the side to touch you bursts with relief, with desire for more. You feel his hardness throb against you at the sound of his name on your lips.

As quick and careful as you can manage, Eddie lays you out on his deep green bedsheets. He takes a mental snapshot of you, bra askew and eyes heavy-lidded, before resuming his kissing and touching. 

“Beautiful,” he murmurs against your breast, “So fucking pretty.”

“Me or my tits?” You stroke your fingers through Eddie’s hair, smiling dreamily when he looks up at you. 

“Both.”

He very pointedly kisses each one before nuzzling the warm space between, feeling your heart thumping beneath his lips. His mouth leaves wet little smooch-marks behind as he makes his way up to your lips again, sharing a few more smiling kisses as he reaches around on his bedside table for something to keep his hair out of his face.

You are painfully endeared by the triumphant little noise he makes when he finds it, and kiss him a little more about it, distracting his Boy Brain from the task at hand. Even though you are soaked for him, even though he is borderline painfully hard for you, there is this moment of total fondness for each other. Curtained in by dark curls, you are besotted by his pink glow and dimples.

Eddie shifts to kneel between your legs, winking at you before he flips his head back to gather and tie his hair up in an annoyingly perfect topknot. You are mesmerised by the flex and stretch of his arms, the light and shadow of his body in the golden lamplight. You wonder about summer, whether Eddie might wear his work coveralls tied at the waist to beat the heat of the shop. You hope so, and you can’t wait to see it; it makes your tummy flutter in a whole new way. 

The drag of thick thigh muscle against your core brings you back to the here and now with the man in your daydreams. You chase the feeling, jaw slackened by how badly you need him to touch you. 

Eddie can see it, and he likes how it looks on you. He wants to give you whatever you desire, everything you deserve.

His hands are not baby-soft; they are work-worn and guitar-string-scarred, but they are so gentle when he rolls your underwear down. They land somewhere amongst the rest of his and her's discarded clothes. Your bra is next, the last to go, forgotten until morning. 

He looks perfect, his head framed by your thighs, cheek resting against the soft fat and muscle. He looks at home there, watching transfixed at how you open up for those gentle hands, hearing the pretty sounds you make for him. His stubble is the right side of rough as he murmurs to you. 

“All this for me?” Eddie asks, watching for your reaction as his thumb glides over your swollen clit.

Even when your hips buck toward his touch, when your legs tremble as he dips the tip of his finger into you. It is all just enough for you to forget how to speak, play with his food while he’s waiting for an answer. 

Another featherlight swipe makes you gasp, wringing out a whine he wants to record and listen to on a loop.

“Answer me, baby, please. Is this all mine?” he whispers.

Your answering nod is a weak thrash of your head; you are pinned under his gaze like a specimen behind glass, trapped in syrupy amber. 

“Yeah. Please, Eddie.”

His answer smile is proud and lazy and lovely, all for you. 

“That’s it, sweetheart. Thank you.”

You feel fit to implode, so tightly wound with need, and Eddie is about to unravel you - the anticipation is nearly too much. 

“Lucky me.”

And then he is almost silent, and any noises he does make are drowned out by you.

His hands might be gentle, but his tongue is silk-soft and sure as he ice-cream-licks his way into you. As much as you had been thinking about getting your mouth on Eddie, his mind had wandered back to that morning between your legs more times than he could count.  Now he is back there, a heavenly place, he has no ambition to leave despite how his hips press against the bed to seek relief. Right now, the sweet taste and the sweet sounds you make are enough. 

One leg over his shoulder, the other splayed out to the side like a ragdoll, Eddie has you just how he wants you: open and wantonly taking all of the pleasure and good things you deserve. He takes his time with you, watches what you like, what makes you throb and keen and gush. He takes his work seriously.

His mouth is firm, wet, determined, unravelling you from the very core. If your brain was not so blissed-out, you might realise that you have never been so at ease and your thoughts so syrupy-slow. There’s a fleeting idea that he might be some kind of sex magician - it makes you smile lazily at the ceiling - but you are pulled out of your head by the careful stretch and push of two fingers and his honeyed tongue. 

Between your thighs with the weight of your hand on his head, his mouth on your cunt, Eddie is fairly certain he could die happy here. He likes his life, loves it, but should an asteroid hit, he would feel fairly content with his life if these were his final moments. The zing of pleasure down his spine when you tug his curls makes him moan against you, slackening his aching jaw. 

He can tell by the slushy-wet sound, the heightened pitch of your voice, that you’re coming close to your high. With a slight bend and press, a wet suck around your clit, you feel tears spill over as your orgasm blooms, his name on your lips. 

It feels like you are floating, flying in free-fall with your back bowed in a wild arch from the intensity of it all.

Eddie thinks he might come on his nice new sheets at the sight of you, utterly consumed by pleasure, thighs like a vice around his head. Instead, he slows it all down; stills his fingers, but keeps them inside, and rests his cheek against the dough of your thigh, sucking ceased in place of lazy kisses as he watches your comedown. 

“You still with me, sweetheart?” 

You nod, hum a weak ‘mmhmn’ as your legs and tummy twitch with involuntary aftershocks of such an intense orgasm.

“Think I died.”

Eddie’s laugh is low, a little dirty, and you can feel his hot breath against your hip. 

“Sorry.”

He’s not sorry. 

You manage a lazy laugh, slow-blinking your eyes open as you reach out to him.

“C’mere.” 

The long, warm line of Eddie slots against you, moulding himself against your ragdoll body. He kisses your shoulder, your neck, lets you guide him in for a slow kiss that is little more than two lazy mouths smiling against each other. 

He is haloed by lamplight, curls spilling from his topknot. Eddie is so pretty, it makes your heart thud in a funny way. 

“Hi.”

“Hey.” 

His dry fingers are gentle as they swipe away your tears, smudging away the spilled mascara before drawing a line up your nose with his and back down again for one more kiss. 

“You’re a sex wizard.” 

The words have left your lips and Eddie’s shaking with giddy laughter before you realise you have said them, orgasm-drunk and loose-lipped.

“You think so?” he wonders aloud, while inside his head he is wondering if you might want a spring wedding. 

Cupping his cheek, you thumb over his pretty dimple. “Yeah.”

His eyes are sparkling, boyish and bright. “Magic mouth,” you tease.

Because he’s a menace, Eddie nips at you playfully and brings that magic mouth against yours for a kiss. 

“You sure that orgasm didn’t knock a screw loose, sweetheart?” 

He laughs when you shake your head, hiding his face in the crook of your neck. 

“Been called a lot of names, but Magic Mouth Munson sounds good to me.”

Eddie’s voice his muffled against your neck, playful as he seeks out the scent of you beyond your perfume and shampoo. 

“Who’s calling you names? Lemme at ‘em.” 

Your voice has a gorgeous, giggly timbre that he wants to hear every day; he has heard most evenings when you’re a few miles apart, decompressing and downloading about your days, but it’s better in person. 

Before Eddie can come back with something playful, his thoughts are derailed when you wrap your fingers around the length of him again. 

“You could do damage with this thing, could poke someone’s eye out.” 

“Yeah? Wanna do something about that?” 

He’s impressed at how quickly he could come back with something quippy, or anything coherent at all, what with how you are stroking him long and slow, thumb tracing that thick vein. 

You can hear the slight shake in his playful patter when you drag your fingers lower around the base. Another pretty noise spills from his lips when you roll his balls in your hand, feeling a little bad for neglecting them when they are so full and heavy. 

“I really do,” you murmur, turning your head. The closeness is enough to coax him away from your neck for a kiss. 

You can taste how much he wants you on his tongue; clarity comes slowly as you come back around from coming so intensely. 

The shiny foil packet winks at you from the bedside table, pulled to the front while Eddie was rooting for a scrunchie. When you reach for it, he his treated to a face full of boob, and considers his untimely death again. 

The huffing breath of his laugh against your chest tickles as much as it warms your heart. This is all so easy, so fun. You wish you had known him when you were younger, wish you had known how fun sex could be instead of something daunting. But you have tonight, and tomorrow morning too. He has this beautiful, half-dazed smile that makes your tummy twist and your heart thud faster.  

Eddie gazes up at you, a nude vision sitting mermaid style on his bed. The condom in your hand glints like a jewel. He nods, leaning up on his elbows and stifling his dad-grunt at the effort of hauling himself to sit up next to you. 

He used to dig at Wayne for those old man noises, how he pays the price. 

“Damn, you’re perfect.” 

Kissing again, Eddie cups your face like you are a treasure. That’s how he sees you, a pretty bloom amongst the weeds. You can feel it in his touch, how he kisses you, covets you. It feels like your world is tilting, making you dizzy. You both said you could take this slow, but you feel addicted to him already.

“How’d’you wanna do this?” he whispers, dipping his fingers back into the well of your body, working you up again. 

Your breath hitches, thighs twitch to open yourself for him. Brain still soft scrambled, you don’t know what you want more; to have him fuck you into the mattress, hard and dirty from behind, or soft and slow and deep. You want it all, and all you can think about his how good his fingers feel, how good and wanted you have felt all night with him. It’s almost too much; you want it all, and you have so little time and…

“Hey, pretty thing.”

Behind the tendrils of hair that have fallen around his face, you see the creased pull of his brows and the shade of concern in his eyes. When he says your name, it sounds reverent, like a prayer. 

“Where’d you go?”

Eddie searches for some hint on how he fucked up, tilts your ducked head up so he can see you fully. 

Your sad smile makes his heart hurt. 

“Talk to me. We can stop. It’s okay.”

The shift to pained horror at the suggestion startles him, and he’s relieved and confused all at the same time. 

“Don’t want to stop, I promise.” You take a shaky breath and lean into his hand. “Just… I want you so bad, and I know we only have a little time together…” 

Eddie shifts closer, winds his arms around you and holds you. Just holds you, his lips pressed to your head in a fierce kiss. 

He feels relieved and heart-sore all at the same time. The truth that you could not just drop your normal lives and responsibilities to see each other was like a shadowy figure that had loomed in the corner, so easily ignored when you were lost in each other’s eyes or flirting hard over pinball, but always there.

“I know, baby,” he murmurs, smoothing one hand along your spine in soothing swathes of affection. “We still have time. And when we have to go back to real life, I wanna make time for you.”

You hug him tighter, eyes closed as you nod against his shoulder. “Want that too.”

Pulling back enough so you can look at him, reassure him with a kiss, you cover his hand on your cheek and let your foreheads rest together for a few moments. 

A small voice in your head is screeching ‘too much, too fast’ but the all-over calm you feel with Eddie sweeps it away like a sure and steady tide. 

“I get a little overwhelmed sometimes,” you whisper, saying what he already knows, what he has already seen. 

“That’s okay,” he replies, simply getting it. You think this man has seen it all; he’s unfazed and capable, but you know by the way he squeezes you, a reassuring touch, that he gives a shit. 

You kiss him again, the warm glow of want still burns, and even though his hardness has faltered out of worry, the feel of your body and the lick of your tongue against his slowly and surely makes the flames rise again. 

It is a slow tumble back onto the sheets and pillows, hands gripping and groping with confidence and care, and the firm weight of his thigh between yours right where you like it. You feel his hardness, the leaking tip and hot throb, press against you and there is a blind and giggly reach-around for the lost condom. 

Slow. Deep. You want to see him. There is time for it all, but right now you have your answer. 

He looks up at you, in awe of you. Eddie feels like so much has grown between you over just a few hours - somehow still capable of coherent thought as he watches you rip the condom open and straddle his thighs. 

The wait was worth it. 

You take your time, slowly sinking yourself down and savouring the stretch of him inside you. 

Eyes flutter, jaws slacken, brows pinch.

“Fuck.”

Said at the same time, breathy voices overlapping, he can feel a delicious pulse when you laugh. 

“Jesus, fuck. Wait a sec before you move,” he begs, his hands resting heavy on your thighs as he gathers himself. He circles his thumbs along the silvery stretchmarks and whispers of cellulite, soothing himself and you.

It only makes you hotter for him, fonder too. 

“You feel so fucking good, baby.” 

“You feel really big. Almost forgot.”

Eddie swears at the ceiling, eyes scrunched shut as you cover his hands on your legs. He can’t look at that blissful smile too long, like looking at the sun.

“You’re a fuckin’ vixen.” 

It’s fun to mess with him, bringing back the playfulness alongside that tender vulnerability; it distracts you both from how serious you both feel about each other, how scared you both are inside about fucking this up when you could have been fucking each other all night. 

Slowly, you lift and roll your hips, taking a moment to find what feels right for you both. Eddie watches you move atop him, that sensuous raise and roll of your body, the way your chest bounces and the ripple in your thighs when he fucks his hips up into you. 

“Gimme a kiss,” he begs, a vision atop the deep green sheets with his crown of curls. 

When you pitch forward, arms resting either side of his head, Eddie bends his knees and keeps himself snug inside of you as you moan against his lips. Wide hands come to rest on your ass, squeezing and jiggling to be playful and teasing. The stretch of him inside you, the way he glances against that spot inside you that is a haresbreath away from perfect has you wound tight again. So close to just right, but not quite. Your burning thighs are grateful for a break.

“I can help, baby,” he murmurs against your chin before catching your mouth in another messy kiss. “Please? Let me make you feel good.”

You feel empty when he slips out, but Eddie soothes your pouting lips with more kisses as you take his place on the bed.

“That’s it, my princess. Huh? You like being my princess?” he asks, crowding between your thighs to line himself up to push in. 

He teases you, wrapped tip kissing your swollen clit until you answer him, and then rewards you with a slow push to the hilt that makes you howl. 

“Oh fuh-fuck,” a strangled moan breaks from your throat and bounces around the room. 

Eddie’s eyes fall closed, rocking himself into you steadily with one hand behind your knee to keep you spread open for him. He sneaks a glance at where your joined, the stretch and suck of your body around him, pulling him in. 

“That’s it, baby,” he murmurs, bracing himself on the mattress so he can kiss you again. “That’s my girl.”

The stretch feels the right side of too much as he rocks forward, finding a steady pace to make you both moan. Eddie lifts up a little, pressing your thigh back closer to your chest to open you up a little more, so he can fuck a little deeper and make sure you keep making those pretty noises. 

You can see a dewy sheen to his skin as he pounds into you; this position works for him as much as it does for you. It’s not simply from fucking you into the mattress, rendering you into little more than a puddle of pleasure, but he is working hard to not come early and disappoint you - no mean feat when you are the picture of fucked-out, back arched, tits bouncing steadily as you moan for him. 

When he dips to kiss you, taste his name on your lips, you feel him dragging against that spot you couldn’t quite reach. Eddie feels the bite of your nails on his ass as you pull him into you, gasping at the pleasure-pain and the voractity of your ragged voice. 

“Oh fuck - oh! More, Eddie. Fuck!” you wail, wild for him.

He kisses his name off of your lips, holding back some animalistic roar of his own as he pushes you over the edge and feels you gush and squeeze around him. 

“Yes, baby,” he breathes, fucking you through it and kissing your flushed face as he teters on a knife edge of his own. “That’s my good girl.” The spill of tears on your cheeks makes his heart ache and his dick throb. 

He slows to a stop, following your lead as you slowly float back to earth. 

“There she is,” he whispers, smiling as he strokes the dampness away. “Hi, pretty. You alright?”

“Mm, just...” You close your eyes again, smiling dreamily about how good you feel, and give a lazy ‘okay’ sign with your fingers that makes him laugh. “Never better.”

Eddie is careful when he deposits your legs back on the bed, easing out just a little so he can sit back and gaze at you for a minute while you gather yourself. 

“Stop staring,” you murmur, giggle-voiced and feeling shy. 

“I like looking at you.” You hear his smile before you see it, peeking one eye open. 

Eddie tilts his head like he is considering a work of art. “Gorgeous.”

“Yeah?” Your quiet voice is teasing, back to your minxy-self after your sojourn to the stars, courtesy of his Munson Magic. 

“Yeah. Really gorgeous. Most beautiful I’ve ever seen.”

The warmth of his words and lazy drape of his body over yours, chest to chest so he can taste that lazy smile, is almost enough to overheat you. 

“You okay to keep going?” he whispers, leaning his cheek against your hand. 

“Yeah, m’good,” you promise, pressing a kiss to the dimple you are so enamored with.

He taps your thighs, strokes his fingers up and down and feels the goosebumps beneath them. “Like this, or do you wanna turn over?”

The overwhelm you felt earlier feels silly now, but you are too in the moment to let it take over again. He knows you like it from behind, remembers just how much you loved it the night you met.

“Mm, I’ll move. I feel like goo.”

“Sexy goo,” he purrs, swatting your hip playfully to make you giggle. “Very sexy goo.”

With his help, wide hands keeping you steady, you turn over and rest on your forearms, spreading your knees a little so he can admire the curve of your hips and the bow of your back. 

“That okay?” you ask, sneaking a peek over your shoulder just as he rubs himself along your slit. 

He can see your cheeky smile, barely concealed, but your eyes sparkle with mirth. 

“Okay? Fuckin’ perfect.”

He bites his lip when you rock backward, seeking him out with a dreamy look in your eyes. 

“Mm, put it i- ohh!” 

Those dreamy eyes drift closed as he presses inside, fulfilling your wish and filling you up. There’s an extra little shove when he’s all the way in, making sure you know just how full you are before he finds his rhythm again, following the beat of slapped-together skin.

“Good? That feel better?” 

He can feel you fluttering around him, he sees how you are gripping the pillow by your head and feels your hot slick drip down to his balls.

“So good,” you nod, rocking your hips in time with his. It is no put-on performance, he knows you are not simply inflating his ego with your praise. “Eddie, please. Harder.”

Heart aflutter, Eddie squeezes your waist and pulls you back onto him, harder and deeper like you wanted. “You got it, princess. I got ya.”

Head tipped back, jaw slack, Eddie almost misses when you snake a hand between your legs to touch yourself. The quick-circling tips of your fingers graze against him and he can hear your breathy little gasps against the sheets.

Your ass is sure to have the shape of his gripping fingers tomorrow, a visual reminder alongside that properly fucked feeling that will linger for a day or two. A babble-voiced chorus of ‘yes yes yes’ spills from your mouth as the knot of white-hot pleasure is pulled tighter and tighter with every stroke - your voice will be hoarse in the morning too, but you are too melted with pleasure to care.

All at once, you begin to fall apart and come hard as Eddie splits you open over and over and over. He watches you sob with pleasure into his pillow and feels his eyes roll back, his head following them as he swears up at the ceiling.

“Oh fuck, fuuuck,” he groans, barely clinging on to his composure as you fall apart for a third time. He keeps himself and check and slows enough to stay inside you as you slump further forward onto the sheets, bending forward to kiss along your shoulder and along your arm.

“Keep going,” you murmur, turning your head so he can press one of those wet kisses to your mouth. “Feel really good.”

You reach a hand out to the side, wrap your fingers around his wrists as he braces himself on top of you and starts thrusting again. Less coordinated now but it still feels amazing.

His breath huffs against your neck as you squeeze your walls around him, pulling more gorgeous groans and grunts from his mouth as he spills into you. 

The weight of him along your back, both of you spent and sweaty and sated, feels perfect as you float on your shared high. Eddie gives himself a moment before kissing your shoulder again, easing himself up and out of you so he can deal with the condom. 

You don’t see the proud little grin at his own reflection in the ensuite mirror, but you are wearing a dreamy smile when he comes back to lie with you and it makes his heart gallop. 

Tangled together with your head on his chest, you listen to that thud thud thud that matches your own hammering heart.

“You okay?” he asks, nuzzling your head before crowning you with a kiss. 

“Mmhm, more than okay. You okay?” 

“Fuckin’ A, sweetheart.” 

Your head tilts back and you pout for a kiss, which turns into slow, lazy kisses until the sweat on your skin makes you both shiver. Soon, you will move to the shower, sharing the hot water and kisses against the chilly tiles until your laughter rings against the walls and Eddie’s low dirty chuckle makes your tummy swoop. He will share his clothes with you, find something in his drawers for you to sleep in - a tshirt or a hoodie over the soft cotton undies rolled in your purse for tomorrow - and fetch two glasses of water before he holds you beneath the covers and you both fight to stay awake, keep talking.

Tomorrow will come too soon, but for now, you stay tangled together and savour every moment. 

It is a little before eleven when you knock on Henderson’s front door and hear Claudia and Hazel’s voices coming down the hallway to let you in.

Hazel almost bowls you over with the force of her hug, squeezing her arms around you as tight as she can. You dot a halo of smooches along her forehead and tune into her excited chatter about her sleepover with Miss Claudia. 

The older woman smiles at you both, you and your Mini Me, feeling fondness that makes her miss her son. 

When the door is closed behind you to keep the cold out and the cats in, she makes some tea for you both as Hazel gives you the full rundown of how she showed Claudia Inside Out and that next time she sleeps over, they will watch the second one.

Around the cosy kitchen table, you sip your tea and ask Claudia about her springtime trip to Boston to see Dustin and watch how gentle Hazel is with the two ragdoll cats.

Claudia says your name gently, bringing you back from being so besotted with your little girl and wondering how Eddie’s morning with Fae is going. 

“Sorry. What did you say, Claudia?” You shoot her an apologetic smile and sip your tea.

“I was just saying how amazing Hazel is. I say it every time, but she’s the sweetest girl.” She squeezes your arm gently. “And she’s really settled in. Told me all about her friends at school and her playdate last weekend. Fae Munson. Another sweetie pie.”

Your attempt to temper your expression leaves you with a tea-scaled tongue and warm cheeks. 

“Yeah. Fae has made her feel so welcome. They’re in the same grade and dance class. I’m sure she told you all about it. Two peas in a pod.”

Claudia squeezes your arm again, smiles warmly. “I know her Grandpa Wayne a long time. And my Dusty is great friends with her Dad, Eddie. He’s a good kid.”

Caught off guard, you can only nod. 

Two hours ago, you had been cosy in his bed, drinking coffee and sharing a plate of buttery toast with Eddie after he had made you come again. You knew just how good he was. Less than an hour ago, you had kissed him goodbye in his car and thanked him for a magical night. You miss him now, your chest aches with it, but you have your nightly phone call to look forward to, another date to plan. 

The older woman fills the silence that falls over the breakfast nook.

“If you need a babysitter any time, I’ll be here. Or if you need someone to lean on. I won’t pry, and I don’t gossip about my friends,” she says. 

There is a wave of relief that pours over you, slowing down your hammering heart and worried thoughts.

“You look happy. You’ve got this really lovely glow about you lately. I’m so glad you’re settling in, you and Hazel.” 

“Thank you, Claudia.” There’s a thick feeling in your throat and you blink a few times to clear your cloudy eyes. “I feel happy. I’m starting to feel at home here.” 

Hazel shuffles back over to the table, presenting her cheeks to you for two kisses before twirling over to Claudia. Your heart swells at her sweetness, her softness. 

“Miss Claudia, can I give the kitties a treat?” she asks, as Catrick Swayze and Luke Skypawker bump against your ankles, seeking some affection. 

Their furry heads feel like silk beneath your fingertips as Claudia and Hazel fetch treats for them and you snap a picture of them to send to Eddie. Swayze makes himself comfy on your lap, watching Hazel with his wide blue eyes, waiting for his treat. 

There’s already a message from him waiting for you; a picture, great minds. 

It’s Eddie, a few years older than the girls are now, standing by a lake, holding a fish he had just caught under Wayne’s patient tutelage. You can see the edge of his thumb holding the frame, and if you squint, you can see the reflection of Eddie and his phone in the glass. You pinch and zoom to look at his proud smile directed up at his Uncle rather than whoever took the photo, his pink-sunburned nose and his scrawny arms holding aloft the big fish for the camera, and the too-big Judas Priest t-shirt.

That cuteness aggression floods back and you want to kick your feet and squeal like a tweenager right here, right now in Claudia Henderson’s kitchen. She’s pretending not to see that big smile on your face, how you try to hide it by biting your lips, but she thinks this happiness suits you.

After poring over the picture, you read the accompanying texts.

Still think I’m cuter than him? 👀  Be honest…  x

You flash back to the night before, when you took the pictures of him in front of the D&D game, his bounty. 

Cute then, cute now. Period. X

Two blue ticks pop up right away; he was waiting for you. 

Damn, you like me or smth? 😘

Heart hammering, your thumb flies across the keyboard as the cat purrs in your lap. 

Mmmmmaybe  Call me later? x

Eddie’s typing right away, just as Hazel comes over to pet Swayze and feed him his treats. 

“Mom, he loves you! Look!” she beams. 

Wouldn’t miss it for the world, sweetheart x

Thank you thank you thank you for reading - I really hope you enjoyed this. I don’t think I’m done with Eddie, Reader, Hazel and Fae yet. I can’t promise when, I but there will be something more to this. Thank you again. Your comments, reblogs and likes are treasured and adored!

Are You Now or Have You Ever Been Masterlist

Summary: You’re the most popular girl in school, a 4.0 student, a fantastic cheerleader, and a  force to be reckoned with. Eddie is…well, Eddie. When you two mix, it’s like oil and water. Spewing hateful insults one minute and hooking up the next, you and Eddie navigate the thin line between love and hate. 

Enemies with benefits, or more aptly put: enemies to situationship to enemies to lovers. She’s a doozy. Inspired by imgonnagetyouback by Taylor Swift, give it a listen!

WC: 40k, ONLY 2 PARTS

Warnings: 18+ mdni!! Angst with a happy ending, fat shaming (once and not to reader), no use of Y/N, bullying, sex, PiV, unprotected sex, teasing, degradation, humiliation kink, Reader is mean to Eddie, Eddie is mean to Reader, semi-public sex, Eddie is 20 R is 18, groping, fingering, oral (m receiving), ball play, ball worship (I love bawls), body worship, pussy slapping, rough sex, name calling (dirty whore, slut–kinda, cumdump, whore, nasty bitch, desperate whore, bitch, hole), begging, dumbification kinda, ass slapping, dirty talk, mentions of drugs, teasing, mentions of cheating (hypothetical), breeding kink, spitting, cum eating, cream pie, gagging on dick, like a little face fucking but not really, innocence kink kinda if you squint but not really, Eddie hates Jason Carver, slut shaming, malicious attempt at getting someone alone (Jason), weed smoking, brief mention of student-teacher relations (not R or E, student is 18), arguments, angry name calling, insinuation of sex for money, insecurity about living situation, stereotypes of trailer park living, mentions of a gun (no usage just in a literary sense), reader’s parents died in a drunk driver incident and she talks about it crassly at one point, metaphorical addiction a la Nicotine by PATD type beat, small mention of hypothetical weight gain (eddie), mention of “felony sexual assault” but nothing happens it’s just used as a snark against Jason, physical violence (not E to R), punching, kicking, fighitng, I’m making Eddie tall in this so however tall you are he’s taller

A/N: a post with both parts in the same place. I didn't want to split them up, but apparently tumblr has a limit of 1000 blocks of text and you bet your bottom dollar this shit was over 1000 lmao

Main Masterlist

Part 1

WC: 25.4k-ish

Part 2

WC: 14.7k

Eddie is the opposite of a nonchalant boyfriend

Masterlist

Context: Nonchalant boyfriend was an internet phenomenon where girls were talking about their, you guessed it, nonchalant boyfriends avoidant attachment style lowkey saying things like, "when he's nonchalant and u never know if he actually likes you or if he doesn't even care abt ur existence" and, "pov: dating a nonchalant guy who never compliments you when you're a words of affirmation girl"

Asks are open, please for the love of god talk to me about Eddie.

Warnings: mentions of a period, a pinch of spiciness, that's it.

WC: 1.8k

A/N: Have this thought that turned long while I continue writing my magnum opus, it is an Eddie x Popular!Reader enemies to situationship to lovers based on the song imgonnagetyouback by Taylor Swift. It's currently at 14k words and I haven't even hit the real drama yet lmao. If anybody applies the slightest bit of pressure on me I will fold like a wet noodle and give you guys an excerpt. I've been planning it out and drafting it this whole week so it should be a well-structured story unlike my other long one.

Eddie declares war on all nonchalant boyfriends. 

He’s never been nonchalant about anything in his entire life, and he’s not gonna start now, not with you. 

No longer will you wonder if your boyfriend thinks you look pretty or if he thought about you that day. 

With Eddie, he thinks about so many things during the day, you included, that he has to write the ones about you down so he can tell you later when you both get home from work. 

He runs down the paper like it’s his grocery list, “Okay, first of all Joe was playing the radio in the shop today and Queen came on and it made me think of you.” 

Your heart flutters at the sentiment, “Aw, what song was it?” You’re curious to know what it was so you can go listen to it, even though you’ve more than likely heard it a million times. You just want to listen to it from his perspective, imagining what lines made him think of you. 

You giddily wonder if it was Killer Queen, you do have an insatiable appetite for him. Or maybe it was Somebody To Love, you swoon at the thought of Eddie hearing the choir-like chanting, ‘Find me somebody to love,’ knowing he’s coming home to you. His somebody. 

Your rose-colored thoughts are dashed when he quips his answer. 

“Fat Bottomed Girls,” he’s got a proud grin stretched across his face before he looks at his lengthy list once more, quickly moving on. 

Your eyes deaden, lips pressed into a thin line, “Okay.” A tone of defeat saturating the word, you should’ve known better. That’s about right for Eddie, your perpetually horny boyfriend. 

He continues as if he’s presenting on a time limit, too much to say, please hold all questions ‘til the end. 

“Okay, up next, I stopped at Bradley’s Big Buy on the way home and bought you a new bag of tootsie rolls.” He reaches into the paper bag on the chair beside him and plops the huge bag of the sugary treat on the counter. “I checked the pantry this morning and saw we’re running low. Plus, your period is supposed to come this week and I can’t be without my greatest allies.” He finishes by patting the crinkling bag. 

You furrow your brow, jerk your head back, eyes flutter-blinking in a questioning manner, how did he know you’re supposed to get your period this week?

“Oh don’t look at me like that,” he waves off your confusion as if it’s preposterous, “I keep up with my girl, and my girl’s girl.” He gestures vaguely to your lower half, it makes you snort. 

“Did you just refer to my vagina as sentient?” Your eyebrows are furrowed, eyes alight with mirth. 

He shrugs, “You know me.” He’s so blasé with it, as if those three words explain everything. 

What you don’t know is he keeps a little pocket calendar that he uses to mark your menstrual cycle. He wants to know when his girl isn’t feeling very good, but he also wants to know when his girl is feeling extra good. 

“Moving forward,” he shouts with a finger up in the air, turning his nose up as if frustrated by your incessant interruptions. Such a drama queen, you think. 

“Gareth asked me if we want to go on a double date with him and Jenna this Friday, I told him I’d ask the old Ball & Chain.” He’s grinning when he says it, preparing for your inevitable smack. 

And you do smack him, right on his shoulder. “Hey! I’m not a Ball & Chain until you lock it down,” is your only response, you can’t help but smile at the glee in his eyes when you mention being his forever. 

“You’re so right, my dearest, how very silly of me.” He says it in a stilted overly-formal voice like he’s a 1940s business man puffing on a cigar. “But mark my words, you will be my Ball & Chain,” he says in a playful threat, “When you least expect it, that’s when I’ll strike.”

You shake your head, smiling at his stupidity. He’s smug at the fact that you don’t know he’s been wearing the engagement ring he bought you around his neck, beneath his clothes, for the past four months just waiting for the perfect moment.

“Yes, let’s do dinner, what’s next,” you question, craning your neck forward to get a glimpse at his chicken scratch writing. 

He jerks the paper away from your view, it’s then that you realize he’s written all of this on the back of a purchasing request from the shop. You see the logo for ‘Joe’s Cars’ at the top of the page, god, you hope they didn’t need this document for their files. 

He holds the paper to his chest, reprimanding you like you’re a nosy kid, “No peeking!” 

You laugh as you settle back into your stance in front of him, waiting for what he has to say next. 

“On my way home I saw a banner on the mall advertising a sale at the Gap and I figured we could go get you that dress you saw in the catalog the other day. Maybe you can wear that to dinner with Gareth and Jenna,” he suggests. 

It’s so straightforward the way he says it. He’s waiting for your response, but you’re nearly choking back tears at the way he loves you. The way he sees you.

You had shown him the dress last week while he was building you a shelf for your joint bedroom. The shelf would be a place for you to put your romance novels, a lot of Jilly Cooper and Jackie Collins, something your ex would’ve never done. He always made you feel bad for reading those types of books, but not Eddie. Eddie built you a place to display them proudly in your room, no longer having to dig under the bed to reread them. 

When you showed him the dress, you didn’t think he actually remembered the interaction. He gave you his attention when you talked about how pretty it was and how much you liked the pleated skirt, but you just thought it went in one ear and out the other. You thought that he was probably nodding, ‘oo’-ing and ‘ah’-ing until you’d go away, leaving him to work. 

But here he was a week later, having remembered the exact dress and the exact store, offering to buy it for a silly little dinner. 

You smile at him with watery eyes, nodding, “Yeah, I’d like that very much,” you move to kiss him, but he holds up his hand to stop you. A pinch of worry squeezes your heart before he says, “Hold on I’m not done yet!” 

His hand still held in the air, he dutifully looks at his list as if he’s reading something lengthy, preparing to recite the next thought he had at work that he needed to share with you. 

He takes a big breath in before turning to you to share the last thing, “And- I love you.” He says it with the sweetest smile on his face, just happy to talk to you, happy to come home to you. 

It takes you a minute to grasp what he said. That was it. That was the last thing he thought at work that he needed to tell you. Wrote it down and everything. 

He stopped your incoming kiss and affection to tell you that, he gave you pause thinking you rudely cut him off again. But he just wanted to tell you he thought about how he loves you while at work.

He’s so stupid, you think fondly. He’s your stupid, silly, dramatic, lover boy. 

Your close-mouthed smile is so big it makes your eyes squint shut, nose scrunching as you shake your head at his antics. A huffing laugh leaves your nose as you reach for him, his arm pulls you in for the sweetest kiss, the one you get to have every day with him. 

“I love you too, stupid face.” 

You love your non-nonchalant boyfriend. 

Bonus: 

On Friday, you’re getting ready for the double-date in the bathroom, touching up your makeup in preparation to show Eddie. 

“Teddie!” You call out the fond nickname, he loves when you call him that, it liquifies his insides. You always make him melt. 

You can hear his soft thudding steps into the bedroom, a slight squeak of the bed as he sits down. 

“You ready to see?” Your voice echoes from behind the door, he can hear the smile in your voice and it makes him smile. 

“So ready,” he grins, “Gimme my prize, baby. Show me what’s behind door number one!” His imitation of a game show host is weirdly good, he blames it on Wayne’s addiction to old reruns of Let’s Make A Deal.

You open the door, stepping out, nervously brushing the nonexistent wrinkles out of the skirt with your hands. You look up at his face, asking a hesitant, “How do I look?”

He’s frozen in his spot, his eyes are wide as they take in the angel in front of him. He finds you sexy any way you come, but he does love when a gift is covered in pretty wrapping. 

Your confidence grows at his speechlessness, you know him well enough to know it's good speechless. 

He stands up abruptly, “Excuse me- I gotta-hold on-,” and he’s out the front door. You have no idea where he’s going, but knowing him, this is for dramatic effect. So you sit down on the bed and wait, crossing one healed leg over the other, leaning back on your arms, bobbing your foot idly. 

When he comes back in thirty seconds later his black suit is disheveled, his hair no longer neat in a ponytail. The shorter curls are windswept as they frame his face, he’s unbuttoned his dress shirt to his sternum, he’s breathing hard and ragged. You stand at his entrance, hands on your hips, an amused glint in your eyes. 

His cheeks are pink with exertion and sweat beads at his hairline, “Sorry, you’re so hot I literally had to take a lap, I’m back now, we’re good to go. You look amazing, by the way.” He leans in to hold you in a kiss, but you put your hands up to stop his body from touching yours. 

You're giggling at his antics, ‘Ew, you’re all sweaty now,” you whine. 

He grins mischievously, “Oh good, then it won’t matter if I get even more sweaty.” Next thing you know he’s clumsily grabbing the sides of your head, pulling you in for a comically sloppy kiss, and pressing his body to yours desperately. You can feel his leg hitch onto your body like he’s about to climb you like a damn tree. 

You break the silly kiss with a loud laugh, tossing your head back, “Eddieeeeuhhh!” 

A/N: please like, reblog, and comment if you enjoyed it. Comments encourage me to write more, they're like a shot of espresso to my heart.

a job well done (eddie munson x fem!reader one-shot)

summary: long-term admirer, recent tutor — you find out eddie's failing gym. in an ode to help him, your expertise expands beyond just textbooks — to your fortune, he teaches you something you've been dying to learn too

contents: 18+, smut!!!, porn with plot, lots of ball action <3, oral (m receiving, mentions of f receiving), pet names and praise (baby, good girl), somewhat-inexperienced!eddie, tutor!reader an: i made an $8k mistake irl so heres 8k words that i wrote to forget about it (just kidding (not abt the mistake, that's very real) i started writing this in july 2023 but recently rewrote most of it to make it into a big ol' one shot-ish thing) wc: 8.5k

“You’re failing gym?” you gasp, jaw dropping as your eyes scan over his report.

“No!” he replies, trying to steal the envelope and its contents from your hands. You turn your body just in time for him to grasp at nothing but air. 

You started tutoring Eddie about a month into the semester. He’s been a willing participant for the most part and that’s why when he kept coming up with excuse after excuse for why he didn’t have his midterm report you knew something was up. 

You took it upon yourself to do some investigating. Nothing invasive, just when you got to his place for a regular tutoring session, you decided to look through his bag while he was in the bathroom. On his bedroom floor, filing through the bags endless messy contents, you eventually came across the familiarly coloured yellow envelope and helped yourself to a peek at what he was keeping a secret from you. 

Mere moments later, he was back. He immediately noticed what you had in your hands and crashed to the floor trying to get it away from you. Evidently, a failed attempt. 

“You have a — oh god, not just a D, a D minus, Eddie.” 

“That’s not failing,” he mumbles under his breath. You wave him off before dropping his report to the floor in front of you. He grabs it, crumples it into a ball, and petulantly tosses it to the other side of his room. 

“You never even told me you were taking gym.”

“Cause how’re you supposed to help with gym?”

“The tests! There’s a whole health portion, I could’ve been helping you with that,” you say, getting worked up over it. Eddie’s been doing so well, this was truly blindsiding.

“Yeah… cause I really want help from you with the health portion,” he grumbles sarcastically. 

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means exactly what it sounds like it means,” he shrugs. 

If you weren’t paying attention, you might think he was angry — maybe even being mean. Luckily, you’re always paying attention to Eddie Munson, and you see the way his face flushes to a bright, crimson red. His annoyance is actually just embarrassment — which is good — at least he has some level of remorse for his failing grade. You can work with that. You take a breath, exhaling it slowly, forcing yourself to calm down. 

“Show me what you’re working on.”

“No,” he shakes his head, reaching into his bag, shuffling around some papers before tossing a heavy textbook your way. “Let’s just do math.”

“No, you have a B minus in math now, that doesn’t need help. You need help in gym.” you reply, tossing the textbook back at him. 

“I don’t.”

“Eddie, you do.”

Sitting up to your knees, you reach into his bag once more, taking out his binder and dropping it to the floor in a pointed thump. He mumbles some kind of disagreement, spine going stiff with his hesitancy to let you go through his stuff some more, but he doesn’t make any attempts to physically stop you. 

You flip through the disorganization that you’ve told him countless times to organize until you come across a diagram of a penis and a vagina. Bingo.

“Told you,” he mumbles, scoffing to himself. 

“Told me what?”

“Why would you want to help me study that?” 

“Uh— cause it’s part of your class and I don’t want you to fail,” you say matter of factly. “Believe it or not, Eddie, I like you, and your success translates to my happiness.” 

Bright red continues to flourish across his skin, affecting the apples of his cheeks all the way down to his throat. He turns bashful, eyes locking down on the carpet. 

Eddie’s shy — not often, but he is. You wouldn’t think so from the way he acts at school and in most public atmospheres, but get him in a room, one-on-one, and he’s all blushed cheeks and shy touches. It’s sweet and it’s one of your favourite things about him — but you don’t have time for sweet shyness right now. He’s failing gym for christ sake — gym.

“So, how do you want to do this?” you ask, slapping your hands to your thighs. Eddie startles, jolting before his wide eyes find yours. 

“Do what?”

“Study this,” you motion to the diagram on the floor separating the two of you.

“I— I’m not… we’re not—“

His eye contact goes rogue again, diverting anywhere else — everywhere else that isn’t you. Shy, shy, shy. Too shy. More shy than normal. And you have an inkling that it has to do with the subject of the conversation at hand. 

“Oh my god, Eddie. This is basic human anatomy. I think we’re grown up enough to handle a little penis and vagina,” you state, tacking on a laugh. 

You get a hint of Eddie's true personality beyond his shyness — it emerges through a quirk of his lip, the corner of it tweaking upwards into the hint of a smirk. 

“A little penis?” He parrots, his smirk fully emerging now. This boy.

“Cue cards? Should we do cue cards?”

He groans, body deflating. “You know I hate cue cards.”

“Okay, so let’s just go over the parts for now, then we can move on and do something else.”

You clear out a bigger area on the floor, making space for your study session. Eddie helps by kicking back stray articles of clothing and then picking out what looks like spilled weed from the carpet and collecting it in the palm of his hand. You’re a touch more productive, taping little pieces of paper over the diagram labels. When you’re done, you sit up admiring your work. Eddie stands, dropping his little handful of greenery onto his desk before sitting down on his bed. 

“Do you want to do it up there or down here?” You ask. 

The slight double entendre isn’t lost on you, you heard it before you even said it. Now knowing how shy Eddie is about this stuff, you couldn’t help but push your luck, and the blush that spreads across his cheeks makes it entirely worth it, especially while you deadpan and pretend you have no clue. 

“I’ll come down there—“ He says and you watch him physically recoil as his words set in. You resist your laughter. 

“Come, Eddie. Faster,” you tease, laughter starting to bubble up. A smile breaks through his embarrassment.

“Jesus Christ, you’re doing this on purpose, aren’t you? You like seeing me suffer?”

“Me? Teasing you on purpose? Never.”

With a shake of his head, he joins you on the floor, leaving a large gap between the two of you. “Can we not do this, I already know this stuff.”

“Oh yeah? Eddie Munson is well versed in human anatomy?”

“I’m — I’m not going to answer that,” he crosses his arms. 

With a clap of your hands, you ignore his pouty demeanor. “Okay! Let’s just do this, the quicker you memorize everything the quicker we can not do this.”

With both of the diagrams set up, you give him the option of starting with the penis or vagina first. He chooses the easy answer, opting to go with the penis. 

One by one you point out each part of the penis, asking him for the anatomically correct name. You quickly understand why he’s failing. 

“Okay, and this one is…?”

“The head,” he states. 

“I mean… sure,” you nod hesitantly — “but the little arrow is pointing there — the glans. This one?”

You continue going through the chart, teaching Eddie the proper names for everything. When you finally graduate to the diagram of the vagina, Eddie is physically squirming in his spot. 

“Eddie, relax. Seriously. We’ve all seen a vagina before.”

“It’s so fucking hot in here, are you hot?” He groans, standing up and tripping his way to the window, slamming it open with a grunt. 

He’s barely made his way back before you have a thought.

“You’ve seen a vagina before, right?” 

He freezes — just for a moment, but you catch it. On his way to return to his spot on the floor he pauses, then continues moving as if you haven’t asked him a question. When he sits, you quirk a brow. 

“Yeah!” He answers. His voice tunes so high, it begs to crack.

You nod skeptically. You wouldn’t say he’s lying per se, but something seems off. Something that you’re interested in getting to the bottom of. 

“Let’s take a break, okay?” You offer.

“Yeah, a break’s, uh — good.” He exhales, letting out a breath of relief. He tugs at the collar of his shirt, fanning it in and out, getting some air flow on his skin. It’s very suspicious and you have to assume —

“So, you’ve never seen a vagina,” you say.

Eddie’s eyes go wide. “I have! I’m not a virgin.”

“You’re squirming like one.”

“I’m not!”

“There’s nothing wrong —”

“I’m not!” He says much louder, cutting you off. 

You believe him, seeing the full depth of sincerity in his amusedly large, and overly serious eyes. 

“Okay,” you nod.

“I’m not,” he insists once more, tone leaning towards stern. 

“I believe you, Eddie.”

The two of you sit quietly in your respective spots. You could busy yourself with getting some more studying stuff ready, but somehow — even though there was some verbal finality — this conversation doesn’t seem over. 

And with an inhale from Eddie, it’s not.

“I’ve just never been like…” he pauses, thinking, “I’ve just never been all up in there.” He makes a crude motion with his hands, both palms splayed out flat in your direction, moving outwards like he’s spreading something out. 

“You’ve never eaten a girl out before?”

“What are we doing?” He says, dropping his head into his hands, scrubbing at his cheeks with both palms. 

“You don’t have to answer. Seriously, if I’m really making you uncomfortable, I’ll stop. Swear.”

His chest inflates with a deep breath, then his head pops up. “I have but only for like a minute, in the dark, parked outside of the hideout after a gig,” he confesses. You raise your brows, surprised.

“You work quickly. A minute, that’s impressive.”

“No… Jesus, no,” he winces. “I fucking wish. We got interrupted and… yeah she never wanted to hang out after.”

“Oh,” you hum. “That sucks.” You tilt your head at him, frowning apologetically. 

“Yeah. She, uh, I’m pretty sure she had a boyfriend but I didn’t know when we… yeah.” He concludes his confession with a shrug before sitting back to lean against the side of his bed. 

“That really sucks. Sorry.” 

“Don’t be sorry,” he says, tacking on a laugh. It’s not a nervous laugh. It’s genuine and you take his lack of nervousness as permission to continue the conversation. 

“So… Do you have a tactic?”

“Tactic?”

“Yeah. Like, most guys use the alphabet on the clit thing, which is awful by the way, don’t do that.”

“I think…” he raises his brows. “I think, maybe, just being overzealous is my thing. I don’t really know — I haven't done it enough to have a tactic.”

“Overzealous is good…” you nod, “as long as it’s strategic.”

Eddie meets your gaze. He’s intrigued — “Elaborate?” he asks. 

“Like, sure if you want to go to town and eat the pussy, go for it, but the only place it really counts is the clit — of course everything else is nice too, but the clit is definitely where it matters,” you nod to yourself, punctuating your statement. “And—” you add on, raising your hand, bringing together two of your fingers to mime the curling motions of getting fingered. “I like when they use their fingers too. It's a lot better like that.”

Eddie goes silent. He looks like he’s thinking, maybe even committing your words to memory— but it’s an odd look he has on his face. One you’ve never seen before from him.

“Sorry, did I say too much?” You laugh, trying to diffuse. Eddie looks at you, shaking his head in amused disbelief.

“Why the fuck are you tutoring me in going down on a girl right now?” He laughs. 

You smile, appreciating his amusement. Tilting your head boastfully, you accept his comment like a compliment. “Just a natural born teacher, I guess,” you tease. 

He nods, humming agreeingly. He doesn’t say anything more but you’ve got a handful of curiosities burning through your back pocket, and when in rome…

“Are we done with this conversation,” you ask, “or can we keep going ‘cause I might have a few questions for you?”

“Hasn't this whole conversation already been an interrogation of my experiences?”

“But this might be your only opportunity to teach me something, Edward.” You jet out your lower lip, pouting it, rounding your eyes at him — trying your best to keep this going. 

He rolls his eyes, feigning annoyance. 

“Are you about to ask me if I can move my dick without my hands, because the answer is yes but it’s not full control.”

“That’s not what I was gonna ask, but very cool.”

“Sorry. That’s usually what girls ask.”

That has been a curiosity but your questions… your questions are much more… sophisticated? 

“So can I?” you ask. 

“Can you?”

“Ask you questions?”

He bites his lip, pointedly making you sweat it out. With a dramatic sigh, he gives in. “Go for it.”

You sit up straighter, very pleased with his answer. 

“Balls,” you state. Eddie’s eyes widen immediately — you ignore the regret that flashes across his face. “Do you like them being touched? Every time I’ve done anything with them, the guy kind of, like, recoils and it feels like I did something wrong.” 

“Jesus…” he clears his throat with an awkward laugh. “You’re really going for the big questions, huh?” 

“The big questions?” You raise your eyebrows suggestively. 

“No, Jesus I’m not implying my balls are — holy shit. My balls are normal sized, that’s not what I meant.” He continues to laugh through his embarrassment, cheeks heating right back up to that very cute, bright, red colour. 

“I’m just teasing you, Eddie. I’m sure your balls are lovely and perfectly normal sized.”

He hums appreciatively but it gets stuck in his throat, coming out as a high pitched croak. He clears his voice, nodding as he raises a hand to the back of his neck, wringing it nervously.

“You don’t have to answer, but I would appreciate knowing,” you say, softly, sympathetic — leaning into apologetic. He nods again, and you can tell the gears are spinning in his head as he thinks over his answer. 

“They’re just… sensitive,” he swallows. “But… I do like them being played with, or sucked, or licked… or whatever.” 

His eyes focus on the far wall, not out of nervousness or shyness this time, but more like he’s giving his words some real thought. You appreciate it and wait patiently for him to continue. 

“I guess I would have to say that it’s personal preference, so ask?” he continues unsurely, eyes still focusing elsewhere. “I mean, no guy is ever gonna be mad if you ask to put their balls in your mouth — or… whatever you want to do with them.” He looks at you with wide eyes as he suddenly gets nervous again. You wave him off, letting him silently know that ‘balls in your mouth’ is not an offense to you.

“Could you cum from someone playing with your balls?”

“Holy shit,” he gasps, laughing. His hand that was wringing his neck drops to his lap in a heavy thud. At the same time, he brings up both knees, hugging them halfways to his chest as he mulls over his answer. “Um? Maybe? But, I think a big part of it is a visual thing — like, it adds to the hotness when they’re into the balls?” He finishes, adding an unsure inflection to the end of his remark. You nod, narrowing your eyes into a squint as you absorb what he’s saying. 

“So it doesn’t feel good?”

“It does,” he quickly corrects, “just anything on the head feels way better.” 

“Okay… good to know.” You nod, moving on. “And dirty talk. You really like that? Like, when the girl’s going on and on about your ‘big cock in her tight little pussy’, is it not weird?”

“Jesus, you really aren’t holding back with these questions.” He smiles through the blotchy redness growing down his neck all the way to the collar of his shirt.

“Tell me to stop and I will,” you promise, dipping your face lower to catch Eddie’s gaze. He holds it for a second, before letting his eyes roam the room. 

“Dirty talk is hot, obviously, but… it’s not when it’s rehearsed shit like that. It makes it feel like they’re performing — and maybe I’m just doing a piss poor job and they are performing — I don’t know, but I’d rather hear about what you actually like that I’m doing. Even if you’re telling me to go faster or harder or whatever. That’s fucking hot.”

“Alright, so be genuine. Cool,” you nod. 

“You done with questions?” He meets your gaze with raised brows for a fraction of a brave second before quickly looking away. 

The thing is, you’re not done. 

“So, hypothetically, if someone you didn’t like played with only your balls, and it wasn’t hot— like nothing about it was hot, would you still cum?”

He doesn’t give you the same surprised initial shock as he did with all the other questions. This time he just lets out a long, evenly staggered breath through puffed out cheeks. 

“I think…” He hugs his knees closer to his chest, rubbing both his palms along his shins quickly, filling the silence with the sounds of skin on denim. 

You can see the edge of his words in his expression, like he wants to say something but is holding it back. Whatever it is, you wait patiently — you do sit up a little straighter though, eagerly leaning inwards, listening with baited breath to his quiet, pensive hum.

His lips twitch, mouth opening then closing. With a loud exhale, he lets go of his shins, letting his knees drop from their upright position, and with that, his resolve breaks.  

“Fuck it” he curses — “Probably. Sometimes I think that the wind blowing the wrong way could make me cum. Like, I’m fighting for my fucking life to not get hard right now.”

He ends his speed-run confession with a pant, chest shallowly heaving with each breath. Excited wings beat inside your chest, dipping down to your belly as you absorb what he's just said to you. 

“Really?” you ask, blinking wide eyes at him. His breathing evens out, and he meets your gaze.

“Yeah,” he shrugs shyly — cutely.

“You know I like you, right?” 

His face falls. “What?” His brows press together, furrowing with confusion and you really don’t know how you could have been clearer about this whole ordeal.

“Eddie,” you smile. “I’ve told you like a million times that I like you — like earlier, I told you barely an hour ago before we got started.”

You said it quite plainly too; ‘Believe it or not, Eddie, I like you, and your success translates to my happiness.’ 

“Yeah, but I thought you meant as a… a person? Or a friend?”

You can’t help but laugh — not at him… well, a little bit at him, but this is just so ridiculous, how could he be so clueless. 

“I love my friends but I don’t think I would fill all my free time teaching them math and all the anatomical correct names of the different parts of the penis.”

“Are you serious?”

“Yeah, they’re good people but that’s not exactly my idea of fun,” you tease. “Of course I’m serious, Eddie. So if you wanted to make a move… I wouldn’t be opposed.” 

At this point, after a confession as straightforward as that, you’d hope for movement — anything — even him getting closer to you, moving in for a kiss at the very least… but he stays sat in his opposite spot, his binder with the vagina diagram laid out flat, separating the both of you. 

Maybe you read this wrong — backpedal. 

“Did I just make this weird? Should I have not said that? I like tutoring you too, I don’t want you to think I’m expecting something from you just because I’ve been helping you.” You ramble apologetically, shrinking into yourself as you feel your whole body start to flush with icky embarrassment.

Eddie’s spine goes rigid as he sits up pin-straight, shaking his head emphatically.

“No! I like you too,” he interjects, leaning towards you, putting a hand on your knee. “Even before you started tutoring me.” 

“You do?” You sigh a breath of relief. Meeting his eyes, you smile sweetly, ignoring the whiplash that still has your stomach pinched in a half knot.

His voice gets soft with his confession — “Why do you think I didn’t want to sit around looking at penises and vaginas with you?” he laughs quietly,  “I was terrified of getting hard and scaring you away.”

The mention of him getting hard has your eyes flickering downwards for a split second. You can’t tell, but you tease him anyway — “And how’s that working out for you?”

“If you’re asking if I’m hard…” He trails off, smiling nervously, leaving you with a confirmed suspicion. 

“Should I make a move?” 

“Well, I’m not opposed.” He says it like it’s a joke — you know he’s being funny, breaking tension or whatever, but you don’t laugh. You perk up, tummy filling with fluttery feelings because that’s permission.

Permission to crawl the short distance between the two of you.

Permission to help yourself to his lap — pulling your skirt up high enough to straddle his upper thighs.

Permission to let your hands feel from his shoulders, down to his pecks. 

Permission to be this close to him — close enough that you can see every shy detail, every cute freckle, every nervous flutter of his lashes. 

Best of all — it’s permission for an intimacy you’ve been waiting for — longing for.

You sink yourself against him and — “Oh,” you gasp, “you weren’t kidding.” 

Through the thin cotton of your underwear, you feel the hard curve behind the zip of his jeans. It has you biting your lip, holding back your grin. 

His eyes coast your features, narrowing in on the tweaked up corners of your lips. He ghosts a quiet ‘yeah’, dipping his face downwards, hiding his own coy smile. 

You just won’t have that — you bring your hands to his cheeks, tilting his chin upwards, encouraging him to look at you. He lets you guide him, lets you wash your gaze over his features — lets you rake your eyes over every detail, even when his skin grows pink and you know he wants you to be looking anywhere else.

But you can’t help it. The rosy tint to his cheeks looks too warm, too inviting. His lips are just too pink, too bitten. And most of all, his eyes have become too deep, too capturing, especially when the usual gold in his brown has resolved to being just the thinnest ring, glinting and shimmering around absorbing black orbs.

“Your eyes are really dark right now,” you observe aloud. 

“Yeah?” He asks and you nod your head. You watch him as he lets his own gaze search your face. He swallows, coming to his own conclusion. “You just looked amused.”

You smile. You are amused but — “I’m not just amused.”

“No?” 

“I’m also really turned on.” You feel it in your belly, multitudes of warm winged flutters, sitting low, radiating heat throughout your whole body. You lean in closer, watching intently as his brows rise, moving to hide beneath his bangs as he processes your second confession of the evening.

“You are?”

“Yeah,” you whisper. “Want to know what I’m thinking about?”

He swallows thickly, and that golden ring in his eyes gets the faintest bit thinner.

“I do.”

You sit more comfortably, bringing your hands back to his chest and letting your bum press fully to his thighs. He lets out a near silent groan as your front sinks to his and when you adjust your hips, his hands dart to your sides, holding you tightly. 

“First,” you smile, batting your lashes at him. “I’m thinking about kissing you.” A soft swoon washes over Eddie's face, eyes turning soft for you. His eyes blink down to your lips, but you have more to say. “I’m also thinking about your balls in my mouth.”

The softness steps back, shock taking over. “Jesus christ,” he curses yet again, drawing out each syllable in a low groan. 

“And since I’ve been sitting here, I can’t help but think about how your cock would feel inside of me.”

“Fuck.” He meets your gaze, eyes rounding, jaw going slack. His chest begins to rise more rapidly, his breathing growing heavier. 

The feeling of him between your legs is undeniable now — he’s hard, very hard, uncomfortably hard. You let your hands slide up his chest, to his shoulders, letting your fingertips graze along the warm skin of his neck. He blinks heavily, eyelids growing weighted, swarming with evident lust. It makes you excited, makes you want more. 

You lower your voice to a breathy whisper, leaning in closer, letting your lips graze the shell of his ear.  “How’s the dirty talk, Eddie? Am I doing good?” You purr. His fingers pinch into the flesh at your sides as you shift once again, rolling your hips just enough to feel that hint of pleasure between your thighs. 

Eddie stifles his moan. “S– so good. You’re doing so g-good,” he stutters. His breath hitches as you press a kiss to the edge of his jaw, and then another, moving downwards to his neck. 

“What are you thinking about?” You pull away, looking at him through your lashes. You barely have a second to react before his hands are on your jaw, tugging you into him. 

It catches you off guard at first as his lips mash to yours. It’s entirely overzealous, bidding his earlier statement true by multiple definitions. It’s not terrible, but it is desperate. 

Flattening a heeding palm to his chest, you pull away just the slightest bit, letting your lips faintly graze his. 

“Slowly, Eddie.” you whisper. 

His interrupted desperation manifests as a quiet huff against your lips. Regardless of how hard he is beneath you, and how badly he wants to mash his mouth to yours, he nods, noses bumping together as he does.

This time you lean in. You guide the kiss, moving slowly, tenderly, and he follows your lead, moving gently, catching on quickly. Your upper lip presses between both of his and it's so delicate, so earnest, that it makes your heart thrum. It's exactly what you needed, and you reward Eddie with a quiet hum, letting your hands wrap behind his neck, pressing your chests together. 

His breath fans over your skin as he hums back, letting his hands glide to your lower back, hugging you closer. His lips massage yours, slowly, and he takes his time, letting you melt into him entirely. 

When you feel the pressure of his tongue licking across your lower lip your anticipation really sets in. You open your mouth, rolling your hips upwards as you move in closer to him. With a huffed, eager grunt, and with fingers kneading bruises into your skin, he licks into your mouth completely contradictory to it all, still giving you softness in the kiss. You’re elated by it all, swept up, enraptured by him being so sweet to you.

You sigh breathily as you have to pull away. 

“That was really good,” you fawn, dropping your head to rest against his shoulder. You let out another sigh, smiling contently to yourself. You’ve been wanting to do that for a long time — really too long, if you’re being honest. 

Eddie hums an agreement. You intend to go further than just a kiss, but you give yourself a moment to bask in it all. Just a moment, that’s all you need. 

And in the next moment, with your wits gathered, you wiggle your hips. Eddie’s palms press tightly against your back and he lets out a sharp gasp that melds into a whimper. You giggle a quiet apology. 

“Too much for you?” you tease.

“Nuh-uh.” He shakes his head, his warm cheek pressing to yours. “M’just really hard right now.”

He is — you can feel it, and you can feel the mess growing between your own thighs. 

A simple solution; you hint at rolling your hips another time. It’s hardly any friction, just testing the waters. You’re surprised when Eddie pulls you inwards, guiding your hips, encouraging you to move. He lets out a low groan as the squish of your thighs pass over his length, one that you hardly register over your own gasp as you get your first real hint of pleasure.

With his help, you build a slow rhythm, grinding to the curve in his denim, one that has your eyes fluttering shut and Eddie tensing, letting out meak whimpers and low moans. It's nice, it really is, but as nice as it feels for you, you weave a hand between the two of you, suggestively placing it on the buckle of his belt.  

“Can I ask you another question?”

“Yes,” his voice comes out as a heaved breath. Very eager to continue.

“After you cum, how long does it take for you to get hard again?”

“Sh-shit — it depends. Sometimes —” he swallows thickly and you hear the gulp in his throat — “sometimes it’s barely a few minutes.”

“I want to try out what you taught me, but I want you to fuck me too.”

“We can — yeah we can do that.” His voice wavers as he bites back his excitement, trying to play it cool. Despite that, you feel the overzealousness in his pants, twitching with enthusiasm. 

You press a chaste kiss to his lips before scooting back on his legs, weaving your hands between the two of you to pop open his belt. Just as you unweave the leather and toss the heavy buckle to the side, holding the button under your thumb, Eddie’s hand meets your waist — not stopping you, just getting your attention. 

“Can I…” he starts. You look up at him, pausing your movement. He continues, “can I try what you told me too?” His eyes barely meet yours, growing bashful all over again. 

“Of course you can,” you say sincerely. You finish unbuttoning his pants, tugging the zipper down while leaning in, pressing a kiss to his cheek. “You don’t gotta be shy, Eddie. I like you already, a lot.” 

He nods, but you can still see a hint of cautiousness in his expression. 

“I’m serious, Eddie. I want you to be comfortable with me. Anything you need, anything you want, you can tell me.” 

He nods. His mouth mulls for a moment, but he nods a second time, assumedly coming to a conclusion. “Can we move up to the bed?” he asks. 

“I’d like that,” you smile and he smiles back.

Just as you lift your leg to get off him, you let out a surprised yelp as he does the bravest thing he’s done yet, both hands grabbing firmly at your bottom, tugging you into him and up as he pushes himself off the floor. He moves the both of you up to the edge of the bed with one strong flex of his legs and your stomach swirls with the rush of it all. 

From there, it's a giggling tussle of limbs, him pulling you up the bed, you pulling his pants off. Eventually, you both settle, him pantless, sitting with his back to the wall where his headboard should be, and you, by his side, knees pressing to his thigh. Your fingers wiggle with excitement as you take the thin cotton of his boxers, lacing them just under the waistband. 

You shimmy in your spot, shaking your hips, letting out a happy hum as you begin to pull them down. Your belly fills with good nerves, butterflies, and your mouth salivates. When you get them down as far as you can without his help, he silently chimes in, lifting his hips, hooking his own thumbs into the material. With a quiet humph, the fabric passes his length, freeing it to bob against his shirt-covered belly. 

Tempestuously red. Furiously flushed. Severely erect. Poor Eddie. Happy you. His tip is blushed to a deep crimson, glistening with the pearlescent sheen of precum. It has your body flushing hot everywhere — from your cheeks all the way south to where you grind yourself down onto the backs of your heels just to feel a pinch of salvation. 

Somewhere between where your ogling started and where you had to physically swallow the gathering saliva in your mouth, his boxers got discarded entirely, your own shirt disappearing along with them — because it is just so hot all of a sudden.  

If you weren’t completely blinded by your impeding tunnel vision, you would have seen the way Eddie gawked at your newly revealed skin, absorbing every inch, taking in every feature to your body. You would have seen the way his adam’s apple bobbed in his throat and the fresh cherry red blush spread to his cheeks. You would have seen the way he had to forcefully peel his eyes away from your chest when he felt your fingers press into his bare thighs as you situated yourself between his legs. But you didn’t have a chance to notice all of those details, not when you felt the thrilling thrum of anticipation bubbling up in your bloodstream. 

“You ready, Eddie?” You ask, grinning at him. He blinks slowly at you, no answer, making your smile falter.

“You look pretty,” he blurts out, much to your delight. “Really pretty. All the time — not just now because you're about to — you’re just beautiful, s’what I want to say.”

“Thank you,” you say, pleasantly surprised. Eddie on the other hand, cringes at his own rambling, face scrunching in defeat. You like him even more for it — “I think you’re beautiful too, Eddie,” you smile. “And not just because I have your pretty cock in front of me.” 

Eddie huffs a soft laugh and you gleam, pleased with yourself. 

With actual consent, you take him in your hand. Gentle at first, easing him into your touch. Just barely grazing your thumb over the tip, you smear the slick precum around, before sinking your fist to his base. He lets out a tensed moan, exhaling — exhilarating. That quiet, throaty noise has you lighting up, already feening for more.

Leaning down further, arching your back, you gather your saliva in your mouth before letting it spill out in a single string over the tip of his needy head, falling down just to be caught by the upwards rise of your fist. This time he sucks in a sharp breath and you live for it. 

Closing the distance between your mouth and his cock, you lick the tip gently, pressing your tongue to the river of precum that sits in the curves of his slit, relishing in the saltiness that makes your mouth water effortlessly. You hum, feeling the pulse between your legs grow deeper, more intense. You push your hips back, angling them, searching for any sort of relief. 

While it doesn’t satiate the need between your thighs, Eddie notices your squirm, and brings a splayed palm to your side, letting it curve to your skin. It settles in, warming you, encouraging you to distract yourself in such a beautiful way by taking him into your mouth. 

You let your tongue swirl. Flick. Caress. Your lips graze before closing, and you suck. Cheeks hardly hollowing, the noise he lets out makes you want to keep being gentle — draw this out, make this last. 

But like a devil on your shoulder, you want to skip forward. You want his balls in your mouth, that’s the guise of this whole encounter, isn’t it? To practice what he’s taught you.

Jumping right to the chase, abandoning his desperately swollen cock, doesn’t strike you as the way to go about this, so you continue to be gentle. Pulling off the tip, kissing him up and down his length. Pressing your lips where needed and drawing circles and lovey hearts across his skin with the pointed angle of your tongue.

It's not fruitless. Every noise, every groan, every heavy breath, pleading whimper, fills you up. It fills you up until it has you leaning your body into his hand on your rib cage, needing to feel him wherever you can, while taking him fully into your mouth. Swallowing him down, deeply hollowing your cheeks, gliding your lips and flattening your tongue until your nose presses to the wispy patch of coarse hair at his base. 

“Fuck— fuck.” Eddie groans through a strangled breath. 

His hand leaves your ribs and you whimper at the loss, only to be reunited with the physical contact as he takes hold of your head with both of his hands, pulling you up. You whine, chest collapsing with defeat. You pout as soon as his cock leaves your mouth. Looking up at him, he looks worked up and frayed — all a shivered mess — but eyes sincerely apologetic as he catches your disappointment. 

“Sorry, I just wasn’t expecting that.” He pants heavily, catching his breath while you catch your own. Your pout lessens, and instead, your pride sets in. You did that to him. 

Wiping your gathered tears, you place a tentative hand on his length, watching him for any protests. His head knocks back into the hard wall, but he never loses sight of you, now looking down the angular slope of his nose, watching with amorous, lusting eyes. 

You dip down, reapproach, but this time you give into your own desire, indulging yourself.

Lifting his cock, you nose down his length. His eyes turn wide, but still, no protests.

“Can I put your balls in my mouth?” You ask, doing just as he told you to do, embellishing your simple sentence with pleading, fluttery lashes and persuasive, pinched together brows. 

His lips press into a purse as he swallows, and then they part with approval. “Yes,” he says. You watch as his tongue swipes along his plump bottom lip, and you can’t help but smile up at him. 

Appreciation sits on the tip of your tongue, but you don’t say it, you show it. Bowing your face low, you lick up the centre of his sack, flattening your slow moving tongue with an oath of sincerity — this makes you burn. For a moment, you believe that you’d be content if this was for you and you only, but then you meet his gaze, and you see the way he burns too.

His eyes devour you — your hand wrapped around his cock, thumb barely touching index, your chin settled deep between his thighs. You burn identically and it makes the swirl of butterflies in your stomach rise high, beating heavily in your chest. You get lost for a moment, but a thumb on your cheek, sweetly swiping softly against your skin, brings you right back.

“Pretty girl,” he hums. 

You tilt your head, nuzzling into his grip, humming a tender thank you. His thumb swipes again, just under your eye before settling behind your ear, sitting there with no intention but to be tethered to you.

It’s sweet, and you return the gesture, pressing two kisses, one to each side. You shift your focus, returning back to the moment.

Head still partially in the clouds, you do something daring without thinking, and you suck one of his balls into your mouth. Eddie lunges forward, bending at the waist, nearly folding in half as his stomach tenses harshly. He whimpers, and you pull back immediately.

“Sorry!” You shift, looking at his contorted expression. “I’m sorry, did I hurt you?”

He quickly relaxes himself, patting your cheek as he settles, unclenching his thighs that had tightened at your sides.

“No — no.” He shakes his head, catching his breath “Do it again.” He gently guides you back down. “I was just distracted, caught me off guard,” he explains.

Distracted like you were. You understand, and you let him guide your face back down. 

This time you’re careful. With his eyes on you, you start again, licking, feeling the silky skin with your tongue as you gauge his reaction, peering up at him through your lashes. He nods, and you carefully take him into your mouth, letting your tongue roll cautiously along the velvet skin. 

You’re careful not to do too much, but you grow more confident when you see the way his mouth falls open with his own appreciation. 

“Fuck,” he exhales. “Just like that. Good girl,” he praises, groaning as you suckle delicately. His cock jumps in your loose fist, reminding you just how long it's been since you’ve paid it any attention. Tightening your grip, you run your fist up, then down languidly, multitasking in a way that has Eddie gaping, jaw slack, mouth parted wide, eyes owlish and filled to the brim with heated astonishment. 

With your mouth, you switch to his other side, doing the same, rolling your tongue exploringly, seeing what has his stomach tensing and noises pulling from his lungs. 

As you let your thumb run over his leaking head, he lets out a throaty groan. His thighs tense around you once more, but instead of backing away, you lean into it, embracing the new-found way to make him squirm. 

His breathing quickly becomes rapid as you take more of him into your mouth, sucking more confidently, and pulling away every now and again to press deserved kisses. Your fist moves quicker, focusing on the tip — purposeful, as you remember what he taught you. 

You suck, and glide your hand in smooth strokes, over and over, showing him just how much you like him. If he didn’t believe you before, he has to now. 

With a strong, devoted rhythm built, the skin against your tongue eventually begins to pull taut. He throbs in your hand. You know before he says anything, even before his hand can flex its grip on your cheek. You pull away, letting him fall from your mouth with a quiet pop. He lets out a worn sigh of relief as you sever the threads of spit from your mouth to his balls and shift, moving back to his wired-up cock, twitching at just the sensation of your breath on his over-flushed tip.

Rearranging yourself, you sink your fist, moving it low to his base, and then you adjust, moving your hand to cradle his balls in your palm. His stomach flexes and he lets out a pitiful whimper — he's so close, even while you're barely touching him.

“Please,” he rasps through a strained breath. 

You have nothing but appreciation for the man in front of you, reduced to pleading. You want nothing more than to satisfy him.

Gentle, a thing of the past. You take his cock in your mouth deeply. Swallowing his thickness down, taking him as far as he fits, pressing him to the very back of your throat. Your eyes water, and you breathe heavily through your nose, never once forgetting to massage him in your hand.

His chest heaves, and his fingers weave their way into the hairs at the base of your neck, tugging — communicating. His helpless moans draw out, getting longer and deeper, drawing out each and every flutter in your belly, adding to your fire. 

You can’t believe you’ve been sitting around, tutoring him, teaching him math when you could have been doing this. This is much better — much, much more fulfilling. 

You rise and fall, bobbing quickly, and he encourages you, helping you find the pace that brings him to his edge. He swells in your mouth, and draws upwards in your hand. You hum, encouraging him to let go.

“I’m gonna —” he tries to speak, but a rogue whine cuts him off. He sucks in a sharp breath — “I’m cumming, I’m —” Panic invades his voice as his grip in your hair turns harsh, pulling, stinging your scalp. You hum again, and then you feel the spill. 

The warmth of his cum invades the back of your throat, loading your senses with the distinctly musky taste and a bitter-flavoured swell of sweetness in your chest. Pleased, you swallow it down, and ask for more with the purse of your lips on his overworked tip. His hips buck up into you as you happily swallow everything you can, lapping it up with your appeasing tongue. 

His body relaxes until you don’t stop. Then he’s flexing again, sucking in harsh, gasp-like breaths, using his hands in your hair to guide you away from his over-sensitive cock. 

Both his palms cup your cheeks and you rise, straightening out your spine, walking your knees up the mattress to be closer to him. His hand falls to your knee, encouraging a bend, welcoming you back into his lap. You happily take a careful seat on his thighs. 

“Holy fucking shit,” Eddie gushes unapologetically. 

His body slouches into the mattress, but he continues to beakon you forward. You follow his weak, weary pull and he guides you to his lips, attaching his mouth to yours in a lazy kiss. His beholden tongue greets yours, unaffected by the lingering flavour of his seed that coats your lips and mixes with your spit. He devours it gratefully. 

“That was —” he starts, pulling away just to peck your lips again — “So, so— I don’t even have words.” His hand slides loosely across the expanse of your bare waist as he presses a frenzy of chaste kisses to your lips, making you giggle.

“I did good? I thought I hurt you for a minute.”

“No— shit, you did so good, baby.” Eddie hums, fondly pressing his cheek to yours as he hugs you closer.

You feel his praises blaze at something inside of you, thrumming through your bloodstream, and you’d be lying if you said it didn’t highlight your own neediness, the one left abandoned between your thighs. 

Despite the restlessness that grows in your twitching hips, you try to relax, focusing on the sentimental feeling of the rise and fall of his chest, letting your body slink into his, fitting seamlessly against him until his breathing returns to a steady rate. You patiently wait for him to make the next move — especially after him letting you lead most of this evening. 

Just as you’ve let your eyes flutter shut, resting them for a peaceful moment, a kiss to your shoulder has your excitement kicking up in your lower belly, waking up those warm, winged creatures once again. He presses another kiss, and then another, following the slope of your shoulder. Down the curve, to your collarbone, high on your chest, kiss after kiss until his lips meet the plumpness of your breast that spills over the cups of your bra.

The swell of your breast, across, to the centre, his lips find your sternum, and you keen into it, unafraid of coming off as desperate. 

It’s barely anything, just innocent pecks, but it has you impatient, tilting your head back, curving your body to offer up more skin to him. He hums a warm tone, affectionately following the path of your sternum, nosing his way down your cleavage, sighing a deep, warm breath against your skin, adding a few extra heated degrees to your body temperature — you thank him with a breathy moan.

His hands move to your sides, tickling along your flesh, leaving goosebumped skin in their path as he traces along the band of your bra, fingertips gliding until they meet the clasp.

“Please,” you whisper, biting your lip as he finger paints small swirls along your spine. You push yourself closer, needing more.

And he gives you more. The band tightens around your ribs as he finds the edge, and you hold your breath.

One clip comes undone easily, granting you a hint of relief. Two follows, leaving just the third hook stuck standing between you and the promise of pleasure.

Then he stops — worse actually — he doesn’t just stop, he completely abandons the clasp on your bra as his head pops up, nearly clipping the edge of your jaw. He pulls you flush to his chest, tucking your head to his shoulder.

It surprises you, making your heart pound for an entirely different reason.

“What—” you begin, but his heedful palm spreads across the plain of your upper back, halting your question, making you pause. Unsure and curious, you turn your face, pushing against his grip on you, trying to see what’s wrong.

His face is contorted into a flat, focused look as his eyes fixate on the closed door of his room. You’re totally confused by what has pulled his attention, but then you hear a clatter from the living room of his trailer. You turn to look at Eddie. 

His eyes pinch shut with disappointment. “No,” he groans, dropping his head to your shoulder in defeat. 

“Is that —”

“My fucking uncle,” he mumbles into your skin.

“Oh,” you say quietly, trying to fight the unresolved neediness of your body from turning you into a slouching ball of disappointment.

“He's not supposed to be home yet,” he groans, and it comes out huffed, like he's annoyed, but you know it's not directed at you. Part of you is relieved to hear that upset edge in his voice, because you know how easy it would be for most boys to shrug it off when they already got what they needed.

His palm swipes across your back, rubbing it in a soothing way before he pulls away, finding your eyes.

“I’m sorry,” he apologizes. 

You shrug, it's not like this is his fault. “It’s okay,” you promise. 

“It’s not.”

You smile. “It is,” you say, delighted by his sincerity. “This just means we’ll have to pick up where we left off another day.”

“But you didn’t get to cum.”

True but — “I still had fun.”

He dips his face, chin bowing downward, bitten lips jetting out with his generous empathy. “I’m sorry,” he says again, and you giggle at his niceness. He might be more upset than you are, and you love it.

“Eddie, you know me,” you grin. “You said I did a good job, and there’s nothing better than the satisfaction of a job well done,” you beam, and you’re very pleased when you get a good chuckle from Eddie.

“Next time?” He proposes with a raised brow.

“Next time,” you agree.

✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦

merci buckets hope you liked if you did make sure to hit! that subscribe button and leave a like down below (aka comment and reblog <33333)

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i am weak for shy and nervous eddie munson who fumbles when around his crush. imagine him pining over this girl who he’s never even talked to, (maybe they have different social circles) and he just sees her around with her friends and he is smitten and then one day they accidentally bump into each other and she’s like “you’re eddie right?” and you know he’d be so flustered.

pairing: eddie munson x fem!reader word count: 2.2k

content warnings: lovesick eddie, pining, a little self-deprecation and self-doubt, mostly cheese and fluff, adult language - wildly unedited, oops.

“I hate this fucking school.”

The group exchange knowing glances as Eddie sits at the table with a grumble. His lunch tray lands with a low crash, nearly colliding with Gareth’s juicebox and therefore spilling its contents all over. A huff and quick reflexes on Jeff’s part save the group from catastrophe, more importantly, save the homework the boy had yet to finish ahead of next period. 

Eddie however, doesn’t notice the mess he has almost created. Frankly, he’s not paying attention. Even when Gareth tells him to, “Watch it, dude.”. The metal-head flicks his hand to say he’s sorry for whatever it is that his friends are chastising him for, but his eyes are fixed ahead, on the sole reason he’s in such a grumpy mood.

You.

Or rather Steve the dick Harrington, who’s got his arm draped shamelessly around your shoulders, as if he wasn’t just publicly humiliating Nancy Wheeler — since up until mere twenty-four hours ago, Hawkins High thought the blue-eyed girl was the King’s girlfriend, not you.

Eddie’s miserable. When did this happen? How did this even happen?

Last night, Steve and Nancy were all over each other. Eddie knows this to be fact since he saw them together at that party he wasn’t invited to as a guest, but to work because the popular kids always need a fix and he needs to make a living if he’s ever going to leave this shithole town. Anyway, that’s when Eddie saw the “it” couple and yet, now Nancy is nowhere to be seen and you’re snuggling into Harrington.

“I hate this fucking school,” Eddie repeats, sticking his fork into today’s cafeteria lunch. “Everyone is so two-faced and fake. No one has any integrity.”

The guys don’t need to follow his line of sight because they know very well who and what the metal-head is talking about.

“Maybe if you just talked to her, then you wouldn’t be so miserable today.” Jeff notes without looking up from his homework. “Plus, I overheard Charmaine tell Julie that Harrington is continuing to hold a candle for Nancy. This thing over there, that you’re obsessing over, is just friends being friends.”

“Doesn’t look like just friends to me,” Eddie grumbles, then looks at Jeff. “And I tried talking to her. It’s just, every time I do, my mind goes blank.”

Gareth rolls his eyes. “Dude, she’s not some superbeing. She’s a girl from our school. You’ve got no problem talking to other girls?”

Eddie doesn’t say anything because how does he go about explaining to his friends that to him, you’re more than a girl from school. It’s embarrassing enough how he’s never talked to you and yet, you occupy his entire mind and soul. The guys think it’s just another crush. Eddie knows it’s not. He can’t tell them though because they’ll laugh him out of it. Eddie the freak Munson is very much pining after a girl who doesn’t know he exists. Pathetic.

So, as any respectable guy in his situation would, Eddie continues to wallow in his own self-pity. 

He stares at you throughout the remainder of the lunch break, narrowly avoiding your gaze here and there by simply looking away. His downcast humour continues throughout the rest of the day. Since he doesn’t often engage in class anyway, the teachers pay him no mind. Although, their reasons are different: a quiet Eddie Munson is better than one who causes various disturbances. After the final bell ring, he hurries out of the building and blares music the entire drive home, to fizz out his thoughts.

Called into work. Here’s some cash. Go to the diner. 

Wayne

Eddie sighs. The one thing he was hoping for were his uncle's words of wisdom, although it seems that will also have to wait. Eddie slides the note into the pocket of his denim jeans and he is out the door again.

The diner is about thirty minutes away from the trailer, by foot. The metal-head decided to walk it anyway, hoping the fresh air would knock some sense into him because he’s got no business feeling this emotionally shattered. 

Maybe if he wasn’t such a bitch boy around you, things would be different. Unfortunately, for some reason, ever since he first laid eyes on you, Eddie’s default is shy.

Okay, maybe you and Harrington are a thing now, so what? Eddie’s got no claim on you, unspoken or otherwise. You can date whoever, even if it’s Steve the asshole. It’s also not like you and Nancy are friends. Everyone at school knows you two run in different circles, meaning no girl-code is being broken. There is also the possibility of what Jeff overheard from Charmaine and Julie being true: you and Harrington are nothing but friends. Very friendly friends. Touchy, feely. And Eddie would have noticed earlier if it were simply the case of friendship, therefore, he concludes that you are in fact dating Steve the douche Harrington and he somehow has to come to terms with it.

Eddie pushes the door open and makes a beeline for an empty booth. He orders a burger with fries and a soda from the middle-aged waitress, then whips out a notebook from his backpack while he waits. The only one he carries and it’s not for any schoolwork. The numbers scribbled hastily in the margins are easily mistaken for maths, but that’s just business. He focuses instead on the latest D&D campaign he’s working on.

For a moment, the metal-head forgets about today's events. He gets lost in the fictional world he’s creating. The made up monsters replace any harboured thoughts of you with Steve the turd, although one closely resembles Harrington's famous head of hair and he smirks, proud of himself for the immaturity. He figures if girls can write about their demons in journals, he can bring them into D&D. Bring them, then kill them.

He’s just about finished marking a big cross over the doodle of monster Steve when a figure steps in front of the light, creating a shadow over his notebook. Eddie sighs, foot tapping underneath the table in frustration. He’s about to make a rude remark, but when he looks up to meet the eyes of the perpetrator, he’s met with your wide gaze and naturally, he freezes.

“I like your drawings,” you say.

“Uhm, t-thanks,” he fumbles.

“You’re Eddie, right?”

All he can do is nod in response and you smile. Small and charming. Enough to make the brunette’s head spin and pinch his leg because he can’t believe this is happening. Surely, this must be a dream of some sort. He came home and passed out on the sofa. The only logical explanation for why you would be talking to him, complementing his stupid little doodles. The only logical explanation for why you know his fucking name.

“We’ve never officially met,” you begin and reach out your hand. 

Eddie glances at it and without really thinking, he utters, “I know who you are.”

It comes out a little more mean than he intends it to, he knows because you retreat your hand as if you’ve been burned. Eddie’s heart stings. Now he knows it’s real since only he’d be stupid enough to ruin a good thing before it even began. He’s an asshole.

“Sorry,” he mumbles quickly, then straightens in his seat. “Do you wanna sit? I-I have fries.”

He chews on the inside of his cheek for how incredibly pathetic that sounded; fries. You however, don’t notice and you’re also kind enough not to point out how he’s stumbling about his words like a little schoolkid.

“I love french fries.”

And with that, you’re sliding into the booth, across from him.

Eddie watches in disbelief as you help yourself to his food, not just the potato side, as if the two of you have been friends a lifetime. Then, probably to confuse him even more, you start telling him about how your parents locked you out and how it’s nice to see a familiar face, while he’s sitting there in silence, taking it all in, wondering whether perhaps this was some cruel joke Harrington and his band of losers were playing on him.

He wants to ask. Save himself the embarrassment if this does end up being a prank and tomorrow’s gossip: Eddie the freak Munson thought he had a chance. You keep talking, only taking small pauses to take bites out of his food or a sip of his soda, and to Eddie’s surprise nothing happens. No one jumps out screaming, laughing, pointing at him. This is really happening and he is truly baffled.

“Can we get another burger meal and the same soda?” You order from the waitress when she comes around to check the tables and afterwards, turn to look at Eddie, smile ever present. “Kinda ate most of yours.”

“It’s fine,” he manages to say.

For the first time since you sat down, it’s quiet. Now you’re the one staring at him, head tilted slightly to the one side. The smile on your face transforms into something more thoughtful, as if you were trying to read his mind — which is exactly the same thing Eddie was trying to do to you.

“So,” you begin again, “What were you scribbling intently before I crashed the party?”

“Just some stuff for an afterschool thing,” Eddie answers with a shrug, voice a little shaky.

“Mysterious.”

The sparkle in your eyes screams that you want to know more, but the metal-head is hesitant to share. Even though this wasn’t part of some scheme by Hawkins’ finest, it didn’t mean there wasn’t a different underlying reason as to why you were taking interest in him and he didn’t like when people made a fool of him.

Eddie clears his throat.

“Did your parents really lock you out?” He questions.

A brow goes up, it seems you are surprised at his push back. 

“Yes,” you say matter-of-factly, then add, “They do this sort of thing from time to time. They’re big hippies, so it’s not like neglect or anything. It’s weed. They don’t want me home when they’re high because they think it would make me undermine their authority.”

Eddie smirks and you tell him it’s not funny, but he can’t help the chuckle leave his throat. When you throw a fry at him across the table, smiling wide, he’s no longer feeling the nervous bubble. In fact, he’s suddenly quite relaxed.

“I’m sorry that I’m a good daughter. Next time I’ll be sure to pick a less judgemental table” you say dramatically, although the grin doesn’t leave your features.

The brunette lifts his hands in front of his chest in a defence motion.

“No judgement here. My social status requires me to second guess reasons people have for talking to me. I had to make sure your boyfriend wasn’t going to jump me the second we stepped outside.”

“Boyfriend?” You seem genuinely taken aback by the assumption.

“Harrington,” he clarifies, although he’s not sure why he should be.

Until you laugh. It’s soft and tender, but it’s a laugh nonetheless.

“Steve’s not my boyfriend,” you state in between giggles, “He’s madly in love with Wheeler. God, does the whole school think we’re dating? He’s gonna hate that. Poor Nancy.”

Eddie blinks. Seems Julie’s information was correct, but it still doesn’t explain the closeness and the banter the entire cafeteria was witness to. He feels weird for letting this bother him so much and even though he usually has difficulties keeping his big mouth shut, he doesn’t want you thinking he’s some sort of pervert, so he doesn't say anything, simply bops his head.

Although, his silence doesn’t seem to deter you.

“I noticed you staring,” you admit, half a decibel lower. 

A fresh burger and fries land on the table, followed by a large Coca-Cola. The waitress mutters something along the lines of enjoy, then walks away to tend to another table.

Eddie doesn’t know what to do next: admit or deny. He’d rather go back to fifteen minutes ago when you were eating his food and he wasn’t talking. Therefore, he slides the burger closer to himself and in one swift motion, lifts it to his lips, taking a bite too big for his mouth. He doesn’t care what he looks like at the moment, he just needs to keep himself quiet before saying something else he’s going to regret.

Across the table, you’re all smiley again.

“Do you think, when you’re done eating, you could walk me home?” You ask, offering him a napkin. 

As he nods, he reaches for the paper cloth and his fingers brush yours delicately. There’s a zap of electricity, but if you feel it, you don’t react. Eddie’s continuing with the shyness, so he looks down at the burger in his hand and pretends nothing happened to him either.

It’s not until you lean over the table, index finger stretched and inching forward to touch his face, wiping leftover ketchup from the corner of his mouth, that the metal-head thinks maybe, just maybe, you feel some type of way about him too because that’s not what a person does for someone they only officially met minutes before.

Afterwards, you say, “I’ll tell you all about how I’ve been watching you too.”, and Eddie nearly chokes on his food.

thank you for reading & please support your writers by reblogging <3

after skinny dipping at a lover’s lake alone, eddie is shocked to see someone else was there all along (reader) 🫶🏻

thank u for requesting anon! this prompt literally drove me insane! (in a good way)! — eddie falls in love with the weirdest stranger he's ever met in his life (wednesdayaddams!reader-esque, mentions of being naked, 18+ | 1.2k)

The edge of Lover’s Lake sits right outside Eddie’s trailer, partially visible through a thin treeline of bright orange oaks. He stumbles through it on graceless, lanky legs — high out of his mind, which is filled now with racing thoughts of boyish rage. 

He’s failing English (again), for one. For another, Corroded Coffin’s been bumped to Tuesday night shows instead of Friday nights (a death sentence if he ever saw one). And ever since then, Wayne’s been on his ass about working with him at the car shop (‘cause moonlight as a rockstar isn’t a real job, apparently.)

Eddie gets angrier the more he thinks about it — which is perpetually and without mercy. It makes his pale skin feel red hot, boiling to the touch, practically repelling every wisp of autumn breeze that threatens to cool him down. He wonders, briefly, if it could be the weed fucking with him. ‘Cause everything else has been today.

He stands on the grassy bank of the moonlit lake and strips off his clothes to find out. He stumbles trying to get his pants off, right after his chin gets stuck in the neck of his t-shirt. He doesn’t think to check if anyone’s around until he’s left only in his thin, navy plaid boxers.

“Free show?” a feminine, unfamiliar voice calls from the center of the pitch-black lake.

Eddie practically jumps out of his buzzing skin. His heart lurches into his throat as his palms hurry to cover his still-clothed crotch. “Shit!” he shouts, voice echoing over the empty clearing.

You don’t flinch at the volume of the voice. He can’t even tell if you’re blinking from here. You just remain in the middle of the rippling, silver water, only visible from the tops of your bare collarbones.

Eddie swallows hard, adam’s apple bobbing, and tries to catch his breath. “Sorry. I— I didn’t know anyone else was out here…”

“Don’t stop on my account,” you tell him, flirtatious words that sound strangely deadpan falling from your lips. “Lover’s Lake is big enough for the both of us.”

Eddie squints into the darkness, dark eyes flitting across the water. “You’re alone?” he concludes after a few moments. 

“Usually…” you hum, lifting a naked shoulder in a lazy shrug. “…Are you?”

“Usually.”

“Want some company?” you offer, still strikingly monotoned. The strange boy with the wild hair and pale legs stammers for a response. You tilt your chin to your chest and look cautiously at him through your lashes. “…Or should I go?”

“No!” Eddie blurts, then clears his throat with a red face. Quieter, he adds, “No, it’s not that. You don’t have to go.”

A smile quirks at the edges of your lips. So faint Eddie can hardly tell it’s there. But still, it sparkles in your eyes like the moonlight does. “Just act like I’m not here,” you lilt, disappearing back into the water before Eddie can blink.

He’s not so sure how possible that is, but he gets into the water with you, anyway.

The fall season has turned the lake into silk. It’s cool and soft against his burning skin as he slowly submerges himself within its void. Eddie’s wide, attentive eyes never leave the water as he searches for your body beneath it. He follows the faint, silver ripples until they disappear completely — until he starts to worry if you’ll ever come back up again — until he starts to convince himself you were never there at all.

There’s a loud and sudden splash before him. He blinks, and your face is inches away from his own. An almost uncomfortable proximity between two strangers. “Jesus!” Eddie blurts, flailing awkwardly in fear.

“Did I scare you?” you squint, like it wasn’t totally obvious.

The boy exhales a wavering breath. “Yeah… Yeah, a little bit.”

“Sorry. Won’t happen again,” you promise with a faint smirk that tells him otherwise, as you swim slightly back from the boy ahead of you. The dark waves rise and valley at your bare chest. Eddie’s boyish mind immediately wonders exactly how bare you are underneath them. 

“Actually, it might,” you continue. “But it’ll be an accident… Probably.” 

Eddie struggles to tell if you’re joking or not — if you’re playing games with him, or if you’re just too aloof to know what you’re doing to him.

“You’re a strange… strange person,” he tells you, a half-compliment and a half-something-else, as the words tumble from his lips before he can think about them. His chocolate eyes narrow into thin slits at you. “Did you know that?”

The question’s mostly rhetorical, but you nod rapidly in response anyway.

“It’s ‘cause I’m not a person,” you confess, eyes wide and glittering with sincerity. “I’m a mermaid trapped in human form.”

“Aren’t mermaids already half-human?”

A contented noise sounds in your throat. 

“Hm… Guess I’m already halfway there, then.”

Eddie forgets to respond, and the conversation lulls. It makes the rest of the world seem terribly loud. Wind whistles through trees. Frogs croak in the tall grass. Water sloshes softly around your bodies. He gets lost in the serenity surrounding him and drowns in the chaos in your eyes.

“You have a staring problem,” you blurt. “Did you know that?”

The boy blinks rapidly to clear the haze from his glazed-over eyes. “Sorry. Sorry, I’m just—” Eddie clears his throat and shakes his head, hair damp at the edges and sticking to his freckled shoulders. “I’m just trying to figure out if you’re real, or if I just… made you up in my head or something?”

Something about that seems to please you. 

A mischievous smirk pulls slowly at the edges of your mouth — into a smile brighter than Eddie thought you were capable of. You float towards him with little effort, like two distant planets now threatening to collide. He doesn’t realize how close you are until your breath fans warm across his jaw.

“How’s this for real?” you hum quietly, leaning in like you plan to kiss him.

Eddie’s stunned still. He forgets how to breathe as his heavy eyes fall to your lips. He moves closer to you on instinct, mouth gravitating to yours despite himself — like you’re some kinda siren controlling his mind with a song he’s too far gone to hear.

Through the mist in his vision, he watches your mouth curl into a cheeky half-smirk. You look on at him, at this puddle of a boy, like you’ve got him in the palm of your hand. 

“You are a strange… strange boy, Eddie Munson,” you hum quietly.

Eddie shakes his head as he descends (face-plants, more like) back into reality. The water ripples faintly around you as you swim away from him. He stammers for words while you head back towards the bank. “Wait— How— How do you know my name?” the boy gapes.

Your body ascends from the silver lake, naked as the day you were born, and shining beneath the full moon. 

Water drips from your skin like diamonds as you crouch to grab your clothes, lying in a discarded pile beside the dock. The sight of your bare ass would make Eddie implode if he wasn’t already reeling.

“Sorry!” you call to him over your shoulder, with your all-black clothes balled at your chest. “Can’t hear you all the way over there!”

You never cease your stride back towards the pitch-black treeline. Eddie shouts at the back of you anyway, “How do you know my name?!”

He never gets an answer.

Stars In My Eyes

(a part two to this fic!)

modern music teacher!eddie munson x art teacher fem!reader

18+ ONLY MDNI!!!

warnings: fluff, so fluffy, first dates, first kisses, some anxiety/stress, a little dash of coach!steve harrington, suggestiveness

author's note: i feel like this took me ages to write! so sorry for the wait...i do sort of love how this turned out :) writing a first kiss scene is hard!!!

please let me know what your thoughts are on this series!

word count: 7.7k

Eddie Munson couldn’t believe his luck.

Like, sure he’s gotten lucky a few times before.  There was that one time an officer let him off with a warning after he rolled through a stop sign, he’d played the “I’m a teacher during finals week” card and it had seemed to work out pretty well for him.  There were also a few times when a stranger in front of him at the Starbucks drive thru had paid for his morning coffee, only for him to turn around and see there was no one behind him to pay it forward to.  

And then, there was that time back during his final senior year where Stacy Cowell was going through a “rebel phase” and decided to give Eddie a string of random blowjobs over the course of a week and a half to make herself feel like she was living on “the wild side.”  She quickly transitioned out of that phase when Eddie had asked her out on a date, he figured they should probably make an effort to learn a little about each other if she was going to be deepthroating him in the back of his van every other day after school.  She turned him down with a disgusted sneer, leaving Eddie a little heartbroken by the fact that a girl could be so offended at the idea of a date with him.  

But none of that even mattered to Eddie anymore.  All of those situations touched by a bit of luck have been reduced down to mere coincidences now that he has you in his life.  Even though it was only one IKEA date trip that the two of you went on last weekend, Eddie couldn’t stop himself from imagining a long, happy future with you because of how fucking perfect it all went.

- 

You don’t think you’ve ever been so nervously giddy over anything in your entire life.  There had never really been any boys that you were crazy for when you were younger.  Sure, you’d been in love a couple times before, but nothing was ever…”wow.” 

 You’d never felt any real sparks, never met anyone truly special enough to change your life like all of the women you’d seen in movies or read about in books.  

But Eddie…he was very much wow.

After you’d worked out the details for your IKEA trip that afternoon in your classroom, you found it hard to stop blushing for the remainder of the week.  The both of you decided that you’d go on Saturday morning, and Eddie had insisted on picking you up and driving there together.  He bowed his head and lightly pressed his lips to your hand in a dramatic and silly fashion before leaving your classroom.  Your knees felt weak and a bright red blush bloomed on your face as Eddie stood back up to his full height to face you. 

“You know,” he started, still holding your hand, "you're really cute when you blush like that.”

A tiny squeak is all that comes out of your mouth when you open it to respond.  

You struggle to put together a coherent sentence and settle for the smile and girlish giggle that bubbled its way out of your chest.  

“I’ll see you later.”

Eddie started to walk backwards, keeping your hand in his grasp until he was too far away and then turning around to exit your classroom.  There wasn’t much else you could do except stare at the hand that had just been held by him, while holding your other over your mouth in shock.  

Eddie waited the appropriate five seconds after being out of your line of sight before erupting into a silent “fist-punching-head-banging-fuck yeah!” celebration in the hallway.  He couldn’t believe he kissed your hand.  The thought to kiss your hand had barely graced his mind before his body had made the decision to go through with it.  Eddie was terrified that his nerdy qualities would cause you to run for the hills, or that you’d think he was weird or stupid.

But instead, you’d blushed bright red and blessed his ears with a giggle, and all of Eddie’s worries and fears were banished from his mind at the sound of it.  

Eddie decided he was going to really enjoy taking every opportunity to make you blush.  

-

There were only two days until your IKEA trip with Eddie, and somehow you kept missing each other in the hallways at school.  On the rare occasion that Eddie had a spare moment, you were at some kind of art teacher workshop.  Whenever you could pull yourself away from decorating your classroom and lesson-planning, Eddie was leaving early for the day to go look at different types of Tubano drums for his classroom.  

There were a couple of staff meetings that everyone had to attend, but the two of you never ended up sitting next to each other.  Instead, you would indulge in a game of eye tag, making yourself feel like you were in high school all over again with a big fat crush.  

While you were really looking forward to your day out with Eddie, a tiny part of you was glad that you weren’t running into him constantly.  You found yourself overpouring your coffee in the morning because of the way the deep brown shade of the coffee matched the color of Eddie’s eyes.  You accidentally took a sip out of your paint water cup instead of your drinking cup because you were staring off at the lamps in your room, wondering which one had been Eddie’s favorite.  Two days was just what you needed to collect yourself enough to act like a normal human being before you saw Eddie again.  You weren’t even allowing yourself the time to think about being in a car with him for the hour that it took to get to IKEA.  All of the workshops, lesson plans and other preparation for the start of school kept you calm and collected.

Eddie, on the other hand, was reduced to a pile of chunky silver rings and nerves.  He couldn’t stop thinking about everything he had to get done before your trip…date?  Was it a date?  Did you say the word date when you asked him?  Is it even a date when the girl asks the guy-

Eddie’s frantic pacing is interrupted by a shark knock on his propped open classroom door.

“Yo, Munson.  How’s the…” Steve trailed off as he took in Eddie’s disheveled state.  “Dude.”

“I know, I know, man.” Eddie responds, plopping down in a chair that was meant for one of his students.  He puts his head in his hands, tugging on the roots to try and get a grip.

“What’s goin’ on, Ed?  I haven’t seen you this distraught since One Direction broke up.”  Steve sits on top of a desk next to Eddie, jabbing him softly in the shoulder after his lame attempt at getting a smile out of Eddie.  

Eddie chuckles and shakes his head at the stupid joke.  He looks up at Steve with a deep sigh, then stands up and grabs him by the shoulders.

“If I tell you, it stays between us.”  Eddie fixes Steve with a hard look and raised eyebrows, not any different from the look he gives his students when they’re getting up to no good.  “I’m so dead serious.”

Steve’s eyes widen at the sudden seriousness, making a cross over his chest with his finger.  “Yeah man, cross my heart and all that.”

Eddie lets go of Steve, slumping back into the chair with a huff.  

“How do you know that a date is a date, and not just a friend thing?”

Steve smiles cockily and leans forward, always interested in Eddie’s love life…or lack thereof.

“Well, I don’t know…I think I might have to hear a little more about this special lady in order for me to provide some of my good ol’ Harrington Love Advice.”  Steve wiggles his eyebrows at Eddie, throwing in a wink for the sake of being annoying.

Eddie rolls his eyes, he knew it was a mistake to bring up girls around this guy.  Steve was always giving Eddie pointers on how to get chicks the way he did, but Eddie was in no way similar to Steve when it came to relationships.  Steve never had nothing to do on the weekends, always with a new girl, sometimes even the single moms at school.  He’d meet them out at a bar, woo them, take them to dinner and then even sometimes back to his place.  Despite his fuck-boy tendencies, Eddie knows it’s never that meaningful for either party.  Steve’s been pining after one of the English teachers for years, and these flings are only serving as a way to satiate his intensely flirtatious side.  

As annoying as he may be, it would be nice to rant about all of his pent up loverboy feelings for you to Steve.  Eddie knows he’s just giving him a hard time, it’s one of the many love languages they share as best friends.

“I-it’s just…she’s so beautiful man, like…holy fuck.”  Eddie shakes his head in disbelief, looking off into the distance as he rambles on about you.  “I mean just…she looks like some kind of Elven princess-angel-goddess-fairy–”

“Dude, Ed.  None of that nerd shit please, say it to me in English.”

Eddie chuckles and shakes his head with a sigh.  

“Okay.  I really like her.  I haven’t felt this way in years, maybe ever.  We met officially yesterday and just…clicked.”

Steve smiles at Eddie as he talks about you, happy to see his friend so excited about someone.

“We made plans to go to IKEA this weekend, but I don’t know what to make of it?  Is it a date?  Should I bring her flowers?  What if I do bring her flowers and she gets weirded out because it was actually never a date at all?”

Steve holds his hands up like he’s trying to calm down an animal.  

“Woah there, buddy.  No need to get all freaked out about it.”  Steve can’t help but to laugh a little at the helpless look on his friend’s face.  “Let’s just start with the details, okay?  Who asked who?”

“She asked me.  I said I liked her lamps and then she said she got them at IKEA and then I said that I needed some for my room and then she said that we should go to IKEAandshopforsometogether-”

“Okay, okay man.  Take a deep breath.”  Steve motions for Eddie to inhale for a couple seconds.  

“Then let it all out.”  Eddie expels the breath from his lips in a hard huff, looking a little calmer.  “Alright.  So, she asked you?”

Eddie nods.

“That’s good, it means she’s interested!  Not a lot of women are making the first move these days, it means that she definitely wants a slice of Munson.”

Eddie rolls his eyes at Steve, but still waits for him to go on.

“Are you picking her up for the trip to IKEA?”

“Yeah, I offered to pick her up and drive us both there since it’s about an hour away.”

Steve scratches his five o’clock stubble.

“Hmm…okay.  Did she like…jump at the chance for you to drive her or was there some hesitation before she agreed?”

Eddie thinks back to that moment.  How the two of you were standing slightly too close for new friends, the way your eyes seemed to sparkle as you looked up at him, how he was surprised you couldn’t hear his heart beating out of his chest.  

He remembers offering to drive the both of you to the store, surprising himself by saying it way calmer than he was feeling.  Your face lit up a little, like you were shocked that he’d even offer to pick you up and drive you there.  You smiled and nodded your head sweetly before agreeing out loud.

Eddie feels himself smiling at the tiny memory.

“It wasn’t like she immediately answered…but she definitely was smiling when she agreed.  She didn’t seem nervous about it or anything, it was more like she was excited or something.”

Steve’s eyebrows shoot up as a smirk emerges on his face.

“So let me see if I’m getting this straight.  She asked you to go to IKEA, probably knowing it was a long drive, and then she happily agreed to let you pick her up and drive the two of you there?  For a whole two hours there and back?”

Eddie nods, anxiously awaiting Steve’s opinion on all of this.

“I mean, it’ll probably be a good four or five hours that you spend together driving and shopping.”

Steve fixes Eddie with a look that says ‘c’mon man, it’s obvious.’

Eddie’s had enough of his edging.  “Will you just get to the fucking point please for the love of god?”

Steve sighs and claps a hand on Eddie's shoulder. 

“Ed, it’s a date.”

Eddie barks out a triumphant laugh and Steve does the same.  The two men high five and Steve wraps a beefy arm around Eddie’s shoulder to pat him on the chest.  Eddie can’t help but to let out a big sigh of relief now that he can stop worrying about how to act on this trip date.

-

On Friday, you could’ve sworn you went slightly neurotic.  

Since Tuesday you’d been considering your day with Eddie as a date, but it suddenly hit you that maybe he didn’t feel the same way.  What if you’d been doing all this worrying and freaking out for no reason?  What if he ends up calling you ‘dude’ the entire day?  What if he has a girlfriend already, and he just agreed to take you to IKEA so that you wouldn’t get your feelings hurt?

You’d been running circles in your head trying to prepare yourself for any and all possible outcomes that Saturday could hold for you, but none of it seemed to be doing you any good.

So, you did what you always did whenever you found yourself flipping out over something new.

You made a to-do list. 

Pick out an outfit.  Dress! too fancy…jeans?  Dress, definitely dress. not too fancy though…

Drink wine 

Watch movie

Clean house…again

Drink more wine

Possibly reconsider outfit…

After all was said and done, you plopped down on your worn-in couch, sufficiently drunk with a clean house and an outfit neatly hung up outside of your closet.  You decide to pour your third and final glass of wine for the evening, and to surrender your anxiety to the gods of love.  You hope and pray that they like you enough to let you have this one. 

-

It was finally Saturday.  Eddie stands in front of his closet furiously, wondering why in the fuck he can’t find a single thing to wear for his date with you today.  He’s got enough clothes to fill his entire closet, dresser, and a $20 clothing rack he picked up at Target years ago.  Steve said to just go with what felt the most like ‘Eddie’, but he’s suddenly unable to remember what his style even looks like.  

He wants to punch himself in the nuts for not taking the time last night to plan this all out like a normal person.  

He ends up settling for a fitted white tee, a pair of trusty black jeans, and black boots.  On a FaceTime call with Steve (so he could approve Eddie’s choice), Steve mentioned that the outfit was casual, but still fairly nice, and that the white shirt showed off his tattoos and muscles.

“Chicks dig the muscles and white tee combo, man.  Trust.”

Eddie chuckles at his friend’s ‘frat boy’ lingo, but the comment makes him feel better about his appearance anyways.  Last year, Steve had managed to convince Eddie to start going to the gym with him after school during the week, and it pains him to admit that he sort of really likes it now.  He likes how much stronger he feels, he likes sweating out all of his frustrations, and most of all he likes the way he fills out his t-shirts now.

After hanging up the call with Steve, Eddie flexes a little in his mirror before leaving to go pick you up.  He decides to do a few last minute push ups and to moisturize the tattoos on his arms so that he looks extra good for you.

-

Perhaps being slightly neurotic about this date was a good idea.

Thanks to all of your meticulous planning, you managed to get completely ready with a half hour to spare.  You decided against sitting on your couch until Eddie arrived since the nervous butterflies in your stomach made you want to throw up, so you opted to wander around your house for the remainder of the time.

You pass by your mirror, doing a final check and making sure your outfit and makeup are up to par.  You’d decided on a simple white dress, with a denim button up thrown over it and your pair of black chelsea boots that had yet to let you down.  You smile at your reflection, happy that you’d managed to choose a comfy and cute outfit that felt like you.

There’d been too many dates before this one where you’d gone out and spent insane amounts of money on brand new outfits that you weren’t even sure you really liked, all in the name of impressing your date and hoping he likes you enough to ask you out on a second one.  When prepping for those dates, you spent hours upon hours running around like a mad woman.  Shaving, plucking, tweezing, waxing.  Making sure your hair curled just right and that your eyeliner was sexy, but not slutty.

You couldn’t figure out why Eddie felt so different to you.  Even though the nerves of a first date had really freaked you out the night before, this morning was fairly calm.  Sure, you took plenty of time in the shower and doing your hair and makeup, but it didn’t feel like you were trying to morph into a different version of yourself to please a man. 

It felt more like you were trying your best to look like your favorite version of yourself. 

You want Eddie to know who you are inside and outside of work, and you really hope that he likes what he finds. 

-

Eddie stays parked outside of your house for a minute or two to try and settle his nerves.  

You lived in a small, red brick house in a family neighborhood.  There were flowers planted in the beds under your windows, and your front door was painted a deep turquoise color.  Eddie sucks in a breath when he sees your figure moving around through the gauzy white curtains covering your windows.  

How can a hazy silhouette still be so beautiful?

Looking into his rearview mirror, Eddie takes a deep breath.

“You got this man.  Be cool.”

He turns his car off and makes his way to your front door, knocking three times and then taking a step back to wait for you.

It takes all of two seconds for your front door to swing open, revealing you on the other side.

Eddie immediately feels weak in the knees.  You looked so cute in your little boots, and he couldn’t help but to let his eyes trail up the smooth skin of your legs.  He gulped a bit at the short hem of your dress, and then realized he should probably say something.

“Hey you.”

“Hi,” You smile up at him bashfully as he looks you up and down.  You take the opportunity to look him over as well, and damn.  You already knew he was sexy, but his tight tee shirt and pulled back hair made you want to drag him into your house and do things to him…

You only notice that he’s been holding a hand behind his back when he brings it out in front of him, revealing a beautiful bouquet of flowers.  

“These are for you.  I didn’t know which was your favorite, so I just asked the lady to throw together a bunch of different kinds and to make it look pretty.”  Eddie holds the colorful bouquet out to you and smiles sheepishly.  

Your mouth hangs open as you reach out to take them, being so careful for no real reason.  You look up at Eddie with those big, sparkling eyes.

“Thank you so much, Eddie.  These are so incredibly beautiful,” he watches you looking down at the flowers, gently brushing your fingers against their petals.  “Let me run inside and find a vase for them real quick.  Come on in!”

You wave him in behind you and hurry inside.

Eddie tries to suppress the excitement he feels at being invited into your home.  He felt like he already got a good glimpse at who you are and how you express yourself when he was inside your classroom, but he’s now getting to see where you spend the majority of your time, where you live.  As he steps over the threshold and into your house, he readies his brain to take mental pictures of everything he sets his eyes on, just in case he never sees it again.

Instantly, he’s hit with a sense of “home.”  The inside of your house is the perfect temperature and it smells so good and womanly, like your perfume and also like you’ve been baking something but somehow also like flowers…Eddie loves it already.

You scurry off into the kitchen, trying not to think about the fact that Eddie Munson is looking around your house right now.

Where in the hell have all of your vases run off to?

Eddie walks around cooly with his hands clasped behind his back, taking in everything about your space.  Much like your classroom, Eddie is able to spot at least four different sized lamps and light fixtures placed around your entryway and living room.  There were warm white Christmas lights hung up along the ceiling, multiple green-leaved plants in different corners, and Eddie even thinks he spotted a black cat sprinting under your soft looking white sectional.

Overall, he’d give your interior design skills an 11/10. 

He’s just starting to miss you a little when you come out from your kitchen holding your flowers in a sparkly glass vase.  

It’s an odd feeling, seeing Eddie in your house.  His ‘edgier’ look seems like it wouldn’t fit with your overall aesthetic, but to your surprise he looks like he belongs here.  You walk up to him almost in a daze, admiring the silver hoop earrings he’s wearing, the smile on his lips, and the way some of his hair has made its way out of his low bun to frame his face.  

The two of you stand there for a moment looking at each other, with you holding your flowers in between your bodies.  You engage in a staring match for almost a second too long before you break the silence.

“No one’s ever gotten me flowers before,” you sheepishly admit, looking down at them instead of at him.  Eddie grins at the blush that blooms onto your cheeks after your prolonged eye contact.

Eddie scoffs before he can stop himself.

“Seriously?  That’s a damn shame, sweetheart.”

You look up at him again and try not to faint at how easily the word fell from his perfect lips.  Unable to take another second of his eyes on yours, you retreat into your living room to find the perfect place for your new flowers.  You decide to put them on your coffee table, then turn around to find that Eddie had followed you in.  

He offers his arm out to you, “Shall we?”

This time, you can’t fight the smile.

You take his arm and swipe your purse from the coat hanger next to your front door on your way out.

-

Eddie was the perfect gentleman for the entire duration of the car ride to IKEA.  He had opened the car door for you, he let you pick the music, and he definitely did not sneak a glimpse at your bare, voluminous thighs when your dress shifted as you sat down.  The sweet smell of your perfume spread throughout the interior of his truck, he hopes that smell never fades away.

He couldn’t help glancing over at you every other minute, looking so beautiful in his passenger seat while you bobbed your head to whatever song you had queued up on his phone. 

“Would it be a total invasion of privacy if I played your On Repeat playlist?  I’m dying to know what the music teacher’s favorite music is right now.”  Eddie turned to see that you were smiling pleadingly at him, and how could he say no to that face?

“I suppose,” Eddie sighs dramatically.  “But, you are not allowed to judge me for whatever pops up.”  He playfully points a finger at you while keeping his eyes on the road.  You giggle girlishly.

“I wouldn’t dream of it.”

You hit ‘shuffle’ on Eddie’s playlist and aren’t surprised when the first song that plays through the speakers is ‘The Unforgiven ll’ by Metallica.  You already knew Eddie was a fan of the band thanks to the music he always has playing a tad too loudly whenever you pass by his classroom.

“Oh, I know this song!”

Eddie’s face whips towards you sporting a shocked ‘you’ve gotta be kidding me’ expression.  He was definitely expecting you to be the ‘indie music’ type.  Your eyebrows furrow adorably angrily at the look on his face.  

“What?  A girl can’t like Metallica?” You fix him with a look that tells Eddie he should think twice about his response.

“W-well…I just didn’t expect you to be into them…that’s all.”  You roll your eyes playfully at him and cross your arms.  “But!  I’m very pleasantly surprised that you are!  Girls rule, alright?  Men like…totally suck and stuff.”

You chuckle at his frantic attempt at avoiding a lecture on gender inequality and feminism while settling back into your seat.  And because you actually do know and love this song, you start mouthing the words, which eventually evolves into singing them under your breath.

When Eddie thought he spotted you mouthing the words out of the corner of his eye, he was sure that his eyes were playing tricks on him.  But just barely hearing you singing the words to his favorite Metallica song just further confirmed a fact that he already knew.

Eddie Munson was totally going to fall in love with you.

The rest of the car ride consisted of sharing music, talking about work and life, childhood memories, and other random topics.  Eddie discovered that you love thunderstorms, your cat’s name is Pascal (after the chameleon from Tangled), and that you moved here at the beginning of summer from Chicago.

Eddie swears there’s never been a conversation in history that flowed as well as yours and his.  He felt like he’s known you for years, and he hopes you’re feeling the same way.

You totally are.

-

Once the two of you made it to IKEA and inside the giant store, Eddie quickly realized that he never really put any thought into what he actually wanted to buy for his classroom.  You swiftly came to his rescue and pulled out your phone to open up Pinterest.

Together, you found a couple pictures that matched the general vibe of Eddie’s classroom.  He grabbed a map of the store and a cart, and set off into the maze of furniture.  

You were back to being shy again, now that you were out in the wild with Eddie.  He found that making jokes about all of the funny names got you giggling, and so he didn’t miss an opportunity.

He made you laugh the hardest next to the Koppang drawers.

You bumped your shoulder into his around the Baggebo bookcases.

His hand brushed yours next to a Tornviken kitchen island. 

And Eddie finally worked up the courage to hold your hand next to a Klippan loveseat.

You gasped a little when you felt his warm hand slide into yours, interlocking your fingers together.  A red hot blush worked its way up your neck as you snuck a glance over at him, only to find that he was already looking at you with a smirk.  He knows exactly what this hand holding is doing to you.

He chuckles smugly as the two of you arrive at the lights section of the store.  As he pushes the cart through the aisles, you’re enamored by the twinkling lights that are draped overhead.  You’re lucky he’s holding your hand, or else you probably would’ve fallen flat on your face.  Eddie can’t help but to stare at you as you stare up at all the different light fixtures.  The different colors and hues of light shine beautifully onto your face, and the soft smile on your lips makes Eddie wish he could just grab you and kiss you right here in the aisle.  But, he figures that would cause you to explode after your reaction to his hand-holding.

He watches as you look further down the aisle at the lamps that are on display there, your face lighting up in recognition.

“Oh!  That’s one that I’ve got in my room!”  You point at an orange, donut shaped light called a Varmblixt.  Eddie recognizes it, you do indeed have one hanging on the wall behind your desk.

“I must have it,” Eddie says with a flourish ,”Never have I seen a more extraordinary donut lamp.”

You giggle and go to grab one to place in the cart, but the box proves to be way heavier than you remember.  Eddie notices as soon as you inhale to exert more effort, and he steps in immediately. 

 No fair maiden such as you should be forced to exert any effort whatsoever in his presence.

“I’ve got it, sweetheart.”

You try not to let the name affect you but once again, you fail.  You’re left blushing and biting your lip, speechless.  You stare unashamed at Eddie as he picks up the heavy box and goes to place it in the cart with ease.  The overhead lights were really doing him favors, every ridge and contour of his body was lit to perfection.  You could see the delicious bulge of his biceps, the ripple of his forearm muscles, and the outline of his chest in his shirt….why is your mouth watering?

Eddie easily places the box in the cart, turning to face you again.  He finds you blushing up at him with wide eyes, and is unable to contain the smug smirk on his face.  The sudden lack of distance between the two of you did not go unnoticed by him, he hoped you couldn’t hear his heart pounding in his chest.

The ‘normal you’ would’ve noticed that you were obviously in Eddie’s personal bubble, and you would’ve taken a step back like the respectable adult that you are.  But the ‘normal you’ was long gone in Eddie’s presence.  This version of you was not unlike the version that existed when you were an awkward teenager who was on the brink of passing out anytime a boy even breathed in your direction. 

While you were busy ogling Eddie’s physique, you’d failed to notice the close proximity between the two of you, which led you to your current situation.  

You and him were so close together, you could feel the warm puffs of air from between his parted lips gently hitting your face.  His gaze trailed down from your eyes to your lips, but you wouldn’t have noticed anyways because you were one step ahead of him.

His lips looked so pillowy and soft, you wondered how they’d feel pressed against yours.  Would he kiss you slowly, gently holding your face in his big hands and brushing his thumbs along the apples of your cheeks?  Or would he be rougher than that, grabbing you by the waist and tugging you into him, kissing you with fire and passion?

Eddie’s eyebrows furrow as he watches you suck your bottom lip into your mouth to bite it.  You’re so goddamn beautiful, and you looked like an angel in this aisle of lights.  A lamp from behind you lights up the silhouette of your hair like a halo, and he can see the lights above his head reflected in your eyes like stars.  

Eddie knows he shouldn’t kiss you right now, not in the middle of IKEA where he can hear kids whining to their parents and couples arguing over which shade of beige would match their living room better.  He knows this, but he can’t stop himself from reaching his hand up to gently grasp your jaw.  His thumb slides from your chin to your bottom lip, tugging it free from your teeth.

His hand snakes down to the side of your neck, and you can feel the slight tremor in his hand.  You’re glad that the situation is affecting him too, because you are freaking out.  

Is he going to kiss you right now?  

In IKEA?

On your first date? 

Is this even a date?  

Do you even want him to kiss you?  Idiot, of course you want him to.

Eddie’s eyebrows lift slightly, almost questioning you.  Asking you, ‘Do you want this? Is this okay?’

You answer him with a soft smile, and you feel his hand move behind your neck to pull you in.

It is at this moment that a baby starts to wail one aisle over, effectively ruining any sort of moment you and Eddie had been sharing.

He lets out a frustrated huff, and touches his forehead to yours with closed eyes.  

“Of course,” he groans.

You’re secretly giddy at the fact that he so obviously wanted to kiss you badly.  You bring your hand up to his arm that’s still resting on your neck to give it a reassuring squeeze, and in a surprising burst of confidence, you rise up on your toes to peck him on the cheek.

Eddie’s eyes shoot open at the feeling of your soft lips on his cheek.  He pulls back to stare down at you as his face turns red.

You giggle at him, then turn around to walk down the aisle.

“C’mon, I think I saw another one of my lamps down this way!”

Eddie snaps himself out of his daze with a shake of his head, he’s sure that he’s got hearts in his eyes as he watches you walk away from him.  Grabbing the cart with one hand, he holds his other gently to his cheek, touching the spot that’s still warm from your lips.

-

Eddie ends up purchasing five lamps from IKEA after an hour and a half of wandering through the aisles with you.  

He can’t help but to act like the loverboy he is when he’s looking at furniture with you.  He fantasizes about a life with you, imagining that the two of you are actually here to pick out items to furnish your shared house.  

He wonders which kind of wood floors you’d pick out and which backsplash you’d want in the kitchen.  You’d probably want to decorate with colorful rugs and throw pillows, and Eddie wouldn’t complain.  Not as long as you’re happy.   He’d live in a pink house decorated with bows and lace trim as long as he was living in it with you.  

Maybe he’s getting ahead of himself, it’s only your first date together right?

If only he knew you were having similar thoughts as you strolled up and down the aisles, hand in hand.  You thought about what kind of decorating he did in his house, you figured it was styled in some way considering the amount of effort he puts into making his classroom look as cool as it does.  Does he have shelves full of records or different posters framed and hung up on his wall?  Which side of the bed does he sleep on?  You hope he likes plants, there’s no way you could part with your beloved greenery if the two of you were to live together.

You’re quick to silence the random thoughts buzzing around in your head, it’s silly to think about these things on your very first date…you don’t even know his middle name yet!

You and Eddie both seem to snap out of your stupors at the same time, sighing simultaneously.  You both turn to look at each other and then begin to laugh, unsure on whether or not the ‘jinx’ rules apply in a sighing situation.  

-

Eddie pays for the lights, and soon enough you’re both back in his truck.  

It dawns on you that your date is almost over, but you’re quickly redirected when you hear the starting notes to the next song that starts playing when Eddie’s phone connects to his radio.

Is that…Taylor Swift?

You turn to him slowly, confused at why a Taylor Swift song is on his ‘On Repeat’ Spotify playlist.

Eddie’s already staring at you mortified.  He holds a hand up, pausing any words that might’ve come out of your mouth.

“Before you say anything,” he begins ,”I really admire her lyricism.  Girl’s a wizard with words.”

The two of you sit in a charged silence for a moment before you can’t hold in your reaction any longer.  A laugh breaks free from your chest, and Eddie can’t  help but to laugh along with you.

You’re wiping tears from your eyes as your laughter dies down, and Eddie just grins at you.

“I can’t believe it.  The rock and roll music teacher listens to enough Taylor Swift for it to end up on his ‘On Repeat’ playlist.”  You shake your head at him with a wide smile on your face that Eddie wants to take a picture of and frame.  

“Yeah, yeah…laugh it up.  As a music teacher, it’s my duty to appreciate all types of music.”

You nod along to his explanation, “Yes, of course.  How else are you supposed to connect with the teenage girls these days?”

“Right! Yes!”  Eddie exclaims.  “I do this lesson on lyrics and Taylor’s music is a great example of what storytelling in music can look like.  I respect her, hard.”

You stifle another laugh at his emotional Taylor Swift themed outburst.

“This stays between you and I alright?” Eddie points a finger at you playfully.  “If Harrington gets word of this I’ll never live it down.”

“Of course, my lips are sealed.”  You mime zipping your lips shut and throwing away the key.

Eddie settles back into his seat with a huff, boyishly smiling over at you.

“I have a very important question for you Eddie.”

He leans in, intrigued by your seriousness. 

“Which era are you in right now?”

Eddie scoffs, throwing his head back with a groan.  This sends you into another laughing fit, Eddie can’t help but to join in again.  He’s coming to find out that your joy is such an infectious thing.

“Hmm let’s see…,” he muses.  He turns to look at you with one hand on the wheel and a smirk on his face as he puts his keys in the ignition.  

“Right now…I’d have to go with ‘Lover,’” he says with a wink.

Your laughter is cut off abruptly as you gasp and bite your lip, attempting to subdue the cheesy grin that’s surely made its way onto your face by now.  

You stare unashamed as Eddie puts his right hand over the back of your seat to turn around and look through the rear window as he reverses the car out of its parking spot.  You can smell the cologne he must’ve sprayed on this morning, which immediately awakens the butterflies in your stomach.

As soon as Eddie is set on the route back to your house, he holds out his hand expectantly over his center console.  You look at it, then at him, then back at his hand before shyly placing your hand in his.  He’s quick to lace his fingers through yours, holding on tight and running his thumb back and forth.

You’re both thinking that you could get used to this.

-

Eddie (reluctantly) only lets go of your hand in order to rush around the front of his truck to open your car door for you after he’s pulled into your driveway.  He’s quiet as he walks you to your front door, wondering which way is the best way to ask you out on another date.  

You stop when you reach your door, looking down at your hand in his.  The silence begins to feel just a tad awkward as you both search for something to fill it.

“Thank you,” you start quietly ,”for today.  I had a wonderful time.”

Eddie lets out a relieved breath and grins widely down at you.

“I did too,” he begins, readying himself for his next question.  “Would you…I mean–would you like to…uh…shit, would you want to maybe do it again sometime?”

You know what he means, but it’s still so tempting to tease him when he’s blushing like this.

“Would I want to go to IKEA with you again?”

“N-no!  I mean, if you wanted to we could I guess…b-but I was thinking something more along the lines of dinner?”

You find it adorable how nervous he is to ask you out on a second date, as if you wouldn’t agree to go out to dinner with him tonight.

“I’d love that.”

Eddie’s face lights up with a triumphant smile as he lets out the anxious breath he’d been holding in.  

“Good, that’s really good.”  The way you’re smiling up at him right now is causing him to lose his train of thought.  “Um…how’s tomorrow night?  Around 7?”

“Tomorrow night is perfect.”

“Awesome.  Great, yeah I’ll just…I’ll pick you up, okay?”

You’re beaming as you nod your head, much too ecstatic at the idea of going out with Eddie again to form a coherent sentence.

Eddie finds himself smiling and nodding with you, you’re just too adorable. 

“Hey could I uh…c-could I get your number?” Eddie stammers the question out like he’s a prepubescent teenager, mentally face palming the whole time.

He’s relieved when you chuckle and hold your hand out for him to place his phone in.  He fumbles around trying to give you his phone as quickly as possible, he can’t believe how nervous he feels right now. 

He finally somehow manages to pass over his phone with a new contact page pulled up and ready for you.  You type in your number and name, making sure to add the artist’s palette emoji afterwards.  Eddie laughs through his nose when he sees it, then pockets his phone again.  

There’s a weird tension in the air that can only be brought upon by two people who so obviously want to kiss each other, but are too nervous to make the first move.  Eddie wracks his brain for a way to ask you if it’d be okay for him to kiss you without looking like a total idiot.  It’s really unfortunate that the way you bite your lip causes his mind to completely shut off and switch to autopilot.  

“I really wanna kiss you right now,” he blurts out.

You look up at him, shocked at his bluntness.  Eddie’s even more shocked than you are.

“Y-you probably should then,” you bashfully admit.

Eddie can’t believe that worked.

He steps towards you and softly places one hand on your cheek, the other going to gently grasp the side of your neck similarly to the way he had in IKEA during your almost-kiss.

Your eyes flutter closed as you feel his lips graze yours for the first time.  The feeling is electrifying, and you can’t help but to venture forward for more.  

Your lips were just as soft, if not softer, than Eddie imagined. 

You plunge forward to press your lips against his, instantly deepening the kiss.  Eddie found himself instantly addicted to the feel of your lips and the way you sigh into the kiss.  It’s a shy kiss at first, where the two of you slowly begin to figure out your shared rhythm.  But it wasn’t long before you sank into a synchronized dance, mirroring each other’s movements in a way that crafted the most perfect, earth shattering first kiss.  

You let Eddie Munson kiss you at your front door in a way that you had longed to be kissed for your entire life.  This was how the women you saw in movies or read about in books were kissed.  You’d read about magic and sparks flying, and you think you’re finally starting to believe in all of it.  

Eddie moves his hand from your cheek to your waist, gripping it and pulling you closer to him.  The gasp you let out gave him the sweet opportunity to run his tongue against your bottom lip, asking, pleading for an entrance which you of course granted.  You tasted like autumn and felt like home, he decided he could kiss you for hours on end.

You both stood there for a good five minutes at your front door, making out like giddy teenagers and feeling like them too.  Eddie finally pulls away from your lips, pleased to find you subtly chasing his mouth with your own.  You open your eyes and come out of your kiss-induced haze to find him smiling adoringly down at you with both hands now circling your waist.  

“I’ll see you tomorrow,” he whispers, leaning in to kiss you once more. 

“Actually, I’m gonna call you tonight.”  He kisses you again.  “Is that okay?”  Another peck.

You're giggling as he places a final kiss on your forehead, “Yes, please.”

“Good.”

Eddie steps back, grabbing your hand to kiss it like he did on Tuesday.  He pulls you back in with that same hand to plant one last kiss on your lips, then jogs back to his truck.  He waves and quickly honks his horn twice as he pulls away.  

You’re left standing at your front door, watching his truck disappear down your street and reliving every moment of your first kiss with Eddie Munson.

When you finally make your way inside, you make sure to smell your brand new beautiful flowers before scurrying off to your bedroom to pick out an outfit for your second date with Eddie tomorrow night.  

TAGLIST:

@josephquinnsfreckles @the-fairy-anon @anukulee @littlebebebunny @meetmeatyourworst @lalalala-melmosworld @someantics @lokis-army-77 @loserboysandlithium @strangerstilinski @mystra-midnight @lesservillain @queenimmadolla @luveline @munson-blurbs @fairyysoup @urhoneycombwitch @oneforthemunny @rebelfell @taintedcigs @wroteclassicaly @eiightysixbaby @bettyfrommars @loveshotzz @lovebugism @carolmunson @rustedhearts @lonelysatellites

TO BE DRUNK AND IN LOVE

EDDIE MUNSON X F!READER.

Nervous Eddie, protective reader, and a drunk love confession. Idiots who are too dumb to realise their feelings are reciprocated. 9.4K of tooth rotting friends to lovers fluff. [Re-uploaded from my old blog]

Even when it was Valentine's day it wasn’t all that surprising to open your door to a random knock and find Eddie Munson staring back at you.

He was your best friend after all.

What was surprising however, was to open your door at nearly midnight, bleary eyed and more than a little bit annoyed, to a sheepish looking Steve Harrington.

His usually perfect hair was in wild disarray from the winter winds still sweeping through Hawkins and there was a hesitant smile on his face, all boyish charm and sweetness, like he was already intent on persuading you to forgive him before you even knew why.

But then you had taken a closer look, letting the light from inside spill out onto the porch to reveal that Steve wasn’t alone. Appearing to be struggling with a rather drunk Eddie, arms straining, looped around the longer haired boy who instead of being on the ‘hot date’ he’d been rambling about having all week, was half asleep, swaying back and forth into his friend’s side.

"He called me to come get him but when I got there he wouldn’t stop asking for you.” Steve explained before you had the chance to ask, grumbling good naturedly. “Didn’t wanna drop him off home and risk him having the genius idea of trying to get here himself, s’that okay?”

You nodded in response, still a little confused but you couldn’t stop yourself from softening. Chest warming as you mumbled a quick ‘of course’ and tried to bite back the laugh that was threatening to bubble up at the way Eddie was trying to use Steve like some kind of pillow.

The wild mess of his curls spilling down to cover his face as his head fell to the other boy’s shoulder with a quiet groan, ringed fingers curling into the fabric of Steve’s jumper and voice rough as he grumbled your name again, again, again.

"Yeah, she's here, man." Steve chuckled, his tone surprisingly gentle, a fond type of exasperated as he nudged his shoulder into the rosy squish of Eddie's cheek. "You wanna wake up now so you can actually see her?"

To your surprise he actually listened.

His head snapping up quicker than you anticipated, curls bouncing with the movement and brown eyes a touch glazed over, just that little bit unfocused, before they locked on you and then his mouth split into a blinding grin. The kind that made his whole face light up and your heart flip all too wild behind your ribs.

"There’s my pretty girl." He cooed loudly and you heard Steve snort, something that sounded an awful lot like ‘very smooth Munson, jesus christ’ muttered under his breath whilst he fought to remain upright against the weight of Eddie leaning his entire body in your direction.

You did laugh then.

A bright, flustered thing that you were unable to resist any longer, along with the way your arms opened on reflex to wrap around the boy when he finally managed to break free of his friend’s hold. His hands batting furiously at Steve’s as he twisted away, and only stumbled slightly in his determination to swoop you up into hug that was all leather, cheap beer and the smoky bite of whiskey - weed and the spice of his shampoo where his hair tickled at your nose.

"Hey sweets.” He whispered, humming happily as he pushed a messy kiss to your hairline.

God, why did that make you want to melt.

“Hey Eddie, you okay?” You asked softly, one hand rubbing gentle circles on his back and the other reaching up to cradle the back of his head.

It made him snuggle into you further, ducking down so he could press his face into the warm crook of your neck as his arms tightened and you prayed he was too drunk to notice the way your pulse thrummed faster when he spoke, soft lips brushing against sensitive skin.

"‘Am now.”

Tou froze for just a second, lips parted, blinking once, twice, just to make sure you had really heard what you thought you had and when it did fully register you wondered if the heat radiating off your cheeks was as obvious as it felt.

A quick glance at Steve told you it was.

Your friend was looking at you and Eddie all huddled together with an endless amount of amusement and affection, eyes twinkling as he grinned, shining like there was something he knew that you didn’t.

"Okay then, that’s good I guess,” You croaked out, voice a little too affected for your liking, coughing slightly in attempt to cover the sudden shyness you felt before you told the other boy. “I better get him to bed before he falls asleep standing up.”

Steve chuckled at that. “Wouldn’t be the first time,” He added, snorting at the ‘hey, screw you Harrington, it was one time’ that sounded from the metalhead still needily curling himself around you. “You need a hand hauling his ass upstairs?”

You considered it but then the poor Steve was desperately trying to fight a vicious yawn and failing, his eyes tired despite the way they crinkled as he smiled when you gave him a mothering look and made a shooing motion with the hand that wasn’t still making gentle strokes down Eddie’s back.

“Don’t worry, I’ve got him, go get some sleep, yeah? And thank you for bringing him.”

He hesitated but ultimately didn’t argue and you waved him goodbye as he drove away before shutting the door. Turning your full attention to your best friend who had slowly become suspiciously heavier, arms loosely folded around your waist and hands still, where only moments before they’d been trailing patterns along your spine.

"Eddie?”

Nothing.

“Eds?” You tried again and when there was no response a second time your eyes narrowed, suspicious.

The boy remained limp as your hands snuck past denim and leather, his breathing light and even whilst your fingers crept up his vest covered sides until you met torn fabric and then smooth, warm skin.

You let them rest there just a moment, waiting, and when he made no move to give up the pretence of sleep that you suspected, you dug them in a little firmer, tickling across his ribs until you heard a choked laugh and felt the stretch of his grin against your neck.

"Just let me sleep here, m’comfy.” He whined when you took to the task with more enthusiasm, snickering as he protested. But he was still laughing as he jerked and thrashed, dramatic as ever, and then threw himself out of your arms, cheeks flushed with it and dimples showing despite the glare he attempted to pin you with, snapping. “Fuckin’ devil woman, give me peace.”

There was no heat behind it and you smiled sweetly in return,reaching over to poke him in the cheek before pointing in the direction of the staircase. “I’ll give you peace Munson when you get your ass upstairs so we can go to bed.”

He raised his brows at the demand, dark eyes gleaming with mischief.

“Are you trying to seduce me sweetheart? Do I need to call Steve to come back and protect my virtue, save my poor innocent soul from being snatched by a temptress?” Eddie asked playfully, all faux horror and scandalised expression, a hand pressed to his heart as he choked down a bark of laughter at the way you stared at him, incredulous.

"Jesus christ.”

"No, I’m Eddie, remember? If you’re tryin’ to seduce a man at least get his name right, babe.”

You threw your arms up in the air, let out a long-suffering groan whilst the boy cackled and then you were marching towards him, fingers twisting in denim as you shoved him in front of you and walked him in the direction of the stairs and to your room.

"Shit, okay, I’m going.” He yelped, sniggering when he heard you grumbling behind him as he deliberately leaned his full weight back into the press of your hand and tsked, voice full of tease. “So fuckin’ pushy, you're lucky the whole bossy thing works on me.”

There was a familiar routine to the way you entered your bedroom, the kind that developed after countless nights of Eddie deciding it was too late to drive home despite the journey only being five minutes, of you both refusing to let the other take the couch that very first time until you eventually agreed, with shy smiles and faux nonchalant shrugs, that it was no big deal if you just shared the bed.

Friends totally did that, right?

It happened enough that he claimed a side and a drawer, that tapes and other trinkets of his littered the tops of your dressers, mixing with yours, and you’d even bought an ashtray and a spare lighter especially for the bedside table on his side.

And it happened enough for it to be second nature for Eddie to veer left and you right, clumsily kicking his shoes off before he fell into the bed with a contended groan and turning just time in to catch the old, faded sweats he left the last time he stayed that you threw before they could slap him in the face.

"You smell like a brewery Eds, don’t even think of getting in that bed until you’ve changed.”

"Mean.” He groaned but he hauled himself back up and did as you asked, shrugging off denim and leather in one go until all he was left in was tight, black jeans and a slashed up vest that showed more tattoos and bare skin than it possibly hid. His silver chain glinting prettily where it lay against his collarbones.

And oh fuck, you were staring.

Despite the fear that prickled at your skin at the thought of being caught, it felt impossible not to.

Because Eddie had always been far too pretty, a heartbreaking kind of gorgeous really, and if that wasn’t distracting enough, then the way his muscles moved as he yanked the vest over his head before dropping his hands to his belt certainly was.

You swallowed hard, throat suddenly dry when you realised your eyes had followed, fixed on the flex of his hands, and you couldn’t stop from wondering if they’d look just as perfect dragging up your bare waist, gripping at your thighs. Maybe circling your neck, cupping your chin, rings glittering in the low lamplight, before his lips descended on yours.

Jesus.

You wrenched your gaze away, fully intending it to land somewhere more decent. Somewhere that wasn’t your best friend and where it couldn’t ruin that easy bond you’d always had with the boy by giving all your secrets away.

But it felt like there was some kind of higher power at play, some hand of fate kind of bullshit that brought it straight back to Eddie, to his eyes that were already watching you, darker than usual and more than a little wild.

It made your breath catch in your chest. Cheeks flaming with heat, heart slamming against your ribs hard enough you thought your bones might shatter, and god, could he hear it?

You already knew by the look on his face that Eddie had seen every single second of your staring, that he’d been able to guess every little thought that swam through your mind and revealed themselves in the brief flash of want in your expression before you could shove it back down.

You just hadn’t noticed him doing the same.

Gaze lingering on his shirt that you were wrapped up in, the way the hem was as long as the length of your sleep shorts and made it seem like you were wearing nothing else, the way it made you look too soft, too enticing, too much like you were his and when his eyes flicked back up to yours he looked at you like you were something dangerous.

Like you were making him want something he shouldn’t ask for, or at least, didn’t think he could.

You licked your lips, a nervous sweep of your tongue as the air in the room seemed to thicken, and his gaze followed the movement hungrily as if he wished it was his mouth sliding over them instead.

But then the wind was howling, branches smacking and scraping at your window, the sound bringing reality crashing back in and making you both flinch.

Eddie’s cheeks were pink and his lips parted, a strangled noise slipping past them as he tried to speak and stumbled and suddenly you couldn’t look at him. Eyes snapping shut and mortification burning in your throat as you spun round before you could make an even bigger mistake than you already had, because what the hell were you doing?

What were you thinking?

This was Eddie.

Eddie, who you swore to never let your feelings for ruin your friendship.

Eddie, who you were convinced was still very much drunk and you very much weren’t.

It felt wrong.

It felt like you were begging to have your feelings hurt when the boy became clear headed enough to realise that the person he was looking at like he wanted to push them down onto the bed and devour, happened to be his best friend and inevitably freaked the fuck out.

He had just come back from a date with someone else after all, a date that he would have never thought to ask you on and despite the fact that you suspected it must not have gone well given his current state, it didn’t really make you feel any better or lessen the sting of jealousy that felt like barbed wire snaking through your ribs.

You continued to face the wall as he changed, cheeks still burning, stained with heat. But your gaze was unfocused as it flickered over lines of polaroids, fairy lights and old ticket stubs that you’d refused to throw away and used as decoration, your mind far too aware of the sound of his belt being unbuckled, the chains on his jeans clinking quietly before the denim hit the floor with a soft thud.

The silence that spread through the room after felt overwhelming, like it amplified every little movement either one of you made, the breaths you both took that made your chests fall a little too quick, a little uneven still, and when Eddie finally cleared his throat you tensed at the way it broke the quiet so harshly it felt like he’d made the noise directly in your ear.

"It’s okay - if you wanna turn around now, I mean.” He muttered softly.

It still felt like too much to look at him.

Maybe even more now because all you could see out of the corner of your eye before you walked towards the little lamp on your desk was messy hair and bare skin, sweats slung low on his hips. Big, brown eyes that seemed to be pleading with you to meet their stare and melt back into your usual softness with him like nothing had happened.

You couldn’t.

Not yet.

So you flicked the light off whilst the boy sighed and slipped beneath the covers, shoving his face into a pillow that smelled faintly like you as he squeezed his eyes shut before they flashed open again when he heard your approaching footsteps.

Eddie swallowed as you drifted close, throat bobbing when the air between you seemed to hum again once there was less of it as you reached above him to draw the curtains tighter, knowing how much the boy hated any hint of sunlight first thing in the morning.

There were nerves all lit up inside him that he hadn’t been able to shake all night, fondness fizzing in his chest when he heard the sound of the unopened bottle of water you’d brought up for yourself being set down next to the pile of his rings. The rattle of painkillers being plucked from the draw following before you moved around the bed and pulled back the sheets to climb in beside him.

He couldn’t help but hate what felt like an ocean of cool sheets that you deliberately left between you.

Hated that you didn’t push into his side and press your legs to his to steal his heat like you usually did, hated the way you lay stiff with tension in your own bed, facing the ceiling he had helped you paint one summer instead of facing him like you would when you would whisper with him, nose to nose, until the sun came up.

And when you did finally turn, a soft frown on your face as you wriggled to find a more comfortable position, he hated that your eyes widened slightly with panic when you finally noticed he was watching you.

It made his brows pull together in a distressed frown - his throat tight with guilt when you quickly glanced down at your hands that were knotting in the bed sheets.

An anxious habit he despised being the cause of because god, the last thing Eddie had ever wanted was for you to feel uncomfortable because he couldn’t keep his own feelings in check.

For the longest time he looked at you like he wanted to say something, working his jaw like he wanted to address what had happened and apologise but couldn’t find the right words, his eyes soft and sad in the pale slip of moonlight from the window.

And then he seemed to think better of it.

You were caught off guard when he smiled instead. A soft grin that was all easy warmth and a touch playful as he reached to poke a finger to your cheek and whispered, “thanks for taking care of me, sweets.”

You huffed out a laugh like you couldn't help yourself and the boy took it as small progress when you visibly relaxed. Taking the opportunity to get more and more dramatic with his prodding and tickling until he could feel the way your body vibrated with the giggles bubbling up from your chest and you’d allowed yourself to sink fully into the bed, rolling closer as you tried to fend him off.

"Someone has to make sure you’ll be alive enough to take us for breakfast in the morning.” You whispered back sternly when your face re-emerged from its hiding place in the mattress.

But your smile was matching Eddie’s, growing wider when he caught the hand you tried to bat his away with and gently pinched at your fingers.

"So you’re only being nice so you can use me.” He gasped theatrically and propped himself up on an elbow to stare down at you, all over the top stricken expression as he stifled a laugh when you shoved your face into the pillow and groaned. “How could my best friend betray me like this?”

You turned your head back to face him, rolling your eyes before levelling him with a thoughtful stare. “I wouldn’t call it using,” you mused, slipping your arm under your pillow and beneath your head as you yawned, “more like cashing in straight away on a debt, y’know, since you woke me up in the middle of the night. Which, as my best friend, you’ll remember makes me very grumpy in the morning.”

Eddie nodded, bangs falling into his eyes as he did so. He was serious for all of a second before he let himself fall back into the mused sheet with a guilty grin, hair spilling everywhere and the movement making your body lean into the dip he created, suddenly closer to the boy than before.

"Touche.”

The word came out in a small huff that you felt it against your cheek, a soft thing that made your lashes flutter and when you glanced up at him you found him looking at you with gentle eyes, all brown sugar sweet and lovely as he smiled, full of affection.

It made the last of the left-over tension fizzle away, turning the air softer, warmer, as Eddie drew lines along your fingers with his own before he slotted them together.

You hadn’t even realised he was still holding your hand.

"You win, babe,” He murmured, almost too quiet to hear, his thumb rubbing slow against your skin, touch worshipful as he traced the faint scar on your hand that was proof monsters were never simply just part of stories, and if he noticed the way you inhaled a little shakily, well, he did his best not to show it.

“I’ll do anything you want, maybe take you to that bakery you like and buy you coffee so you’ll stop hissing at me and then so many of those cinnamon things that like that you’ll go into a sugar coma and I’ll have to carry you out.”

You snorted and Eddie beamed like he’d hit the jackpot, encouraged by the sound as he arched a brow like he was begging you to argue.

"Idon’t hiss.” You muttered petulantly, full of false indignation whilst you scrunched your nose to hide your grin and knocked your knee against his.

His gaze shone at you, eyes bright and twinkling with mirth in the dark, and when he managed to fend off your attack by hooking a leg over yours to trap it between his own, he continued with a teasing scoff.

“You do. You’re like some kind of rabid raccoon when you wake up, I’m lucky I still have both eyes and all my fingers.” He wiggled the ones resting snug around yours for emphasis and you snorted. “Now shut up, I’m trying to impress you with my plan to get back in your good graces.”

You huffed, too amused to be offended, and gestured with your linked hands as if to say ‘well go on then’

Okay, so after I’ve carried you out of the bakery, we’d go to the bookstore,” the boy told you, gaze knowing and smile a little smug when he noticed that he’d caught your attention despite the way you tried to hide it from him.

"Always a pretty foolproof plan - which one though?”

“Not the fancy one where the housewives hog the couches pretending to talk about their weekly book club read,” Eddie assured you, his voice dropping to a scandalised hush, the fingers that weren’t holding yours tugging at his curls to hide a salacious grin as he whispered, “when instead they’re bitching about how their husbands don’t satisfy them anymore and how they’ve had to resort to fucking the pool boy so they can feel young again.”

"Of course,” You choked on a laugh, a startled, delighted sound that made Eddie’s heart stutter and his chest ache with warmth. “Can’t have them cheapening the wholesome moment when I’m overcome with the joy of being surrounded by books and finally forgive you.”

"Exactly.” He replied sagely. “So we’re gonna go to that one near Oak instead with the shit ton of stacks everywhere that threaten to fall and crush you if you breathe near them. Works better in my favour if I get to save you from a gruesome death.”

You nodded, only looking half as serious as Eddie thanks to the way you could barely stop the threat of giggles rising in your throat. “I get it, totally get extra brownie points for a hero moment.”

"Right? And then maybe I’ll get you one of the books you stare at all longingly everytime we go in 'cause for some reason you act like it’s a fuckin’ crime to treat yourself once in a while-”

"-I do not! I just have other things that kind of have to take priority, y’know like bills and stuff. ”

"Same thing.” Eddie dismissed, but his voice was softly teasing and his gaze understanding as he fingers tapped a random beat against your hand. “Anyway, after that we’ll rent some movies and get some snacks, maybe horrors so I can be all charming and let you hold my hand when it gets scary, we’ll get pizza for dinner and by the end of it you’ll have totally forgot that I crashed your romantic night with yourself and ruined your sleep.”

You stared at him. “And that’s all it’s gonna take, huh?”

"Don’t pretend you’re not impressed, sweetheart.” He grinned knowingly, looking too proud of himself as his hand slipped out of yours to prod a finger to where your cheeks were appled, aching from smiling far too long.

He wished he could kiss them instead, brush his lips over the pretty flush that bloomed after his touch made you realise you never really had stopped smiling from the moment he started speaking. “Look at you, just dyin’ to forgive me right now, I can tell.”

You hated that he was right.

Not about you dying to forgive him now, because the truth was Eddie hadn’t actually done anything to need forgiveness, no, it was the fact that if you were ever genuinely mad and the boy did all that for you, you knew in your bones you would fold in a pathetic, lovesick heartbeat.

It was the fact that Eddie knew it too, he just hadn’t figured out why.

Yet.

So you swatted at him once again and tried to discreetly shuffle back whilst he was distracted threatening to snap his teeth down on your fingers.

You were praying for some distance, needed it so you could breathe without the scent of him making you feel weak, so you could hide in the dark for the moment it would take to stop looking at him like he’d shoved his hand inside your chest, wrapped long fingers around your heart and slipped it out to put it where it belonged. With him.

But your legs were still tangled with Eddie’s and your body was against you when he clamped his legs down to stop you from slipping away. Turned traitor by the feel of soft fleece pressing to your bare calves, the muscles of his arms flexing when he threw one over your waist and pushed the other one beneath you to roll you on top of him.

His biceps were warm where you caught at him with your hands to steady yourself and as he shifted a little higher up the pillow, stretching until he found himself comfortable, you cursed the warmth it spread through your belly.

"See, you can’t even deny it can you?” Eddie prompted and you felt it rumble from his chest to your own, chin dipped to peer down at you and cheeks dimpling as his grin turned smug. Unbelievably delighted that you had yet to refute him.

You wrinkled your nose when he tapped a finger there, if only to hide the shock that lingered on your face, the way you felt flushed all over because there was no part of you that wasn’t touching him and jesus christ, it felt like his hands resting on your sides were burning through the thin material of your shirt, threatening to brand the skin beneath.

“What, no– I mean yes– I mean, shit, you know what I mean asshole” You finished with a scowl and prayed your rambling had sounded less frantic to Eddie than it had to your own ears, though judging by the way he arched a brow at you, gaze dancing with withheld laughter, you would guess you had failed there too.

'Uh huh, but feel free to keep tryin’ to enlighten me anyway.”

"I was just wondering,” you began, all false confidence just to hide the fact you were still unsure of where you were going with it. Stalling just a little because it was hard to remember what you had been wondering before he had decided to use you as a blanket, your chest now lying atop his abdomen, stomach resting against his hips and legs cradled between his own.

You let go of his arms to fold your hands at the centre of his chest, settling your chin there, and his eyes softened as they roamed your face, waiting for you to continue. “Okay, so how does it make sense that you can pull off something like that and yet you’re here with me, drunk, instead of on your date swooning the hell out of Sarah?”

"Sam.”

“Same thing.”

“Not even close, sweetheart.”

“At least I got the first two letters right, unlike you with the last guy I dated.” You shot back.

Eddie shrugged. “He looked like a Danny.” He defended mildly but his gaze was playful, bottom lip tucked between his teeth to hold back the laugh threatening to escape when you threw a death glare his way.

“His name was Matthew.” You deadpanned and the boy snorted, throwing his hands up in a placating gesture when it looked like you might rip the pillow from beneath his head and smother him with it.

But then you were shaking your head instead, an accusatory finger jabbed to his chest and you rolled your eyes when he frowned and muttered a petulant ‘ow’.

“Hang on, why are we even arguing this again? Answer the question Munson - did you try to take her to skull rock again? ‘Cause I don’t give a damn what Steve says, just because you take a fucking picnic it doesn’t suddenly make a make out spot romantic”

He made a disturbed noise and shook his head but you didn’t miss the way his face fell a little at you bringing up the date again, smile half-hearted at best, and even the dark couldn’t hide the way his eyes had dimmed. His thumbs that had been dragging small, steady circles over the sides of your ribs faltering as he dropped his gaze from yours.

It made you gentle - the sense of protectiveness that tightened your chest and urged you to shuffle your way up his body until you were seated in his lap, knees dragging the sheets askew. Fingers finding their way to his chin to bring his stare back to you and you were too focused on your worry to register the way it made his lashes flutter, eyes hooded and lips parted, breath hitching at the gesture.

"Hey - did something happen tonight? Is that why you came back in such a state?” You murmured, eyes flicking between his, searching, before your tone suddenly grew sharp and your hand fell flat against his chest. “Was she a dick to you - I swear to god if she was I’ll get dressed right now and–”

You were cut off by Eddie’s hand descending over yours, the other landing on the thigh that you had already raised to clamber off him, squeezing the flesh softly, drawing it back down, and the fight left you just as fast as it had appeared when he chuckled, his voice smudged with fondness, awe, a hint of pride.

“Okay, reign it in Rocky, nothin’ bad happened I promise, you don’t need to go runnin’ off into the night to defend my honour.”

But god, he wanted to kiss you for trying to.

He settled for watching you watch him instead, your frown of concern that he itched to smooth away with his thumb still present before you eventually nodded, only slightly pacified when you had found no sign of a lie in the way he met your gaze.

And Eddie knew it was foolish to hope that was the end of it, knew the expression on your face all too well despite the way it flickered sweet just for a moment, just for him, as he released your hand to tuck a lock of hair behind your ear.

So it came as no surprise to the boy when you seemed to be considering your next words as you tilted your head, whether to deliberately lean into his touch or just a habit whilst you thought he wasn’t sure.

Maybe it was coincidence or maybe it was both, either way when your hand followed his seconds after he had let it go to clasp gently at his wrist, his heart spasmed despite knowing what was coming.

"There was something though, wasn’t there? You stated but you were quiet in how you spoke, gentle, trying to make sure Eddie knew he wasn’t being pushed, that you were only concerned, and everything about it made him ache. His thoughts going a cotton-wool kind of hazy that he wasn’t convinced he could blame on the alcohol anymore.

He let his thumb brush the downturned corner of your lips, a brief second of indulgence before he pressed up, moulding your mouth into a smile until he spied it becoming a real one, the kind that would have had Eddie dropping to his knees if he’d been standing, as you knocked his hand away.

He tapped at your legs then, drumming lightly at the creases of your knees and up the backs of your thighs, making you twitch.

You got the hint though, rising off him just enough for him to push himself up and then back, leaning against the pillows before he held out his hands for you to take so you could climb back into his lap.

It felt like his first mistake.

Or was it his second, after coming here in the first place? Third, after losing his head and nearly kissing you?

He’d lost count.

All he knew was that it was suddenly a little harder to breathe, that being this close didn’t feel as innocent as it had five minutes ago.

As it had all the other times you’d been tucked tight against him, sleepily whispering secrets until dawn broke and your head fell heavy against his shoulder, leaving Eddie to have to carefully roll you back on to the mattress so you didn’t wake up stiff and sore.

Your hands were soft on his stomach, forcing the boy to fight off a shudder every time you traced the dark lines of another tattoo, jaw slack as he watched every little movement of your fingers with rapt attention, only realising he’d been repeating each one with his own touch on your thighs when he felt the brush of soft fabric against his fingertips.

It took Eddie a second to tear his eyes away from the sight, to meet your gaze with pink cheeks and lips almost bitten raw and find that you had swayed closer.

Close enough so that he could map each little freckle that made up constellations on your cheeks in the moonlight that slanted over your features, noses only inches apart and he swallowed down a choked curse when he remembered you were probably still expecting an answer.

He licked his lips, unsure of how much he could give away, and shrugged, fingers toying with the hem of your shirt. "S’really nothin’ for you to worry about princess, the date was fine and she was… great - incredible actually - we just, uh, mutually decided there was a point in taking it past a one time thing.”

The silence stretched long enough that Eddie wondered if he was maybe more wasted than he'd thought. He must have been if the question of whether telling you the truth was really as bad as he'd feared was nudging at his brain, the consequences seeming a lot less daunting the longer allowed himself to consider it.

Because there you were, looking at him with the prettiest confused expression he'd ever seen and all of a sudden it felt like the worst crime in the world to lie to you. That you deserved more than the way he'd been continuously lying to you for years and if there was the slightest chance - which sometimes he thought there were signs there could be - that you wanted him to be the one who gave you more, then he had to take it, right?

"I don't understand,” you said slowly, face scrunched like you were trying to figure out if you missed something somewhere in his explanation, like you were trying to hide how the boy calling Sarah - Sam - whatever her name was - incredible in a dazed voice had made your stomach twist. "If she was so amazing and the date was a hit, why wouldn't you want to see her again?"

"Well turns out no matter how awesome a girl is, she doesn't really wanna waste time trying to date someone who's in love with someone else.”

"Makes sense-" you shrugged, and then it sunk in what he had said. "-no, wait, hang on - what?”

“Yeah,” he chuckled, a little shaky, a little rough, and despite the easy grin he tried to offer, there was an undeniable bloom of nervousness unfurling in his eyes, “crazy right? I mean I expected her to leave when she figured it out but then she stayed and even tried giving me advice, which maybe me taking wasn't the best decision 'cause it involved some liquid courage and telling the girl how I feel but I kinda took the first part too far, which is how I ended up like this– ”

He gestured wildly to himself and when his hands dropped back to rest on your bare thighs it took all you had not to flinch. Your brain felt fuzzy, chest too tight, and suddenly every part of your body that was pressed to his felt like it was in agony. A new kind of torture.

Eddie was in love with someone else.

And he hadn't even told you.

"Eddie–” you murmured weakly, because christ , he was still talking and you just really needed him to stop .

"-she originally offered to help make her jealous, which was fuckin' insane , I thought that shit only happened in movies. I gave it a hard pass cause it seemed sleazy, like a total dick move, y'know. Didn’t seem right to mess with her like that and I don't think I even could if my life depended on it-”

Fuck, this hurt worse than you had ever imagined. A dagger shoved deep between your ribs with every word, twisting until you thought you’d be sick with it.

'Eddie.” You repeated, only a little stronger this time. but to your horror, you could hear the painful edge that made your voice shake.

You wanted to slam a hand over his mouth.

You wanted to crawl as far away from his touch as you possibly could.

And yet you were painfully still.

A statue in Eddie’s lap, turned to stone like those poor souls you’d read about in a mythology book when you were a kid except here there was no terrifying creature to blame, just your best friend who was breaking your heart without even realising.

Oblivious to a tear that welled and spilled over your lash line, dripping onto the shirt that you were suddenly wishing wasn’t his as he pressed on.

God, you felt pathetic.

"Felt wrong just thinking about it,” He rushed out and maybe if you weren’t so upset you would have put it together. The way he was rambling like he couldn’t speak quick enough, like he would lose his nerve if he didn't, lungs burning and eyes darting over your face, anxious, as if his heart would give out if he looked away for even a second. Fingers tapping too quick on your thighs. “Touching someone, kissing them, loving them, even if it’s pretend, shit I can’t even remember the last time I thought of doin’ those kind of things with anyone else that wasn’t-”

“Wasn’t her,” You interrupted, head ducked to hide your embarrassment when the words slipped out scathing, a little more heated than you intended. The burn behind your eyes grew stronger as you tried to climb off him, numb fingers clumsy, grappling for purchase on his stomach so you could push yourself away. “I get it Eddie, fuck-”

He stopped you with hesitant hands wrapping around your wrists, squeezing soft when you didn’t immediately try to yank yourself out of his hold, drawing them to his chest in a plea for you to look at him and listen.

"-you.”

You froze, head snapping up to stare at the boy in disbelief, utterly stunned. Your heart spasming before it began to pound so hard you thought it would splinter bones as you tried to figure out if you had heard him right, if he had said what you thought he had, if you dared to ask him to repeat himself just in case he had.

It felt like the world had slowed for a moment, like it was trying to give you a chance to push past the rush of blood in your ears that was drowning your ability to think straight, to decide whether Eddie had misspoken or not and if he hadn't, did that mean it was finally time for you to stop hiding.

Did you even know how?

The answer came when the winds outside grew into a storm. The patpatpat of rain on the roof coming slowly at first and then all at once and each knock of a branch at your window sounded like the tick of a clock as the silence between you rolled on too long. It felt like a countdown, a warning that if you weren’t going to be brave now, you wouldn’t get the chance again.

So you fought the urge to rip yourself away, lowered yourself gingerly back down onto his thighs whilst Eddie watched you with wide eyes, a little hopeful, a little terrified, a little too aware that any wrong move could make you run for real next time. “Did you– what did you just say?”

"Wasn’t you.” He whispered and neither of you could take your eyes off the other, your own breath trapped in your chest as he took a deep breath before he continued. Voice growing braver like it was an obvious truth he was telling you and not one that felt like a bomb being dropped on your head. “I haven’t thought about anyone else since I realised I was in love with you.”

You inhaled sharply, a small noise slipping from your throat that you couldn’t stop if you tried.

You wanted to ask him to say it again, you wanted to kiss the words from his mouth as he said them, you wanted to say it back, murmur it over and over into him until you were dizzy from lack of oxygen but you couldn’t. Because there were tears in your eyes and your throat, your lungs, were refusing to work, every part of your body suddenly paralysed whilst your heart tumbled wild behind your ribs.

Eddie licked his lips, parted and closed them again as tried to organise the mess of his thoughts into words.

He sat up and pulled you closer until your hips were flush, your thighs caged around his as he gently ran his thumbs up over the soft part of your wrists where your pulse hammered against the skin and you wondered if it was a gesture meant to soothe you or him.

If it was maybe for both of you.

A way to encourage you to touch him in whatever way you needed whilst he did the same, preparing himself to give a confession that he never thought he would get a chance to, that he hoped you would understand.

"I only asked Sam out because I thought you were never gonna feel the same and I just needed to get over it, ” He sighed, cheeks pink as he nervously analysed your expression from beneath his lashes. “Turns out she knew all along, figured out I was gonner that night at the hideout when you made me sing fuckin’ Bon Jovi.”

He said it teasingly, all false betrayal and shining eyes like you’d made him commit the worst kind of crime, like he was so in love with you that he’d sing that fucking song until his throat was raw if you asked again.

You let out a watery laugh and Eddie beamed at the sound.

His gaze lovely as it roamed your face, endlessly adoring when you swiped at a falling tear with the heel of your palm and melted because the boy had caught your hand in his before you could drop it, bringing it to his lips so he could kiss away the salt on your skin with a sweet tsk, voice like honey as he murmured, ‘c’mon, pretty girl, please don’t cry’.

"I couldn’t even deny it when she brought it up, y’know,” he chuckled, leaning in to rest his forehead to yours, noses grazing until you sighed happily for him. “She wasn’t mad either, just told me I needed to grow a pair and tell you how I felt before someone else did, but it was like she’d fuckin’ me in punched me in the face. All I could think was, ‘shit, she’s right, what the hell am I doing’ .”

And then his smile faltered. His stare flickering away from yours like he was ashamed, lips twisting into a grimace, voice strained as his hands slid down your arms and dropped to the hem of your shirt to twist the material in his fingers.

"Thing is, it sounded like the easiest thing in the world when she said it, but then I was about to leave and it suddenly felt terrifying and the idea of calming my nerves with a drink didn’t sound like the dumbest one I’ve ever had.” Eddie admitted, closing his eyes briefly and when he opened them again the disappointment in them made your heart ache.

“Not until I started hesitating the longer I was there anyway, overthinking and talking myself out of it, and then before I knew it I was wasted and I’d fucked up another chance to tell you. So I called Harrington instead, though I guess that kind of backfired too, huh?”

He was making it sound like it was all his fault that this had gone on so long but god, you knew what your own fear felt like. The things you told yourself daily to stop you from taking that plunge.

Had you both been using the same insecurities to hold yourselves back all this time?

"What were you so scared of? ” You coaxed softly, pressing a hand over the place where his heart thumped beneath the skin, fingertips toying with the chain that hung around his neck and when you’re other hand smoothed it’s way up to his jaw, thumb gliding along the edge of it, the boy leaned into your touch like he was starved for it. A ragged sigh slipping past his lips as his lashes fluttered.

"Messing everything up.” He explained quietly and the crack in his voice made you want to wrap your arms around him and smother him in affection. Refuse to let him go or ever doubt himself again. “Losing you. I didn’t know if you’d hate me for making things awkward if you didn’t feel the same and I couldn’t handle the thought of not having you in my life.”

"You could never do anything to make me not be in your life Eddie,” you told him, and if your words were soft then the look in your eyes was even softer. Lips pulling into a warm smile that he swore was pure light as your hand left his chest to tug teasingly at one of his curls. “Even if it’s something like turning up at my door, half gone, smelling like you’ve been dunked in whiskey, to tell me something that I’ve been waiting a hell of a long time to hear from you.”

Eddie melted for you then.

“Yeah?” He breathed, his own grin blinding as his hands nudged their way beneath your shirt to curve around your bare sides, seeking out the warmth of you to ground himself because he could have sworn he was dreaming.

"Yeah.”

“Well shit, sweetheart,” he huffed out a soft laugh, a little giddy with relief, more drunk on you than whatever alcohol was left in his system. “If I’d known that I would have made Stevie boy haul my drunk ass over here a lot sooner. You have any idea how long I’ve had to suffer mourning about my feelings to him after one of his house parties for him to just tell me to shut the fuck up and go to sleep?”

Probably the same amount of time you’d endured Robin telling you to get a grip.

"No, but I’m sure Steve would gladly tell me if I asked,” you answered cheekily instead, letting out a terrible shriek of a laugh when the boy tickled your ribs and muttered that you better not dare.

It made him grin all stupid and lovesick, even more so when you bumped your nose against his and looked at him a little shy, a little hopeful as you asked, “Though maybe you could try voicing some of those feelings without the alcohol, y’know, just so I know they’re not a result of your brain being fried and so that when I say them back, you actually have a chance of remembering it in the morning.”

Eddie was enthusiastically nodding before you could finish, a brightness unfurling in his chest like the flowers that had snaked around his ribs when he met you were now opening up, blooming with what he felt for you. What you felt for him back. “Yeah, fuck, I can do that,” he murmured. “Anything you want.”

You were beaming, and if he could bottle the way it made him feel he would. Gone for the way you melted for him when he slipped a hand from beneath your shirt, dragging it slow up your spine until his palm was fitting itself around the back of your neck, just so he could feel you this close. Just because he could.

"Anything?” You repeated coyly, smiling when he sighed real pretty as you brushed some of his curls back.

“Anything.”

"You gonna take me on a date Munson?”

As if he was going to say no to you. Like he ever could.

He’d bring you the damn moon if you wanted it. The stars too because he wouldn’t be able to help himself when it came to you.

He pressed his nose to your cheek to hide the dopey grin that tugged at his lips, humming. “Mhm, how does tomorrow sound? Maybe upgrade our plans from grovelling duty to first date?”

“Hmm, I don’t know,” you pondered, eyes fluttering shut with a smile, content to tease the boy by pretending to think about it as you tilted your head back for him when he pushed his face into your neck with an amused huff. “I kind of liked the idea of you grovelling all day and the plans you made were pretty tempting. What will the upgrade entail if I agree?”

“Same plans, I’d just get to keep touching you like this, hold you whenever I wanted, whenever you wanted me to.” He murmured, lips catching at your skin as he spoke, the hand that was clamped around your waist tightening when you shivered as he drew a line with his nose up to your jaw. “Maybe walk around with my hand in your back pocket the way I know you think is real cute. Use it to pull you in for a kiss when you’re looking far too pretty to be real, which is fuckin’ always, and I feel like m’gonna die if I don’t.”

Your chest hitched, lips parted and body feeling a touch too warm, because the thought of Eddie kissing you all greedy, a little too desperate to give a damn about where you were or who was around, was suddenly so consuming. Leaving you dizzy enough that you had to clutch at his shoulders, his neck, curling your fingers around his chain to keep yourself seated instead of falling back into the cushions and pulling him down with you. “Oh.” You breathed out.

He swallowed, hard.

And when he lifted his head his eyes were half-lidded, almost black beneath the heavy fan of his lashes, voice a low rasp that made you burn as his gaze flickered from your mouth to settle on yours. “Yeah, oh. ”

"How am I supposed to say no to that?”

His lips twitched. “Now you know how it feels when you ask me for anything.” He whispered hoarsely and you wondered if he could hear the chaotic hammering of your heart, if he could feel the vibration of it slamming into your ribs against his own.

The air between you was buzzing, electric, bloated with anticipation when the last couple of inches fell away as his face leaned closer to yours, mouth hovering over your own. his breath warm and smelling of smoke and whiskey, a hint of mint as he said your name, sticky sweet with heat and a longing kind of need.

He drew lazy circles under your ear with his thumb and it took everything you had not to let the pleading noise building in your throat escape.

"Yeah, Eddie?” You asked instead, so quiet that had he not been right there, you doubt he would have heard you at all.

You knew he had though when his tongue darted out to wet his lips, a nervous gesture just like the way your fingers couldn’t stop their movements, toying with the curls at the nape of his neck and making him shudder.

"Can I kiss you now?”

It already felt like he was.

His mouth brushing yours as he spoke, each word the ghost of a kiss, a brief taste of the real thing that you were sure would shatter you entirely because jesus christ, this alone was making you feel like there were fireworks beneath your skin. The way your bottom lip caught between his stole your breath, a cracked noise bubbling up in your throat that Eddie inhaled and echoed back with a groan when you tilted your head and pushed your lips to his.

It was a fleeting thing, ending after a second because your brain had caught up and was telling you this wasn’t right. Not that kissing Eddie wasn’t right, it felt like the most natural thing you’d ever done, like you’d found a piece of yourself you hadn’t realised you were missing.

It was just the timing.

“Wait…” You murmured and Eddie drew back immediately, the hand that had been clasped around your neck pulling back to tuck your hair behind your ear, cupping your jaw as his worried gaze flicked over your face, searching for any sign of discomfort he might have caused.

"Shit, I’m sorry.” He said gently, thick with guilt, full of concern. “Was it too soon? I swear I didn’t mean to pressure you or anything, fuck, sweetheart, I’d never do anything to make you feel uncomfortable y’know that right? And if I do by accident I want you to tell me or hell, punch me or something- ”

“-No, no, it’s okay Eds - Eddie listen, I’m not gonna hit you, jesus - I just,” You couldn’t get the words out fast enough for the way the look on his face was making your chest squeeze. Your hands flew to his face as you shook your head, stroking your thumbs over the arc of his cheekbones to quiet him whilst you gave him a reassuring smile. “I just don’t want our first real kiss to be when one of us is drunk, that's all. Is that okay?”

He blew out a breath, visibly softening, and then he was wrapping his arms around you, pressing a kiss to your nose, your cheeks, your forehead until you were both grinning, laughter still echoing above the sounds of the storm outside when he touched his forehead to yours. “Baby, of course it’s okay,” he murmured, “you just say the word, I’ll kiss you whenever you want me too.”

His words lit you up, warmth spreading through you until you were giddy with it. So full of affection for the boy that you thought you’d burst and it must have been contagious because Eddie was looking at you like he knew exactly what you were feeling.

"Kiss me tomorrow?” You whispered, unable to bite back your grin as you brushed your nose against his. “When I first wake up so I don’t think I’ve dreamed this whole thing?”

Eddie’s eyes shone and he squeezed you a little tighter, his smile becoming devastatingly lovely, stretching wide across his face as he nodded. “Yeah, I can do that.”

And he did.

Deck the Halls ⋆⁺❆₊꙳‧❅⋆࿔

With Eddie stuck in the hospital, the boys help you bring Christmas to him. 3k

a/n - for the amazing @littlexdeaths twelve days of promptmas! <3

“Mike, stop pulling so hard.” 

“You’re holding it too high!” 

Lucas scoffs. “It’s literally dragging on the floor.” 

“It’s literally not–” 

“Guys!” Your snow-slick boots squeal on the linoleum as you spin. “You’re gonna get us caught if you don’t stop arguing.” 

“But he–” 

“I wasn’t–”

“Both of you! Shut up!” 

The scowl Mike gives Lucas is met with equal disdain. But he rolls his eyes and heaves the Christmas tree in his arms up a notch. You resume down the hospital hallway, hauling the front end of the tree with four grumpy teenagers in tow. 

You can’t be that annoyed. Dustin, Lucas, Will, and Mike are all here with you of their own volition in this stuffy hospital very early on Christmas morning. And they all have a piece of your heart for doing so. 

You adjust your grip on the tree. No matter how you hold it, the bristles poke your waist, and the bark stamps itchy lines into your palms. But you remind yourself of Eddie. Of his hospital room with white walls, white sheets, white machines, white everything. And that’s just not right, not on Christmas. 

So you’re bringing the holiday spirit to Eddie this year. Between the five of you, there are three backpacks brimming with unused tinsel, lights, and ornaments, and a pine tree as tall as Lucas. 

You’d have decorated earlier if you could’ve. But Eddie procrastinated until Christmas Eve to fix the lights on your roof and in his haste, his heel skidded on a patch of ice, and he tumbled off the house in a rather cartoonish display. It wasn’t funny then, but you can laugh now knowing he’s passed out on painkillers and recovering just fine. Still, two broken ribs were enough to hold him for observation and visiting hours ended before you could scrounge anything festive together. So here you are, slinking through the emergency room past receptionists, nurses, and hospital security in the middle of the night. 

You raise a fist, prompting the boys to freeze. The click-clack of heels echoes from around the corner, growing louder by the step. “Back, back, back,” you order. 

Mike backpedals straight into Will’s chest and Dustin steps on Lucas’ foot. The tree lurches backward as they all grapple for balance. It’s a clumsy scuffle nowhere near quiet. If whoever’s there didn’t hear you before, they certainly have now. 

You try the nearest door handle and swing it open. By some miracle, the room’s unoccupied. 

The boys follow your lead, bags jingling loudly with each frantic step. They shove the tree through the doorway at an angle and a branch snags on the frame. 

“Wait– stop, stop!” Dustin whisper-yells. 

Mike rams it through again, a flurry of pine needles shaking loose and fluttering to the floor. 

“Stop,” you bark, “Turn it first.” 

They’re a smart bunch but they lack teamwork skills when you so desperately need it. Several pairs of hands fight to maneuver the tree in opposite directions. And all four of them squeeze through the doorway with it, snapping a branch in half and shaking another sheet of pine needles free. 

You sweep the tree remains inside with your foot– though there’s certainly still evidence in the hall– and pull the door closed behind you. The cheap window blinds crinkle as you steer them aside, just enough to see past the door. 

The heeled woman is either blind, deaf, or committed to minding her own business because she strolls by the door like it’s any other. You slump against the wall, turning to flash a thumbs up at the kids as soon as she’s out of view. You’re matched with a quartet of yawns, skipping from one frown to the next. 

“Almost there,” you encourage. It’s not a lie, per se, but it’s not very close to the truth either. This might be harder than you imagined. 

The elevator is too risky, so you take the stairs. But hauling a whole tree up four flights of stairs is no easy task. Mumbled complaints overlap and echo in the stairwell and by the top, your arms and legs are protesting just the same. 

The door whines as you crack it open, and you peer through the gap to scope out the area. There’s a nurse's station in the center of the floor manned by the same woman you’d seen earlier. Eddie’s room is on the opposite side; there’s virtually no way to sneak past without her seeing. 

You turn around, eyes locking with Dustins like they’re two bullseyes. 

He crosses his arms and cocks his head. He knows the look you're giving him and he doesn’t like it. “What?” 

“I need you to distract the nurse.” 

He says your name through a sigh, but before he can actually disagree, you yank him by the sleeve and thrust him through the doorway. 

The nurse’s head pops up from the desk immediately and Dustin shakes himself into character. 

“Help!” he shouts, promptly clearing his throat. “I need help– it’s my, my mother! You must help her,” he whips his head left and right. “Over here, in the elevator!” 

The nurse doesn’t move. She tries to speak but Dustin interrupts her.

“No! She won’t make it! Please– hurry!” 

The woman scrambles out of her seat and jogs after Dustin. He’s not very convincing, but he’s a better actor than the rest of you. And he’s very committed once he’s in it. Dustin’s cries persist, eventually distant enough that your adrenaline loosens its grip. You fling the door open, pinning it with your foot. The boys hustle through, following your pointer finger down the right corridor. You trot back ahead, escorting them right up to Eddie’s door. 

The sharp, sterile scent of disinfectant imbues the frigid air in his room. The machines are off so the quiet hangs heavy. It’s the opposite of warm in every sense possible. And the little bit of it still spilling in from the hall is quickly cinched as someone shuts the door. 

You grope around the darkness, staggering over to the inky shadow you recall to be a chair. Your fingertips brush the scratchy fabric, and you let your bag slip from your shoulder, landing softly on the seat. 

A splash of light from the window catches one side of Eddie’s face. His lashes kiss the hills of his cheeks and his mouth is hinged open, exhaling a string of soft snores. It’s very cute, though, the kids’ expressions don’t reflect the same fondness. 

“We don’t have all day,” Lucas mocks, parroting your exact words from earlier when you’d urged him to get in the van before all the heat escaped.  

Your gaze sours when it reaches the boys. “Shut up. Help me stand the tree up.” 

Lucas snickers, planting himself on the other side of the tree. You lift the trunk so Will can slide the base under and Mike goes prone on the floor to screw it in. 

“Hurry up,” Lucas complains. 

“I can’t see!” 

“Shhh!”

Will pulls a flashlight from his bag and points it at Mike’s hands. The final screws are tightened and the boys let go.  

You give the trunk an affirming shake before retracting your own hands. It remains upright, even after a few optimistic steps back. 

If you think decorating would be the easiest part of this mission, you’d be wrong. It’s much too dark to work, even after Will situates his flashlight so it’s highlighting most of the tree. And keeping quiet might be impossible when you’re forced to mediate petty teenage arguments every five minutes. 

Mike and Will are hunched over a wad of string lights on the floor, unknotting opposite ends when Lucas waves his much neater spool of lights. “Uhh, we can’t use those. I brought rainbow ones.” 

Will tuts at the other boy. “So? We can use both?” 

“No, it’ll look stupid.” 

Will beckons you over with a growing frown. You’d swear these kids never graduated middle school if you hadn’t gone to the ceremony. The older they get, the more they fight, it seems. But your patience is thinning with each wave of attitude you receive. You’d asked for their help as their friends, not their babysitters. 

“Use both,” you decide, hands pressed into your hips. 

“But it won’t match!”

“It’s fine, Lucas.” 

He rolls his eyes very blatantly at you. It takes every ounce of self-restraint not to drive him home then and there. 

But the sound of the door handle rattling steals your attention. It jerks up and down but the door doesn’t open; one of the kids must’ve locked it. Your heart springs up into your throat, your eyes swinging around the room for an escape plan. The lock will only buy you so much time and there’s no way to safely exit through the window and—

“It’s me!” Dustin shouts, popping into the window frame. His lips are nearly touching the glass and he’s fogging up the pane with his breath. 

“Jesus,” you mumble, clutching your chest as you march up to the door. 

Dustin scrambles in, chest heaving with a glare aimed right at you. “You would not believe how much stamina that woman has! I mean she just kept going. I thought, I lost her, and then–” 

You slap your palm across his mouth. “Shhh!”  

His wide eyes follow yours to Eddie. 

Eddie sighs, lips smacking as he straightens a leg across the sheets. You’ve never been so thankful to be dating such a deep sleeper. 

“Sorry,” Dustin whispers. 

You shove him further into the room. “Go. Be quiet.” 

Dustin grabs the tail end of the lights in Will’s hands. Together they wind the cord around the bottom half of the tree. Lucas dresses the top half in rainbow bulbs, still sulking as he works. 

You squat beside Mike to help him sort the ornament pile. One you brought quickly catches your eye. It’s a clay guitar pick Eddie made in middle school art class, an instant favorite of yours. You take it and hang it front and center, filling the gap in the middle of the tree where they ran out of lights. 

One by one, the tree is stocked with a rainbow of mismatched ornaments. There's something from each of their homes– family photos and elementary school crafts and trinkets of every size. It’s a wild assortment but a very special one too. 

Dustin is determined to hang the star– puts up a case that he was used as bait and thus deserves it– though, no one was going to argue against him in the first place. He climbs onto Mike’s back, arms stretching as far as they’ll go.

“God, you’re heavy.”  

“Stop complaining. Get me closer.”

“I’m trying.” 

Mike staggers closer and Dustin snatches a fistful of the top. The entire tree lurches toward him, ornaments clinking in his wake. 

“Wait– careful,” you urge.

Dustin lists dangerously forward, jamming the star through the bristles. 

From beside you, Will hums disapprovingly, “It’s crooked.”

Dustin’s tongue curls over his lip as he adjusts it. “Now?”

“Still crooked.”

"Now?"

Your hands hover out in front of you like a net but you are not as prepared to catch him as you look. “No, it’s fine. Just leave it.” 

Dustin releases the tip and the whole tree reels back. His arm shoots back out to steady it, but a handful of ornaments swing off and onto the floor. Miraculously, none shatter, but they bounce away in a ripple of clinking. 

Your focus jumps over to Eddie. He’s squinting vaguely in your direction, head tilted off his pillow with curls plastered to one cheek. 

A breathy chuckle reverberates through your chest. “Merry Christmas!” 

“Wha…”

The kids mimic you in their own broken choir of wishes but with half the enthusiasm you delivered. 

Eddie’s eyebrows weave into one crooked arch. He attempts, and quickly fails, to prop himself up on his elbows, making a sullen sort of sigh on the way down. 

You stride over to the bed, landing on the edge by his sheet-wrapped thigh. Your hand slips behind his shoulders and you offer a half smile. “Surprise?” 

He winces into a sit, a hand flying to his chest. Pain folds back into confusion as his eyes flicker across each face in the room. “I don’t… Why?” 

“So you can celebrate, silly.” You hook a finger under the hair stuck to his face and tuck it behind his ear. 

His lashes flutter closed as he melts into your palm, slowly bending until his forehead meets your shoulder. “Sorry, ‘m so tired.” 

Despite the overdramatic gagging going on behind you, you accept the embrace, running a ginger hand up his spine where his gown has billowed open. “Don’t be. Didn’t mean to wake ya. It’s early.” 

His nose sweeps a cold line across your collar. “How’d you get in? Place is like a prison,” he mumbles. “Already tried to escape.” 

“No, you didn’t,” you snort. 

“No,” he admits, lips turning against your shirt. “You snuck in? Snuck a whole Christmas tree in?”

You lean away just enough to nod, pride softening the edges of your grin.

“And you managed to do that with Tweedle-Dee and Tweedle-Dum times two.” 

“I’m sorry– Who face-planted off a roof again?” Dustin cracks. 

Your sudden laughter is corked with Eddie’s palm. He glares– or tries to anyway– but you know his tells. The way one corner of his mouth twitches through his frown. How he tilts his head when he’s secretly amused. “Don’t laugh at that,” he says, utterly unconvincing. 

The rest of your laugh is swallowed, but the levity doesn’t fade. You peel his fingers off, gently carrying them to your lap like they might be broken too. “It’s true. You did.” 

“Whatever.” 

“Don’t pout.” You tip your head, mirroring him on purpose. “Do you like it?” 

His gaze tapers back up to the scene behind you, eyes glowing with red, green, and gold. “No, I love it,” he says honestly. 

“Yeah?”

“Mhmm. I can’t believe this. How’d I get so lucky? Hmm?” Eddie pinches your side, cutting off your giggle with a swift kiss. 

“God, gross!” 

You whip your head toward the source. “Lucas, you literally have a girlfriend.” 

“Yeah, but you’re kissing Eddie.”

“What? You don’t think Eddie’s pretty?” Your fingers clamp either side of his face, cheeks squishing into his puckered lips like a fish. 

Eddie stares blankly at Lucas, but the second his eyes bound to yours, you both burst into laughter. 

“Don’t make me laugh, babe. Fuck,” he hisses, doubled over in amusement and equal pain.

“Sorry, sorry,” you amend, hands gently sandwiching his. “Oh– Let me get your gift.” 

He’s curious but he still sulks as you leave, chasing the lost warmth as you slide off the bed. “A gift?” 

“Mhmm,” you say, unzipping the front pocket of your bag. You fish out a small box wrapped in glossy paper with a puffy, red bow. 

He gives it a good shake when you pass it to him and a knowing smirk at the noise it makes. 

“Open it.” You beckon the kids closer, taking your prior spot on the bed. “It’s from all of us.”

The paper falls away under Eddie’s eager hands, a smirk growing and growing until it suddenly falters. Pure shock washes over him as he gawks at the gift. A limited edition, glow-in-the-dark set of dice he’s been talking about for months. 

His eyes shoot between you and the dice several times before he asks, “Where’d you even get these? They sold out like immediately.”

You shrug, nonchalance slipping. “Know a guy.”

He rolls his eyes, giving your shoulder a good jostle. And his gaze shifts across every person in the room, thumb absentmindedly roving across the box's label. “Thank you, guys.” 

“They come with one condition,” Dustin says. 

“What’s that?”

“You have to resurrect Virehart the Vengeful.”

Eddie groans, burying his smile in his free hand and shaking his head. “I told you guys I’m not doing it.”

“Please, come on! That’s our only condition,” Will tries. 

“He literally had like two lines.” 

“And they were badass!” says Dustin. “A blade is only as sharp as the courage behind it,” he recites in a voice much deeper than his own. 

“Oh my God.” Eddie waves a dismissive hand. “Fine, fine.” 

The boys celebrate with a chain of cheers. Eddie steals your fingers back amidst all of the yelling, a doting little look in his eyes. Forget the dice, you’re the real gift to him. 

The fuss very promptly ends when someone clears their throat. You all turn in unison, finding the same nurse from earlier. She sighs, hands planted on her hips with a disapproving shake to her head. 

Eddie chuckles nervously. “Merry Christmas?” 

1-800-HOT-TO-GO | E.M

Anonymous asked: Can i request a fic where either the reader reveals during a pizza and beers hangout she was a phone sex operator for a brief time and everyone is shocked and one of them jokingly asks if she was any good and she whispers something dirty in their ear and it changes their friendship

Cw: fem!reader, allusions to male masturbation, dirty talk 1.7k words

“Come again?”

“I used to work a sex hotline,” you shrug like it was no big deal.

“No way,” Eddie shakes his head. “I don’t believe you.”

You hear Steve and the others giggle around you, also in disbelief.

“Wanna bet?”

“Try me.” He wants to call your bluff because no way in hell did he not know this about you. You always were reserved when it came to talking about sex; never had you seemed promiscuous.

You hold up your hand to your ear, pretending it is a phone, and Eddie follows your lead.

“Ring ring,” he giggles.

“Hello.” You changed the pitch of your voice to be more sultry.

“Hi,” he smirks.

“Can I get a name, handsome?”

“ Eddie”

“Mmmm, hi, Eddie. I’m Candy.”

“Candy?”

He breaks character, but you don’t.

“the boys say it’s because I’m so sweet.” You fake giggle.

“This is my first time calling. I’m not sure what to do here.”

“That’s okay, I’ll walk you through it… you want to get comfortable for me?”

Eddie looks around the room at the others, who are trying to stifle their giggles. This night was supposed to be chill, with pizza and beers. He wasn’t really sure how you all ended up here.

“I’m comfortable.” He says without actually moving.”

“I wish I could see; you sound so sexy.” You sigh.

Another giggle leaves Eddie’s lips because who is this person who’s taken over your body?

“Yeah? you wish you could see be, Dollface?” Playing into it more.

You lean in to whisper so only he can hear it this time. “oh yeah, big boy; I bet your cock is already nice and hard for me. Such a good boy, I want you to fill me.” You sit back, take a loose tendril, twirl his hair around your finger, and watch Eddie’s eyes widen at what you just said.

“Oh-okay, that’s enough.” He chuckles, trying not to give away how turned on he just got. “I believe you!”

You sit back with a giggle and grab another slice of pizza like nothing just happened.

Everyone looked at you with shock.

Eddie quickly gets up and excuses himself to go to the bathroom.

“What did you say?!” Robin begs.

You shrug in response like it was another day at work… which it has been.

“Damn, is it hot in here?” Steve pops the collar of his shirt.

“You guys need to loosen up, my god.”

While you were still enjoying your pizza, Eddie was having a crisis. Never had he thought of you in that way until moments ago, listening to those filthy words slip from your lips.

“I bet your cock is already nice and hard for me. Such a good boy, I want you to fill me,” your words replayed in his mind while he tried to fight the blood rushing to his stiffening cock.

He can’t go back out there like this. Eddie splashed cold water on his face to try to snap him out of it, but it didn’t help.

A quick rap on the door startles Eddie out of his inner monologue.

“You okay, big boy? You’ve been in there fifteen minutes.” He hears you laugh from the other side.

Had it really been that long?

Eddie’s issue had not been resolved; in fact, it had worsened as he tried to push down the thought of you naked and spread out for him… talking to him like that.

“Yeah-I-uh- just a minute.” Eddie wanted to pull his hair out at how frustrated you had made him.

You were just pals, bubbies, amigos.

You weren’t attractive… were you?

Eddie never thought to look at you in that way; you’re just a friend, always had been, always will be… unless?

The more Eddie thought about it, the more he realized he did think your hair looked really pretty tonight. The way you always did your makeup really brought out your beautiful features…and when he got a whiff of your delicious perfume when you twirled his hair, he couldn’t get enough.

“You sure?” You try to jiggle the door handle, but it’s locked.

“Shit,” Eddie curses under with breath.

“Come on, Ed, talk to me, please?”

You hear the lock unlatch and watch the doorknob slowly turn as Eddie pokes his head out.

“Hi,” he’s short and sounds a bit out of breath.

“I hope what I said didn’t make you uncomfortable.”

Ed saw the worried look in your eyes.

“No! Well, I mean, yes, but…no.”

“Yes, but no?”

Eddie let out a deep sigh. He didn’t see a way out of this. He stepped aside to let you in and shut the door behind you.

“Eddie?” You look up at him.

“Hm?”

His eyes snap to your concerned face.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t think it was a big deal! It did it all the time for work; I just… I don’t know. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay.”

“No, it’s not. clearly, I overstepped a boundary-“

“You’re not the only one.”

“What do you mean?”

Eddie moves his strategically placed hands to reveal the tent formed in his jeans and watches as your face falls into amused shock.

You cup your mouth to stifle an unexpected giggle.

“That’s not the reaction a guy wants when he shows a girl how turned on he is.”

“I’m sorry, I just!-didn’t think?”

“It’s okay. I’m just trying to get rid of it, but it’s not going away.”

“You mean?”

“I’m waiting it out.”

“Oh, ok.” You nod awkwardly.

An awkward silence washes over the both of you as you try so hard not to stare at his crotch.

“Don’t worry, I’m not going to ask for your help if that’s what you’re thinking.”

“I wasn’t!”

“Ok…”

Another very uncomfortable silence settled between the two of you as you fiddled with the hem of your shirt, trying to do everything in your power so as not to look down.

“I um… I guess I’ll just.” You point to the door that he’s blocking.

“Uh. Ok,” he nods and steps to the side.

You close the door behind you but don’t leave. You lean against the door and take a deep breath, trying to make sense of the evening.

Why did the thought of turning Eddie on excite you? He’s a friend. Just a friend. I always had and always will be.

With a deep breath, you go to push yourself up off the door, but before you’re able to, you hear your name being moaned from the other side of the door.

You froze. You knew you should move, but your feet were locked in place. More heavy breaths and the sound of muffled moans seeped from under the door gap, and you pressed your ear to the door.

Eddie was jerking off because of you… and you liked it?

Eddie bit back screaming your name as he finally released himself into the bathroom tissue. Finally, he could return to rejoin everyone without being physically uncomfortable.

He discarded his release, tucked himself back in, washed his hands, and unlocked the door, but he was ambushed when you fell onto him when he went to open the door.

You let out a squeak as you lost your balance, falling into Eddie as the door was opened from under you.

“Woah,” Eddie catches you before you’re able to fall. His rage hands wrap around your biceps, gripping tightly to brace your fall.

“Were you spying on me?”

“Oh god, sorry” you’re so embarrassed. The whole evening has been one shit show. You scramble to find your fitting to create space between you and Eddie.

“You were spying on me!”

“Shhhhh! Keep your voice down.”

“You totally were spying on me!” He accused.

“You’re the one who moaned my name!” You defend.

Eddie’s cheeks reddened.

“You’re the one who said all those… things!” his hands flailed.

“You’re the one who egged it on!”

“So!”

“So?”

“Yeah, so!”

“Woah, guys, what’s going on here?” Steve pops his head around the corner.

“Nothing,” you both glare.

“Ohhhhhkayyyyyyyy,” Steve turns a heel and walks back to the kitchen to grab a drink.

“Eddie,” you sigh, “I don’t want to argue. This is dumb, and we can pretend it never happened.”

“We could, but I gotta know.”

“What’s that?”

“Did you like it?” He took a step closer, filling the gap between you.

“What?” You look up at him.

“I asked if you like listening to me?” he brushed your hair behind your shoulder.

You gulp, not expecting Eddie’s demeanour to switch on a dime.

“I… I don’t know?”

“I think you did, and you’re too scared to admit it.” You can smell him. He is so close to you.

“Eddie, what are you doing?” You watch as he leans in closer.

“Just trust me.” His hands find the back of your neck, pulling you close.

“Eddie?”

“Let me try something.”

“Kay,” you whisper.

Eddie’s lips graze yours ever so lightly before he presses them fully.

A million and one thoughts run through your mind as Eddie kisses you.

You blame the cheap beer for letting this happen. You blame the beer for liking it. You blame the beer for kissing him back. You blame the beer for the tongue slip and the beer for how you wanted to moan when he pulled away.

“Woah”

“Yea woah,” you repeated dumbly.

“um… did you like it?”

“Yeah… did you?”

“Yeah.”

“cool… now what?”

“go out with me,” Eddie states confidently.

“Like a date?”

“what else would it be?” He chuckles.

“I don’t know?” You shrug, embarrassed that Eddie is getting you all flustered.

“You’re cute when you don’t know what to say.” He smirks.

“I’m cute?” You never thought hearing Eddie say those words would send butterflies fluttering through your tummy.

Eddie doesn’t answer verbally; he leans in to kiss you again to confirm his statement.

“We should get back to the others.” You sigh as you pull away.

“You didn’t answer me.”

“You didn’t ask me anything.”

“Yes, I did. I asked you out.”

“No, you said go out with me. That’s a statement, not a question.”

“Are you kidding me?”

“No,” Yes, you were totally messing with him.

“Will you go out on a date with me?”

“Just say yes! You’ve been gone for half an hour!” You hear Robin yell from the living room.

“Robin!” You hear Steve scold.

“What?”

You can’t help but laugh and can’t believe the next world’s coming out of your mouth.

“Okay, I’ll go out with you, Eddie.”

SPILL YOUR GUTS

˚₊‧꒰ა . ——— ˗ˏˋ ✮ ˎˊ˗ ——— ˖ ໒꒱ ‧₊˚

practice boyfriend! eddie x fem! reader

summary: eddie’s your practice boyfriend. you’re positive he’s upset at you and you’re waiting for him to get mad. however, he has a different response in mind.

cw: references/allusions to past child abuse but extremely vague, references/allusions to bad relationships (also pretty vague), reader acts on a learned response and assumes the worst about Eddie, anxiety

tags/tropes: angst, hurt/comfort (my brand!) sappy sappy romantic idiots, they kiss and figure their mess out at the end

a/n: this came to me in a vision

summary makes this sound smutty but i promise it’s not. this accidentally became disgustingly romantic. read at your own risk :)

࣪˖ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ˖

You’re positive Eddie’s mad at you.

Okay. Maybe positive is a strong word. But still.

You’ve only been fake/pretend/practice dating Eddie for about two weeks now. He’s the one who approached you with the offer— when you were in the Upside Down together, you’d made an off-hand comment about how you might die without ever having a real boyfriend- not one that mattered, anyway. It’s always kind of been a sore spot for you for a good portion of your life. Growing up, you didn’t really have the best relationship with your dad (Robin likes to call that “The understatement of the year, and we almost died.”) and out of the incredibly small handful of guys you’ve gone out with, none stuck around longer than a month and all ended in such equally, specifically, and uniquely horrific ways, you finally came to the conclusion you had to be fucking something up. What are the chances of all them ended so completely horribly?

After you all had decidedly not died in the Upside Down, Eddie approached you with an offer: pretend date him. You’re popular and well known enough that it’ll help get people off his back about the whole Chrissy/murders thing —even though he’s been absolved of all charges, the people of Hawkins hold grudges— and in exchange, you get a trial run of a relationship that won’t end unless you both agree too— you get to figure out what you’re doing wrong.

You feel bad about it, because even though you spend so much time together, you feel like a nervous wreck. All. The. Time.

You’re constantly waiting for the other shoe to drop— waiting for him to tell you that you’re too weird, that you’re not considerate enough, that you’re selfish, or that you talk too much.

But he never says any of it. All he ever tells you is the good things. He tells you how sympathetic you are, how kind you are, how good you are at remembering little details that matter. He tells you that you’re a good kisser.

(Yeah. Your first kiss, even after those failed relationships, ended up being with Eddie ‘The Freak’ Munson. You’re not quite sure you’ll ever forget how you felt when his lips —just a little cracked, but not rough— met yours; when his hair tickled your face and you could faintly smell the cigarette smoke that stubbornly clings to all of his clothes, no matter how many times he washes them. You didn’t tell him he was your first. That’s something you decided you couldn’t bear to share.

You kind of have a feeling he knows anyway, though.)

It all sets you on edge. You’re under no reassurance that you’re perfect. You’re currently questioning if you’re tolerable, from a romantic standpoint.

You know how you are. You’re clinging and you drink up reassurance like a dying man in the desert. You linger in his casual touches like it’s the first and last time you’ll ever feel them. You know you’re a lot. You know. You know that guys in a relationship don’t want ‘a lot’, they want a pretty thing to hang off their arm and laugh at what they say.

But you just… can’t.

You tried, and you tried, and you tried. But you always ended up being too much, or it didn’t work out for some other reason. You want more. You want to feel safe, and happy, and cherished and loved and all those things that only happen in the movies.

The ironic part of all of this is that when you first started setting out terms for your arrangement, Eddie had told you flat out: “This will only work if you are completely and one-hundred percent yourself. You gotta lay it all on me, angel.”

And so you had, and now you regret it because he’s upset about something.

You’d come over to his trailer at his request to ‘hang out’ while he went over DND stuff for his next campaign. Eddie does this a lot— he calls them ‘Neutral Dates’ where you’re not really doing anything in particular- most of the time, you’re both doing seperate things, but still just being in each other’s presence.

It’s nice. The majority of your friend circle consists of everyone involved with the Upside Down and that entire mess. You two are no Steve and Robin (you’re convinced those two have the kind of bond no one can replicate or break. Like the kind of bond stray cats get and then they have to be adopted together) but it’s still nice. To just be with someone.

Even if you feel like you’re walking on eggshells.

It’s not always eggshells. Sometimes, for a a few moments, you forget. You forget it’s all pretend. You forget he’s just a friend helping a friend fulfill a goal. That’s all.

You’ve almost forgotten just now, too— you’re too concerned about what you might’ve done.

He’s not acting angry, per-se, but he’s definitely upset. You tend to pick up on this kind of thing: small changes in someone’s personality or body language. Most of the time it’s not a conscious habit.

Most of the time.

Right now, he’s run his hands through his hair about a million times. It’s become a frizzy mess behind him, and when you’d made an offhand joke about it —an attempt to lighten the mood— all he’d done was scowl. Not at you, really, but the message was there. You’d snapped your jaw shut so fast you’re pretty sure he heard your teeth click.

After that he’d frustratedly made tea for the both of you, which consisted of opening the cupboards faster than he usually did, closing them slightly louder than he usually does, and drumming his fingers impatiently on the stove-top while he waited for the kettle to boil.

All of this you observed from the corner of your eye while ‘reading’ on the couch.

And if all of that wasn’t bad enough, when you’d finally mustered up the courage to speak again, a little joke about a part in the book you were reading, all he’d said was a flat:

“That’s great, babe.”

You’re starting to get antsy. Nervous. Maybe you should go? Unless he gets upset at you leaving. That would be bad. But he’s clearly upset with you being here, so maybe you should go.

While you’re debating the pros and cons of leaving, you try to remain as still and silent as possible. No need to upset him anymore by moving too much or being too loud.

You flip a page in the book you’re no longer reading (he might notice you’re not paying attention to it anymore) and decide to test the waters again.

“The author just spelled restaurant wrong. That’s the third spelling mistake I’ve caught in this book.”

“Hmm.”

Okay. So that was worse. Talking to him is out of the question, then. It must be something you did, to warrant this kind of reaction.

You wrack your brain, trying to think of anything you could’ve done in recent hours to make him upset, but you can’t think of anything.

You glance slightly to the right— not far enough that he’ll see you looking at him, but far enough to get a better look at him in your peripheral. He’s glaring down at his campaign notebook. Shit, he looks so angry.

Unbidden, tears begin to well in your eyes and you try to shift, trying to angle yourself away from him enough that he can’t see the tears in your eyes.

But your hand shifts, knocking into his leg.

Fuck. “Sorry!”

You yank you arm back as if burned, jolting back on the couch so you’re in no danger of touching him. “I’m sorry!”

He sits up, immediately snapping to attention at the desperation coloring your voice. “Woah woah, hey. Hey, what’s going on? Are you okay?”

You take a steadying breath. “Did I do something wrong?”

He blinks blankly at you. Oh shit, you’re supposed to know that you’ve done something wrong.

“I mean,” You hurry to correct, “I know I— Can you tell me what I did wrong so I can fix it?”

Understanding floods his features and you brace yourself, ready for the reprimand.

“Can I touch you?”

Now it’s your turn to stare with confusion. You nod once, briefly thinking about how weird it is to ask for permission first.

He sits up on the couch, facing you with his legs crossed, the couch springs squeaking loudly at his movement. You resist the urge to wince. He reaches out with a slow hand, taking the hand that’s still clenched, held away from him and up near your chest.

He stares down at your hand, holding it with his left hand and tracing delicate shapes on it with his right. His ringed fingers drag lines around your knuckles and veins, lingering occasionally over the odd, old scar.

“How long did you think I was upset with you?”

Your heart is racing, muscles tensed and ready to bolt. “Um. A few hours? Maybe?”

You’re hyper-aware of the grip he has on your hand, and how quickly and easy it could become crushing.

It doesn’t.

“Bug,” He says slowly after a moment. At first he used to use pet names as a joke— it was something you’d laugh at, between the two of you, since the relationship wasn’t real.

But recently, he’s been saying them with a different inflection in his tone. A little less teasing, a lot more fond.

“Have you spent the past few hours afraid that I was mad at you?”

He sounds… sad. Which is confusing. It doesn’t— he was. He was.

“But you were,” You say, suddenly unsure about anything and everything. “You were upset.”

“I was upset because I couldn’t work this part of the campaign out, and i’m dramatic. I was never mad at you, honey. I was never mad at you.”

You frown, gears turning in your head. “When I made that joke about your hair, you glared at me. And then when I tried to talk to you, you were upset. You didn’t want to talk.”

“I was jokingly glaring at you, I’m so sorry you thought I was serious. I wasn’t, I promise. I didn’t mean to be dismissive, I was really focusing on writing.”

You’re both silent for a moment. A beat too long. You want to squirm in the unwelcome space the silence has created.

“What did you think I was going to do?”

That is a loaded question.

“I don’t know,” You pick at a loose thread on the couch cushion. “I don’t— I don’t know. That’s the problem. You don’t yell at me, or get angry, or tell me when i’ve made you upset. I don’t know what you’ll do.”

He makes a wounded noise in his throat.

“I know you get angry,” You bulldoze on, “I’ve seen it. You’re so… loud, in everything you do. I know you get angry. But you never get that same kind of loud angry at me and I don’t know what to do because that means that I upset you and you don’t tell me about it and then I don’t know how to fix it. I have to fix it, Eddie.”

His eyes, deep and brown, search your face. He reaches up a hand, painfully slow, to cup your face. Your eyelids flutter shut, and you tip your head to the side, leaning into the job.

“I’m gonna tell you something, Bug. Are you listening?” He waits for you to hum in confirmation before continuing. “You’re not responsible for my moods. Or anyone else’s for that matter. That’s not your job. You don’t have to fix it.”

He reaches his second hand up to cup the other side of your face. “You know why I don’t get angry at you? Not all loud and dramatic like that? Because I’ve seen how you react when people do. And I never, ever want to be the reason you get that look in your eye. I never want to make you afraid. I never want you to believe, with proof and confidence, that I’ve grown sick of you.”

You open your eyes, eyes darting across the planes of his face. Searching for even the smallest hint, the smallest giveaway that he might be lying.

You can’t find any. In its place, you find eyes, shining with pure determination. You find lips parted ever so slightly, a sad-sort of smile being etched into being. You find two hands on your face, thumbs delicately sweeping across the skin of your under-eye, of your cheekbone. Smoothing away the steady tears that had begun falling, wiping away the hot trails they leave on your face.

And you realize all at once that love isn’t like the movies. It isn’t picture-perfect kisses. It isn’t ball gowns and dresses and kisses in the rain. It isn’t like the love you thought you were supposed to have: empty and hollow; a life of hanging off of arms and praying your next slip-up didn’t cost you your relationship.

It was this.

It was just being. Just being and knowing the other person is there for just that— for you. It was not raising your voice. It was carrying extra hair-ties. It was making two cups of coffee. It was steeping tea for an extra couple of minutes, just the way he liked it. It was playing your favorite music in the car, and looking over at each other during the bridge, belting the lyrics with the same, toothy-smile. So full and so happy you just keep screaming the lyrics, because you’re filled with so much you don’t know where to put it all.

Your tears begin to fall in earnest now. Your heart is thudding in your chest, but for a different reason now. You’re struck with the need to convey all of this to him— to tell him you understand, you know, you feel the same.

“These hair ties,” You shove your wrist up to his eye-line. “They’re for you. Because you always forget your own. And— and I steep the tea for a few extra minutes, because you like your tea strong, and you didn’t just find that tape in your van, I bought it ‘cause I know you lost the old one in the Upside Down, ‘cause it felt out of your pocket.”

You’re babbling, nearly choking on your tears and your words, rushing them all out of your mouth in an aching wish to be understood, in this very moment.

“I know,” He says, voice a little hysteric and eyes a little too bright. His lip wobbles. He presses your face tighter in his hands. “I know. I know. I see you. I see you.”

You stay like that for a little while. At some point, your hands find his wrists, and then you’re just two fools, smiling like idiots with tears streaming down your faces, staring into each others eyes.

Eventually, Eddie clears his throat. “The next time you think I’m upset at you, you tell me, okay? You can ask. You can ask me and I pinky promise I won’t get mad.”

You giggle wetly. “Pinky swear?”

“Pinky swear,” He says, taking his left hand away from your face to hold up his pinky. You intertwine yours and his together, the both of you laughing at the ridiculousness of it all.

He gets quiet for a moment; removes his hands from your face and instead clasps, your hands together, resting in your lap.

“You know why I never tell you when you’re being a bad practice girlfriend?” He says, his voice low and soft.

“How come?”

He smiles, full and good. “Because you’re not. You’re so sweet and kind and loving. And if you’d let me, I’d really like to kiss you right now.”

You furrow your brows. “The real kind? The I-love-you kind?”

Your face flushes over the words ‘I love you.’

“I’ve always kissed you for real,” He says, words laden with fondness. “Ever since the day we met and you slapped the shit out of me for being stupid. I’ve been hopelessly obsessed ever since. I’ve just been waiting for you to notice.”

You suck in a breath. “So all of this— the, the dates and the hanging out and the kissing— that’s all been real?”

“Every last bit.”

“Then in that case,” You say, squeezing his hands. “I would very much like you to kiss me.”

He leans in, slotting your lips together and everything just clicks. Like this is where you’re meant to be. Maybe it’s puppy love. Maybe it’s not.

All you know is that Eddie Munson is kissing you for real, and he always has been. You couldn’t ask for anything better.

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗

Eddie Munson x Best Friend!Reader

Summary: You never meant for Eddie to know that you had a crush on him. What happened when he found out, courtesy of Mike Wheeler's big mouth?

WC: 2.6k

Warnings: smut (18+ only, minors DNI), angst to fluff to smut and then back to fluff?? I don't even know, idiots in love, p in v, semi-public sex (we get it on in the van, baby)

Part of @cherrycolored-punk's Softember event!

Divider credit to @saradika

Friday, May 16, 1986: the day you determined that Mike Wheeler was the worst. 

You tried to give him the benefit of the doubt. After all, it couldn’t be easy growing up in Nancy’s perfect shadow. Just the time you spent working with her on the school newspaper was exhausting. 

That was where you were currently sprinting from, weaving through the empty hallways towards the drama room. Leave it to Nancy to schedule an emergency newspaper meeting on a Friday afternoon. 

“Sorry, sorry, sorry.” You kept your head down as you breezed into the Hellfire meeting. Even without looking, you could feel the guys glaring at you. The only thing less forgivable than missing a campaign was interrupting one. 

Gareth let out a huff, crossing his arms over his chest. “Nice of you to join us, Lady Atwood.” He shifted forward in his seat. “You’re in luck today—our fearless Dungeon Master has yet to grace us with his presence.”

You wrinkled your nose, only then noticing that Eddie’s throne remained empty. “Where is he?”

From his spot at the table, Mike Wheeler scoffed. “Surprised you don’t know, considering you’re basically in love with him.”

You were about to refute his statement, or at least give him a well-deserved middle finger, when you heard a clattering behind you. 

Like metal hitting the floor tiles.

No. No, no no no…

“S-Sorry.” Eddie stammered. He quickly scooped up the tin lunch box that doubled as a place to stash his weed. “I had a last-minute deal. Apparently there’s a party at McKinney’s house tonight and he needed some, uh, provisions. So, uh, yeah.” He cleared his throat, eyes darting around the room and looking at everyone except for you. “We can get started.”

There might as well have been a spotlight beaming down, accentuating the embarrassment written all over your face. Everyone in Hellfire knew about your crush on Eddie, but they had the decency to keep it a secret. 

Everyone except for Mike Wheeler, apparently. God, you wanted to squish that little shit like a bug beneath your shoe.

It certainly didn’t help that Eddie kept glancing at you, even when he addressed the group. Like he was waiting for you to say something about Mike’s comment. Waiting for you to refute it, to roll your eyes and whip out a snappy comeback. Maybe he was even hoping you would.

He was probably internally cringing just thinking about you having romantic feelings for him.

“Lady Atwood?”

Your gaze instinctively snapped over to Eddie when he said your name. He was looking at you, brown eyes wide with anticipation of your response. 

Warmth crept up your neck. He had heard what Mike said about you being in love with him–he had to have. He’d just had the good grace to brush over it because…

Because he didn’t feel the same way and didn’t want to cause you any further humiliation.

“Y-Yeah?” You choked on the word, trying to put the incident behind you. But you couldn’t, because the pain of unrequited feelings kept yanking on your heart, drawing tears that you desperately wished would evaporate.

“Gareth the Great has proposed battling the demogorgon.” There was a hint of a smirk on Eddie’s lips. It was your first clue that the move would prove entertaining, perhaps at your character’s demise. “We’re waiting for your input.”

Nodding, you chewed the inside of your cheek and studied the board. Okay, it looked like winning the battle was feasible, though a bit risky. The rest of the club watched as you contemplated; Gareth especially was practically vibrating with anticipation.

Then the ceiling started leaking. Soft drops with no particular rhythm, landing on your cheeks. Just your luck–first Mike’s big mouth spilled your secret, then whatever nastiness was living in Hawkins High School’s pipes was now seeping into your skin.

“Holy shit, is she crying?”

Dustin Henderson’s voice broke into your thoughts. His tone, for possibly the first time since you’d met him, held only concern with a note of snark.

Who was crying? You were the only girl in the club now that Ronnie had graduated, save for the times Erica Sinclair served as a substitute. Which meant…

“Way to go, asshole.” Lucas thwacked Mike across the chest. 

“I didn’t know he was there!”

The purple fabric of your shirt darkened beneath your arms as another disconcerting flash of heat hit you. You wanted to crawl into a hole and die. Maybe you’d get lucky and the floor would open beneath you and swallow you up. 

“I need to get some air.” Whether you spoke the words aloud or said them silently to yourself, you weren’t sure. 

Your feet seemed to carry you out of the room and through the school’s front doors. Tears blurred your vision, and you swiped them away before any other lingering students could see. 

The air was warm, teasing of the approaching summer. God, summer—you always spent it with Eddie, lounging by the public pool or sitting down at Lovers Lake. You’d read a book while he pored over his Hellfire notebook, scribbling notes for future campaign ideas. 

Would he still want to do that, to spend those long days with you, now that he knew about your pathetic crush? 

It wasn’t until you reached the parking lot that you remembered: Eddie drove you to school that morning. If you started walking now, you’d definitely get home before dark. Or maybe you could call your parents from the payphone if you managed to scrounge up the change—

The sound of your name stopped you in your tracks. You should’ve kept walking the moment you saw Eddie, his frizzy curls bouncing as he jogged over to you. 

“Hey.” His hand brushed yours, though you pulled away before he could grab ahold of it. “Where are you going?”

“Home.”

He sighed. “Okay, let me rephrase that: Why did you leave? Because of what Wheeler said?” Eddie let out a small, disbelieving laugh when you nodded. “He’s such a little shit. Always messing with me. I’m gonna kick his sorry ass one of these days.”

Your eyebrows shot up. Messing with Eddie? “What are you talking about?”

“That joke about you being in love with me. He obviously saw me in the doorway and said it to embarrass me.” A blush crept onto Eddie’s cheeks. “Y’know, ‘cause…”

But you didn’t know. You had no idea what he meant. And as much as Mike was a menace, he seemed sincere when he said he didn’t realize that Eddie was there. 

“Because why?”

“Because,” Eddie’s gaze shifted to his van’s tires before he finally looked at you again. “Because he knows I have this dumb crush on you, and he thinks it’s hilarious to fuck with me about it.”

Words evaded you. This had to be some sort of elaborate set-up. Eddie had a crush on you? When girls like Chrissy Cunningham and Heather Holloway lived in the very same town? 

Impossible. 

Not privy to the argument playing out inside your head—thank God—Eddie babbled on. “I know it’s weird. That’s why I haven’t told you—well, until right now. And I’m starting to regret it, because you’re looking at me like I have three heads. So maybe I’ll just shut up now.”

“No.” Summoning all of your courage, you took his hand in yours and managed a smile. “Eddie, Mike was teasing me because I like you. More than a friend should like a friend.”

Eddie’s tongue darted out to wet his lips. “What if I told you…I don’t want to just be friends?”

You let your eyes meet his. “I-I don’t want to just be friends, either.”

He took a pause before he asked his next question. Your heartbeat thrummed in your ears as you waited for him to speak.

“And what if I did this?” One palm, callused from years of guitar playing, cupped your cheek. Eddie moved closer, his nose bumping against yours in a clumsy attempt to close the gap between you. “Shit, that–that was supposed to be suave.”

“Shut up and kiss me, Munson.” The words left your mouth before you could think them through. Your fingers tangled into his hair, pulling him back towards you and finishing what he had started.

His lips, soft and tasting vaguely of the cigarettes he’d smoked after school, crashed into yours. One hand snaked around your waist and pressed you against him until you felt his metal belt buckle through your shirt.

You moaned softly, letting his tongue into your mouth without hesitation. More, more, more…you needed more. You needed all of him. 

It was Eddie who broke the kiss, much to your chagrin. But what he said next made up for the loss.

“Sorry…I’m trying to be a gentleman. But it’s, uh, getting a little hard.” He chuckled, stealing another quick kiss. “Pun very much intended.”

A quick glance proved that Eddie wasn’t lying: His erection tantalizingly strained against his fly. What you wouldn’t give to feel him inside you…

“Y’know, take you on a date, tell you how pretty you look,” Eddie continued, shifting his stance in a pitiful attempt to quell his desire. “I don’t wanna go at it in the school parking lot like some feral rabbits.” He waved his hand haphazardly. 

You bit your lip, weighing your options. A date would be nice; perhaps a night at The Hawk, his arm around you as a movie played on a giant screen. Or maybe he’d take you to dinner—nothing as expensive as Enzo’s, but somewhere more romantic than your usual Benny’s hangout. 

A date with Eddie was something you’d only ever dreamed of. But right now, you needed to live out a different fantasy before you combusted from an overload of lust. 

“Remember the first campaign you created this year?” Your soft voice held a sultry air despite your nerves. “It was your most sadistic one yet. We were all ready to forfeit, but you took pity on us and gave us a hint.”

Taking a deep breath, you plunged your hand into his front pocket. “Do you remember what you said?”

Eddie shook his head. “I can’t remember my own goddamn name right now, Sweetheart.”

You laughed, your finger hooking around his keyring. “You said that sometimes, it’s better to work backwards.”

With a triumphant grin, you plucked the keys from his pocket. 

“You’re gonna be the death of me.” His own smile betrayed his exasperated exterior as he grabbed your hand. His van seemed a million miles away, though it was parked in one of the closest spots in the lot. 

Eddie yanked open the back door, waiting just long enough for you to get settled before he scrambled in behind you. The moment the door closed, he pulled you on top of him. 

You could feel him, feel his hardness, against your core. You rolled your hips instinctively, savoring the friction. 

Hands clamped down on your denim-covered thighs. “You gotta…you can’t…” Eddie choked, struggling for words. “We’re already about to do it in my van. I don’t wanna look even more pathetic by coming in my pants.”

Warmth blossomed in your body. You could imagine him sputtering out a stream of swear words as he came, flooding his own boxers with his release. 

Maybe another day. 

Buttons were undone, flies were unzipped, clothes were discarded into a pile in the corner of the van. It was only you and Eddie, not a single scrap of fabric between you. 

Sweat glistened on his chest, matting down the sparse hairs that curled around his nipples. You leaned in, kissing just above the demon head tattoo etched on his pec. 

“Baby,” he crooned. The new pet name wasn’t lost on you. Your heart beat faster, a butterfly frantically flapping its wings. “Baby, I need you.”

He did need you, unless he was going to take care of his achingly hard cock by himself. The pink tip leaked with pre-cum, and if you had more room, you would have licked it clean off. 

You settled for swiping it away with your thumb, his abdomen tightening at the sudden contact. Eddie nearly passed out on the spot when you sucked on your finger, savoring the salty taste.

“Baby,” he groaned again. “I w-wanted to get you off first, ‘cause I know I’m not gonna last like this.”

“S’okay.” You lined him up with your entrance, ignoring the way your hands shook as you slowly sank down onto him. His hips bucked up almost of their own accord. “F-Fuck, Eddie…”

Eddie looked up at you, brown irises wide. He paused for an extra moment; maybe he really had forgotten his own name. “I know, I know,” he said finally. “God, I fucking know, baby.” 

His thumb found your clit the second he composed himself, rubbing delicate circles until your toes curled. His other hand held you with just enough force to keep you stable while still being able to ride him.

“You’re so beautiful.” He let out a breathless laugh. “If I wake up and this was all a dream, I’m gonna be pissed.”

You shared the same thought. What if the Eddie laying before you, curls splayed against the worn carpet of his van, groaning your name–your name–was all a mirage? Another fantasy conjured up by your lovesick brain?

“I’ve never had a dream this good before.”

“Me either,” he admitted, “but the only ones that’ve come close involve you.”

You tightened around him, your hands flush against his chest. The fact that you occupied his thoughts, unconscious or otherwise, sent a wave of arousal rolling through you. You wanted to hear every last detail of those dreams, to know exactly what turned him on.

Maybe later. Right now, your focus stayed on the way he touched you. So intentional, so precise. And Eddie worked you through your orgasm, keeping his same rhythm as you came around him.

“There you go, pretty girl. That’s it,” he murmured. “‘M close. Where do you–where can I–”

“Inside.” You’d never been more grateful to be on the pill. 

Eddie let himself go, unleashing a torrent of desire. He thrust into you, chasing his own release now that he knew you’d gotten yours.

It was only when he slowed his pace, milking the last drops of cum from his cock, that reality began to settle in.

You just had sex with your best friend in the back of his van, a few hundred feet away from where your friends were gathered around a DnD board–

“Oh my God, Eddie!” Your eyes snapped open in realization. “Hellfire–they’re still there.”

Eddie pulled you closer and kissed your forehead. You relaxed into his chest. “They’re smart guys when they’re not being idiots.” The words vibrated against your skin. “I’m sure they figured out that we weren’t coming back.”

He sighed, wrapping one arm around you. “Can I take you on that date now, baby? Y’know, once we get dressed.” He smirked. “We can go to Scoops Ahoy and split a sundae. And then, if you want, I’ll take you back to my place and undress you again?”

You scrambled for your clothes almost as quickly as you’d shed them, Eddie following suit. And as much as you wanted to have sex with him again, to really take your time and cherish each second, you were equally excited to cuddle up in a booth and share some ice cream.

Friday, May 16, 1986: the day Mike Wheeler’s lack of filter didn’t completely backfire. Because it was also the day that you and Eddie Munson became boyfriend and girlfriend.

--

how to train your wyvern

sadist!eddie x f!masochist!reader desc: when bratting becomes intentional disrespect, eddie has to go to new measures to make sure you stay in line.

cw: minors dni, smut, d/s dyanmics, spanking, slapping, spanking (with hands/with implements), degradation, humiliation, mean names, pet names, pet play (but not the mainstay of the fic), references to other women, emotional sadism, physical sadism, p in a (f receiving), fingering (f receving), oral (m receiving), mmf threesome, spitroasting, facials, rice kneeling, mouth soaping

He could take it to some extent, a little smart remark, a mean joke here and there. A sarcastic reply to a question with an obvious answer. That was fine, nothing a little stern look couldn’t quell. But every now and again there would be nothing he could do and it would drive him fucking insane.

You’d been bratting for days, and nothing — nothing, was working. 

It started last week and some change ago when you decided to invite yourself over after his mid-day shift at the garage. He was exhausted, but he still had to fix a pipe under the bathroom sink that hadn’t stopped dripping – and also repair the cabinet door that he slammed off the hinges when he was annoyed about the broken pipe. 

Normally, having you around after a stressful shift was nice for him. You’d fawn over him, make him dinner, get him a drink, rub his shoulders – suck him off, if he asked. This night was different, you clambered into the trailer and snapped the door behind you, cheeks bitten by the cold and snow in your hair.

“What’s your problem?” he asked softly from the kitchen, cracking a beer open and quickly catching the foam off the top of the can. 

“You forgot to pick me up on your way home,” you huff, “I had to take the bus and then walk.” 

His eyes widened, suddenly remembering that your car was in the shop. He wasn’t working on it, so it slipped his mind, “Oh honey, I’m sorry – I didn’t mean to forget. Sal’s working on your car so y’know it just – out of sight, out of mind.” 

He puts the beer on the table and takes your coat from you, pressing a kiss to your forehead. His warm lips sooth your snow soaked face, but the frustration still remains. 

“Why didn’t you just call?” he asks, seeing the furrow on your brow still stuck in place, “I would’ve come to pick you up.”

“I shouldn’t have to remind you,” you grumble, “You’re such an airhead sometimes.” 

“Hey,” his voice isn’t gruff or mad, more hurt than anything, “It was an accident, you don’t have to say shit like that.” 

You take a breath, pushing it out of your lips, mulling over whether the insult was worth it, “Sorry, that was mean. I’m just cold and annoyed.” 

His lips press against your cold cheek this time, “It’s okay. Um, get yourself cozy – I gotta fix the sink in the bathroom.” 

Your face falls, “Oh.” 

His face falls too, “What’s wrong?” 

“I just – I came all the way over here and we’re not even gonna hang out,” you frown. 

“It won’t take me that long, baby. I just have to fix the sink and the cabinet and then I’m done,” he explains while you kick your shoes off. Your eyes roll dramatically when he mentions the cabinet. 

“So first it’s just the sink, then it’s the sink and cabinet. You’ll finish those and go ‘Oh let me work on the leak in the shower, let me WD40 the door’, you always do that. You start a project and then start fifty of them and I just sit here,” you huff. 

He juts his lower lip out in a teasing frown, “Aw, so sorry I wanna make the place habitable, honey.”

When you don’t crack a smile his shoulders fall, “I promise I won’t be long. You can even sit in there with me while I work on it if you want.” 

“You hate when I do that. When I hover,” you say. Eddie smiles, pressing kisses to your cheeks while he pulls you in to hold you close to him. 

“So it must mean I missed you all day today if I want you to hover when I fix the sink, huh?” he jokes. You relent, giving into his kisses, and his warm chest, and the caress of the tendrils of hair falling out of the low bun on his head onto your nose. 

It’s not long before you're sitting on the shut toilet seat and he’s half concealed in the cabinet, t-shirt riding up while he lies on his back. You’re not focusing on what he’s telling you, something about his day or a customer. Something about Dustin and the new one shot they were putting together next week. All you were focused on was the sliver of his belly peeking out of his shirt, begging to be touched. Begging to be squeezed. You slowly get to your knees and sink onto the fuzzy dark green bath mat by his hips, reaching out slowly to graze your fingers over his happy trail. 

“Jesus!” he shouts, body jumping, a loud CLANG! sounding as a result of him dropping whatever tool and part he had in his hands. 

You laugh, “Oh no, I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” 

He shimmies out of the cabinet with a small red cut gleaming on his forehead, “Babe you can’t do that while I’m working. That’s so dangerous.” 

“I got bored, you were looking so cute. How could I resist?” you ask, “Let me look at your head, I’m sorry.” 

You peer at the little cut, it’ll definitely heal in the next day or so, but it’s enough that he’s wincing when you go near it. 

“Don’t be such a baby,” you tut, pressing a kiss just next to it, “Is that better?” 

“Yeah, it’s better,” he smiles, “But please, I’m barely balancing this tubing in my hands – no distractions please.” 

“Fine,” you say sweetly while he lays back under the cabinet. You wait a moment before your hand reaches out again to drag your finger over a clothed rib. 

His body tenses, “I’m not kidding, baby.” 

“I’m sorry,” you laugh, “I’m just fucking with you, I promise. You’re just so cute when you’re mad.” 

You let him continue, back to his original one sided conversation where he starts explaining the Wyvern appearing in the campaign and all the differences between a dragon and a Wyvern. Your eyes glaze over and your hand reaches out for a third time, sliding a finger at the top of his jeans to trace the waistband of his boxers. You hear him huff angrily in the cabinet, face hidden by the door.

“I asked you to stop, baby, please,” he urges again, “I had a long day.” 

You roll your eyes, standing up and slapping on the cold water in the sink before you walk out of the bathroom, “Whatever.” 

He emerges a few moments later, fuming, soaked, brows furrowed – almost teary with frustration. He wanted an apology but he never got one, opting to put you over his knee so you’d learn a lesson that would sting well into the next day – but it was a lesson that wouldn’t quite stick. 

After his show at The Hideout he’d pulled you onto his lap in one of the booths with the rest of the band. They’d rehearsed all week, canceling two date nights at the last minute in lieu of the show – and the practice was worth it. They got the whole crowd jumping this time, even if it was just thirty to forty people. His hand slid over your thigh, back and forth to bring down his speeding adrenaline, the smoothness of your worn jeans soothing him. He talked over you in conversation, leaning forward past your shoulders to interject. You huffed dejectedly, sulking into resting your chin on your hands with your elbows on the table. Tensing when a group of girls came over to join their after show debrief. 

After all the introductions they start talking music, the girls giggling and smiling. You’re not mean, so you indulge in the conversation – but that grating happy, bubbly friendly voice behind you booms over yours, his chest vibrating against your back when he speaks. “So who’s band is it? Who’s the brains of the operation?” one of the girls asks, glossed lips shining in the low light. The boys clamber to answer for each other, all attesting that the band is theirs as a group, no one’s the head, they all make their own decisions – but they’re all talking over each other.

“It’s obviously Jeff, he’s lead guitar,” you piped up, “It’s Gareth and Jeff.” 

“Isn’t Eddie the lead?” one of the girls laughed, her painted nails tinkling against the glass of her beer. 

“You asked who the brains was. Look at this guy, he look brainy to you?” you tease, running a hand through his curls. The table laughs, including Eddie whose cheeks are tinged red, but his grip on your thigh tightens under the booth. Excuse me?

To add insult to injury, you took his half finished beer out of his hand, taking a few sips to finish it  while your empty bottle stood at the center of the table. You felt his chest press up against your back, leaning forward towards one of the girls sitting next to him, “S’cuse me, we’re just gonna go grab another drink.” 

“Sorry!” she says, scooching out of the way while Ed nudges you forward to get out. You know he doesn’t really want another drink, he just wants to be mean to you. You know you’re riling him up in the way that he likes, you’ve been waiting for this all week. 

“You think you’re bein’ cute tonight?” he says to you when his calloused fingers wrap around your forearm, walking you towards the bar, “Last week wasn’t enough? Want me to make it worse this time?” 

“I think I’m being funny,” you shrug, “Everyone else thinks so.” 

“Yeah, you’re real funny,” he rolls his eyes, ordering another beer that you snatch before he can grab it. 

“Not an eye roll, baby,” you smirk while you take a sip of the beer, “You’re so bratty tonight.” 

“You’re one smart comment away from me taking you home,” he warns. You can see from the glint in his eye that he’s still buzzing from the show and there’s only one way for him to get relief from it. It normally ends with you sobbing on his bed, tied up and begging for more of whatever pain he feels like dishing out.

“Ooh, you’re so tough, Ed,” you tease back at him. His jaw clenches while you drink the beer he just bought. He snarls when he gets you home, shoving you into the bedroom, pulling your clothes off while he berates you over and over again. Lips and teeth gnashing, kissing, biting, growling over you while he does it. But you didn’t give in, you couldn’t. His frustration was too delicious. You didn’t cry when he paddled you, you didn’t even make a sound that resembled unhappiness. You just alternated between pouting and smirking, little remarks pouring out of your mouth with your moans. Every burning strike making you jump and keen and purr.  Eventually he gave up, resorting to a long lecture about bratting and boundaries while you both showered and got ready for bed. He counted every eye roll. Seventeen. 

Two days ago, you dropped off some lunch for him at work and normally he’d melt at the gesture, but he knows why you did it. This was the incident that made it clear that all your behavior had been intentional. Still mad about your two previous punishments you showed up in the one dress you’re not allowed to wear to the auto shop. The hem was a hair too short, bending over would put on a whole show to whoever was looking, and boy, were the guys at work looking. The fabric was light and fluttery, one gust of wind would send it up like Marilyn’s. With the right bra, your chest would heave out of it, but even braless it held you in place just right. It was his favorite dress on you – just for him. 

His jaw clenched when he saw you walk in, leaning suggestively over the front desk to ask where he was. The guys snickered and leered at you, elbowing each other to get the other’s attention. You didn’t even bother to wear tights. Everyone would see the leftover welts from a couple nights ago if the wind blew into the shop the wrong way.

Before making eye contact with Ed, you looked back at them and waved, smiling, working the sway of your hips into your walk. Your knee high boots clicked on the smoothed over cement floor while you approached him. He was found leaning up against a car he just finished working on, wiping his greased hands off on a rag, his face unimpressed with you. Now normally, this is whatever, Eddie’s used to you getting attention from guys. But at work it was different because even though they ogled, the minute you left they’d start to shit on him. 

You let your girl walk around like that? Act like that? 

You must be real pussywhipped Munson.

Gotta make her behave when she’s got an ass like that on her.

You never settin’ any ground rules? 

Better put a ring on her finger before I do. 

“C’mere, wanna talk to you for a second,” he said calmly nodding you over to him, slinging the rag over his shoulder. It was unfortunate how fucking hot he looked at work, even more so when he was disappointed. Old t-shirt covered in oil and grease stains, sweat collecting in some spots, clinging to him. His cover all opened and hanging open at his waist, boots shining in the industrial light. 

“Aw, what is it babe? You look so upset,” you mocked him loud enough for everyone to hear, lips in an exaggerated pout, “What’s got you so mad? I wore your favorite dress.” 

“Yeah! Don’t be so pissy, Munson,” his co-worker joked, “She wore your favorite dress.”

Eddie ticked his head over to the back room where the guys took their breaks, implying he wants you to follow him. You click behind him, giggling at the guys comments, joking back with them, tossing little waves their way until Eddie shuts the door behind you. 

He walks slowly over to the coffee pot set up, pouring himself a cup and turning to lean against the counter. He takes a sip, watching you over the edge of the mug. His stare makes you shift uncomfortably, his calmness was sometimes more terrifying than his rage. 

“We’ve had a big talk about this dress, baby.” 

“The weather’s nice,” you said softly, crossing your arms. 

“It’s January,” he deadpans, he takes another sip of coffee, “S’there something you need to talk to me about? You’ve had this lil’ attitude all week. Now you’re bringin’ it to my job? That’s not fair.” “I don’t have an attitude,” your tone is petty and touchy, “You’re just being sensitive.” 

He nods while he puts the mug down, voice still measured, “I really hate taking this mean guy thing into our real life, sweetheart – but you’re really not leaving me any choices. Is gettin’ spanked not enough for you? Am I not gettin’ that ass red enough to teach you a lesson?” 

“You’re not even good at it,” you lie, tossing his lunch on the table in front of you. 

“I’ll remember that,” he says with a smug smile, “Thanks for lunch. I’ll see you when I get home.” 

He approaches you slowly, hand reaching around to grab your ass to pull you in close to him. You whine at the grip over your welts from the other night and he snickers into his goodbye kiss. His stubble grates against your cheeks while he holds you in place to slide his tongue into your mouth, just enough to leave you wanting more. 

“Bye, princess – love you,” he lilts, letting go of you to grab his lunch and sauntering out of the room. 

The caning he administered that night was brutal, but you still didn’t cry. You yelped and whined, you begged him to stop, you called him all his favorite names to get him to go easier on you. He called your safe word after ten minutes – scared that you were too caught up in the challenge of not giving into him that you’d ignore your own safety. After making sure you were okay, he took his pillow and slept on the couch. 

He canceled your date night last night to work on the finishing touches of the one shot campaign he and Dustin had been working on for their monthly group ‘catch up’ at Steve’s. When he picked you up earlier this morning your attitude had nearly tripled in spice. Every word out of your mouth was a quick whip of the tongue. 

“Baby, please,” he begs, “Please just let me have one good day. Can we please have a good day?” 

You don’t reply, hopping out of the van and slamming the door behind you. He gets in front of you before you get to the door, eyes pleading while he leans in for a kiss that you don’t return, “Bub, I don’t know what’s going on, but I’m just – I’m so tired. Can you please just be nice?” 

“What are you talking about?” you ask sweetly, a sliver of sarcasm in your tone, “I’m so nice.” 

He rolls his eyes, “Don’t start.” 

Steve opens the door before you can ring the bell, running a hand through his hair and dropping it into his pocket, “Surprised you didn’t break the window with how hard you slammed the door.” 

“It was the wind,” you lie, “Took it right out of my hands.” 

You brush past him and ignore Eddie’s gentle reach for your hand, heading straight to the dining room to hang out with Robin and Nancy while the ‘kids’ set up their game in the living room. 

“You look beat,” Steve says to Eddie while Ed kicks his shoes off, “You okay?” 

“Something’s been up with her this week,” he huffs, “Longer than a week, even. M’so tired of her attitude, it’s getting out of hand.” 

“Did you talk to her about it?” Steve asks, watching as Ed rifles through his backpack to pull out his binder full of DM documents and his pencil case. 

“I keep trying,” he shrugs, “I’ve given her more than enough chances to talk to me about it. Even playing hasn’t gotten her to open up and normally y’know, once the water works start and she’s had a rough week she’s all out with it. It’s all about that release with us, does that make sense?” 

He sighs while Steve nods along with his rant, “And instead she showed up at my work the other day just to piss me off. Wearing her little dress, showin’ off to all the guys. After we went through the whole trust chat and everything, after the scene – which I had to cut short cause she just didn’t even cry? Wild. After the scene she told me she did it on purpose – as if that wasn’t already clear, but I didn’t need her to confirm it, y’know?”  

He stands up, flipping open the binder and making sure everything is accounted for. Steve chuckles to himself, leading him to the kitchen to grab them both a drink. 

“Don’t laugh at me,” Ed grins down at the paper, “I’m not like you, I just know how to smack her around. You like all that mean girl shit.” 

“It works. You want me to step in while the game’s going?” Steve asks. Eddie takes a breath, hearing your happy laugh bubble out from the dining room. He savors the sound for a moment – the smiliest you’ve sounded in days – and shakes his head no. 

“Nah, it’s not worth it,” he says while he heads out, meeting the group in the living room. 

After a couple of hours they took a break. It was always an all day affair, stopping to catch up with each other, getting lost in conversations. Eddie walked by you in the kitchen, hand plopping itself on your head while you reached into the fridge to get a beer. 

“Hey, I’d prefer you didn’t,” he softly suggests, “You’re just gonna get mean.” 

“I’m not gonna get mean.” You roll your eyes when he gets between you and the fridge. 

“I said no,” he reminds you gently, “Please? I’m not drinking either. You’re already in whatever mood you’ve been forever – getting drunk s’just gonna feed it. Can I get you something else?” 

“You’re being such a fucking buzzkill, you know that?” you snap. Eddie doesn’t react how you expect, no anger flashing in his eyes, no playful frustration. He just looks hurt, nodding curtly before stepping out of your way back into the living room. “Whatever you say, baby,” he shrugs. His shoulders round forward, settling in the couch and watching the conversation bubbling and tittering around him. He tosses you a look through the archway, shaking his head in disappointment. It was clear he wasn’t having fun with this anymore. You jump when the fridge closes and look around to see Steve next to you, alone with you in the kitchen.

“You think ‘cause you’re Eddie’s girl I won’t embarrass you in front of everyone here?” he asks pointedly, “You don’t get to act like that when you’re in my house.” 

“Fuck off, Steve,” you sigh, your eye roll rivaling even his best. 

“You better feel lucky that I didn’t get the okay to put you in your fuckin’ place,” he hissed while the conversation got more lively in the living room.

“Cause if you think for one second I wouldn’t bend you over that coffee table in front of all your friends and show ‘em how I deal with brats like you, you got another thing coming,” he continues. You shrink under his words, frown painting your face while he stares down at you — but that angry attitude, the reminder that Eddie couldn’t even bother to give you a solid warning, woke that mean girl right up.

“You wouldn’t do shit, Harrington,” you mutter, crossing your arms. 

“Yeah? Try me,” he offers. He shakes his head, hands on his hips, “You swear you’re so tough. Your bullshit is tired. He’s bored with you, look at him.” 

You look over and he’s frowning while everyone gets back into position to play but still lost in their conversations. His legs are splayed out in the recliner at the head of the coffee table, slouched down enough that his chin is in his chest. 

“He just looks sad,” you mumble. 

“Whose fault is that?” Steve asks. 

You sulk, “Mine.” 

You huff one final time before going into the living room. He peers up at you when you come up next to the recliner, leaning down to kiss him on the cheek. His eyes close at the feeling of your lips against him, opening them when you break away. He scans the room to make sure no one is paying attention before pulling you in for a chaste kiss, “Kneel.” 

“Ed –” you start, heat running to your cheeks. 

“Kneel at my feet for the rest of the game. Do you understand?” he asks quietly. You nod, kneeling down beside him while he got up to start the campaign where they left off. To everyone else, you were just watching everything play out – to him you were finally obeying. But it could never be that easy – just like the devil, you had to have the last laugh.

When the game was over, Steve and Eddie hauled off to smoke outside, talking quietly with each other – deliberating over something. You took that time to snag a beer from the fridge, confident you could finish it before they made their way back into the kitchen. However, talking with Robin made you less aware – hopping from one subject to the next, both big chatterers you had neglected the beer in your hand so it was only three fourths finished when the sliding doors opened and the boys showed up in the kitchen. 

Eddie doesn’t say anything, continuing his conversation with Steve while he grabs your coat and slides the can gently out of your hand, pouring the remaining contents out in the sink. You put your jacket on while he throws it away, starting his round of goodbyes to the group. 

“Let’s pick up some dinner, hm?” he asks when you both get back in the van, eerily calm, tossing his hair up off of his neck as the heat blasts. 

“Okay,” you say quietly, “You’re not mad? About the beer?” 

“Oh, I’m upset about the beer,” he says with a nod, keeping his eyes on the road, “But I can’t expect you to listen these days. You’re making your own rules, aren’tcha?”

“No, I –” 

He smiles, finally turning to you while he pulls into a drive-thru burger joint, “Don’t worry, baby, you’re gonna be very unhappy with how things go when we get home.” 

The food tastes like ash in your mouth. 

“C’mon, on your knees,” he says casually once he’s done undressing you down to your underwear. The ride home had been silent aside from the radio. You stepped in the trailer and he barely gave you a moment of reprieve before stripping you down in the bedroom. All tired eyes and frustrated grunts while each item of clothing got tossed onto a chair in the corner of the room. You obey his command but your eyes shoot up at him with a furrowed brow when you make it to the ground. He sighs while he puts your collar on, he looks defeated and worn out.

“Hey, wait,” you urge, taking his hand while he finishes clasping the buckle behind your neck. He looks down at you and falters at the look on your face — not playing, not in your role. Serious, concerned. 

“No choking, please,” you ask softly, “Not tonight.” 

He meets you down on the scratchy carpet while continuing to hold your hand, pressing a soft and gentle kiss against your lips.

“Of course not,” he agrees, “No choking.” 

His hands find your face, fingertips brushing against you like you’re made of porcelain, “Do you trust me?” 

He pulls you in for a deeper kiss before you can answer, taking your breath away in the process. Heat bloomed in your cheeks at his attention, the way his eyes glittered when he looked at you like that. Hungry, aching. 

“I trust you,” you whisper between his kisses. You catch his gaze and he looks at you expectantly.

“What’s on your mind, huh?” he asks, “You okay? We can stop, we don’t have to do this. Could always just talk to me about it, you know I’m all ears.” 

“You’re not mad, mad are you?” you asked softly, “Are you really mad at me?” 

“M’not mad at you, sweetheart,” he assures, “Very disappointed, but not mad. Just like teaching you a little lesson. Is that okay?” 

“Yeah, it’s okay,” you smile. He kisses your face, again and again. Reminders of who he really is. 

“At least I’m not Steve,” he laughs, standing back up, “He loves taming brats like you.” 

“I’m not a brat!” you gasp. 

“You sure?” he asks, looking down at you with a hardening demeanor, “No? You’re not?” 

You shake your head ‘no’, he laughs at you pitifully, “Coulda fooled me.” 

“Remember what I said to you?” he asks, going into the closet. His voice is muffled while he’s in there, “You’re going to be very unhappy with how I treat you tonight.” 

He emerges and your furrowed brows soften into sadness, eyes rounding into pleading when you see what he has in his hand, “No, sir, please…” 

“Pets don’t talk, baby,” he says gently while he clips a chain link leash to your collar. 

“But I don’t…I don’t want to,” you whine, tugging at the chain in his hand. He looks down at you without remorse, petting the top of your head.

“This is how you learn to behave,” he says, “Nothing else is working, so I have to punish you with something you don’t like.” 

“But…” tears pooled in your eyes as he took a few steps forward and tugged on the leash for you to follow. You frowned, crawling on all fours to follow him to the kitchenette. He tugged twice when he wanted you to stop. 

“Sit,” he mutters down to you, catching your eyes while he walks over to the cabinets above the sink, “Stay.” 

You huff, sitting back on your heels while he rummages through the cabinets, finally reaching in and coming out with a tall yellow Tupperware. He opens the top and looks into it, frowning, and then looking at you.

“I hate to waste food but you need this,” he says softly, walking over to stand in front of the sink. Next to him, he lays down a line of white rice by his feet. 

“Eddie, please,” you whined, “I’ll be good, I promise.” 

His head whips towards you, “What did I say?” 

“Pets don’t talk,” you whimper back. 

“Want me to beat that into you?” he hisses, reaching for his belt.

“No sir, I’m sorry.” 

He stands at attention, looking down at you, “Come.” 

You start to crawl forward but he stops you, “You’re gonna let your leash drag on the floor like that? You know better.” 

You shake your head no, reaching for the leather handle and putting it between your teeth before starting your slow journey next to him. You hesitate when you get to the rice. He very rarely goes back to these kinds of basics because he knows you don’t like them, you’d much rather be spanked. He reaches down to grab your leash and gives it a sharp tug, pulling you forward.

“Don’t make me warn you again,” his voice is stern and you inch forward, knees settling on the rice slowly. You start to whimper quietly to yourself, the sting is immediate. 

“Eyes up at me,” he instructs, fingers under your chin tilt your head up toward him, “You’re gonna kneel here while I get these dishes done.” 

“That’s stupid,” you whine while he wraps part of the leash around his hand so there’s little slack for you to move anywhere. The backhand he deals you at the sound of your voice is shattering, your thighs tighten at the feeling, lips parting in a low moan.

“Open your mouth again, see what happens,” he growls, “My number one rule when we play, for years, is only speak when you’re spoken to.”

 You grit your teeth, putting your face back to center and tilting up to look him in the eyes. 

“Shouldn’t expect a brainless pet like you to take orders though – that’s why we gotta train you.” 

You shift uncomfortably on the rice, trying to relieve the pain one knee at a time but it only makes you gasp as the pain increases. 

“You gonna cry?” He asks. You shake your head no despite the burn you feel in your nose and the rattle in your chest. Your knees sting with the bite of the rice, whimpering when he starts the dishes. He casts a few looks down at you while you stay looking up at him. 

“We’re gonna keep at this until you break, you understand?” he asks, you nod. It doesn’t take him long to do the dishes, you squirm when he looks down at you down the slope of his nose. 

“Stay,” he commands, walking out of the kitchen to the bathroom to get something, then back to the bedroom. You wait for him on screaming knees to return but he doesn’t. You hear the shift of weight on the couch, the creak of the springs in the cushions, the stomp of his boots as he spreads his legs wide. He whistles. 

“Come here, baby,” he calls out to you cooly. You hear the flick of a lighter and start your short journey to the living room. 

“Do I hear that leash dragging on the floor?” he asks with a warning edge. You let out an annoyed groan, pulling slowly at the chain link while it skitters across the tile. You put the leather back between your teeth, gingerly making your way over to him again. 

“Let’s check out those knees before I keep you on them even longer,” he mutters, cigarette burning between his lips. He waves his hand at you, encouraging you to stand.

“C’mere, pretty,” he says sweetly, the mask coming off briefly to wipe off the stray grains that stuck to your skin. It was certainly irritated, but there wasn’t any blood, no damage that would last overnight. Less frequent types of punishment, non-impact play, sometimes made him nervous — not as confident in the outcomes.

“It’s okay?” he asks, looking up at you. His calloused hand finds yours, a soft check in, a gentle touch. 

“It’s okay,” you nod while he presses a kiss to your fingertips, putting your hand back by your thigh when he’s done. He lazily places the cigarette on the ashtray sitting on the arm of the couch to settle. 

“You know where you belong, pet,” he says, voice dropping register again. The clink of his belt coming undone makes your hips twitch, the slow drag of the zipper of his jeans. He lifts his shirt up before he pulls it out, tattoos smattering dark against his pale skin. 

He leans back on the couch while you kneel between his legs with your tongue out, flattened against your chin. His cock makes you drool, spit pooling at the sides of your mouth while he lets his fingers drag over the underside, pink leaking tip peeking out from his foreskin. 

When he lifts it up off his stomach you audibly gasp at how wet the top is, hips shifting on your legs for friction. He leans it towards you teasingly and you eagerly lean forward to let your tongue stripe over it but you’re met with a hard crack to the face instead.

“Very bad,” he admonishes, “You’re such a bad girl.” 

He starts with slow strokes, soft little gasps puffing out of his mouth when he runs over the more sensitive spots. Your mouth waters despite the sting on your cheek, “Guess I gotta keep training you, huh baby? That’s too bad, was gonna let you suck it if you could behave first.” 

You let out a frustrated huff and he likes it.

“Let’s keep that mouth busy since I can’t trust you not to act on your impulses,” he says, his voice dripping with mocking disappointment, “You’ve been doing that a lot, lately.” 

He reaches into his back pocket and it’s clear now, what he got from the bathroom. The bar of Pears soap glowed amber in the side table lamp light when he unwrapped it. 

“Y’know, I forgot about this trick,” he says with a smile, like you’re having a casual conversation. You gulp at the sight of it, leaning back with your mouth shut.

“Steve reminded me today, when we were out having a smoke,” he continues, eyes and smile wolffish while he leans forward toward you. 

“You hated it last time,” he shrugs, “But you didn’t run that pretty mouth for a while. So it must’ve stuck, huh? Open your mouth.” 

You hesitate a moment too long and his patience runs out before the buzzer to obey goes off in your brain. His fingers work between your lips, pressing at the hinge of your jaw like you’re a dog who has a piece of plastic in their mouth. You sputter over his fingers, head turning and twisting to keep him from getting a hold on you but your efforts were useless. The bar slid half way into your mouth, wedged between your teeth. You knew better than to raise your hands and fight him, he’d cuff you before you could protest – better off not seeing how bad he could go tonight. 

“Much better. Y’look so pathetic with your mouth full,” he teases, “Really suits you.” 

“Since I have to do this myself now, who should I think about, sweetheart?” he asks you, your heart sinks. He lets his eyes flutter closed when he squeezes gently around the base, a dark laugh bubbling out from his chest.

“Should I think about Chrissy from the diner?” he asks, heavy lidded eyes staring at you, his breath hitches. He pumps in slow strokes, taking his time, “Think about her pretty blonde hair and her pretty blue eyes?” 

You whine, swallowing thickly while slimy suds start to leak out of your mouth, he smirks.

“Mmm, bet she’s a really good girl,” he moans, “Bet she’d never talk back to me.” 

Tears start to well in your eyes and he has the audacity to fucking smile. The bitter bubbles gather on your tongue as your salivary glands work to push the taste out, but there’s no point with the bar pressed deep into your mouth.

“You know I love a nice girl like that, baby,” he coos, pace quickening while he fucks into his fist, “Probably loves getting stuffed full. You think so?” 

His eyes open fully and he grips your hair at the scalp with his free hand, “You think so?” 

You nod, face burning with embarrassed and frustrated heat. 

“God, watching her pretty tits bounce when she’s on top of me? Fuck. Bet she’s so fuckin’ tight,” he breathes while he teases the tip with his thumb, brows knitting in focus and pleasure, “So fucking sweet, too. Not a brat like you, baby.” 

He leans his head back while he feels himself get close, edging himself – slowing down and speeding up. And then he hears it, your broken, sad, choked sob. The sound of the Pears bar dropping onto the carpet. His head perks up, and there you are, crying on your knees in front of him, wiping at your eyes.  “My poor baby, there you are,” he coos, tucking himself into the waistband of his underwear, “Finally got you cryin’. You don’t like that? When your master thinks about someone else?” 

 “No sir, I don’t like it,” you answer through blubbering and spitting up suds. He tuts, leaning forward, letting a thumb drag over a tear on your cheek. 

“I’ll be good, please don’t think about someone else,” you cry up at him.

“You’ll be good? Yeah? You’re a good girl?” he asks, sentences peaking up at the end like you’re a dog. You nod pitifully. “You see a good girl in here?” he questions, “Is there a good girl in the room with us right now?”

“Stop,” you huff, wiping your eyes again.  “Now that I finally got you crying I can really go to work, huh?” he smirks, “Think getting belted will put you in your place?” 

You nod while he pulls up his pants, “Let’s get that mouth rinsed out first.” 

He keeps up with ‘walking you’ to the bathroom, now a mess of tears and a soap slicked mouth. Shuddering and stuttering while you get cup of water after cup of water to spit out until the water runs clear. You still don’t settle, all the feelings of the week and some change of aggravation and anger surging and pulsing through you all at once. 

“You wanna tell me what’s got you acting like such a cunt this week?” he asks while you get situated on your knees on the mattress in the bedroom. Foolishly, you thought he might soften up when you started to cry – but now it’s clear he’s just getting started. 

“You just weren’t paying enough atten-attention to me,” you confess, quietly. He gapes at you, anger and disbelief flashing behind his eyes.  “All this ‘cause you weren’t gettin’ enough attention?” he hisses, “When’d you get so weak, huh?” 

“You kept w-working late, and ditching me f-for Steve, and D-dustin, and the band,” you whined. 

“Cry all you want,” he says with a straight mouth, “This is so disappointing, baby. Thought you were tougher than that. Gotta get you correct, don’t I?” 

“You kept c-cancelling, so I thought –” you continue.

“Hey!” he barks, startling you to look up at him, “I asked you a question.” 

“Yes, you have t-to correct me, sir,” you nod, “I need it.” 

“You need it?” he mocks back, “Get in position for me.” 

You oblige, bent over on the bed while he goes to get the belt that hangs next to the front door. You hear it clink with every stomp of his boots back down the hall, your thighs twitch with anticipation of him taking his anger out on you – much more pliable this time, much more reactive, no longer trying to stop yourself from feeling it.

“Attention, huh?” he repeats when he comes back in, “Well you got it, whore. I’ll pay attention to you all night.” 

“Thank you, sir,” you breathe. You hear him open the top drawer of his dresser, the sound of plastic, zippers. 

“Maybe we can invite Steve over to help,” he suggests, “Does that sound good? A little extra hand to make the lesson sink in.” 

“Do you wanna share me, sir?” you ask while he reaches over you to press each wrist to the outside of your thighs, wrapping each of them together in thin rope he picked up at the hardware store. A shopping trip you are certain had the owner looking at you both with a cocked brow as you both left blushing.

“Something fun about watching someone use my toys,” he says playfully. The makeshift spreader bar finds its way between your legs, clicked into soft cuffs around your ankles. A vision, bent over and spread out for him. Eddie’s not an awful man, so he offers the courtesy of tucking a pillow or two under your torso to keep you raised and balanced, pressing a kiss to the middle of your back. 

“M’gonna really fuck with you tonight,” he threatens softly against your skin, “How do you feel about that?” 

“Orange,” you say back. Orange, the coolest flame. The okay. 

“And Steve?” he asks, fingers grazing your inner thighs. 

“Orange,” you reply, pussy clenching at the thought of being beaten by both of them. 

“Mmm, that’s a good girl,” he rasps low, “Really good girl.” 

“When’s the last time I made you cum, pet?” he moves away from you again and you whine, the ache of your cry still sitting in your throat to be reactivated. 

“Last week after your sh-show,” you answer obediently. 

“So mean of me, huh? To keep you so needy,” he says, and that’s when you feel it. The handle of the wand being pressed against your inner thigh, the low buzz as he turns it on. You gasp while he adjusts it, feeling it press up against you before he secures it there, hips already searching for more pleasure as he turns it up higher. 

“Let me make it up to you,” the way he says it, you know he has that devilish look pulling across his smile. The metallic flick of his switchblade sounds and your panties are the first to face its wrath, pulled away with ease once the right slices were made. He follows up with the straps of your bra and you want to protest but you know he’ll buy you a new one before the day ends tomorrow – he’s always ruining your shit and buying you more, his mouth running apologies as he does.

“S’that feel good?” he asks. 

“Yes, sir,” you whisper, eyes already rolling at the orgasm building in your lower belly. 

“What do you say?” his voice is expectant. 

“Thank you, sir,” you rasp out. 

“You tell me every time you cum, okay?” he instructs. You nod, losing yourself in the feeling of being restrained and used. Your eyes flutter closed while you succumb to the vibrations between your legs and the sound of his voice, the stomp of his boots. A soft gasp pushes out of your chest, hips pressing down on the head of the toy for more friction. 

CRACK! 

The belt is unforgiving against the fat of your ass and your gasp quickly falls into a loud wail, the cry in your chest pushing to your throat. 

“Okay?” he repeats. 

“Y-yes sir, I’ll tell you every time,” you hurry out, feeling the coil in between your legs get tighter immediately at the sting of the belt. 

“Sir?” you ask quietly, “Hit me again, please.” 

“Yeah?” you shivered at the low gravel of his voice. You hear him rev up, then the leather whooshing through the air to land in a hard ‘thwap!’ across your behind. You whine at the hit, hands balled into fists at the pain – but god was it good. It was so good. 

“I have to make a quick phone call,” he mutters, “Keep track for me.” 

He returns some minutes later, leaning over the mattress to look at you, “Look at you, what a fucking slut. You like this?” 

You nod pitifully and he rolls his eyes, your hips twitch at the sight. 

“You cum yet?” he sounds so bored when he asks you think you might cum again instantly. 

“Twice, sir,” you confess. 

“Twice?” he repeats, “Must not be enough – so quiet.” 

You feel the tip of something drag against the flesh of your thigh while Eddie draws two short vertical parallel lines, “Just using up your eyeliner to keep track.” 

“But thats –”  His hand cracks down on your fresh welt before you can continue, “I’ll buy you a new one tomorrow. Get you a new lipstick, too. So shut up.”

“Yes, sir,” you rasp out. 

“Let’s get you nice and loud for me,” he mumbles, reaching between your thighs to turn up the toy's speed. 

“Oh, fuck! Oh my god,” you cry out, “Oh, shitshitshitshit.”

His giggle is grotesque when you feel the slide of your lipstick on your skin; your back, your ass, your calves. the waxy scent wafts through the air with the smell of your arousal, “Steve’s right, writing all over you is really fun. Wanna see what you look like, whore?” 

“Y-yes, sir,” you obey, hips stuttering while a third orgasm runs over you, “Three! Fuck, three.” 

Another vertical line is sketched on your thigh with the other two. The sound of his Polaroid goes off when he’s done with his handy work, leaving the picture next to you to fade into view. 

“H-hope you spelled everything right,” you tease, knowing exactly where it’ll get you, “Know how hard that is for you, ‘86.” 

He growls, a stinging dig he didn’t deserve, but you remember the ache of each canceled date. Every ‘I’ll make it up to you.’ Him mentioning Chrissy while he jerked off when you always suspected he’d secretly been checking her out when you went for lunch there. 

“Well that wasn’t very nice.” 

You groan at the blend of the crack of the belt on your ass and the sound of Steve’s disappointed voice. 

“Four, fuck, four,” you cry while your thighs shake — another line added to your collection. 

“Looks like your training isn’t done, peach,” Steve says sweetly, “You’re still being such a little bitch.” 

You hear him fall in line with Eddie, his ringed hand pulling at your hair to lift you up, “Say hi to Steve, sweetheart.”

“H-hi Mr. Harrington,” you rasp out before he drops your head back down on the pillow.

“Hi, angel,” his voice was low and syrupy, “So respectful.” 

“Heard he’s been real mean to you, peach,” he announces, and you can feel his hand skate over the hot skin of your ass where the belt has met you more than once tonight, “Making you be his pet, kneeling on rice, he’s so mean isn’t he?” 

“Yes, sir,” you reply breathily as the buzz of the vibrator turns up higher.

“I have to be mean, too,” he says softly, hand cracking down hard on your ass in a sweeping smack, “Remember what you said to me earlier?” 

“No, sir,” you whimper, the cry caught in your throat finally aching back out. Tears rapidly stain your face as you see Eddie come into view at the end of the bed.

“Why don’t you try a little harder?” Eddie bites, a short smack with his fingers bouncing off your cheek, “Use your brain.” 

“I said you — shit, five, FIVE, oh my god five — please turn it off Ed, please,” you whine, hips jumping to escape the vibrations, your clit beginning to ache. A wave of concern washes over his features at the sound of his name and not ‘sir’.

“What did you say to Steve earlier? Tell me and I’ll consider it,” he says, eyes scanning you hurriedly to check your face for signs of discomfort beyond what you could normally handle. You huff and cry, too overstimulated to answer him.  

“Don’t make me ask you again,” he warns, hand snaking back into your hair.

“I said he wouldn’t do shit,” you grit out, whimpering out a broken, “Six.” 

“You can turn the toy off, Harrington,” he says gruffly. Two more lines are marked on your thigh, you shiver when Steve traces them after he turns the toy off.

“Nice collection,” he says, cocking his head over to Eddie’s implements laid out on the dresser. You hear him rifle through his options, Eddie’s quiet instructions while they look together, ‘Too much, she’ll tap out,’ ‘She can only do a few with those,’ ‘You’re not experienced enough for that, you’re not here to practice on my girl.’ Warmth pools in your belly and soothes you despite the stinging on your skin and the bruised ache between your legs. They decide on the belt, it’s Steve’s favorite and yours, and you’re silently happy he joined in because Eddie absolutely would’ve caned you otherwise. 

“You have a nice break?” Eddie asks, he appears at the end of the mattress again – torso in your vision. You nod, feeling a wet spot under your cheek from drooling. 

He tuts, wiping some of it away, muttering, “You fucking dog,” under his breath.

“I’m not gonna do shit? That’s what you said, right?” Steve asks, you moan in frustration when the toy starts up again between your legs – setting turned up high. 

“Yes, Mr. Harrington,” you stutter out. The last syllable leaves your lips and Eddie’s belt meets you across the thighs with a speed and precision you’ve never felt before. The sound that comes out of you is desperate and aching, barely coming down from the sting when the second comes down hard the side of your ass. 

“Didn’t think this one through, did ya, peach?” he asks, a grunt and flounce of his hair adding power to the next one. 

“No, sir. I’m s-sorry,” you cry, shoulders shuddering when he follows through with two more. The vibrations of the toy and his rough smacks of the belt blend together again and you gush between your thighs with a high whine.  “S-seven,” you whimper. 

“What a slut,” Eddie mutters while he adds another line to your orgasm tally, “Gettin’ beat makes you cum?” 

“Yes, sir,” you nod feverishly, easing your hips back down lightly over the vibrator wand. He slides the belt he’s wearing out of his belt loops and wraps it firmly around his knuckles. You look up at him petulantly with wet, glassy eyes. Another strike of pain hits your backside as Steve whips the belt against you again.

“What?” Eddie asks, eyebrows raised, “You got somethin’a say?” 

“No, sir,” you raspily whisper. 

“Good,” he smiles, “Cause pets don’t talk, do they?” 

“No, sir,” you admit with a nod, yelping when the leather strikes your thighs. 

“You’re gonna cum ten times, baby,” he explains, “I’m gonna help you get there.” 

“Since getting whupped makes you cum so much,” he teases before both of them bring their belts down simultaneously. The release of crying is more euphoric than the orgasms, settling into the burn of each rise and fall of their arms, each crack of their belts and slap of their hands raining down on you.

“Ow, fuck that hurts so fucking good,” you wail, “Please more, please.” 

“You dirty fucking bitch,” Steve glowers, “You learning anything?” 

“Yes, sir – AH! EIGHT – EIGHT!” you scream, the choked sob in your chest wracking through you into a full on meltdown. They both drop their belts, Steve approaching you again with both hands gripping your hot, welted skin hard. You squirm under his touch while his hand barrels down on you again, the other turning off the toy. 

“You know something, peach,” he says, finger softly tracing whatever Eddie wrote on your back, “I think you act like a bitch ‘cause you wanna be fucked like one.” 

You squeal out a noise while he kneads the burning fat of your hips and thighs, spreading you open, “Does that sound right?” 

“Yes, Mr. Harrington,” you say between big breaths, trying to steady your sobs. You relax into the relief of the toy being turned off, shivering at the feeling of his finger going back to trace the words on your back. 

“Says here you’re an anal slut,” he smirks, “You like getting fucked in the ass?” 

“She loves getting fucked in the ass,” Eddie answers for you, a whiff of his cologne and cigarette smoke wafts through the room while you feel him detach the spreader bar from between your legs. 

“So how about I fuck you like that? Think that’ll drive it home?” 

You nod while Eddie uses his switchblade to cut open the rope on your wrists and thighs, your hands falling down towards the mattress limply. You lift one of them to push yourself up but Eddie catches your arm.

“Stay,” Eddie says sternly, “You didn’t answer his question.” 

“Yes, Mr. Harrington,” your voice sounds moody and petty. 

“Is that what you want?” Eddie asks, brows raised again. You can tell he wants your extra reassurance since this was newer territory. He didn’t share you very often, and not normally with someone so close to home. 

“Yes, sir,” you nod, he squeezes your arm twice in silent communication. A gentle reminder. A silent ‘I love you’. 

“Get her on her back, Harrington,” he smiles, “That’s how she likes it best.” 

Steve, though still stern, takes his time working you up to it – teasing your clit with his thumb until wetness pools out of you down to your ass. 

“You like it slow like this? Like getting stretched out?” he asks, “You’re not my toy, so I don’t wanna break you.” 

“Mmm,” is all you can reply as one of his fingers pumps slowly in and out of your tight hole, your hips moving in time. Your head lolls back over the end of the mattress where Eddie’s stood over you, the mix of his musk and body wash filling your nose while his balls sit over your mouth. 

“Oh, you can break her, Harrington,” Eddie nods, “Put some miles on her.”

Eddie pops open a bottle of lube and tosses it to Steve, “Two squirts is normally enough to get the second finger in, she’ll loosen up good after that.” 

Your thighs twitch while you hear your boyfriend’s low gravelly voice instruct someone on how to fuck you. How your body reacts, what your body wants. Like he’s always been studying you this whole time. You preen into his touch when his ringed hand slides town your torso to move Steve’s thumb away from your clit. 

“You like getting used, angel?” Steve asks, easing a second finger in slowly. You groan at the stretch, legs shaking when the pads of Eddie’s fingers swirl over your clit at the speed and pressure you like the most. “Mhmm,” you muffle out, hand reaching out to grab Eddie’s thigh, nails digging into his skin while you continue to drool onto his sac. He hisses at the bite of the assault, “Hands to yourself.” 

You whine when he takes his hand away, offering three short slaps to your clit with his fingers. 

“Nine,” you gasp out, hips jolting at the pleasure from the pain and the fullness of Steve’s fingers pumping in and out of you. You lay there like that for a bit, eyes fluttering closed while Eddie guides his cock into your mouth, slowly pushing in and out while his hand cups your face. 

“Think you’re ready for something bigger, peach,” Steve says softly, pushing your thighs up to press against your chest. You instinctively hold them up, never having to be told where and when to be helpful in providing access to you. You feel the blunt head of his cock push forward and you suck in a breath through your nose while Eddie’s length slides against your tongue. His thumb smoothes over your jaw bone. 

“You can take it,” he encourages, his hand moving downward to grab one of your breasts. A quiet groan bubbles out of his chest when Steve pushes himself in to the hilt, making you moan over his cock. 

“So tight, shit,” Steve grunts, a soft sheen of sweat forming on his forehead while his body finds balance on the mattress to begin thrusting. And thrust he does, not caring about your pleasure – only his. Eddie doesn’t mind though, he knows that part of what gets you off is the total disregard for you, that delicious taste of degradation and humiliation that comes with being used. 

“She’s good, isn’t she Harrington?” Eddie asks, hips moving a little faster while he fucks your mouth. Your eyes roll behind closed eyelids as the sensation of one of them pushing in and the other pulling out rocks you against the mattress. 

“Fucking Christ,” Steve gasps, “Yeah, shit – better keep her on a fuckin’ tight leash.” 

Steve runs a hand through his hair before both of them find a solid grip on your waist, drilling into you. You jump with each slam of his hips while your skin smacks together, waking up the buzzing sting of the welts they both left behind. You let yourself be used, moaning muffled by Eddie’s girth, pussy pulsing over nothing while they took turns teasing your clit and chest. Rough grabs turning into soft, feathery touches. Leather and lace, push and pull, back and forth.

“Gettin’ close, baby,” Eddie grumbles, the snap of his hips starting to stutter when he pulls out of your mouth. You obediently keep your mouth open and he laughs at you, tapping your chin closed. 

“No, you don’t get to swallow my cum,” he taunts, “You didn’t earn that.” 

You watch him fuck his fist, eyes burning with lust while he watches Steve pull you closer to him on the bed, your face finally staring up at him. You can smell the spice of his cologne, see the fire in his light brown eyes, his furrowed brow while he rapidly reaches his orgasm. Each thrust gets more punishing while he berates you into the mattress. 

“You take it so good, you fucking slut,” he hisses, “He trained you real fuckin’ good.” 

He leans over you, one hand supporting him, the other creeping up the front of your neck. You’re too fucked out to notice Eddie grab his wrist before Steve can put any pressure on your airways. Offering him a quiet ‘not tonight,’ with a shake of his head, curls bouncing next to him. Steve nods, not skipping a moment to use the same hand to smack you hard across the face – your back arches immediately. 

“Ten, oh my god, ten,” you cry out while your final orgasm rips through you, gushing down between your legs over Steve’s cock. Relieved and satisfied, the tears start to pour out of you again. Aftershocks of your orgasm making you writhe and whine, cry and shake. 

Suddenly, you feel Eddie’s cum shoot in hot spurts over your face. You sputter, eyes shut tight, face contorting while he purrs a low, “You want some more?” 

You whimper, letting out a pathetic ‘mhm’ with a nod in order to keep your mouth shut. You feel Steve’s knees walk over you, the ‘schlick, schlick, schlick’ of him fucking himself over you, using your cum for friction. 

“Say please, baby,” Steve coos over you. 

“Please, sir, please,” you beg, warm briny spend leaking into your mouth at the words. You catch the hitch in his breath before his own thick ropes of cum land on your face. You hear his ragged breathing, feel the shift of his weight while he leans over your body before getting off the bed. 

“Fuck, heh, she’s – damn – she’s good, man,” Steve laughs. Eddie laughs with him, ringed hand coming down to smear their cum into your face before cracking his palm against your cheek from above you. 

“As usual, rode hard and put away wet,” his tone is bored and it makes you shiver again, “Go hit the showers, Harrington.” 

You hear him step out and the bathroom door shut partway down the hall, the air stills now that it’s just you and Eddie. You let out a long, contented, shuddering sigh; too tired to cry, too tired to do much of anything. In the fog, he says ‘I’ll be right back,’ to you, and you aren’t sure how much time has passed between his leaving the room and his arrival. 

“Hey baby,” he croons, “You with me?” 

“Mhm,” you mumble. You feel the warmth of a wet washcloth smooth over your face, taking gentle care over your eyes and lips. “Can you open your eyes for me?” he asks, pushing your hair away from your damp forehead. Your eyes open halfway, looking at him through bleary vision – he’s handsome just the same. 

“Hi there,” he grins. 

“Hi,” you croak out. 

“Why don’t you rest a little?” He suggests, pressing a kiss to your cleaned off cheek, “I’ll be right here.” 

You barely register the last syllable of his sentence, exhaustion taking over before you can even agree to the sentiment. 

You wake up slowly, eyes blinking open to the dull flicker of the collection of drippy pillar candles on Eddie’s dresser and the glow of his bedside lamp. He sat up against the wall beside you, book in hand, something new he picked up from a friend at the garage. You lazily reach over and put your hand on his knee, groaning a little at the stretch in your skin where him and Steve had left their marks. 

“There you are,” he smiles, peering over his book, “You have a good rest?” 

You nod, rubbing the sleep from your eyes, “How long was I out?” 

“Couple of hours,” he said, starting to giggle, “You slept like a log. Just – out cold. I thought you died.”

You peer around the room and see that it’s been straightened up, the heats on. You’ve been covered up in blankets – water and aspirin already set up next to you. 

“Where’s Steve?” you ask, wincing while you sit up in bed, reaching for the pills to down them. 

“He went home,” he says, dog earring the page and setting it down at the end of the bed, “But he told me to tell you he owes you a night out.” 

“Ugh, a night out with Harrington – can’t wait,” you roll your eyes, sipping your water. 

“I told him you’d rather chew glass,” he laughs, the laugh fades to a look of fondness, “Hey.” 

“Hey.” 

“Was that good? Was that okay with you?” he asks, scooting closer to pull one of your hands between his. His fingers toy with your absent mindedly while he waits for your answer. 

“Yes, baby, it was okay,” you smile, chuckling at the dichotomy of his dominant persona and who he is after. 

“Just okay? Are you alright? Did you like it?” His questions are feverish and you can tell he feels guilty, teetering on getting too in his head. 

“Ed, honey –” you start, offering him a kind look that makes his shoulders relax, “I loved it. I love when we play. Adding Steve was really fun.” 

“You don’t want him, like, every time, right?” he asks. 

You pull a face, “No, ew. That’s like, a punch card kind of thing. Every five fucks he gets to join or something.” 

You both laugh in the low light of the room and he leans his head against the wall, looking at you through the slits of his eye lids, “I love you – I’m sorry it felt like I wasn’t connecting with you lately.” 

“It’s okay,” you nod, “I should’ve said something. I just, I don’t know – hate seeming like I’m being needy when I’m sad that you canceled a date. Like, we’re adults.” 

“It’s okay to be disappointed about it,” he shrugs, “I would be, too. S’not gonna hurt my feelings or start a fight if you’re just like ‘Hey, you’re bumming me out – let’s fix it’. I wanna fix these things – this is the long haul, baby. You’re not getting away from me any time soon.” 

“Um – but can I be honest about something?” you ask, nerves creeping into your chest. 

“Yeah, what’s up?” 

“Um, please don’t talk about Chrissy like – ever again.” 

His shoulders deflate, “Baby…I wish you told me, you should’ve–” 

“I know, I know, I should’ve said something when it was happening but I just. I froze?” you try to explain, “I didn’t like that.” 

“I’m so sorry,” he pleads, and you know he really means it, “You know I would never. I don’t really want her like that. I was just trying something new. I never want you to feel like there’s someone else.” 

You nod with a tight smile, “I just like – that’s why I’m scared to complain. Cause what if you wanna be with someone who will just like – brainlessly do whatever you want and not care?” 

He tries to fight a smile but he can’t help it, “Well, babe, I mean…you already sort of brainlessly do whatever I want.”

“Oh, fuck off,” you tease, swatting at him. He catches your hand and brings it to his lips to kiss the back of it. 

“You can complain every day for the rest of your life,” he says simply, “And I’’ll feel lucky to be the guy you’re complaining to.” 

“So, why don’t we get you in the shower,” he starts, voice soft and smokey, “I’ll clean you off.” He presses a slow kiss to your cheek, crawling over you. 

“Get you all relaxed,” he says, before tilting your head up to take your lips in his. It’s loaded with desire, not a peck, but a hungry mouth on yours, “Patch you up a little.”  

“I already started dinner.” 

Kiss. “Your favorite.” Kiss. 

“We can eat.” Kiss.

“We’ll have dessert.” 

Kiss. 

“Your favorite, again.” 

Kiss. “And you can have –”

Kiss. 

“All of my attention –” 

Kiss. 

“For the rest of the night.” 

His big brown eyes linger on yours when he breaks away from his final kiss, lost in looking at you. 

“You okay?” you ask. 

“Yeah, I just – damnit –” he sucks his teeth, “I made myself hard again.”  You giggle at his frustration, leaning forward until your noses press against eachother.

“We can take care of that,” you start – 

Kiss. 

“In the shower.” 

Snow in Indiana

Eddie Munson x Reader

5.7k words

Eddie has spent the past decade thinking about the pen pal he lost touch with, but fate has a funny way of bringing people back together when they need it most

Warnings: family death (unedited bc it is 3am and I have been working on this for hours)

“Dear Eddie, 

Does it Snow in Indiana?” 

He had read the beginning of the note hundreds of times by now. He had memorized how each individual letter had been written and slightly smudged. He knew the entire contents of the letter by heart, but that never stopped him from coming back to it from time to time. 

“My grandma hasn’t told me much about Hawkins, just that it’s just like home. Except it’s on the other side of the country. Grandma likes the snow, so I hope you say yes.” 

Something about the innocent nature of your writing calmed him down when things got rough. He had received the note in the middle of August at the beginning of 6th grade. Your grandmother had just moved across the country, and she just so happened to be the Librarian at Eddie’s new middle school. She had told both of you that the other could use a friend, even if you were thousands of miles apart. She also insisted that being pen pals would improve both of your lackluster reading and writing skills. She meant well. 

“Can I tell you the truth? I didn’t want to write you a letter when grandma called and told me I should. My teachers say I’m not good at writing anyway. But Grandma also said maybe you and I could be friends. And I think I would like that.” 

Some of your words had been crossed out with pen, either from misspellings or second thoughts on phrasing. Eddie had stared at the paper for so long that he even knew what was underneath those scribbles. 

When the snow started coming down each winter, it was hard for him to not want to keep the letter on him at all times. The opening line of your first letter to him always floated into his head with the first snowflakes. 

He had written you back to assure you that it does snow in Indiana, that he too had troubles with pleasing his teachers with his school work, and of course, that he too would like to be friends. 

That was over 10 years ago now. He had never met you, never heard your voice, never learned what you looked like (besides the poorly drawn picture you had included for him one time) but you had been a part of him for his middle school years. 

The letters started slowing down in the 8th grade. You had told him you were nervous for high school, that you’d heard that kids were meaner there. The last letter he had sent you was in the summer before both of your freshman years. He hated that he couldn’t remember what he had said, what his last words to you were. All he knew was that he wished you luck for your first day. 

Then the letters stopped completely. After months of checking mailboxes impatiently, he got the hint and gave up. 

At the age of 24, he wishes he sent another letter. He wishes he got some closure on why you stopped writing. He had always wondered if it had been something he had said, or maybe you had just found new friends in high school and decided you didn’t need him anymore. 

He was embarrassed to admit that it was his first heartbreak. So he refused to admit it even happened to anyone he knew now. 

He tucked the old letter in his pocket as another patron entered the diner. He had picked up a second job as the night cook in hopes of saving up enough to to move out of the trailer with Wayne. It had been months of helping Wayne with bills now, and he was just barely starting to see the hard work pay off in his savings account. 

He peeked out the pass through window to get a glimpse of the first customer they’d had in the last hour and a half. The snow had been coming down hard, and it was preventing the already few people who would be coming in to the diner at this hour from showing up. He wasn’t surprised to see the young woman, somewhere around his age, follow the waitress quickly to the booth in the corner and sit down. He was, however, surprised to see no new car in the small lot outside. He hadn’t seen headlights arrive or depart to drop her off. The snow that has accumulated on her hair, even thought it has been covered with a hood, was making him think she had walked a distance to get here. If the counter hadn’t been blocking his view, he would have seen the bottom of her pants completely soaked through from the snow piled outside to confirm his suspicion. 

“Can you start on a stack of pancakes, Ed?”

He nodded at the waitress, Judy, who wasn’t usually one to whisper like she was now. She rushed off to the phone in the back office, which did nothing but pique the interest in Eddie’s under stimulated brain. 

Curiosity got the best of him, so he made his way out of the kitchen quickly, grabbed a mug from the counter and the full coffee pot, and made his way over the girl in the corner. 

You had been staring out the window, and Eddie recognized the look as he approached. You were doing your best to hold yourself together. He was used to this kind of customer at this time of night. People who really needed the company, who had nowhere else to go, often found their way here after midnight. But there was something different about you, and it wasn’t just that he had never seen you around town. No matter how hurt he could tell you were inside, you did your best to keep up a facade when you saw him approaching. 

“Coffee?” he offered, less poised than he had intended.

“Please,” you smiled up at him as he set down the mug and poured. He allowed himself to take you in, and that’s when he saw the snow still caked on to your sneakers, and the damp cloth stretching from the hem above your ankle nearly up to your knees. There was snow yet to melt from head to toe, and you were trying your best not to shake from the cold. 

“You walk here?” He tried to make light conversation as he chuckled, but you weren’t as chipper. 

“My car broke down about a mile up the road. Walking was my only option,” You tried to keep the smile on your face, but Eddie saw the look, almost like a shunned child. As if you were embarrassed by what you had done, preparing for the lecture or consequence coming your way. 

Before he could say anything, Judy returned from the back office. 

“Tow truck won’t be running ’til morning, darlin’. But I left a message telling them you’d call first thing,” Judy gave you a halfhearted smile, before turning to Eddie, “Where’s that stack I told you to start on?” 

“Right, sorry,” he quickly excused himself back to the kitchen, but did his best to listen for the conversation you were having on the other side of the room. 

“Where are you staying tonight? I can try to get you a ride there.” 

“My grandma’s house, well it used to be I guess. I think it’s just a few more miles into town, I’m not a hundred percent sure though, I’ve never been out here.” 

“Used to be your grandma’s house?”

“Yeah, she, uhm… passed away not long ago. Hard to own something six feet under,” you tried to joke, but failed to make either of you laugh, “Funeral service is next week, I came early to pack up her things. Guess I chose the wrong day to drive in though.” 

“I’d say. Well let me see what I can do, do you have the address?” 

“Yeah, it’s right…” you trailed off as you checked your pocket, slowly coming to realize that you had left the torn piece of paper with the address written on it on your passenger seat, right on top of the map you were struggling to follow in the heavy snow. “Guess I left it in the car.” 

Just as the realization was threatening to break you, Eddie came and set a fresh stack of 3 pancakes in front of you. 

“You eat up, it’s on the house. And let me know if you remember any of that address,” Judy smiled at you and walked into the back before you could refuse the free pancakes.

Eddie watched you for the next hour through the pass through window. No other customers came in, so he didn’t exactly have anything better to do. It was nearing 4 am, the end of Eddie’s shift. He had cleaned his station in the kitchen faster than he ever had and made his way out to your table to check on your before he left. 

“Any luck with that address?”

“Don’t think I’d remember it with a gun to my head. I might as well walk back and grab it.” 

“Not a chance. My shift is over in a few minutes. Why don’t I drive you back to your car, you can grab it, and I can get you there.”

“I couldn’t possibly-“

“No need to be polite. You’ve had a rough enough night, let’s just get you home.”

You didn’t correct his phrasing. This was the furthest you had ever been from home, and you were sure as hell feeling that in this strange diner with barely a concept of where you were. The snow falling outside only exacerbated your feeling of being out of place. 

Eddie rushed to the back to grab his belongings and wish Judy a good night, letting her know he was going to get you out of there, before he made his way back out to you. You had brought the hood of your sweatshirt back up, and were staring out at the snow silently. He approached cautiously and gently spoke, “Let’s get out of here,” before guiding you through the door. 

“I’m Eddie, by the way. Sorry I didn’t properly introduce myself earlier.” 

You paused at his name, but he was too busy trying to find his van through the wall of snow to notice. 

“I’m y/n, thanks again for helping. You and Judy are both angels.” 

He smiled at your name for a moment, but kicked the idea from his mind. 

Both of you thought of the letters you had sent all those years ago, unaware that the person climbing into the same car as you was in fact the person you were reminiscing on. 

Eddie shook the snow out of his hair like a wet dog before starting the van. 

“Left out of the lot?” 

“Yeah,” you smiled. 

“You know, I’ve helped fix up a few cars in my day. I could take a look under the hood for you when we get there if you’d like.”

“You’re already helping enough, thank you though.”

“I really don’t mind. Can’t hurt just to take a look.” 

The glance and smile he shot you made your stomach do flips. In the low light of the passing, sparse streetlights, he looked incredibly handsome. Your mind wandered back to what you thought your Eddie looked like back in middle school. You had sent him a drawing of yourself, mostly as a joke since your drawing skills as a 12 year old weren’t amazing, but you were also trying to send him the message that you desperately wanted to know him better. Of course, when your grandmother had insisted you become pen pals with a strange boy, you weren’t too happy about the idea, but as time went on, the sound of a friend sounded too nice. You hadn’t had many of them in elementary school, and it concerned your family. But as your friendship with Eddie grew with each letter, you found yourself hoping for something, anything, more. Now, as an adult, you blame your adolescent brain for the silly crush. But that didn’t stop you from thinking about him from time to time, still wondering what he might be doing in that moment, or if he is happy. But most of all, you wondered if he missed you as much as you missed him. 

“You doing alright over there?” he asked you over the quiet metal playing over the speakers. He was playing it at about 1% of the volume he usually listened at, in an attempt to not scare you off just yet. 

“Yeah, just a long night,” you smiled back at him. He nearly assured you that you could be real with him, that he could tell that something more was bothering you, but he worried that would be coming on too strong. And before he could find a way to say it without sounding creepy, you pointed out your car on the side of the road with a sigh. 

It had only been a couple hours since you had left it, but it was nearly buried in the snow. 

“That’s a little more difficult to check out,” He chuckled as he pulled to the side of the road, lighting up your car with his headlights. 

“It’s fine, I’ll just go grab the address and we can get going,” you tried not to sigh as you opened the passenger door. 

“Wait a second,” Eddie reached for your hand before you could make it out of the car, “I’m fine with taking a look, and I can grab the address too. No need for you to get cold again.” 

“I already walked a mile in the snow earlier, I don't think a minute out there will kill me.”

“All the more reason for you to stay in here if you ask me.”

“Fine, but skip looking under the hood. I can call the tow truck when I wake up, it should be fine until then. Even if you could fix it with nothing, I don’t think I should be driving any more today.”

“Long trip?”

“Since 8 am. I really just want to get to sleep.”

“Deal,” he smiled again before stretching his hand out to you, “Keys?”

You reluctantly let him have the keys to go grab the paper, but not before trying to assure him you were capable of grabbing it yourself. You watched him as he rushed as fast as he could through the near foot of snow, grabbed the address, and rushed back to the van. 

“You didn’t lock it,” you stated, nervous to not to sound nagging. 

“I know, do you have a bag or something I can grab for you?”

“Oh, yeah, I’m sorry.” 

“Don’t be, where is it?”

“It’s in the back seat on the passenger side. It’s a small black suitcase.”

“You got it, here, take this,” he handed you the torn paper with your grandmother’s previous address written on it in a handwriting that would have been familiar to him, had he glanced down at it. 

He ran back to grab your suitcase, and made sure to double check that the doors had locked after he shut them before he rushed back to the van. He threw your suitcase in the backseat before jumping back into the drivers seat. 

“I don’t know how you lasted a mile in that, I’m already freezing,” he complained, but his smile still refused to leave his face. 

“I’m sorry,” you tried yet again to apologize. 

“Don’t be,” he paused to look you in the eye to assure you that he wasn’t upset in the slightest, “Now let’s see that address. Hopefully I actually know where it is.”

You handed him the paper, and even in the low light, you couldn’t miss the way his face fell, even for a millisecond. He hadn’t seemed to stop smiling all night, but the second he saw the paper, it faltered for just a moment. 

“Everything ok?” 

He looked up at you, and you could tell he wanted to say something, but thought better of it. 

“Yeah, uhm, this is on the other side of town though. It’s a bit of a drive, is that ok?”

“I’d rather drive a little further than stay in my car tonight. So yeah, it’s fine,” you giggled, relieved that he didn’t seem angry or annoyed with you like you thought. 

But he had seen the handwriting. He would know it anywhere, yet he still wouldn’t let himself get caught up in the coincidences. You were just a girl with similar handwriting, and the same name. You weren’t his y/n. He could never be so lucky. 

“So, what brings you to town?” he asked after a moment of driving. 

“It isn’t the happiest story, and I don’t want to be a bummer.” 

“I’m nosey, and that does nothing to curb my interest,” he joked. He just needed to prod, he needed to know if he was being crazy. 

“My grandma passed… about a week ago now. Her funeral is next week, but someone needed to clean up her house for the service, and no one else wanted to make the drive out.” 

“Do you have any other family in the area to help out?”

“No, she only had 2 sons. My dad and my uncle, and they’re both back west. She moved here, like, 12 years ago now I think. Maybe 13.” 

Just another coincidence. He’s not this lucky. 

“I’m sorry for your loss.”

You looked at him out of the corner of your eyes. You hadn’t heard that yet. Just stressed adults complaining about how traveling in the winter was too much of a hassle. Hearing those words, from a near stranger no less, was enough to make you tear up. And Eddie could hear that in your voice when you thanked him, but he chose not to comment on it. 

“So,” you began after a moment of awkward silence, “How long have you lived in Hawkins?”

“My whole life.”

“Do you like it here?”

“Uh… It has its moments,” he tried his best to hide his discontent with the town. If it weren’t for his uncle, his band, and his small group of friends, he would have ran for the hills by now. He was too attached to them to run… and also lacking the funds to do so. 

“That good huh?” you laughed. 

“Hate to sound like an ass, but there are definitely plenty of cons that outweigh the pros for me half the time. But that’s not everyone’s experience.”

“Grandma seemed to like it, but she also liked it back home, and it’s no cake walk back there.” 

You almost spat the end of your sentence, and although it wasn’t spoken explicitly, Eddie understood. 

“Sorry, I don’t mean to keep bringing the conversation down. It’s just been a really long week.”

“I believe it,” He paused, “So how long are you going to be staying in town then?”

“I have no idea. Rumor is Grandma left me the house. And even if she did…. I’m sorry, I’ve been awake for almost 24 hours now, and driving for over 15 of them. I know you really don’t need to hear any of this.” 

You started to make your body as small as possible, hyper aware of how loudly you had been speaking, and how riled up you were getting. Your father would have hated to see it. But not Eddie. 

“No, keep going. Like I said, I’m nosey, and it sounds like you could use someone to talk to about this.” 

“You sure?”

“Yeah,” he agreed nonchalantly, unaware how much it meant to you. 

“My grandma and I were really close before she moved. She didn’t get along with either of her sons, but she was the world to me as a kid. And my dad put up no effort to even reach out to her in the past decade, but he expects all of her stuff to be left to him, and my uncle wants the same. But my mom told me that one of them had reason to believe that she left it all to me. I don’t even know where they heard it, and don’t get me wrong, I’m not ungrateful, I promise. I just don’t know what to do about the two grown men that she apparently left out of the will if that’s true, and how mad they’re going to be at me.” 

“They wouldn’t be mad at you.” 

“You don’t know my dad,” you scoffed. You knew damn well that the man wasn’t afraid of throwing a tantrum, especially if it came to money. And he wouldn’t care if you were the one getting hurt in the process. 

“What would they have to be mad at you for though? For your Grandma loving you enough to leave you something to start your life on? How is that your fault?”

“It doesn’t matter if it’s my fault, they just care that they get their share. If it’s left to me, I might as well just divvy it up before they say anything.”

“But that’s not what you want, is it?”

“I just don’t want to have any issue with them.” 

“I’m sorry, that’s not fair to you.” 

“You really need to stop being so nice, you’re going to make me cry,” you chuckled, genuinely fighting back the tears as you spoke. 

“Sorry,” he chuckled back. He took a subject before continuing. “Have you seen the house? Like have you ever visited?”

“No, actually. Who knows, maybe it’s a real fixer upper and I’d be better off passing it on to my uncle,” you giggled, and that put the smile back on Eddie’s face. 

“If I didn’t mess up the address, it should just be in this next neighborhood.”

You kept saying that all you wanted was to get some rest after your long day, but now that you were talking to Eddie, you didn’t want the drive to end. The disappointment hit you like a rock as he pulled into the driveway of your grandmothers old house, but the feeling quickly turned to something else as you looked out the window to see the beautiful 2 story house with large trees on either side. 

“So much for the fixer upper theory,” Eddie said with a whistle, but you were speechless. This was much more than you had been anticipating, much nicer than you had spent your younger years picturing every time you missed your grandma. 

“You ok?” he asked after a moment of silence. 

“Oh, yeah. Sorry, I was just taking it in,” you chuckled nervously, still staring at the house. 

“Why don’t we get you inside?” He said, reaching in the back for your suitcase. You put a hand gently on his arm to stop him, and he looked up to see your nearly empty stare, still on the building in front of you. 

“Can you give me just a minute? I’m sorry, I know it’s late.” 

“No, it’s fine… Are you ok?”

“Yeah…Yeah, It just,” you trailed off for a moment, “I hadn’t seen her in years. Had no idea what her house looked like, or what she looked like anymore. I got letters, I got calls, but… Part of all this didn’t feel as real. Going in there, that’s real.” 

“Want me to come in with you?”

“No, that’s fine. I just need a second.” 

“Have you ever lost anyone before?”

You didn’t answer, just shook your head as you moved your eyes from the house to him. 

“Let me walk you in. You shouldn’t be alone for that.” 

You looked back at the house for a moment, took a deep breath, and nodded your head. 

Eddie carried your suitcase through the front door, and you both kicked off your shoes before stepping on the carpet. You took a deep breath before reaching for the light switch. Eddie sensed your hesitation as your fingers hovered. He took the opportunity to grab the fingers of your other hand. It gave you enough courage to turn on the light in the entry way. 

The furniture was mostly unfamiliar. You could see a few pieces in the living room that you had remembered from your childhood, and the sense of nostalgia calmed you. Eddie let you walk ahead of him, letting go of your hand as you ventured further into the room. Slowly but surely, you made your way to a wall on the other side of the room. It was covered in pictures, new and old, of your grandma with family and friends. You recognized yourself in plenty of them, but the newer ones were the ones that you couldn’t stop looking at. She looked so much older that you had remembered, but still had the youthful glow to her that you had attributed to her mischievousness. No matter how old she got, how wrinkled her face grew, or how gray her had and gotten, you still recognized her. Part of your heart began to ache for not knowing her as she was before she passed. It had been so long. 

You felt Eddie approach you from behind, and you expect him to say something nice, or encouraging. But he didn’t. He was surprisingly quiet. You turned to make sure he was alright, but he didn’t seem fine. He was staring at one of the photos on the wall, and he looked like he was about to be sick.

“Are you ok, you look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

“Uh, yeah,” he replied, still white as a sheet as he tore his eyes from the photo to look at you. He barely shot you a half smile before looking back up at the pictures. You took a step back to stand next to him. 

“I just remembered that she worked at the middle school when she moved here. Did you know her?”

“Yeah.”

“…Did you like her?” you tried asking after waiting for him to say anything more. 

“Yeah, she introduced me to my best friend.”

“Me too,” you smiled at the memory of your old pen pal. 

“Someone back home?”

“No, actually. I probably shouldn’t refer to him as that still. We haven’t spoken in… years actually.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” he said, finally peeling his eyes away from the photos on the wall. 

He should have said more, but he didn’t know what else to say. This was her. He was in shock. The girl he had spent the last decade wondering about had wandered into his diner. His thoughts were moving a mile a minute, he felt like he could physically hear them, and it was hard to focus on anything you had possibly said. But luckily, you weren’t saying much. 

He followed you like a ghost as you explored the first floor of the house. You were happy you had arrived before anyone else. You had the chance to see the house how she had left it, how she had lived in it. It gave you a sense of closure you weren’t going to get otherwise, it felt as if you were getting a sense of knowing her once again. You were caught up in it until you saw a clock on the wall, reading nearly 5 am. Realization hit you that you were keeping Eddie, and a sense of guilt washed over you. You turned to find him, with a bit of color returned to his face. 

“It’s really late, I’m sorry I’ve kept you. You can go home if you’d like. I’m sure you want to get some rest too after your shift.” 

He took a second, before asking, “Are you sure you’ll be alright?” And you hesitated before nodding. 

“Honestly, the roads are pretty bad out there. I could stay on the couch, help you figure out your car in the morning. How does that sound?”

He way have been a complete stranger just hours ago, but you really did feel like you could trust him. So you smiled and nodded. 

“I’ll go find some blankets for you,” you smiled before disappearing up the stairs. Eddie didn’t expect you to come back for a while. You were bound to find your grandmothers bedroom and need to look around for a while. He made his way back to the living room while he waited. He stared at the wall again, but not in shock this time. Now that he knew was 24 year old you looked like, he desperately want to see what 12 year old you looked like. He found a picture near the middle of the wall, of a young girl smiling at the camera. It was the only photo on the wall without your grandmother in it. She had your eyes, had your smile, but most importantly, she actually looked like the drawing he had received all those years ago. You weren’t as bad of an artist as you’d thought. Eddie tried not to grow emotional staring at the photo. He only tore his eyes away from the picture of younger you when he heard you making your way back down the stairs.

Before you could reach Eddie, you paused by the window next to the back door, blankets in hand. The snow coated the back yard, reflecting the light from the back porch into the sky. You began to tear up, just as Eddie approached to take the blankets from you. He saw one of the first tears fall down your cheek, and quickly, but gently put an arm around you. 

“Hey, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing, just… Is this what it looks like every winter?” you asked, looking up at him with misty eyes. 

“For parts of it, yeah. Why?”

“Grandma loved the snow,” was all you could reply before looking back out at the yard. 

He contemplated it for a second, fought himself on whether or not this was the right moment to say it, but he couldn’t help himself. 

“I told you she’d like it here” 

A moment passed as you processed what he had said. You gasped quietly, quickly turning your head to face him. He looked nervous, as if he had just handed his heart to you on a platter, waiting to see if you would reject it. 

“Eddie?” you asked cautiously, and you both knew what the question really was. 

“Yeah,” he nodded, still nervous and unable to read what you were thinking. 

“You stopped writing,” was all you could get out before another tear dropped. 

“What?”

“Y-you stopped writing,” you repeated, beginning to choke on your breathes as you spoke. 

He nearly panicked as he tried to reply. 

“Y/n, w-what do you mean? I only stopped writing when you stopped replying.”

“Oh my god, it’s really you,” you couldn’t stop looking at him, another tear dropping down your cheek. Your exhaustion was exaggerating your emotions, but you may have felt the same regardless. You had waited 12 years for this moment. 

“Yeah. Why don’t we go sit down,” he smiled at you, before herding you towards the couch. 

“Y/n,” he spoke softly as he crouch in front of you, one hand resting on each of your knees as you sat on the couch, “What do you mean I stopped writing?”

“I sent you a letter, you never replied.”

“That’s impossible, I waiting for months to hear back from you. There’s no way I missed a letter from you.”

“No, I sent one, and I waited, but you never replied. You broke my heart Eds,” you quietly began to sob, filled with too many mixed emotions. 

Eddie quickly sat next to you on the couch and pulled you to his chest to comfort you the best he could, but he was still confused. He had checked his own mailbox, his neighbors mailboxes, other houses in town with the same street number as his trailer. This didn’t add up. He quietly shushed you as he thought. 

“What did the last letter say?” he asked as you began to calm down just slightly. He had half the collection of your letters memorized, but especially the first and last. He would know if he had read it if you described it. 

“It was before Freshman year, I told you how scared I was that all the kids were going to be mean. I was so afraid that I was going to get singled out for still having no friends, and I waited for months to hear back from you. But you never wrote back. You were my only friend, and you stopped writing.”

“No, sweetheart, I would never,” he sighed as his heart dropped. He got that letter, he replied to it. Which meant that she never got his last letter. Neither of them had stopped writing on purpose, they had both assumed the other had given up. But he had sent out one last letter that was unaccounted for.

“Sweetheart, can you look at me,” he gently guided you to look up at him, “I promise you, I wrote back. I don’t know what happened to it, but I never would have stopped writing like that. I thought you had just ignored my last letter.”

“You wrote,” you said quietly, and Eddie couldn’t tell if it was a question, or if you were trying to reassure yourself. 

“I did, I promise,” he whispered as he swept a tear off your cheek with his thumb. 

And though you still needed to know what happened to his letter, and you had had one of the longest days of your life, nothing mattered more to you in that moment than leaning in, slowly. You took a second, pausing right before reaching his lips so he could pull away if he wanted, but he didn’t. It was a quick kiss, but it was gentle and sweet. Eddie didn’t try to pull you in for another, but he didn’t want to part as you pulled away. 

It took him a second to open his eyes again, but when he did, he was smiling just as big as you. 

“You ok?” he asked for what must have been the hundredth time that night. But unlike every other time you had answered, this time you told him the truth. 

“I am now.”

(may or may not be already trying to figure out a part 2 for this, depending on if people like it <3 )

@embrace-themagic @fanficparker  @heartbeats-wildly @saturn-aka-six @calum-hoodwinked-me @peterplanet @mischiefmanaged49 @nicotine-sunshine820 @itsjusttor @emistrash @thenoddingbunny-blog @sovereignparker @raajali3 @eddielives1986 @eddieswifu @chickpeadumpsterfire @fluffybunnyu @panagiasikelia @canthavetoomuchchaos @whenshelanded @starlitlakes @witchwolflea @ali-r3n @g0thdraculaura @celestcies

SPILL YOUR GUTS

˚₊‧꒰ა . ——— ˗ˏˋ ✮ ˎˊ˗ ——— ˖ ໒꒱ ‧₊˚

practice boyfriend! eddie x fem! reader

summary: eddie’s your practice boyfriend. you’re positive he’s upset at you and you’re waiting for him to get mad. however, he has a different response in mind.

cw: references/allusions to past child abuse but extremely vague, references/allusions to bad relationships (also pretty vague), reader acts on a learned response and assumes the worst about Eddie, anxiety

tags/tropes: angst, hurt/comfort (my brand!) sappy sappy romantic idiots, they kiss and figure their mess out at the end

a/n: this came to me in a vision

summary makes this sound smutty but i promise it’s not. this accidentally became disgustingly romantic. read at your own risk :)

࣪˖ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ˖

You’re positive Eddie’s mad at you.

Okay. Maybe positive is a strong word. But still.

You’ve only been fake/pretend/practice dating Eddie for about two weeks now. He’s the one who approached you with the offer— when you were in the Upside Down together, you’d made an off-hand comment about how you might die without ever having a real boyfriend- not one that mattered, anyway. It’s always kind of been a sore spot for you for a good portion of your life. Growing up, you didn’t really have the best relationship with your dad (Robin likes to call that “The understatement of the year, and we almost died.”) and out of the incredibly small handful of guys you’ve gone out with, none stuck around longer than a month and all ended in such equally, specifically, and uniquely horrific ways, you finally came to the conclusion you had to be fucking something up. What are the chances of all them ended so completely horribly?

After you all had decidedly not died in the Upside Down, Eddie approached you with an offer: pretend date him. You’re popular and well known enough that it’ll help get people off his back about the whole Chrissy/murders thing —even though he’s been absolved of all charges, the people of Hawkins hold grudges— and in exchange, you get a trial run of a relationship that won’t end unless you both agree too— you get to figure out what you’re doing wrong.

You feel bad about it, because even though you spend so much time together, you feel like a nervous wreck. All. The. Time.

You’re constantly waiting for the other shoe to drop— waiting for him to tell you that you’re too weird, that you’re not considerate enough, that you’re selfish, or that you talk too much.

But he never says any of it. All he ever tells you is the good things. He tells you how sympathetic you are, how kind you are, how good you are at remembering little details that matter. He tells you that you’re a good kisser.

(Yeah. Your first kiss, even after those failed relationships, ended up being with Eddie ‘The Freak’ Munson. You’re not quite sure you’ll ever forget how you felt when his lips —just a little cracked, but not rough— met yours; when his hair tickled your face and you could faintly smell the cigarette smoke that stubbornly clings to all of his clothes, no matter how many times he washes them. You didn’t tell him he was your first. That’s something you decided you couldn’t bear to share.

You kind of have a feeling he knows anyway, though.)

It all sets you on edge. You’re under no reassurance that you’re perfect. You’re currently questioning if you’re tolerable, from a romantic standpoint.

You know how you are. You’re clinging and you drink up reassurance like a dying man in the desert. You linger in his casual touches like it’s the first and last time you’ll ever feel them. You know you’re a lot. You know. You know that guys in a relationship don’t want ‘a lot’, they want a pretty thing to hang off their arm and laugh at what they say.

But you just… can’t.

You tried, and you tried, and you tried. But you always ended up being too much, or it didn’t work out for some other reason. You want more. You want to feel safe, and happy, and cherished and loved and all those things that only happen in the movies.

The ironic part of all of this is that when you first started setting out terms for your arrangement, Eddie had told you flat out: “This will only work if you are completely and one-hundred percent yourself. You gotta lay it all on me, angel.”

And so you had, and now you regret it because he’s upset about something.

You’d come over to his trailer at his request to ‘hang out’ while he went over DND stuff for his next campaign. Eddie does this a lot— he calls them ‘Neutral Dates’ where you’re not really doing anything in particular- most of the time, you’re both doing seperate things, but still just being in each other’s presence.

It’s nice. The majority of your friend circle consists of everyone involved with the Upside Down and that entire mess. You two are no Steve and Robin (you’re convinced those two have the kind of bond no one can replicate or break. Like the kind of bond stray cats get and then they have to be adopted together) but it’s still nice. To just be with someone.

Even if you feel like you’re walking on eggshells.

It’s not always eggshells. Sometimes, for a a few moments, you forget. You forget it’s all pretend. You forget he’s just a friend helping a friend fulfill a goal. That’s all.

You’ve almost forgotten just now, too— you’re too concerned about what you might’ve done.

He’s not acting angry, per-se, but he’s definitely upset. You tend to pick up on this kind of thing: small changes in someone’s personality or body language. Most of the time it’s not a conscious habit.

Most of the time.

Right now, he’s run his hands through his hair about a million times. It’s become a frizzy mess behind him, and when you’d made an offhand joke about it —an attempt to lighten the mood— all he’d done was scowl. Not at you, really, but the message was there. You’d snapped your jaw shut so fast you’re pretty sure he heard your teeth click.

After that he’d frustratedly made tea for the both of you, which consisted of opening the cupboards faster than he usually did, closing them slightly louder than he usually does, and drumming his fingers impatiently on the stove-top while he waited for the kettle to boil.

All of this you observed from the corner of your eye while ‘reading’ on the couch.

And if all of that wasn’t bad enough, when you’d finally mustered up the courage to speak again, a little joke about a part in the book you were reading, all he’d said was a flat:

“That’s great, babe.”

You’re starting to get antsy. Nervous. Maybe you should go? Unless he gets upset at you leaving. That would be bad. But he’s clearly upset with you being here, so maybe you should go.

While you’re debating the pros and cons of leaving, you try to remain as still and silent as possible. No need to upset him anymore by moving too much or being too loud.

You flip a page in the book you’re no longer reading (he might notice you’re not paying attention to it anymore) and decide to test the waters again.

“The author just spelled restaurant wrong. That’s the third spelling mistake I’ve caught in this book.”

“Hmm.”

Okay. So that was worse. Talking to him is out of the question, then. It must be something you did, to warrant this kind of reaction.

You wrack your brain, trying to think of anything you could’ve done in recent hours to make him upset, but you can’t think of anything.

You glance slightly to the right— not far enough that he’ll see you looking at him, but far enough to get a better look at him in your peripheral. He’s glaring down at his campaign notebook. Shit, he looks so angry.

Unbidden, tears begin to well in your eyes and you try to shift, trying to angle yourself away from him enough that he can’t see the tears in your eyes.

But your hand shifts, knocking into his leg.

Fuck. “Sorry!”

You yank you arm back as if burned, jolting back on the couch so you’re in no danger of touching him. “I’m sorry!”

He sits up, immediately snapping to attention at the desperation coloring your voice. “Woah woah, hey. Hey, what’s going on? Are you okay?”

You take a steadying breath. “Did I do something wrong?”

He blinks blankly at you. Oh shit, you’re supposed to know that you’ve done something wrong.

“I mean,” You hurry to correct, “I know I— Can you tell me what I did wrong so I can fix it?”

Understanding floods his features and you brace yourself, ready for the reprimand.

“Can I touch you?”

Now it’s your turn to stare with confusion. You nod once, briefly thinking about how weird it is to ask for permission first.

He sits up on the couch, facing you with his legs crossed, the couch springs squeaking loudly at his movement. You resist the urge to wince. He reaches out with a slow hand, taking the hand that’s still clenched, held away from him and up near your chest.

He stares down at your hand, holding it with his left hand and tracing delicate shapes on it with his right. His ringed fingers drag lines around your knuckles and veins, lingering occasionally over the odd, old scar.

“How long did you think I was upset with you?”

Your heart is racing, muscles tensed and ready to bolt. “Um. A few hours? Maybe?”

You’re hyper-aware of the grip he has on your hand, and how quickly and easy it could become crushing.

It doesn’t.

“Bug,” He says slowly after a moment. At first he used to use pet names as a joke— it was something you’d laugh at, between the two of you, since the relationship wasn’t real.

But recently, he’s been saying them with a different inflection in his tone. A little less teasing, a lot more fond.

“Have you spent the past few hours afraid that I was mad at you?”

He sounds… sad. Which is confusing. It doesn’t— he was. He was.

“But you were,” You say, suddenly unsure about anything and everything. “You were upset.”

“I was upset because I couldn’t work this part of the campaign out, and i’m dramatic. I was never mad at you, honey. I was never mad at you.”

You frown, gears turning in your head. “When I made that joke about your hair, you glared at me. And then when I tried to talk to you, you were upset. You didn’t want to talk.”

“I was jokingly glaring at you, I’m so sorry you thought I was serious. I wasn’t, I promise. I didn’t mean to be dismissive, I was really focusing on writing.”

You’re both silent for a moment. A beat too long. You want to squirm in the unwelcome space the silence has created.

“What did you think I was going to do?”

That is a loaded question.

“I don’t know,” You pick at a loose thread on the couch cushion. “I don’t— I don’t know. That’s the problem. You don’t yell at me, or get angry, or tell me when i’ve made you upset. I don’t know what you’ll do.”

He makes a wounded noise in his throat.

“I know you get angry,” You bulldoze on, “I’ve seen it. You’re so… loud, in everything you do. I know you get angry. But you never get that same kind of loud angry at me and I don’t know what to do because that means that I upset you and you don’t tell me about it and then I don’t know how to fix it. I have to fix it, Eddie.”

His eyes, deep and brown, search your face. He reaches up a hand, painfully slow, to cup your face. Your eyelids flutter shut, and you tip your head to the side, leaning into the job.

“I’m gonna tell you something, Bug. Are you listening?” He waits for you to hum in confirmation before continuing. “You’re not responsible for my moods. Or anyone else’s for that matter. That’s not your job. You don’t have to fix it.”

He reaches his second hand up to cup the other side of your face. “You know why I don’t get angry at you? Not all loud and dramatic like that? Because I’ve seen how you react when people do. And I never, ever want to be the reason you get that look in your eye. I never want to make you afraid. I never want you to believe, with proof and confidence, that I’ve grown sick of you.”

You open your eyes, eyes darting across the planes of his face. Searching for even the smallest hint, the smallest giveaway that he might be lying.

You can’t find any. In its place, you find eyes, shining with pure determination. You find lips parted ever so slightly, a sad-sort of smile being etched into being. You find two hands on your face, thumbs delicately sweeping across the skin of your under-eye, of your cheekbone. Smoothing away the steady tears that had begun falling, wiping away the hot trails they leave on your face.

And you realize all at once that love isn’t like the movies. It isn’t picture-perfect kisses. It isn’t ball gowns and dresses and kisses in the rain. It isn’t like the love you thought you were supposed to have: empty and hollow; a life of hanging off of arms and praying your next slip-up didn’t cost you your relationship.

It was this.

It was just being. Just being and knowing the other person is there for just that— for you. It was not raising your voice. It was carrying extra hair-ties. It was making two cups of coffee. It was steeping tea for an extra couple of minutes, just the way he liked it. It was playing your favorite music in the car, and looking over at each other during the bridge, belting the lyrics with the same, toothy-smile. So full and so happy you just keep screaming the lyrics, because you’re filled with so much you don’t know where to put it all.

Your tears begin to fall in earnest now. Your heart is thudding in your chest, but for a different reason now. You’re struck with the need to convey all of this to him— to tell him you understand, you know, you feel the same.

“These hair ties,” You shove your wrist up to his eye-line. “They’re for you. Because you always forget your own. And— and I steep the tea for a few extra minutes, because you like your tea strong, and you didn’t just find that tape in your van, I bought it ‘cause I know you lost the old one in the Upside Down, ‘cause it felt out of your pocket.”

You’re babbling, nearly choking on your tears and your words, rushing them all out of your mouth in an aching wish to be understood, in this very moment.

“I know,” He says, voice a little hysteric and eyes a little too bright. His lip wobbles. He presses your face tighter in his hands. “I know. I know. I see you. I see you.”

You stay like that for a little while. At some point, your hands find his wrists, and then you’re just two fools, smiling like idiots with tears streaming down your faces, staring into each others eyes.

Eventually, Eddie clears his throat. “The next time you think I’m upset at you, you tell me, okay? You can ask. You can ask me and I pinky promise I won’t get mad.”

You giggle wetly. “Pinky swear?”

“Pinky swear,” He says, taking his left hand away from your face to hold up his pinky. You intertwine yours and his together, the both of you laughing at the ridiculousness of it all.

He gets quiet for a moment; removes his hands from your face and instead clasps, your hands together, resting in your lap.

“You know why I never tell you when you’re being a bad practice girlfriend?” He says, his voice low and soft.

“How come?”

He smiles, full and good. “Because you’re not. You’re so sweet and kind and loving. And if you’d let me, I’d really like to kiss you right now.”

You furrow your brows. “The real kind? The I-love-you kind?”

Your face flushes over the words ‘I love you.’

“I’ve always kissed you for real,” He says, words laden with fondness. “Ever since the day we met and you slapped the shit out of me for being stupid. I’ve been hopelessly obsessed ever since. I’ve just been waiting for you to notice.”

You suck in a breath. “So all of this— the, the dates and the hanging out and the kissing— that’s all been real?”

“Every last bit.”

“Then in that case,” You say, squeezing his hands. “I would very much like you to kiss me.”

He leans in, slotting your lips together and everything just clicks. Like this is where you’re meant to be. Maybe it’s puppy love. Maybe it’s not.

All you know is that Eddie Munson is kissing you for real, and he always has been. You couldn’t ask for anything better.

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗

can you pretty please do [intimidation] with eddie

🥺👉👈

[INTIMIDATION] sender, in an effort to frighten the receiver by invading their personal space, sits in their lap to try and inspire discomfort or fear in them.

cw: alcohol consumption, fem!reader, sort of enemies -> lovers (but actually idiots -> lovers), 2.4k

dividers by @strangergraphics

You're blocking the doorway into the Harrington kitchen, shoulder leaned against the wood panelling where you have a good view into the living room. Your unimpressed glare is drawn from the figure currently hogging the sofa when someone bumps into you just as you're bringing the plastic cup in your hand to your lips.

"Jesus, fucking watch it-" The outrage in your tone fades quick when you see who's run into you.

"Sorry." Jonathan grimaces as he watches you wipe a bit of juice and vodka from your chin.

"No, it's fine," You sigh and turn on your heel, following Jonathan into the kitchen as he begins to grab things to make himself a drink, though it appears to be far more lemon-lime soda and grenadine than anything else. "Sorry, I just.. I dunno, sorry." You shrug before gulping down another mouthful of your own admittedly strong drink. You're kind of hoping that once your buzz kicks in you'll feel just a little less like there's a storm cloud floating right above your head.

"What is with you, tonight?" Jonathan asks with an overly cautious smile, "I haven't seen Munson bug you even once, so it's gotta be somethin' else-"

"Nothing," You huff, a little defensive at just the mention of the other boy, "I'm fine."

"Oh yeah, totally," Jonathan chuckles and raises his newly acquired drink in a salute, "You're like a ray of sunshine tonight."

It's annoying as hell, but he's right. You're fuming and Eddie has yet to even speak to you. He's been avoiding you like the plague from the moment you walked through the door, as if Eddie could somehow sense that you were already in a mood, and he didn't feel like getting told off for being the reason that you finally snapped.

Because normally, Eddie would've found at least seven ways he could irritate you by now. He'd have finished the last of the juice he saw you eyeing for your next mixed drink and laughed maniacally when you pouted about it. He'd have pestered you about whether you might want to join in on another campaign, all while making a handful of little comments about just how easy it'll be for him to decimate your character when you do. He'd have watched you shiver while you passed passed a joint back and forth by the pool, and then draped his stupid jacket around your shoulders just so he could roll his eyes and give you shit about not dressing warmly enough.

Eddie was infuriating — And the worst part was that he knew it. The asshole thrived on pushing buttons and testing people's limits, but tonight evidently he'd been able to tell that you were already toeing dangerously close to yours and had steered clear altogether.

You peer back out into the living room now, narrowed eyes zeroing back in on the figure sprawled across the entire length of the loveseat, socked feet kicked up on the opposite cushion where someone else could be sitting if he weren't such a selfish prick.

"God, what an asshole." You grumble, downing the last of your drink and grabbing the nearest bottle to begin mixing another. "I mean, look at him, seriously. Does he have to take up the whole couch?"

Jonathan's gaze follows the path your own had taken moments before, and he snorts in amusement, "Eddie."

It's not a question, but you answer him as if it had been.

"Yes, Eddie." Another quick glance up into the living room has your eyes locking with the man in question just as his name falls from your lips.

Eddie's eyes go wide, his cheeks dimpling with his sudden grin. He jabs his index finger into his chest, lips moving silently around the words, "Who? Me?"

"Uh-huh.. Why don't you go do something about it?" Jonathan teases.

Eddie's attention is pulled away when Gareth says something from his spot in an armchair. Whatever he says it gets Eddie riled up and he's immediately talking animatedly, hands gesturing wildly as he speaks.

"Maybe I will." You're already moving with purpose, halfway out of the kitchen when you hear your friend shout after you.

"I was joking!"

"Well I'm not!" You call back over your shoulder.

It's darker as you step into the living room, overhead lights off in favor of utilizing the warmer glow from the the lamp tucked away in the corner. You have to step over Eddie's discarded shoes at the foot of the sofa, and the boy very nearly knocks your drink out of your hand when you step in front of him, too distracted by his own tirade to have seen your approach.

But his head snaps up toward you as your thigh brushes his arm. Whatever he's been saying, the words cut off abruptly at the realization of who it is standing beside him.

"Well hey there, princess." He shoots you a toothy grin — You assume it's meant to be charming, but it only irritates you further. "To what do we owe the pleasure of your company?"

You ignore Eddie in favor of casting a small smile of apology toward Gareth, "Sorry to interrupt."

"Nah, no worrie-"

"No, no! You didn't interrupt. We were done." Eddie cuts his friend off, "Gareth was just telling me he was gonna go take a piss, actually."

Gareth splutters for a moment, but when his eyes shift from you to Eddie he's suddenly rising from his chair. You watch Gareth shake his head as he steps around you before he stalks off without a word.

"What was that about?" You can't help but ask in curiosity.

"Beats me. Really had to piss, I guess." Eddie says quickly, sitting up a little straighter against the arm of the couch. He throws an arm out to gesture to Gareth's recently vacated chair, "Did you wanna-"

Rather than taking advantage of the empty seat, you plop yourself across Eddie's thighs unceremoniously, feeling oddly satisfied by the huff of surprise that escapes him when your weight is suddenly in his lap.

The way the warmth of his body seeps into your own is near immediate, even through two layers of denim. Your arm presses into his chest as you lean back into the cushion of the sofa, trying and failing to remain unaffected by his proximity. He smells infuriatingly good this close, clean and masculine with just a lingering hint of the weed he'd smoked earlier in the night. It makes your stomach flutter wildly, makes your head swim for half a second before you're lifting your cup to your mouth in an effort to compose yourself.

Eddie huffs softly and his breath fans out over your exposed shoulder, warm and smelling faintly of cheap beer and menthols. Goosebumps prickle along the length of your arm, hairs standing on end suddenly. You wish you could convince yourself that your body's reaction were one of repulsion, but deep down you know that its something far, far worse than that.

"You.. You're just gonna.. sit.. here?" Eddie asks, voice a little wobbly, unsure.

His knuckles brush your thigh, likely an accident, but one sidelong glare has his hand retreating to the relative safety of the couch cushion in a flash.

"Yep."

You can see outside to the patio from your position, and you focus your attention to the group sitting with their feet in the pool. The sheer amount of effort it takes to keep your eyes trained there, rather than allowing it them to drift to where Eddie's hand twitches near your knee-

"Do- Did you want me to move my legs? Do you want-" He shifts underneath you like he's ready to pull his feet from the cushion at the other end, but you remain resolutely in place.

"Nope, I'm good."

You have absolutely no plans of moving any time soon. You'd remain seated right here in Eddie's lap until his bladder was ready to burst, until your weight made his legs fall asleep and tingle from lack of blood flow, until he was ready to grab you by your hips and force you into another seat.

He'd learn his lesson. The inconsiderate couch-hogging asshole.

"O..kay." Eddie says slowly, wiping his palm on the side of his own denim-clad hip, as if his hands might've gotten a little sweaty.

Were you making him warm? Good.

"So.." Eddie pauses. You catch a glimpse of his face scrunching in thought at the corners of your vision before he continues, "Any big plans for the weekend?"

With how close you're sat, Eddie is speaking almost directly into your ear. There's no need for him to raise his voice to be heard, and you find that the low rumble of it is nice, soothing almost. It curls around your ears and sends something warm shooting down your spine.

"Killing boys." You return dryly, eyes straining now in an effort to remain focussed on what's going on in the backyard.

Eddie snorts, body jolting underneath you with his amusement — And his almost-laughter absolutely does not make your chest flush with pride. You couldn't care less whether or not Eddie Munson finds you funny. As if.

"Oh, so nothing out of the ordinary for you then."

Eddie chuckles and the tip of his thumb finds its way to the place where your thigh presses into his. You can't tell if it's accidental or on purpose, but the gentle press of his finger kind of makes your stomach flip pleasantly, so you allow it. Whatever.

You hum in agreement, "Yeah, well. There's almost always some boy who deserves it."

"I don't doubt it," Eddie murmurs, chin nearly brushing your shoulder now, "Anyone I know currently at the top of your list, madame assassin?"

"There is this one asshole." You pause to take a sip of your drink, fighting off a grimace at the awful liquor to juice ratio. "He's loud. And irritating. Just loves getting on my last nerve-"

"Long hair?"

The interruption has your eyes rolling, "Yep. Walks around looking like some Van Halen wannabe."

"Oh, he sounds cool."

You can practically hear the smirk in his voice now.

"Well he's not." You return blankly. "He's always trying to get a rise outta me, acting like a total prick-"

"Hold on, hold on-" Eddie cuts you off again, "Now I'm not so sure we're on the same page. Thought I knew who you were talkin' about, but-"

"Oh, you know him." You grumble, sinking farther into the plush cushion on the back of the couch with your drink clutched to your chest. "You know him well, trust me."

Eddie shifts beneath you, angling both himself and you until he's taking up more of your line of sight than the patio doors. His big brown eyes bore into you until you crack and flick your gaze toward him.

"Here's the thing.." Eddie starts, the pad of his thumb stroking the seam on the outside of your knee. "Maybe this guy's just pushing your buttons because he likes when all of your attention is on him-"

The arm he has thrown over the back of the couch by your shoulder moves then, brushing your hair back from your temple to trail the pads of his fingers featherlight over the space between your brows.

"-Maybe.. Shit, I dunno, maybe he likes the way your eyebrows come together when you're angry-"

Your heart is beating so loud you can hear the blood pumping in your ears. The urge to fidget under his attention is strong, but you sit at still as possible in fear of breaking the spell. You have to strain to hear Eddie's next words over the dull whoosh of your heartbeat echoing in your skull.

"Maybe he thinks you look kinda devastatingly beautiful-"

"You-" And, fuck. Did your voice just crack? "You're trying to tell me you think this guy is, what? Being a dick because he likes me? Pulling my pigtails on the playground and shit?"

Eddie's grin is less cocky than you've ever seen it. His lips twitch at one side of his mouth. He almost looks nervous.

You take a deep breath as his fingers skim over your jaw on their way back toward your hair, where he pinches a small lock between two fingers and tugs just once, oh-so gentle.

"What if he was?" Eddie asks softly, "Being a dick because he likes you, I mean."

"I'd tell you he's an idiot." You manage, plastic cup crinkling under the increased pressure of your hand.

Eddie winces, but nods and averts his gaze. His arm falls to the back to the sofa again, close enough for you to feel the warmth of it beside your shoulder.

"But.." You have to swallow down a smile when Eddie's wide eyes snap right back to yours. "Maybe this idiot's attraction isn't totally one-sided. So, maybe he should stop being an asshole and try making a move."

Eddie blinks. Once, then twice. He squares his shoulders and leans in like he might kiss you, but then he backs off again and searches your eyes as if he's terrified he might be reading the entire situation wrong.

"Eddie." You whisper sharply, "The idiot is you, asshole."

"Oh, Jesus Christ, thank god."

And then his fingers are curled gently around the back of your neck. His hand is fully grasping your opposite thigh as he tries to drag you impossibly closer. His plush lips are pressing softly into your own, the taste of beer mixing with vodka and citrus.

It's a quick kiss, chaste. Your mouths remain glued together for maybe three seconds before he leans back enough to watch you blink at him from beneath heavy lashes. You can't imagine how stupidly docile you look; brows pushed up your forehead, chest nearly heaving beneath your shirt, jaw slack, lips parted and waiting for more. It's pathetic how he's managed to turn you into this with just one G-Rated kiss.

The hand on the back of your neck moves to your face, fingertips tracing the smooth line of your brow before trailing back down to cup your cheek.

"Yeah.. Yeah, this is nice too." Eddie murmurs, "You're awful pretty when you're mad, but this.. This right here is somethin' else."

"You're so annoying." It comes out airy, absolutely no bite to your words.

"Oh, that's not changing, sweetheart. Matter of fact, I think it's a part of our spark. Gotta keep the fire burning, right? I'll keep annoying you, you'll keep getting angry-"

"Would you just shut up and kiss me again?"

Eddie grins, already leaning in, "Sure thing."

eddie munson x shy fem reader

warnings: hope y’all like CHEESE, reader wears glasses

a/n: this is incredibly self indulgent and lame but i hope y’all enjoy xx.

“You’re staring… again.”

Nancy says under her breath, which has your eyes immediately darting away and back down toward your lunch out of sheer embarrassment.

“I was not staring….” you hiss, picking at the pile of peas on your tray.

“Oh, you soooo were,” she laughs, knocking her shoulder into yours. “Why don’t you just go and talk to him?”

You let out an exasperated breath before glancing over at your best friend. She’s giving you that soft yet encouraging gaze that’s entirely Nancy.

“Why would someone like him be interested in someone like me?”

Your voice is softer, but that underlying fear bleeds through nonetheless.

“I’m just so….” you trail off, chewing on your lower lip. “Boring.”

Your eyes have drifted back over to the hellfire table, where they seem to find themselves almost every lunch period now. Totally entranced by the male sitting at the end of the table.

Eddie Munson, dungeon master and local metalhead. Also the guy you’ve been harboring the biggest crush on since your junior year.

He looks even more pretty with the afternoon sunlight shining through the windows of the cafeteria, highlighting the warm chestnut hue of his fluffy curls. His lips are poised in an annoyed pout, fingers drumming on the table in rapid succession while he listens to Dustin’s nervous ramblings.

“He’s just so— outgoing and doesn’t give two shits what these dipshits around here think of him.”

Your lips can’t help but quirk up into a small smile when you witness him tossing a pretzel at Mike’s head.

“You are not boring,” Nancy sighs, her curls bouncing when she shakes her head in distain. “But you’re not gonna know if something could work out between you if you don’t at least try.”

Your snort has her rolling her eyes, but yours are still transfixed on the boy in question. So much so you haven’t noticed the way your glasses continue to slip down the bridge of your nose.

“I doubt he even knows my name, Nance.”

When your eyes suddenly catch his chocolatey brown ones, you feel mortified. You’ve been very careful about your… admiring during lunch or in between classes. But Nancy had momentarily distracted you, and now you’d been caught red handed.

Unbeknownst to you, this isn’t the first time he’s noticed your wandering gaze. Soft eyes that are filled with the utmost longing and kindness. Someone with a reputation such as Eddie Munson doesn’t have looks like that thrown his way very often.

So it’s no surprise he’s caught on.

But you don’t seem to notice the way he always glances back once you look away, dark eyes seeking out your figure in the halls. The longing of his own for you to finally meet his gaze. But your nose is either stuck in a book or those pretty eyes are trained on your feet.

It was maddening.

You quickly break his curious stare and jump up your feet, missing the way he shoots up from his own seat. You sling your backpack over your shoulder and leave your tray abandoned.

“I gotta go… I’ll see you later, Nance,” you say before she even has time to protest, keeping your head down as you make your way toward the exit.

Mentally still kicking yourself for being caught gawking at him like a bumbling idiot. But your heart leaps into your throat when you hear the slapping of sneakers on the linoleum behind you.

Before you can even process what’s happening you all but collide into a denim clad chest, gasping softly when his arms slip around your waist to catch you before you almost stumble backwards onto your ass.

“Whoa, easy there,” he chuckles, those same pouty lips quirking up into a lopsided grin. “Didn’t mean to scare ya…”

When he releases you, your whole body deflates— already missing the warmth of his palms. Even if it was only for a fleeting moment.

“Uh… sorry, did you need something?” you ask, unable to hide the confusion in your tone.

He purses his lips, twisting his rings on his fingers in almost a nervous manner.

Why would he be nervous?

“I just had a question is all…” he mumbles, “and honestly, I’ve been meaning to ask you this for a while now.”

And your heart nearly stops when he carefully pushes your glasses back up the bridge of your nose.

“You free tonight?”

You'd Have to Stop the World...

12.5k words, FWB Eddie X afab!reader, 18+ Explicit Content - MDNI, use of "baby" as a nickname, no use of y/n, set in Hawkins 1990 so everyone's aged up accordingly, no mention of upside down - could sorta be canon if you pretend vecna was defeated and eddie never got attacked by the bats but reader wouldn't know it ever existed.

a/n: most of my ideas are usually inspired by a song - the concept for this came entirely through a playlist I made, so l added the track list! Feedback is greatly appreciated! Thanks for reading and as always, I hope you enjoy!

Struggling through a dry spell, an ideas comes to you when your attractive friend Eddie vents about his recent disappointing hookups. What starts as casual fun gradually complicates as physical and emotional boundaries begin to blur.

“I keep recalling things we never did / Messy top lip kiss / How I long for our trysts / Without ever touching his skin / How can I be guilty as sin?”

A few years ago, you met Eddie Munson, thanks to an introduction from your then coworkers, Robin and Steve. What began as a casual acquaintance in a larger group quickly evolved into a genuine friendship.

But as with many great friendships, a new romance - this time with Matt - changed the dynamics. As your relationship with Matt grew, so did the distance between you and Eddie. Matt didn’t like him, his dislike fueled by a few key grievances: he accused Eddie of overcharging for weed, could barely tolerate Eddie’s metal music - and was visibly irritated by the number of times you dragged him to Eddie’s shows. Yet, beneath it all, Matt’s discomfort had a more personal edge. He was convinced there was something more to your friendship, despite your insistence on its platonic nature.

“Okay, sure, whatever you say,” Matt insisted, his tone dripping with frustration. “But I’m telling you, he definitely wants to fuck you.”

Matt’s reasoning included:

• “He never makes you pay for weed.” 

⁃ Ah, the classic move of the charming drug dealer - Robin and Steve are also lucky recipients of Eddie's personal stash. Generosity? Sure. A sign of deeper feelings? Unlikely. 

• “He flirts with you.”

⁃ Eddie flirts with everyone. This isn’t a private act of seduction - it’s his default setting. And sure, before you dated Matt maybe you’d indulge in Eddie’s flirty nature but it was just all in good fun. 

• "He call's you - Baby." 

⁃ The nickname was not some romantic gesture, Eddie's just a menace. It all started after a shift at Family Video, you and Robin went back to Steve's house. Eddie made an entrance, a blunt was passed, and you started rambling about the ridiculousness of the name "Baby" in Dirty Dancing. "You know, it's funny you hate it because 'Baby' suits you perfectly," Eddie quipped. You shot him a look of annoyance, but Eddie, with that trademark grin, decided it was a keeper and has called you it ever since. 

• “The way he fucking looks at you.” 

⁃ This is where the plot thickens. While the other signs are easily explained, you didn't quite see what Matt was ever referring to. 

Yet, every time Matt voiced his theories, your mind couldn’t help but drift to thoughts of Eddie in bed. He had quite the reputation as a good fuck and it was undeniable that he was incredibly attractive. But the guilt of entertaining these thoughts, especially while with Matt, was crushing. So, you shoved them aside.

In December of '89, Matt accepted a job that meant relocating out of state. By then, your relationship had lost its spark, of course, except for the one area where it still managed to flicker - the bedroom. You both knew it was time to let go, the idea of a long distance romance wasn't practical when the only thing holding you together required physical proximity you would no longer share.

Despite it being the obvious choice - the end of nearly two years together was tough, but as the saying goes, when one door closes, another opens. With Matt no longer in the picture, your calendar quickly filled with late nights and laughter, surrounded by Robin, Steve, Eddie, and your ever expanding social circle. It was the start of a new era, as you entered the new decade. 

"These fatal fantasies / Giving way to labored breath / Taking all of me / We've already done it in my head / If it's make believe / Why does it feel like a vow / We'll both uphold somehow?"

Four months into being single, and the dry spell was becoming a cruel joke. Every date you'd been on had left much to be desired, as none of them ever ended with you on your back. Ultimately a waste of your time. 

It was an added frustration to be out with Eddie and watch him glide from one partner to the next with such ease. You even found yourself feeling a bit envious of his conquests, because the more time you began spending with him, the more you understood why Matt had his suspicions. 

On quite a few occasions, you caught Eddie's gaze lingering on you. The stolen glances and charged looks sent your heart racing. Gone were the days of pushing these thoughts away. Now, you found yourself indulging in them, late at night, hand between your thighs, wondering if the fantasies might ever become reality. 

“Don’t play dumb, I know you fantasize. You could have me on my back every night.”

One night, after having your friends over for dinner, Eddie decided to stay and chill after Robin and Steve had left. He sprawled on your couch, legs draped over the coffee table, grumbling about the monotony of his recent casual encounters and the lack of sexual chemistry he'd been experiencing.

Eddie looked at you, cutting himself off mid rant, his fingers deftly rolling a blunt. "It's cool if I smoke in here, right? Or d'ya want me to go on the balcony?" 

You hesitated for a moment before nodding. "I don't usually love it, but why not for tonight?"

With a grin, Eddie continued on his ranting as he finished rolling. Lighting the blunt and taking a long drag when he finished his complaint. 

"Okay, but bad sex is more often than not, still enjoyable," you said, in response to his last comment. 

Eddie held out the blunt offering you to take a hit and while normally you’re pretty weary to cross fade, you were feeling adventurous as you grabbed it from his fingers taking a hit. 

"I get what you're saying, but nothing's been like, mind-blowing. I was getting head the other day, and I was literally counting the minutes until it was over. I think it would've been more enjoyable if I'd just taken care of myself." 

You let out a laugh, the smoke escaping in a light cloud. "You think counting maybe prolonged the experience a bit, bud?" Passing the blunt back to Eddie. 

"No, baby, the counting's what got me there." He smirked before taking another hit. 

You rolled your eyes playfully, but his words sparked thoughts of your own dissatisfaction.

The two of you sat there listening to the soft sounds of The Cure album you had on, as you took turns with the blunt. Eddie's gaze didn't leave you, his eyes focused on your lips - the movements of your mouth. The subtle way your lips parted and closed around the blunt had him entranced. 

You were too lost in your own thoughts to notice his staring. "I think this is one of those grass is greener situations. l'd take the bad sex. There's only so much I can satisfy myself, and sometimes I- well, I just want to get railed." The words slipped out before you could fully think them through but as soon as they did, you felt a rush of heat flood your cheeks.

Eddie's eyes widened slightly, a blush of his own creeping onto his face as he exhaled smoke. "Oh sure." You'd always been open about discussing sex, but this was a new level of candor for you and it caught him by surprise. It also made his cock twitch.  

You weren't sure what it was - the alcohol, the pot, the adrenaline from your embarrassment, - but Eddie's complaints mixed with your own dissatisfaction sparked an idea. You set your wine glass down, turned to face him, and criss-crossed your legs on the couch.

Passing what was left of the blunt back, you asked the question that's been on your mind for weeks.

”Eddie… are you attracted to me?" you asked, trying to keep your voice steady despite the flutter in your chest.

"What?" He asked as he put the blunt out.

"Eddie," you pressed. 

He chuckled, the sound a bit shaky. "Everyone thinks you're pretty, you know that."

"That's not what I asked," you countered. "I'm asking if you think I'm like, hot - not just pretty."

A smirk played on Eddie's lips as his eyes scanned over your figure, nodding. “Yeah, you’re hot,” he said, taking a sip of his beer and letting his eyes linger on how the soft fabric of your clothes hugged your chest. Truth be told, he thought you were fucking heaven sent. 

"So why haven't you made a move? I've been single for months." 

"You know me, baby. No attachments. Couldn't have you falling in love with me."

You scoffed. "Really, that's your excuse?"

His gaze met yours, a touch of defensiveness in his eyes. "It's not an excuse. It's just how I am. I don't hook up with friends, it can get messy." 

"Got it," you replied, considering letting it go, but curiosity had taken hold. "Do you ever fantasize about them, though?”

A wry smile appeared on his lips. "Depends on the friend, I guess.”

"Cut the shit, Munson.”

His smile grew. "Alright, yeah. A lot more than I probably should have.”

You leaned in closer, your voice dropping to an intimate whisper. "If it's any consolation, I've fantasized about you a fair bit too.”

"Oh, yeah?" he breathed, his voice huskier than before.

"Mmm-hmm." You shook your head slowly, maintaining eye contact. You noticed the way Eddie's eyes darted down to your lips and then back up to your eyes. 

"What about?" he asked.

"I could tell you," you whispered, "or I could show you.”

Eddie's laughter was shaky as he looked away, running his hand through his hair. "Tempting," he whispered, leaning back and trying to create some distance. His arousal, however, was unmistakable. 

The room fell silent. You could see the inner conflict in his eyes: the struggle between desire and his self imposed boundaries. The sight of Eddie's hard cock straining against his jeans had your pulse quickening more than the conversation had. You felt yourself growing wet, the heat between your thighs demanding attention.

"So even though it's clear we both want this, you're willing to just let it go because of some vague principle?" you asked, frustration tinging your voice.

Eddie's expression grew serious. "I wouldn't want to complicate our friendship just to get off.”

"And if I promised you it wouldn't complicate anything, that nothing would have to change - it would just be a good time?”

His breath hitched at your words, his eyes soaking in your presence. "Then... maybe I’d rethink some things."

You sighed, acknowledging his hesitation but also feeling the urgency of your own desire whether Eddie joined you or not.

“Well, you think about that,” you said, standing up and heading toward your bedroom. “You’re welcome to join me if you decide you’re in. If you decide to leave, the spare key is by the door. Just lock up and I’ll get it next time.” You closed the door behind you

Eddie sat on the couch contemplating for all of 5 minutes before his decision was made. Of course he wasn't going to let this moment pass him by. He stood up, his mind racing as he walked toward your room.   

When Eddie opened the door, he found you lying in bed, bathed in the amber glow of your lamp, only in your panties. You were lost in your own pleasure, hand moving beneath the fabric, eyes closed tight as breathy moans escaped your lips. 

"Fuck," Eddie muttered under his breath, his gaze locked on the scene before him. He froze, taking in every detail. The gentle, desperate movements of your fingers, the soft sway of your breasts, and the way your lips formed an O with every soft whimper. He was mesmerized.

He moved closer, cautious not to disrupt the moment. You whispered his name, soft and needy. "Eddie..."

The sound of your voice, so vulnerable and inviting, was nearly enough to push him over the edge. He groaned, a deep, guttural sound that came from the very core of his being. As he stood at the end of the bed, your eyes fluttered open, taking in his presence.

You kept your eyes locked on him, focusing on his face, the way his gaze was fixed on you.

Looking at you like this, made him feel as if he was witnessing the eighth wonder of the world. "What are you thinking of?" Eddie asked, needing to understand what was driving you.

"That this is your hand instead of mine, just like l've been imagining for weeks," you admitted, voice trembling slightly.

Eddie's breath hitched. "Can I see all of you?" he asked, desperation lacing his voice as he sat on the edge of the bed. 

You nodded, slowly sliding your panties down your legs and tossing them aside, revealing your glistening cunt. You returned your hand, teasing yourself gently. Eddie's eyes were fixed on you, the sight almost too much for him to bear, a low whimper escaping his lips.

"How would you touch me, if it were your fingers?" you asked, voice a seductive whisper.

Eddie slid up from his spot on the edge of the bed, closer to your side, as he began directing you on how he would pleasure you, eyes glued to your movements. "I'd start by gently tracing my fingers, just like you are now."

You whimpered as he continued his instructions, caught between the fantasy he was describing and the reality of your own touch. His guidance was driving you wild, but the need for his direct touch was growing unbearable. Breathlessly, you said, "Eddie, please."

“Tell me what you need,” he rasped, his eyes locked on yours. 

“Touch me,” you pleaded.

Eddie knew what you meant; you wanted him to replace your fingers - but he needed to kiss you and at the vague request for his touch he couldn't help but use that as his cue. He leaned in, his body hovering over yours, cupping your cheek and pulling you into a kiss. The kiss was rough, and raw as if years of restrained longing were unleashed in that heated moment. His lips were demanding, his tongue wrestled with yours, the taste of beer mixing with moscato. You bit his lip and Eddie’s groan was deep. 

His free hand found its way to your thigh, gripping it tightly, driving you further into your own touch. The intensity of his actions only heightened your pleasure. You gasped into his mouth as your climax hit. Eddie’s grip on your thigh never letting up as you clung to him, struggling to steady yourself through your orgasm. 

As the waves began to subside, you whispered raggedly, “I need you.”

Eddie trailed his hand from your thigh to your cunt, only for you to stop his hand. “No. I need more, I need you inside of me. Now.” 

Eddie groaned at your desperate plea for him to fill you. Without a word, he began undressing. His breathing was labored as he quickly removed his shirt, tossing it aside. He fumbled with his jeans, eager and clumsy in his haste to free his hard cock. When he finally did, you let out an audible gasp, taking in the sight of him. He was so fucking perfect.

“How do you want it, baby?” He asked, eager to give you anything you’d ask for. 

“What have you fantasized about?”

Eddie hesitated, “We don’t have to -”

“Tell me,” you demanded. 

“You, um, you’ve got great tits,” he all about moaned. “I think about you riding me a lot.”

The words were barely out of his mouth before you pushed him back to lean against the pillows, a sly smile on your lips. You reached for a condom from the nightstand, tearing open the wrapper with a quick, practiced motion, and rolled it over his throbbing cock. Eddie’s eyes followed your every move, sighing at your touch. 

With a deep, steadying breath, you positioned yourself above him. Your hands rested on the headboard while his hands gripped your thighs, his fingers digging in as he watched you. Slowly, you began to lower yourself, the initial contact making both of you gasp. The incredible stretch of his cock stung as he you lowered yourself down inch by inch. It was almost overwhelming, but so perfectly pleasurable. Eddie’s eyes widened, his breath coming in quick, ragged bursts. 

“Fuck,” he said through gritted teeth. His hands tightened on your thighs, reminding you just how much he wants this.

You continued to sink down, savoring the sensation of being filled. Once fully seated, you paused to adjust, getting accustomed to his size. Eddie wasn’t the longest you’d ever had, but by no means was he small. Close to 7 inches if you had to guess. He was however, the thickest not by an absurd amount but enough to notice the  difference. He felt phenomenal. 

You began to move, lifting yourself slightly before sinking back down. The room began filling with the sound of your mingled moans. As you established a steady rhythm, Eddie’s moans grew more frequent, his grip sure to leave bruises. “Fuuuuuck,” he repeated, his voice rough with pleasure.

You shifted from leaning forward to putting your full weight on him, arching your back slightly as you moved your hands from the headboard to behind you, resting them on his thighs. In this position, you had better control and began to increase your pace.

“Aghh - just like that,” Eddie groaned. “Show me how much you want it." Eddie’s eyes were locked on you, taking in every detail - the bounce of your breasts, the flush on your cheeks, the intense pleasure on your face. You looked stunning.

He moved his hands to your breasts, groaning as he squeezed them gently. He adjusted himself so he was sitting up, his hands moving to roam over the rest of your body as he began kissing your skin. He started at your collarbone and moved along your chest until he reached your left breast. Kissing and nipping at the soft skin before enveloping your nipple into his mouth and sucking gently. You shuddered at the added stimulation, moving to rest your hands on his shoulder for better stability as he moved his mouth to your right nipple. 

You were finding it hard to keep quiet, biting your lip to stifle your moans as the combination of his mouth and the fullness of his cock drove you closer to ecstasy.

Eddie, however, was having none of that. Removing his mouth from you chest, “Don’t hold back," he rasped. "Let the whole fucking building know how good it feels to have my cock inside you.”

You let yourself moan freely, the sounds echoing in the room as you quickened your pace.

"Ooooohhh god,” you cried out as your orgasm began to build. 

You swirled your hips, adding a tantalizing motion that made Eddie mumble curses of pleasure. His hands moved to your hips, gripping firmly as he reclined against the pillows. You leaned forward with him, placing your arms on his chest for support as you rode him with increased intensity.

“Such a good girl,” Eddie said in awe, his eyes locked on you as you chased your orgasm. The praise spurred you on, and you let out a loud cry. Eddie’s lips curled into a wry smile as he watched you, clearly enjoying the effect his words had on you.

“You like that, huh?” he teased, his voice dripping with satisfaction.

You whimpered a feeble “yes,” your voice barely audible as you tried to keep up with the intense pleasure.

“Thought you might,” he chucked. “Be the good girl that you are and cum for me,” Eddie instructed.

That was all it took. Your hips began to falter as your orgasm ripped through you, sending your body into a shuddering climax. Eddie’s groans of satisfaction grew louder as he watched you come undone on top of him. He gripped your hips tightly, taking over control and thrusting into you with a fierce rhythm, pushing you seamlessly into another orgasm.

As you came down, your body collapsed against Eddie's, still trembling from the aftermath of your third orgasm. Tears gathered at the corners of your eyes, the intensity of the pleasure overwhelming you. Eddie, sensing your exhaustion, slowed his thrusts, his hands gently tangling in your hair as he lifted your face to look at him.

“Shit Eds” you whispered, your voice barely audible. “I don’t know if I can come again.” 

Eddie’s lips curled into a mischievous smile, his eyes gleaming with determination. “Sure you can, baby. You haven’t even gotten what you wanted yet,” he said, pressing a soft kiss to your cheek before repositioning you both.

The sudden loss of him inside you made you whimper, the emptiness leaving you desperate to be filled again. Eddie lifted you, placing you on your knees, and then knelt behind you. His hands took hold of your hips, and he lined himself up with your entrance before thrusting into you with a forceful, deep motion. The immediate fullness made you moan, the new position allowing him to penetrate you more deeply and hit your g-spot perfectly with every thrust.

“Fuck, oh fuck,” you cried out, your voice raw with pleasure as he continued to thrust into you with a relentless rhythm.

“This is what you wanted, right baby? To get railed?” Eddie asked, his voice a deep, gravelly whisper. His hands squeezed the flesh of your ass as he drove into you.

“Yes!” you cried out. “Please Eddie, harder,” tears streaming down your face.  He responded by pounding into you just as you asked. 

Leaning forward, Eddie kissed the skin along your back, his teeth grazing your flesh with gentle bites, adding another layer of sensation. Your hands gripped the sheets tightly, knuckles white from the strain, as desperate cries of pleasure fell from your lips. His left hand slipped between your legs, fingers finding your clit and rubbing it frantically.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck, don’t stop,” you moaned, your voice trembling with need. Eddie’s fingers worked your clit with determined precision, the added stimulation making it clear you were about to lose it.

As the pleasure built to its peak, you screamed his name, your body shaking uncontrollably as you came. Eddie’s grip on you tightened, his thrusts never faltering as he felt you clenching around him.

“There it is,” he moaned, his voice filled with satisfaction as he felt you coming undone. Your mascara ran down your cheeks in streaks, merging with your tears as you reached the height of your pleasure. Eddie continued to pound into you as your orgasm subsided, savoring the way you responded to him.

He was relentless, driven by his own need to reach his climax. He removed his hand from your clit,  gripping your hips firmly as he thrusted into you with increased force. “I want you to cum with me,” he growled.

You cried out, your voice filled with desperation. "I-I ahhh..." Your words were swallowed by your moans as Eddie kept thrusting. 

"You can do it," he encouraged, his voice low and steady. "I know you can."

Eddie's thrusts grew more intense, his rhythm never faltering as he drove you toward another climax. His hands gripped your hips tighter, his own breath coming in ragged bursts as he neared his release.

"Atta girl," Eddie growled. His thrusts grew sloppy, driven by the raw intensity of the moment. You clenched around him, surrendering to the pleasure as euphoria washed over you. The sensation was all -consuming, a final, powerful climax that left you gasping.

Eddie's own climax hit hard. He let out a string of moans, his body shuddering as it hit. His thrusts became erratic, his grip on your ass tightening as he rode out his release.

Eddie collapsed beside you, both of you breathing heavily, basking in the afterglow. The intensity of the night had left you feeling dizzy and euphoric, your body still tingling from multiple orgasms - five mind blowing orgasms, to be exact. The most you’d ever had with a partner before was three - and while still sensational it was nothing compared to this. Making it clear that Eddie Munson was the best fuck you’ve ever had.

As you started to come down, you glanced over at Eddie. He was staring at the ceiling, his face a mix of disbelief and deep thought. "Eddie, what's going on in that pretty head of yours?"

"Can I level with you?" he asked, his voice serious.

"Of course," you replied.

"It's pretty obvious that what we just had was too good to be a one-off," he said, his eyes meeting yours. "And it's not going to be easy to just go back like this never happened. I mean, I can't just pretend I don't know you've got a praise kink." He teased. 

"Eddie!" You laughed, giving him a playful nudge.

"I'm only half kidding. I clocked that shit when I tried to teach you guitar, this just confirmed it," he admitted with a grin.

You rolled your eyes, a smirk on your lips. “So, what's your point?"

He shifted, propping himself up on one elbow and looking at you seriously. “If you can handle keeping it casual, I think we should do this again.”

“Fucking hell, Munson didn't we address this on the couch? I wanted to fuck you, I'm not in love."

Eddie laughed. “Right, I know. But sometimes it can lead to that, and I just want to make sure you understand if we continue to hook up it will never be anything but physical. I can never offer you more, is that clear?" 

You grinned. “Crystal. 

"So, friends with benefits?” He asked. 

You nodded, a smile tugging at your lips as your eyes locked with his. 

"It's a Sexually Explicit Kind of Love Affair" 

Two months had passed since you and Eddie established your friends-with-benefits arrangement, and you had both adhered to a set of rules: open communication, no exclusivity, and keeping things private. Your frequent hookups had become a thrilling part of your routine, each encounter more intense than the last, and quite a few that were unforgettable. 

Fucked You in the Bathroom When We Went to Dinner:  The two of you went to dinner with your friends to celebrate Vicky’s birthday. Amid the celebrations, you and Eddie shared knowing glances across the table and when the opportunity arose, you both slipped away, heading towards the restaurant's bathroom.

As soon as the door closed behind you, Eddie's hands were on you, pulling you close. He pressed your back against the wall, as his lips found yours in a rough kiss. His mouth began trailing along your jaw as you you reached down to unbuckle his belt. Eddie's pants were down around his knees, his hands hiking your dress up, growling when he saw you had no panties on. You lifted your leg, resting it on the sink, back still pressed to the wall as Eddie wasted no time before guiding himself into you. Your hands immediately threading through his hair as he sunk in. 

Eddie's thrusts were urgent and desperate. "Fuck, can’t get enough of you," Eddie gasped, his breath hot against your neck. 

You could only respond with a series of breathless moans. The pleasure building rapidly as Eddie's movements grew more intense. His hands gripped your hips firmly,  holding you in place as he drove into you. 

Your climax was approaching quickly, and you couldn't help but let out shrieks of pleasure. Eddie's hand reluctantly coming to cover your mouth to stifle the sounds. He loved hearing you, but not here. 

“Shh, baby. I know." He whispered feeling you beginning to clench around him. You bit the palm of his hand to stop the scream that was desperate to escape you as your climax hit. His thrusts growing erratic as he came with you, burying his face in your neck, his breaths coming in ragged gasps.

As you both caught your breath, you quickly adjusted your clothes, and you fixed Eddie's hair. You walked out first heading back to the table. Eddie arrived a few minutes later, drink in his hand as if he had been at bar the whole time, a satisfied smirk on his lips as he sat down.  

Knee Deep in the Passenger Seat: It'd been a lively evening out at the bar playing pool with Chrissy, Eddie and his bandmates. You were keenly aware of the effect your outfit was having on Eddie as you'd chosen a particularly short skirt that barely covered your lacy black panties if you moved too much. So each time you bent over to take a shot, your underwear was tantalizingly visible. 

As you lined up for another shot, Eddie approached, leaning in close.  To any onlookers it would seem like he was giving you a tip to make your shot. "You're such a fucking tease," he murmured, his breath warm against your ear.

You turned your head slightly, catching his eye with a sly grin. "I know, but you love it," you whispered back. 

Eddie's gaze was fixed on you as he walked back to his spot against the wall. As you knelt over the table to take your shot, a smirk tugged at your lips knowing he was clearly struggling to focus on anything other than the view you were providing. 

If Eddie could have had his way, he would have sunk to his knees right there and ate you out while you were bent over that pool table. But patience is a virtue. 

As you turned to face him after landing your shot, you knew he was trying to maintain his composure.

When it was time to leave, Eddie offered to take you home.  "Chris, I’ve got her. I pass her apartment on my way home anyway.” While that was true, you knew that wasn't his plan.

As you walked out, Eddie's eyes never left you, his gaze focused on the way your hips swayed with each step. When you reached the van, he opened the passenger door for you and you slid into the seat, feeling his intense gaze on you. 

As you settled in your seat, you looked at Eddie who was still standing next to you. A sly grin pulling at his lips, as he stepped in. You were confused until he knelt down on the floor in front of you, shutting the door. His expression one of eagerness.

With his hands now gripping your thighs, he pushed your skirt up, his fingers brushing against your skin. "I've been wanting to taste you all fucking night," he hummed, his voice low and filled with need. 

You looked down at him, a teasing smirk on your lips. "Aw look at you, did I tease you so much that you can't even wait?"

Eddie’s big doe eyes, looked a lot less innocent in this position, darkening at your words. Hunger written all over his face. 

In an instant he pulled your panties to the side, leaning forward so his head was nestled between your thighs. His tongue making contact with your bare slit, with a tantalizing slow lick. You gasped at the feeling. Eddie moaned against your pussy, "You taste so goddamn good,” his voice vibrating through your core. 

The moment his tongue touched your clit, he was relentless, alternating between licking and sucking. Your eyes rolling in the back of your head as he savored you. 

Within just a few short minutes you were a moaning mess, hands tangled in his hair, breath ragged, eyes screwed tight as you could feel yourself on the brink of your orgasm. Then suddenly, Eddie pulled away. Your release immediately ripped away from you. 

His face flushed and glistening with your essence, looked up at you with a smirk. “Look at that, I can be just as much of a tease as you," he rasped.

You whined at the loss of contact. "Please, Eddie.” 

“You’ll have to wait, baby.” He said, readjusting your underwear and skirt, wiping his mouth as he dipped out of the van and walked to the drivers side.

Truth be told, this was just as upsetting for him as it was for you. You were intoxicating and if he was being honest he’d love nothing more than to continue to devour your sweet cunt until you came all over his tongue - multiple times. But he thought it only fair that you feel the same strain that he had all night. He’d make it worth the wait when he got you to his trailer. 

You're on your knees, I'm on the case: You had the day off, so what better way than to spend it in Eddie's bed. When you arrived at his trailer, he answered the door shirtless, wearing only boxers with a towel draped over his shoulder.

"I'm about to shower," Eddie said, ushering you inside and closing the door behind you. "I'll be out soon. Feel free to watch TV, the remote's on the table."

As Eddie went to shower, you settled on his couch, finishing up the episode of Seinfeld that was on. After about ten minutes, you began to get restless.

You could hear the shower running, steam cascading into the hall because Eddie didn't shut the door completely. You made your way to the bathroom, knocking on the door to let him know you were there as you walked in. 

"Be out in a second, just gotta rinse my hair."

"Mind if I join ya instead?" 

There was a brief pause before he responded, a hint of amusement in his voice. "Sure, come on in."

You quickly undressed and slipped into the shower the steam enveloping you. You were facing Eddie as the water was cascading down his hair. Some droplets hitting your body, as Eddie glanced over you with a grin. 

You gave him a playful smirk before immediately dropping to your knees, positioning yourself in front of his hardening cock. Eddie's eyes locked onto you, filled with anticipation.

Without hesitation, you took him into your mouth, the warmth of the water mingling with the heat of your breath. Eddie's response was immediate. His breath hitched, at the feeling. "Ahhh," he grunted, his voice thick with pleasure. 

You began to move, sliding your lips up and down his length with practiced ease. Eddie's hands gripped the shower bar for support, his fingers tightening as he struggled to maintain his composure.

"Holy Shit," he gasped, his voice strained with pleasure. "You're so good, that feels so fucking good." 

You continued your rhythm, your mouth and tongue working him expertly. Eddie's groans grew louder, the pleasure clearly overwhelming him. "Oh god, yes," he panted, his hips thrusting gently to match your movements. 

The water continued to cascade around you both, mingling with the sounds of Eddie's pleasure as you pushed him closer to the edge. "Don't stop, baby" he urged, his voice breaking. "I'm gonna cum."

With a final, deep stroke, Eddie came hard. You kept your mouth on him, sucking every drop as he moaned and gasped, his hands gripping the shower wall for dear life bracing himself.

His face was flushed, a mix of steam and sweat glistening on his skin. He looked down at you with awe and satisfaction. "You're fucking amazing," he said, his voice barely a whisper.

You stood up, and Eddie cupped your face, capturing your lips in a heated kiss. As your mouths moved together ,his cock began hardening again, ready for round two in his room.

"I know, "Baby, No Attachment!"

As the months passed the frequency of your encounters with Eddie had evolved beyond merely getting off. At first you considered that it was just your friendship deepening, but as time went on, you couldn't help but feel that these interactions between you were teetering the line of something more. 

Eddie's band practices had effortlessly blended into your weekly routine. “Want to come to practice again?” he’d ask, flashing a grin. The first time he invited you, you joked about whether he had a fantasy of hooking up in Gareth’s garage or something. Eddie only laughed and said, “Nah, I just figured you might enjoy hearing us play and I thought it’d be nice to have you there.” Of course you went, and enjoyed every second of it, maybe even more than the shows. Seeing Eddie perform offstage, goof around with his bandmates, and brainstorm new arrangements was incredibly fun to witness.

By the third week into attending practice, Eddie offered another invitation. “Want to come with me to visit Wayne this Sunday?” he asked one afternoon. You hadn’t seen Wayne since he left Eddie the trailer, and although the invite surprised you, you agreed. Wayne’s warm hospitality was a delight, and seeing Eddie with his uncle gave you a new insight into his life - it felt special he shared it with you. 

You began noticing more changes in your own habits. Instead of going to social events alone, you often opted to ride with Eddie. Your weekend hookups had bloomed into near everyday occurrences, leading you to spend a lot more time at his trailer, as it offered much more privacy than your apartment - Eddie and you were rather loud. Eddie's loud anyway, but when he's inside you he doesn't shut up. Always talking you through it, telling you how good you're making him feel and he loves hearing what he does to you, so you never hold back. 

On more than a few occasions you’d accidentally fallen asleep over there, and eventually Eddie just began inviting you to stay the night in the first place. Gradually, your personal items like a toothbrush, a few changes of clothes, and your favorite books made their way over. You were there so often that it was shifting from a convenient arrangement to something that felt more like a shared space.

The boundaries you’d set were being tested, and it was becoming harder to maintain the pretense that this was purely physical. The line between attraction and emotional connection was blurring, and although Eddie had always insisted that this arrangement was meant to stay casual, his actions seemed to contradict that. In those soft moments with him, at practice or Wayne's, or when you were lying in his bed wrapped up in his arms after another incredible fuck, you found yourself dreaming of more and every time you did you'd think back to Matt's insistence that there was something between you and Eddie. Back then you thought it was Matt's jealously, eventually giving way that it was underlying attraction but now like this you can't help but think maybe there has always been more simmering between you both. 

You didn't dare say it though, you wanted to remain the “chill girl” who didn’t push. But the more time that passed the more you felt caught between holding your tongue and addressing the growing complexity of the situation.  

"It's fine, it's cool, you can say that we're nothing but you know the truth." 

The summer heat was beginning to wane as you and Eddie arrived at Steve’s Labor Day party. 

You were enjoying yourself, chatting with Nancy when you overheard a conversation nearby. Eddie was talking to Chrissy, who had just referred to you and he as a couple. 

“Oh, no, we’re not together,” Eddie said, a dismissive edge in his voice as he responded. The words hit you like a slap. You knew what you had signed up for, but it still stung, especially when the lines had been blurring for months. 

You attempted to shake it off, focusing on the friends around you. However, as the evening wore on, the frustration you felt was hard to ignore. Eddie’s behavior had been increasingly confusing. And this comment felt like the final straw - if your friends could see it, why couldn't he? 

When the party ended, Eddie drove you back to his trailer with Metallica blasting through the speakers. The music did little to ease the anger you were feeling. 

Once inside the trailer, Eddie reached out his hands gripping your waist, as his lips found yours. The kiss felt good, almost intoxicating, but your anger quickly reclaimed its hold as the words "we're not together" echoed in your mind.

You pulled back, needing a moment to regain your composure. Eddie’s eyes searched yours, confusion in his gaze. “What’s wrong, baby?” he asked softly.

"I'm not really feeling it right now,” you said firmly, pulling away from his touch. "I think I'm going to head home actually." 

Eddie’s face fell for a moment before a small smile played at his lips. "You don't need to go, stay the night. We can watch a movie."

A few months ago, this invitation would have felt like a friendly gesture. After all, the beauty of a ‘friends with benefits’ arrangement is that it starts with a foundation of friendship. But tonight it was just a bitter reminder of how these nights have morphed into something much more complex. At the start of your arrangement, movie nights often transitioned from watching the film to fucking until the credits rolled. This felt natural, expected. But now the dynamic of movie nights has grown significantly more intimate; cuddling on the couch, Eddie softly playing with your hair, and gentle kisses between scenes. All gestures that are only typical in, well - relationships. You've had enough. 

"Eddie, are you being avoidant or are you truly oblivious to what's going on?" 

Eddie’s brow furrowed. “Wait, what? What are you talking about?"

"Us. This," you said, gesturing between the two of you. "It feels different, and it has for a while now." You took a deep breath, struggling to steady your voice. "Eddie, even our friends notice it."

"This is about Chrissy's comment?" he asked, annoyance seeping into his voice.

"You were so quick to dismiss it."

"We're not a couple, so that probably has something to do with it," he said, with a laugh, his irritation evident. "What was I supposed to say?"

You gave him a short nod, as you began to gather your things. "It's not even about what you said, it's about what you're not saying." 

The frustration was evident on Eddie's face. "I thought we were both on the same page about this," he said, following you.

"Dammit, Eddie," you turned towards him, your voice rising. "We were, but it’s hard to feel like we’re still casual when my favorite bra lives in your dresser!"

Eddie’s expression shifted, a flicker of guilt crossing his face, but he still held his ground. "From the start, I told you I don’t do relationships. I never promised you anything more than what we agreed on."

You scoffed. “I know, and that’s exactly why I’ve kept my mouth shut for so long. But you’ve pulled me into every aspect of your life, and it’s not the same anymore. If you weren’t so hung up on that concept, maybe you’d admit what you’re feeling.”

“Don’t," he said sternly. "Don't try and make me out to be the bad guy because you couldn't keep your own feelings in check.”

His words felt like a punch in your gut. You could feel the lump take perch in throat, trying to swallow it back but the tears were coming. 

Eddie’s expression softened as he noticed your your eyes glistening. He watched helplessly as you continued to pack, his frustration morphing into anguish as tears streamed down your face. "Wait,” he pleaded. "Let's talk, we can take a step back."

Your hands shook as you stuffed your clothes into your bag, sobs coming in ragged, painful gasps. “A step? We'd have to take twenty." you choked out, your voice breaking. 

Eddie looked away, struggling to reconcile your pain with his own fears. "I just, I'm sorry I confused you. I didn’t mean to give you the wrong idea."

"Maybe you didn't intend for things to change, but they did. We both let them. I did because I liked it, why did you Eddie?" 

His stomach twisted at your words.

 “Every rule we set, you broke," you continued, bitterness lacing your voice. "It was all ‘let’s keep it discreet’ until you kissed me between songs at practice. What the fuck was that?! ‘We need open communication,’ but you never talked about any line we crossed." Your voice rose despite your sobs. "For fucks's sake Eddie, we haven't been exclusive yet for six months, you’ve called after me! Going as far as turning down others because you want me in your bed. Whether we fuck or we don't."

Eddie stood still, motionless, as the weight of your words sunk in.

"You can try to downplay this all you want, but deep down you know. And it's why your past hookups could never satisfy you the way I do.” Tears streamed down your face as you glared at Eddie.

He just stood there, hit with the reality of your words. The silence grew heavy as he struggled to find a response.

"I don't know what you want me to say. I can’t just flip a switch and become something I’m not. I made my stance clear from the beginning." His voice wavering as he spoke. 

You shook your head in disappointment. "Got it." Your tears fell harder, and Eddie’s own eyes were on the verge of tears as he watched you zip up your bag.

“Baby,” he started, his voice trembling as he reached out a hand towards you. 

“Don’t, Eddie,” you scolded, your voice a harsh whisper. “You don't wanna call it love, fine. But it's done." 

Eddie’s face twisted in confusion and frustration as you finished speaking. He seemed to get only a fraction of what you were saying. "Okay, okay," he said, his voice cracking with desperation. "We'll just go back to how it was before. I mean, we can just forget about all this..." 

"You're not getting it, Eds" you replied, your voice steady despite the tears. "I can’t be your friend.” 

Eddie’s face contorted with panic. "No, don’t say that," he pleaded, his voice trembling. "I’m sorry I led you on. We can go back - just like it was. We can fix this." Tears welling up as he tries to grasp what you're saying. 

"Eddie, it wasn't just that. This whole thing between us has made me realize that maybe… maybe I had feelings for you long before we hooked up."

Eddie's face pales, his panic escalating as he tries to comprehend what you're saying. "What the fuck is happening right now?" he says, his voice rising in distress. He collapses onto the couch, his body shaking as the gravity of the situation hits him full force.

"Before we, before this, you said you didn't," he mutters, almost to himself, as he tries to reconcile your words with his memories. 

"I didn’t realize it then," you admit, your voice breaking. 

Eddie’s face was wet with his own tears now, his hands trembling as he held his face, taking in your words.  

"I never would’ve let anyone else call me a nickname I hated. Anyone else’s persistence would’ve been stopped but it just sounded so pretty coming from your mouth..." Your voice was choked with emotion. “And I think being honest with myself about that, along with everything we’ve been doing... I've realized that maybe I was  being a fool to think it was ever just attraction."

Eddie breaks down, his tears flowing freely. "Goddammit" he chokes out, his voice thick with regret.  “I can't-"

You cut him off knowing what he was going to say. "I know Eds, you've made it clear," your voiced cracked sobs breaking through the words. "You were right to worry this would get messy, I'm sorry I told you I could handle it." You took a deep breath and looked at him one last time, the ache in your chest almost unbearable. You slung your bag over your shoulder, heading for the door.  "I'd probably do it again though." You whispered. 

"I don't want to lose you,” he said, his voice wavering as he tried to hold back his emotions.

You paused, your heart aching with the weight of his words. "I have to go," you said finally. With one final glance at Eddie, you turned and walked out of the trailer.

“You just need a better life than this / You need somethin' I can never give”

Eddie’s tears fell uncontrollably as you left.  Watching you walk away was like a rift tearing through time and space, an unbearable ache that pierced his soul. 

His mind spiraled in a loop, like a broken record that kept repeating the same line: It was a mistake. He knew better, he knew better than to get involved with you, but he had, and now you were gone. Eddie had wanted to believe that you could handle something casual, he risked it because he had an insatiable hunger that only you had satiated. His own denial ran so deep he hadn’t even fully accepted the magnitude of what was happening between the two of you until your words hit him like a freight train tonight. But as Eddie sat there, drenched in regret, his mind wandered to all things you. 

Eddie had always been branded the freak for being a little outside the box, and while he stayed true to himself it was always a bit toned down when he met new people. However when he met you, he knew he didn't have to do that.  While you could fit neatly into the box, you didn't care to. Eddie was instantly captivated by you, and it wasn't just because you were stunning - it was your wit, and charm that pulled him in. 

He could never forget the first day he realized he wanted to kiss you. It was one of the early times you hung out - that night you were complaining about "Dirty Dancing." You just kept rambling - so comically irritated, he found it hilarious and he wanted to just shut you up with his lips. He couldn't help himself coining, "Baby" for you. It had felt right rolling off his tongue, and even though you shot him an annoyed look, he could’ve sworn he saw a hint of a smile. Eddie then proceeded to try and get you to reenact the lift scene from the movie, but you refused with a firm “Fuck no, Munson.” Robin wouldn't either, but Steve, high as a kite, agreed. Of course it ended with them flat on the floor and the four of you laughing your asses off. For whatever reason that night marked a turning point for your friendship - the two of you began spending time together outside of your shared circle. It was always a little touchy, a little flirty and Eddie was constantly having to push the urge to kiss you outside of his mind. 

Steve was always trying to persuade Eddie to just go for it, but Eddie wasn’t interested. He typically only hooked up with the same person three times - if ever more than once. He feared that if he ever got involved with you he wouldn’t be able to go back, and commitment was something he wasn't into. Fast forward three years and nothing's changed. Still, one night around two years ago he nearly let his guard down. 

A group of you had gathered at a nearby bar before Corroded Coffin’s first paid show at The Hideout.

“Let me buy a round for you guys, a little liquid courage before tonight!" you insisted. Gareth joked that it wasn't necessary when they had Eddie's good luck charm - You. “Is that why you keep me around, Munson?” you teased, planting a playful kiss on his cheek. “For a little extra luck,” you said with a wink and a smile before heading to the bar. In that moment, Eddie was certain he had to kiss you. 

When you returned with a round of tequila shots, your cheeks flushed and your smile bright, you explained that the handsome guy at the bar; Matt - asked you out and then proceeded to buy the round of shots for you when you'd said yes.

As Jeff raised his shot and toasted, "To Matt!" Eddie looked at you, realizing that it was better this way. It would have been foolish to kiss you. You deserved someone who could offer you more. 

Eddie’s mind whirled, jumping from that almost kiss to the fateful night on your couch. He should've went home because from that moment everything changed. You were sensational, the way your body responded to him, the way you sounded, the way you made him feel. He was right to know himself, that after a taste, he would never want to go without. He was selfish for this.

The past 6 months together Eddie had recognized little shifts, but he'd ignored them. Looking back it was probably June when things first began to change from the raw thrill of a good time to something that hinted at a little more intimacy. Your presence had turned his bed into a sacred oasis, where he felt truly seen and understood. The laughter, the warmth, the touch - it was all part of a connection he cherished. Yet, every time it felt like it was too much, he would push it out his head, trying to drown out the truth that he felt something more. Even if he wanted to risk all for you, he couldn’t. He wasn’t good enough to make you his.

This painful realization was a truth he had to face. His fear of inadequacy and his belief that he couldn’t sustain a meaningful relationship had driven a wedge between you. And now, with you gone, he was left grappling with the reality that he had pushed away the one person who had made him question his own defenses. Sitting on his couch, a headache pounding from his tears, he tried to sleep, searching for some sort of peace.

In the weeks that followed, Eddie rarely visited his bedroom. It was a space tainted by your absence. His home felt hollow, so he picked up extra shifts at the diner, and crashed at Gareth’s when he could. He thought about reaching out to you, admitting you were right, that he loved you too, but he knew it wouldn’t change a fucking thing. He still couldn’t give you what you wanted. He wasn’t ready for a relationship, not when he didn’t believe he was enough.

You deserved the best, and Eddie didn’t think he was that. He was still  a pot dealer,  bussing tables to make ends meet and for some free food, just dreaming of a future with his band...

Eddie had been so absorbed in the band that he had drifted from the usual social circle. The only time he’d seen Steve and Robin since your departure was after one of his show the last weekend in September. They had approached him, and Eddie, looking weary and regretful, had apologized for not being around much. He wanted desperately to ask about you - God, he did - but he struggled to find the right words.

When Steve and Robin happened to mention they hadn’t heard from you either, Eddie’s heart sank. You were probably avoiding them, likely to keep from running into him. Steve, with a knowing look, asked if the two of you had gotten involved. Eddie gave a brief, vague answer that painted a picture of your arrangement without exposing too much. 

“Maybe try reaching out to her though.” He suggested. 

 Robin nodded solemnly. “Of course,” she replied, understanding the complexity of the situation without needing more.

The days blurred into weeks as Eddie threw himself into his band, trying to escape the gnawing emptiness and the haunting memory of you. Each gig was an  escape, but it never lasted. The real struggle was coming home to an empty space, a home without the one person who had made everything feel right. 

“Back when we were still changin' for the better / Wanting was enough / For me, it was enough" 

It was the kind of night that makes you want to crawl into bed and pull the covers over your head, except you weren’t in bed. You were behind the wheel of your car, heading home after leaving the man that you loved. 

As the tears flowed freely, your mind drifted to the most serious relationships you’d had. Your college boyfriend, your relationship with Matt - both seemed like mere practice compared to what you shared with Eddie. He wasn’t just the best fuck you’d ever had, he was the best person you’d ever known. The thought of never being around him again was agonizing.

Returning to your apartment felt like a warm welcome from an old friend. You had spent nearly all of August entwined in Eddie’s bedsheets, living for the hope that maybe, just maybe, you could have a future together. You uncorked a fresh bottle of Riesling, not even bothering with a glass as you tried to drown out the fact that Eddie was never truly yours.

Weeks after leaving Eddie, the silence was deafening. The ache of not hearing from him, of not knowing how he was, ate at you incessantly. You knew that this was your choice, yet you'd expected some sign - any sign - that he was still there, still thinking of you.

You threw yourself into work, hoping that staying busy would numb the pain. But this came at a price - you isolated yourself from your friends, avoided their calls, and shut yourself off from the world that might remind you of Eddie. When Robin buzzed your intercom one evening, her arrival was a welcome disruption to your self-imposed exile. She stood at your door with pizza and ice cream in hand, a silent understanding in her eyes.

"Hey," she said softly, a warm smile breaking through her concern. "I thought you could use some company."

You invited her in, your heart heavy as you tried to muster a smile. You sat in your living room, as you finally let your emotions spill out. 

Between sobs, you managed to ask, "How is he?"

Robin took a deep breath, clearly choosing her words carefully. "He hasn't been around either, but Steve and I saw him last weekend, he's been busy with the band. They're doing really well - they’re working hard to catch the eye of an A&R rep to help develop them. When we told him we hadn’t heard from you, he briefly explained why that might but, not that I wouldn't have anyway, but he was one that suggested this." 

He had thought of you. That was enough to make you break down again. Robin wrapped her arms around.

“It’s okay," she whispered.

Robin comforted you the rest of the night. Reassuring you that in time it will get better. As Robin was on her way out you told her that while you missed everyone it was just too hard right now, and you needed more time. 

She nodded, understanding. "We’ll be here whenever you’re ready."

As she left, you felt hope amidst the sadness. But even with that hope, you found it difficult to move forward. You almost mustered the courage to attend Jonathan and Nancy’s Halloween party, but after getting dressed, you couldn’t bring yourself to go. A week later, you had plans for lunch with Steve and Chrissy but the nausea of confronting your emotions kept you from following through. It was still too soon to be around the people who reminded you of Eddie, so you stayed away, in your cocoon of sorrow, hoping that someday the pain would ease enough to allow you to step back into your life.

“And from the outside / It looks like you're tryin' lives on / I miss the old ways / You didn't have to change/ But I guess I don't have a say / Now that we don't talk"

It was the second week of November, and you’d decided to go out for drinks with some colleagues. You were at a bar you’d never been to before, located on the other side of town - quite far from the usual spots you and your friends frequented. With the slim chance of running into anyone you knew, you let your guard down and enjoyed the evening. 

You were so engrossed in your conversation that you almost missed it. At first, you thought you’d imagined it, but then you heard it again. Your stomach dropped, and a wave of heat washed over you as you recognized Eddie’s unmistakable voice. Looking around, it was Gareth you spotted first, and as you looked for Eddie, your heart sank. He looked drastically different - his once long hair was now a buzz cut, cigarette hanging out of his mouth, while dressed in a navy striped button-down. His signature leather jacket draped over the back of his chair the only remnant of the man you remembered.

Despite your attempts to refocus on your colleagues, your attention kept drifting back to Eddie and the band. They were celebrating with a round of shots, and you wondered if they were marking a milestone. Since the round of drinks you’d suggested for their first paid gig, you knew they had a tradition of celebrating this way. Your heart sank as you overheard Eddie’s toast: the local station had agreed to start playing their music, and they were promised a small tour around neighboring states in the new year.

Watching the band’s journey over the past three years -  early gigs at house shows to paid gigs at dive bars - you knew you had to say something, not just to Eddie but to all of them. You were proud of their progress, and after witnessing their hard work at countless practices this year, it felt right to acknowledge their accomplishments. And you couldn't deny that it felt a bit like a twist of fate that you both wound up at this bar. 

As your coworkers began wrapping up their night, you excused yourself. You made your way over to the band’s table, your heart racing. As you approached their table, Gareth’s eyes lit up as he saw you.

“Well, look who it is!” Gareth exclaimed, his voice filled with surprise and delight.

Eddie turned, his smile dropped as he took in your presence. 

“Of all the gin joints, you walk into the one I’m in?” you joked, attempting to ease the awkwardness. The band chuckled, and you continued, “I couldn’t help but overhear you guys. I just wanted to come over and say congratulations. I know how hard you’ve all worked.”

The band echoed their gratitude before Gareth suggested you join them. A sudden, overwhelming discomfort gripped you. This was a mistake. Every lingering feeling you had for Eddie was rushing back, and you found yourself struggling to maintain composure. "Oh thank you, but I need to get home” you say, attempting to mask the unease. “But I’m really happy for you all.”

As you start to walk away, Eddie rose from his seat. “Baby, wait" he called out. 

There it was, the nickname only he called you. The one you'd been aching to hear.

You stopped, turning slightly to face him as he reached you. "I um, just wanted to say, thanks for that. I really appreciated you coming to to the table.” 

"Of course." you say softly.

His eyes roam over your figure as he takes in the way your dress fits, and a low, almost involuntary groan escapes him. “Wow, that dress, you.. you look incredible." 

You give him a thankful nod. It hurt you to hear him say that, knowing you'd bought this dress months ago solely with the intention of him taking it off.

"Me? Look at you, you look so.... I don't know. Refined, maybe?"

Eddie raises an eyebrow. “Is that good or…?” 

"Oh y'know you always look good," you reply, trying to keep your voice steady. "But I’d be lying if said the hair didn’t shock me a bit at first,” you admit.

Eddie’s eyes soften, and he responds with a chuckle. “It’s weird for me, still. I haven’t had a buzz cut since middle school. But I just needed... a change.” His words hit you harder than expected, and you feel tears prickling at the corners of your eyes.

You nod, unable to hide your emotion.

He smiles, though it’s tinged with sadness. “I want you to know I thought about reaching out but I wasn't sure...." he trailed off. 

You nodded again, acknowledging the sentiment, a small smile on your lips as you try to swallow the lump forming in your throat. “I really should go, but I am truly so proud of you, Eddie,” you said, your voice wavering. “Ever since I met you, I’ve seen how hard you’ve worked for what you want and I'm so happy that it's paying off."  

The words seemed to break something in him. Instinctively he reached out, wrapping his arms around you, pulling you against his chest. “I’ve missed you,” he breathed into your hair.

You hugged him tightly, tears rolling down your cheeks. “I’ve missed you too,” you whispered back, feeling the warmth and comfort of his embrace. For a moment, it felt like time had stopped, and you wished you could stay there forever. But as much as you wanted to linger, you knew you had to go. You slowly pulled away, forcing a smile through the tears. “I'm really glad I got to see you,” you said softly. 

Eddie looks at you, his gaze lingering as if he’s on the verge of saying something more, but he simply nods. “Me too,” he says quietly. 

“And I’d give up forever to touch you / ‘cause I know that you feel me somehow / you’re the closest that’ll get to heaven that I’ll ever be / and I don’t want to go home right now”

The ride home felt like déjà vu. Another teary-eyed drive to your apartment after walking away from the man you loved.

Once you were home, you sank into the couch. Wrapped in a blanket, tears streamed down your face as The Smiths' The Queen Is Dead album played on the record player. For the 17th of November, the weather was a bit of a mess. It honestly felt poetic, the thunderstorm mirroring the emotions you were feeling. Every crack of thunder echoed your sobs.

About an hour into your pity party, you were starting to regain some composure when the buzz of the intercom startled you. You figured it was your neighbor, who often used the wrong buzzer, so you hit the button to let them in. Just as you were about to lay back in your spot on the couch, you heard a knock at your apartment door. Curious and a bit irritated, you peered through the peephole and froze. It was Eddie, drenched from the rain, with tears streaming down his face. Your heart raced as you swung the door open, and he walked in, shutting the door behind him.

"Eddie," Before you could utter another word, he started rambling.

“What are the fucking odds you’d be at that bar tonight?” he began, his voice breaking. “On a night that was supposed to be a highlight in my life, all I wanted was to share it with you.” His words came out in fractured gasps, his tears mixing with the rain on his face.

“When you said I fought for everything I wanted, it felt like a knife twisting in my chest... because it’s a lie when I let you leave.” His voice cracked, and he struggled to steady himself.

“I should’ve told you this at the bar,” he choked, his tears falling harder now. “It felt like fucking fate that you were there tonight, and I still let you walk away. Again. I'm so sorry for the way things turned out. I should've fought for us. I should've fought for you. I let you go because I couldn’t admit I loved you. Even though you knew - of course fucking you knew - because you see me, all of me. And you’ve loved me through it, even when I didn’t think it was possible.” He buried his face in his hands, wiping his tears and catching his breath.

“I was convinced I wasn’t enough for you,” he continued. “But you wanted me all the same. I’m so sorry, I should’ve called you weeks ago. I’m sorry for being scared I couldn't be what you deserve, but every day without you has been fucking hell.” His breaths came in jagged, broken waves. “I thought I could move on... but the goddamn world would have to stop before I could ever stop feeling this for you. It’s always been you.”

“Eddie,” you breathed.

Eddie stepped forward, his hands cupping your face. “I'm still not sure if I'm the man you deserve, but I'd like to try if you’ll have me.”

You nodded at his words, tears streaming down your face. Leaning in, you pressed your lips to his in a kiss that began tenderly but quickly deepened, fueled by a desperate need to reconnect and erase the distance that had come between you. Your moans mingled as your tongues met, and Eddie's hands tangled in your hair. When you finally pulled apart, both of you breathless, you rested your foreheads together.

“I love you, Eddie Munson,” you whispered.

“I love you so fucking much, baby,” he murmured, placing a kiss on your forehead.

𝐭𝐨𝐩𝐚𝐳, 𝐥𝐢𝐦𝐞, 𝐫𝐮𝐛𝐲 𝐫𝐞𝐝 | 𝐞𝐝𝐝𝐢𝐞 𝐦𝐮𝐧𝐬𝐨𝐧

Eddie has a staring problem that you barely notice, though you share an aching, awful crush. One of you has to bend first, and it’s not who you’d expect. fem, 5k 

ditzy-ish reader, pining eddie, mutual pining, confessions, first kisses, fluff and hugging, idiots in love, mild states of undress

˚‧꒰ა ✮ ໒꒱‧˚

It’s a day fit for a funeral in Hawkins. Rain hammers his bedroom window like hailstones, plinking against the frame, condensation running down the panes in thick rivulets he soaks up with an old t-shirt. 

It’s supposed to be spring time. Green grass, flowers, a gentle humming sun to warm the back of his neck while he sits out on the couch on the porch, a hand-rolled cigarette between his fingers, the tip shimmering with heat. 

But the rain pours. He’s cleaned his room for the first time in a month, at least, and his back aches in the best way as he lays down amongst fresh sheets. His room feels strange when it’s organised, but he doesn’t mind. He pictures the state of it through a second pair of eyes. This is a boy who cares about things, who takes care of them, who could take care of me, too. 

Rain again rackets on the metal roof above. He and Wayne keep a couple hundred bucks stashed for the day the roof flies straight off —they take turns hiding it, because cars break down and groceries get more expensive every year, but god will they need it, and so they safeguard it well. 

He syphoned a little of the money recently with Wayne’s support. It was for a good cause. 

“Jesus,” Eddie murmurs to himself, not tired but feeling dull as the clouds outside eat the remaining sun. 

It’s depressing to be poor, and to lose a day trying to hide the evidence of an entire life in a small room. He could sleep a hundred years. 

He’s just finished pulling the sheets over his shoulder when somebody knocks on the front door. Wayne opens it three rooms away, the sound of the rain doubled. 

He gives a startling shout, “Ed! Your girl!” 

Eddie topples out of bed. Doesn’t mean to, foot caught in the bottom of the sheets and stuck as he scrambles to slide out of the mess. He’s begged Wayne not to call you that when you’re within earshot, but Wayne’s a mean (kind) old bastard (middle aged dad) who wants Eddie dead (happy, and in love). 

“Come on in, girl. You’re soaking.” 

“It’s raining.” 

“It’s pouring down. Did you walk here?” 

“Took my bike. Thought I’d get struck by lightning in the car.” 

“How’d you figure?” 

Eddie goes to grab the door handle and spins on his heel, staggering onto his bed and up against the wall, where a mirrored tray once used by Dio himself for rolling hangs from the wall. He checks his face in the polished surface, his warped mouth and nose, too small eyes, and swears to himself that one day he’ll get a real mirror with a fully-functioning reflective surface. 

Then he hops down off of the bed, causing a reverberation he knows traverses the entirety of the trailer floor. Eddie snatches a rare clean towel from his laundry chair and speeds down the hall. 

“Hello,” he says, more casual than he feels to find you unexpectedly in his house. “You’re soaked.” 

You give a sweet smile. “It’s raining out, did you not know?” 

Your hair is dripping, water racing down the curves of your face to collect at your chin. Eddie can see the smudges of your makeup where it’s washing off as he wraps a towel around you, kohl on your cheeks, eyelashes turned to half-diamonds and sticky-looking. You grin at being covered, taking the towel from his fingers before he can dab you dry. 

“Why didn’t you just call me?”’

“I can never remember if your phone number ends in three or four.” 

“Seven. I wrote it down for you a hundred times.” 

You rub your eyes and spread all manner of glitter and shadow over your skin. You wipe your neck and the glitter spreads like an alien rash. 

When you talk next, you shiver, “I lost it a hundred times, sorry. Is it okay that I'm here?” 

Wayne, who’s been watching with a distinct sense of amusement from the couch, lets out a chesty laugh. “Honey, it’s always okay that you’re here on my account. And it’s my house.” 

“It’s fine.” Eddie turns your shoulder so he can mouth over it without being caught. Asshole. 

Another laugh follows. Eddie would cut each of his fingers from his hand and then his hand from his wrist if it were something Wayne needed him to do, but that doesn’t make him any less of an opportunistic asshole. If there’s a way to fuck with Eddie, he tends to try it. He loves Eddie with all the tenacity of a father who loves his son, but Wayne got infected with little bitch disease or something and Eddie can’t cure it. 

“Can I please wash my face? I didn’t expect to get soaked.” 

“Didn’t you?” He regrets his flippancy quickly, leading you down the hall. “You could take a shower. What do you think?” 

You’ve never showered here, but Eddie’s trying to, you know, date you. Romance you, get to cherish you, however anyone wants to say it. And it’s not a war of attrition, just a natural escalation of sharing, or a minimising of boundaries. 

No, that’s pervy, isn’t it? 

“I mean–” He starts to correct himself. 

You interrupt with your answer, “Yes, please, do you think I could? But I don’t have anything to wear.”

“I have your purple hoodie in my room, and there’s gotta be a pair of sweatpants here that fit you,” he says. 

They’ve got a whole bunch of clothes here that floated in from somewhere else, Eddie’s other friends or stuff they’ve bought by mistake. He’s sure he can find something.

“You have my hoodie?” you ask, black kohl spreading across the towel as you wipe your cheek. 

Eddie only smelled it one time. When he’d realised you left it in his van he brought it in and folded it, waiting for the next time he’d see you to give it back, but that night he’d been getting out of the shower wondering if he could call you or if that was too soon, and your hoodie had been right there. So he stood there in his pyjama pants with his wet hair and he didn’t think about picking your hoodie up, he just did, and when he pressed it to his face it still smelled of your perfume. 

He put it back and felt like a loser for days.

“It’s in my closet, you left it in the van Monday,” he explains quickly, nudging you through the doorway of the bathroom. 

The Munson bathroom is teeny tiny but not unnavigable. There’s a shower pressed to the far wall that could squeeze in two people, their toilet to the right, a sink basin opposite that with a medicine cabinet and just enough room for a dirty laundry box that’s always, always full. 

Eddie opens the shower and turns it on. “It takes a while to get really hot but then it’s not hot for long, sorry. There’s my shampoo if you want it, and soap, and body wash. Sorry, none of it is super girly.” 

“Sorry sorry,” you say, pretending to hit him in the stomach. “What’s with all the sorries, handsome? I can’t wait to smell like a boy.” 

The way you say it. Eddie doesn’t know what it is, but it’s why he’s crazy about you. 

Probably shouldn’t tell you that as you're taking off your jacket, though. 

“I’ll be right back,” he says. 

Eddie heads out of the bathroom to their skinny linen cabinet hidden in the hallway. He grabs the last two towels from the middle shelf and takes pause, fabric starchy in his hands. Just be normal, he thinks, a pep talk from Eddie to Eddie. She hangs out with you all the time for a reason. She held your hand at the movies. 

Eddie’s in better spirits when he remembers that. Your hand in his, your ring pushing his ring further down his finger, your cheek touching his shoulder as you’d leaned in and asked if he wanted some of your popcorn. 

He opens the door without thinking, shower pattering against the perspex wall, your legs crossing tightly as he enters, turning yourself away from him.

“Woah!” you say, laughing.

“Holy crap.” The image of your red underwear immediately stamps itself into his mind as he pulls the door shut between you. They were really cute, red and white gingham, showcasing just the slightest curve of your– “I told you I was coming back!” 

“I thought you’d knock!” you laugh. “Sorry I flashed you. At least I had my shirt on.” 

At least, he thinks wryly, shoving his arm through the gap in the door, heavy towels pulling at his fingers. His head’s about to snap off, it's turned so far away from the door’s opening. “Here.” 

“If you wanna see me naked so bad you can just ask,” you tease. 

“Take the towels, loser.” 

You take the towels and he closes the door, preventing any more accidental creeping, and giving himself a reprieve. Gingham underwear. Wavy lettuce edgings kissing your skin. 

Holy fuck. Being a person is so lame, Eddie thinks. He wants to have a crush on you purely, and yet seeing the way you’d crossed your legs to hide from him, smiling, he can’t not think about kissing you —touching you. If he doesn’t get you laid out in his bed soon for some slow kissing he’s not gonna make it.

Eddie opens the strip vent above his window and prays it doesn’t flood his whole room. Clean, it doesn’t look half bad, he could bring you in here respectfully, you could stay the night without fearing for your life. 

You take a quick shower. He’s barely gotten over his nerves when you’re walking into his room, a towel around you, not a hint of shyness about you. 

“You didn’t bring me anything to wear,” you explain. 

Eddie just stares at you. 

“Eddie?” You wrap the towel tighter. “Come on, you’re staring at me.”

“Sorry.” His mouth is bone dry. 

“You have my hoodie, right? Just need some pants.” You cross your arm tightly across your chest. “I don’t usually notice when people are staring at me.”

“You aren’t usually naked in my room,” he says, genuinely and embarrassingly apologetic. 

“I’m not naked. Come on, please? Do I have to wait outside the door?” you ask with a laugh. 

Eddie stands up. Shakes his head hard, almost trips over himself trying to get to his dresser. He decides honesty will be best at this point, lest you think he has only one thing on his mind, “Listen, I’m sorry. I’m just in my head about something and I wasn’t expecting you to come out like that. It’s not right. You’re just… you’re really pretty.” 

“Thank you.” He can’t see you, sorting quickly through his middle drawer and all his miscellaneous pants for a pair he’s sure would fit, if he could just remember where it was. “What are you in your head about?” 

“What?” 

“Eddie, are you okay?” 

“No, no,” he moans, rubbing his face with his hand, ring scratching the bridge of his nose, “I’m not okay, princess, I’m overheating or something, Jesus Christ.” He finally lays eyes on the sweatpants he’d been thinking of, grabs your hoodie from the top shelf and drops them both at the end of the bed. “I’ll give you some privacy.” 

“I don’t have any underwear.” 

“And that’s something I can’t fix,” he says, leaving the room in a hurry. 

Eddie gets to the living room and keels over. His hair falls in his face, his shirt slides down his back. What the fuck is wrong with him? 

Wayne, sliding his shoes on in the recliner, gives a start. “What’s wrong?”

Eddie lifts his head, yanking hair from his face, the skin of his under eyes pulled down harshly. “Oh my god.”

Wayne wrinkles his nose. 

“No ones ever been such a pathetic excuse for a man before,” Eddie says. 

“Your dad’s in jail,” Wayne points out. “And not for the impressive stuff.”

“I’m pathetic.” 

“You’re fine. You’re not supposed to be not pathetic, you’re twenty.” 

“I’m twenty one.” 

“The extra year doesn’t mean much. I know you think you’re all grown up, but you’re still an idiot.” 

Wayne stands and shrugs on the jacket laying over the armrest. 

“Wait, where are you going?” 

“I thought you were definitely gonna ask her?” Wayne asks knowingly. That’s what Eddie told him, after all. “Next time I see her, Wayne, I’m asking her to go steady.” 

Eddie shakes his head. “You can’t leave.” 

“Eddie.” Wayne gestures for Eddie to stop slouching like some fiend from a bad horror. “Listen. I get that you’ve always been sort of… behind everyone, but that doesn’t mean you can’t do it. She likes you. She biked here in a hurricane.”

“What if she says no?” he asks. 

Truthfully, Eddie’s more scared of you saying yes. 

Wayne shrugs. “Girl like that’ll still be your friend after. It’ll be fine, okay? Do you need a hug before I go?” 

“No.” Eddie rubs his eyes some more, sore now from being touched. “Maybe.” 

Wayne crosses the room to give his shoulder a squeeze. “It will be fine. You’re great with rejection, Eds, but I have a good feeling about this one.” 

Eddie felt better about it, before he embarrassed himself staring at you. But Wayne’s right, even if Eddie’s read things wrong between you, he’s sure you’ll still want to be his friend. You and Eddie are the same kind of weird, though he’s more angry where you’re carefree. If everything goes wrong, you’ll probably just give an unnecessary apology and offer to braid his hair. Which will be torture, but Eddie’ll still say yes.

Wayne calls goodbye, and you shout, “Bye, Mr. Munson!” to which Wayne wiggles his eyebrows. 

“Get lost,” Eddie says. 

“Go make her a drink. I’ll see you later.” 

That’s not a bad idea. Eddie makes you a mix of orange and grapefruit juice with a couple of ice cubes and a plastic straw, your reaction predicted and then proved. 

“It’s a cocktail,” you say, pleased, sitting on the side of his bed. 

“It’s not a cocktail, just juice.” 

“Can I have some socks, please, Eddie?” 

Eddie passes you your drink, fingertips brushing. “Yeah. Anything else?” He pretends to be exhausted as he trudges back over to his dresser. 

You laugh and sip your drink. “No, I think you’re treating me quite well.” 

Eddie grabs a random pair and finally gets to sit down beside you, the dresser drawer left out, a spare sock fallen to the floor. You shuffle back into his pillows, propping your juice on his side table, and holding your hands out for the socks. Again, your fingertips touch his as he passes them to you. You seem to enjoy it, a smile lighting your face as you pull your knees up to put the socks on. 

“Thank you for waiting on me,” you say quietly. Not shyly, just quiet. 

“You’re welcome. Came all this way to see me, didn’t you?” He gives you a shove. You shuffle back further. “In the pouring rain.” 

“It felt important at the time.” 

“Yeah?” 

You get the socks on and don’t care about them once they're past your heels. Eddie does the honour of smoothing out the bands so that the elastic won’t dig into your skin, and when he’s done he can feel you looking at him heavily. You’re not one for continued eye contact, but you smile like you were waiting for it all day, like it’s a relief to see him. 

“Bad weather,” you say, slouching down. “I think I’m still wet on the inside.” 

“Gross,” Eddie says, pushing you over bodily to sit beside you. This isn’t new, he doesn’t need any nerves, and he’s grateful when they don’t come. “Here, I’ll pull the blanket over you.” 

“Can’t move,” you say, leaning back against the pillows.

Eddie stretches his legs out. You keep yours up, but you turn to his side, and before he can really make any sense of you, you’re dropping your face into his shoulder. 

“Are you still cold?” he asks, searching for the truth in your strange comment. 

You nod into his shoulder. “I’m freezing. The shower didn’t get very hot.” 

“Sorry,” he says, letting his cheek rest on your head. 

You lift your chin as he does it, his lashes pressed to your forehead, the two of you stuck together like two warped jigsaw pieces. You probably weren’t made to be together, but you make a nice picture, and you fit snugly now. That’s what Eddie thinks. 

This is the sort of moment that makes Eddie wanna ask you out. Maybe you’re just the best friend he’s ever had, but something about this closeness feels different. You wrap your arm around his stomach in a hug and he knows this is different. 

“It’s okay,” you say finally, sighing as you shift downward into his side, getting comfortable. 

“Please don’t bike here in the rain. It’s, like, torrential. You could actually get sick.” 

You feel warm where your body presses against his, but Eddie doubts that’ll make a difference if the cold already made you sick. The bike ride from your place to his isn't short. He covers your arm with his and tries to be your space heater, cheek sliding over your forehead. 

“Eddie…” You hug him with tenderness. Eddie’s reluctant to say cuddle, but it’s close. “This might be a surprise to you, but I think it’s worth the rain and the cold to see you. Especially when you do this.” 

“What am I doing?” 

“You’re rubbing my arm.” 

He hadn’t noticed his hand caressing up and down your arm where it rests on his stomach. 

“You make me feel amazing,” you say, dropping your face into his chest. 

That’s his last straw. Eddie gets both arms around you and cuddles you (it’s a cuddle, okay! he’s a loser!) to him, arms tight but not cruel. All this fuss and you’re finally laying on top of him. He decides he won’t ask you after all. He’s not that brave, and he doesn’t want this to end. 

Your legs fall onto him. You relax completely. Even after you shower he can smell your perfume. 

“You smell nice,” he murmurs. 

“It’s on my hoodie,” you murmur back. 

Right. Eddie should remember. 

“You make everything smell like you.” Even his van keeps your scent most days. 

“Too much?” 

“The right amount,” he says firmly. 

You lay on his chest for a while, just breathing. Eddie rubs your back, tells himself he will ask, actually, because he can’t imagine not getting to do this again. You might even stay over. He could live hours of this. He didn’t know having you lay on him could make him feel like this. 

He can’t believe you’ve never done it before. 

Rain pounds the window. Condensation drips down onto the sill. You let your legs stretch out flat and then manoeuvre to be laying half atop him, hoodie riding up your back. 

“Any warmer now?” he asks.

“Yeah, you’re warming me up.” You lavish in his arms for a moment, and then lift your face. “Oh, this is a bad angle.” 

“For me or you?” 

“For me, duh.” 

Eddie doesn’t think you could have a bad angle. He rubs at your upper arm as you start to shift. “You know, your bike has just as big a chance of getting hit by lightning as your car does. More, probably.” 

“You think so?” 

“It’s physics. So, please don’t do it again.” 

You hum. “Hm, should I risk getting struck by lightning, or spend the evening without you?” you murmur, your arm moving, moving slowly, your hand resting gently on the column of his neck. There’s something ironic in your voice, wry, but your eyes are warm. He’s paralysed. No one has ever spoken to him like you. “I think I’d rather get struck by lightning.” 

You stare at one another. He laughs. You join in, your thumb a pressure at his neck, and when you move up his chest to lean in, he isn’t expecting it. 

“We’re very close together,” you whisper. 

“Super close,” he whispers back. 

“…Eddie, can I ask you something?” Your eyes slip shut, your lips so close that something in him aches, just enough wit about him to cup your shoulders in his forearm. 

“Yeah.” 

He doesn’t sound half as calm as you do. 

“Would you… Do you think we could be official? Would you want that?” You tilt your head to the side. “Is that stupid?” 

“Official?” he asks, panicked, his eyes squeezed shut hard enough for a moment that they ache.

“Like, you’d be my boyfriend. I’d be your girlfriend. We’d be close like this all the time.” 

Eddie panics so hard he just says the first thing that comes into his head, “Like, we’d kiss?” 

“I hope so,” you say, your nose pressing against his, the tip to the side of his, and then against his nostril. The heat of your breath is hard to ignore. “What do you think?” 

What does Eddie think about it? 

He catches your lips in a slow kiss. Achingly slow, not even sure it’s a kiss until you reciprocate, and your fingers dig behind his neck to tease his hair. Your lips part against his, the heat of your tongue sudden and undeniable —Eddie didn’t know you had it in you. He squeezes you to him, attempting to crane his neck downward, reliant on your enthusiasm as you move up, as you use his neck to pull yourself closer. 

Your noses crush together, and it actually hurts. “Sorry,” he says, easing you back, “you okay?” 

“‘Nother kiss,” you say hopefully, distractedly. 

He can’t not give it to you. 

Your hand spreads flat against his chest and you kiss, you kiss, long and slow movements against him before turning your head to take it again. Eddie doesn’t always know what to do with himself, but he knows kissing, no matter what anybody might think about him, and he takes the lead. 

His hand screws into a fist against your hoodie, the slip of your back further exposed as you shiver into his mouth, a sound you shouldn’t make sweet on his tongue. 

You pull away, breath on his lips. “Wanted you to kiss me for so long,” you murmur. 

Eddie knows you’re not saying it to flirt, and that makes it worse. 

“I should’ve kissed you a long time ago,” he says roughly. 

“You wanted to?” 

“Yeah. Yeah, so much, I’m a loser about you–”

“I’m always a loser,” you interrupt, “but especially about you.” 

You scratch your fingers through his hair, encouraging his head down for another kiss. This one rougher but not rough, his arm slips finally behind your head where he’d needed it to be, hooking you in his elbow to keep you in one place. To kiss you soundly, without interruption. Your almost feverish ebbing inward is a dream, your nose rubbing up against his is a fantasy. 

His heart hammers and hammers at his ribs. 

You pull away to let him breathe. “You’re very excited,” you tease lightly. 

Eddie kisses you, breathless. He kisses you so much he’s surprised you allow it, but your thumb rubs his cheek, and he knows he’d been right all along. You want him like he wants you, with startling, mildly pathetic urgency. 

He feels like a fucking prince. Girl of his dreams in his lap, everything he wants, and he didn’t even have to ask. 

—

Eddie spends a week in bliss. You’re suddenly everywhere, all the time, attached to his hip or some other part of him, and he forgets for seven whole days that he bought you a ring. 

The rain dries up, the Munson emergency fund lives to die another day, and he remembers the ring only minutes before you’re knocking at his door. 

He trips over himself trying to answer it before Wayne, who’s taken to being as painfully embarrassing as is possible for one human being, can get it for him. 

“One day you’re gonna eat shit and break your nose,” Wayne says. 

Eddie yanks open the door. “Yeah, thanks. Hey, beautiful, what’s with the sunglasses?” 

You slide them down your nose. You’re a vision on his front step, not that you’d ever notice your own intrigue. “The sunglasses?” you ask, tucking them away. “What do you think they’re for? Three guesses.” 

He grabs your waist, leaning down out of the doorway so as to save Wayne the agony. “That’s smart,” he says, kissing you quickly in hello. “You’re funny. Need anything before we go?” 

“No, I’m okay. Hi, Mr. Munson!” you add.

“Hey, honey! How are you?” Wayne calls.

You look up into Eddie’s face with an obvious delight. “I’ve never been better.” 

Eddie grins back. 

He waves a quick goodbye to Wayne and then he’s out the door. You grab his wrist and practically dance him to the car, where you offer your keys, and he deigns to drive. From there it’s smooth sailing, familiarity with a better twist, Eddie driving with the windows down and your hands twined on your thigh. Things haven’t changed much since you asked him to go steady, there’s just a whole lot more of this. Touching, kissing, no weird guilt about staring. 

As it turns out, you’re as eager to be laid out in his bed as he is to lay you out. He’s never wanted to kiss you more, and now he’s allowed. 

“Eyes on the road.” 

He leans over to kiss your cheek. The sun has warmed your skin, and his kiss makes you smile. You look pretty no matter the weather. 

“Before we get there, I have something to give you.” He takes his hand from yours to slide the box from his pocket. He holds it up. “But you can only have it if you swear you’ll call me tonight before bed. No excuses. You know exactly what number to call.” 

“Ends with a three,” you say, nodding. 

He sighs. “No, it does not.” 

“I’m kidding! Two one nine seven, I have now committed it to memory.” 

Eddie pays attention to the road, though it’s clear and long heading out of the trailer park and into town. “That deserves a gift.” 

You’re back in your glitters today, a skirt to enjoy the fine weather, a button shirt with a cute triangle collar, you’re lovely as ever, if a tad much for some. Not Eddie. He loves the dark clothes, the tinkling bracelets, the fun way you smile like everything he says is a secret between him and you. People stare wherever you and Eddie go, but as long your arm is sewn through his he couldn’t care less. 

“A gift,” you say, smiling in your way, and taking the box politely. “I don’t think I deserve it for just remembering your number.” 

“You deserved it for less. It’s not much. You can pay me back in three or four amazing kisses. Right here.” He points to the tight juncture beneath his jaw. 

You attempt to lean over and kiss him immediately. He pushes you back, laughing, worsened by your own breathless laughter as you steal one exactly where he’d tapped. 

You settle back down, Eddie’s hand dropping kindly to your knee. “I wonder what it is,” you say. 

“Then open it.” 

“I am!” You pop the box open, it’s springing hinge snapping into place. “Oh, woah. Woah. Where did you get this?” 

It’s a slim ring, with a weirdly shaped band of quality metal around some cheaper but not totally worthless gemstones, of which there are three different colours: a topaz orange, a lime green, and a pinky-red ruby colour centre stage. They have nice cuts. It’s strange as you are, and he knew when he saw it you’d have to have it. 

“If I put it on my marriage finger, are we engaged?” you tease. 

“That one would be way heavier,” he says, giving you a squeeze. 

You slide it onto your middle finger and hold your hand up in the sunshine. It fits in with your other ring nicely, though it is, to Eddie’s pride, far prettier. 

He has half a mind to pull over and kiss each knuckle, but he’s trying to be less dramatic about you. It’s not working. 

“Thank you, Eddie. I love it.” 

“Best boyfriend ever?” he asks hopefully. 

To his mild fear but better pleasure, you climb up onto the console to press three quick kisses to his cheek and jaw, your hand under his ear holding him in tender place. “Best boyfriend ever. Even if you stare too much.” 

“How am I supposed to not?” he asks, with more weight than he’s intended. 

You speak matter of factly for the first time in your life. “I am going to cause an accident,” you promise, attempting to kiss his nose. “A bad one.” 

“Sit down, please.” He lets you kiss his nose, and then jabs you in the side. “Sit down, oh my god! That’s not funny, you’re so pretty I will total your car.” 

“Now who’s not funny?” 

You both laugh at the same time, the unfiltered, un-cute cackling of two idiots with the same sense of humour, and the same wealth of ridiculous honeymoon love. 

˚‧꒰ა ✮ ໒꒱‧˚

thank you so much for reading!! I hope you enjoyed. if you did, please consider reblogging or commenting!! thanks very much <3

𝐰𝐡𝐚𝐭'𝐬 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐧𝐮𝐦𝐛𝐞𝐫

𝐞𝐝𝐝𝐢𝐞 𝐦𝐮𝐧𝐬𝐨𝐧 𝐱 𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫

𝐍𝐒𝐅𝐖 𝟏𝟖+

𝚠𝚊𝚛𝚗𝚒𝚗𝚐𝚜: reader with breasts and a vagina, lil bit of established-relationship domesticity, eddie being a goofball, barely-there smut at the end (0.9k)

𝚍𝚒𝚟𝚒𝚍𝚎𝚛 𝚋𝚢 @strangergraphics

It's late.. Or maybe technically it's early, if the birdsong that's begun to drift through the open window is any indication. The sky is already starting to bleed from inky black to a deep blue, with purple and orange threatening to creep over the horizon any minute.

You've got a leech in the form of your boyfriend draped over your sweaty body, one of his hairy legs thrown over your own, his arm curled around your waist. His cock is still softening against your thigh, your combined spend slowly drying on your skin while your breathing re-regulates following an energetic late-night romp. His pale skin is still flushed pink in the dim lamplight of the bedroom, black ink of his tattoos seeming to stretch beyond their usual shape with the help of dark shadows.

"Soo," Eddie drawls, his voice soft when his face presses to the side of your throat. He leans back, propping himself up on an elbow so he can waggle his eyebrows playfully at you, "How many times was that? For you?"

His teeth nip at the soft flesh of your shoulder between the questions, a bid at playing up his innocence, no doubt. Because he's clearly not at all looking for a little something to boost to his ego. No way. Not your Eddie. Never.

You indulge him all the same. Giving in and playing along with his little over-dramatized bits was all just a part of dating him. Not that you minded in the slightest. Honestly, you found his vivacious spirit to be a special kind of intoxicating, and his dedication to it was nothing short of admirable.

You hum as your mind runs back over the last half hour or so, going back and forth with yourself on the exact number as you ponder whether at least one of those ninety second almosts counted — where you'd been clinging onto a truly earth-shattering, brain-dumbing peak that hadn't been meant to be. You debate whether it counted despite never them quite teetering over into orgasm.

Your hand strokes softly along the length Eddie's arm draped across your stomach, the hairs tickling along the pads of your fingers. After much deliberation you tell him, "Three and a half."

His outrage is immediate.

"Half?!" Eddie's voice goes high in disbelief, pushing back a little farther to give you a wide-eyed look to pair with his shock, "When was the half?" He demands, just shy of shrill. The hand on your hip kneads lovingly at the doughy flesh to soften the sheer lack of tact in his delivery.

A smile pulls at your lips at the genuine upset in his hushed tone, a small eyeroll born of nothing but fondness as you try to explain your reasoning, "Well there were a few times, at the end there-"

"No, nope." Eddie's voice only rises in volume, far too loud for the hour but he can't make himself care.

He is well and truly affronted. He can't believe he didn't notice a goddamn half-orgasm — it was horrendous. He's meant to know your body better than anyone else in the world. The thought of you settling for a half-orgasm without saying anything, of you just accepting a half because Eddie busted too quick to get you there again? Maybe he was being a bit dramatic about it all, but, no. It was not acceptable, not in his book.

He says as much.

"That's preposterous. Won't do." Eddie says matter-of-factly as he shuffles up onto his knees again in a rush

"What are you-" You're words cut off with a squeal when Eddie's clumsy sex-weakened limbs give out for a moment and he nearly collapses on top of you. Laughter pushes its way up from your chest, your fingers curling around his biceps to offer him a bit of stability as his head dips so that his nose can brush the tip of your own, "Eddumf-!"

He cuts you off with a kiss, nosing at your cheek until you go pliant underneath him and your mouth opens enough for him to stroke his tongue along your own for just a moment.

He still tastes like sex, the essence of you a little stale and lingering at the back of his mouth, but he kisses you with everything he has. His passion and excitement are as infectious as always and you're keening into the kiss before a minute has passed, your spine arching up off the mattress just a bit to bring your naked chest flush with his.

Your fingers are forced to fall a little loose on his arms when he pushes up onto his hands and shakes out his curls with dramatic flair. There's one stubborn strand sticking at the spit-slick corner of his mouth and a stupidly endearing, crazed look sparkling in his eyes as he begins to backpedal tellingly down your body. His kiss-swollen lips mark a path, kissing his way past your belly button and between your thighs. The round tip of his nose drags lightly up the length of your cunt and you can't help the way your hips jump when he catches your clit.

"Down we go-" Eddie's voice is thrown deep, a ridiculous animated thing that sounds like it's been pulled straight from the table at one of his campaigns. It's a voice that decidedly did not belong fanning out over your cunt while one of his knuckles softly parted your slick folds.

"God, Ed, if you're gonna do it just do it," You speak around a sigh as his finger collects a bit of your combined cum and he swirls it gently around your clit a few times. "I-if you get all goofy on me I'm gonn- oh."

But then his lips are wrapped around your clit and he's sucking like his life depends on it — Three and a half very quickly turns into seven.

Velma

eddie munson x fem!reader

You attend a Halloween party with Eddie, things don't go quite as planned when Jason Carver acts like a jerk.

cw: allusions to curvy reader, drinking, drugs, blood, violence, eddie fights off screen, body insecurities, kissing, not proofread, working on writing fluff

Word Count: 5.5k

masterlist

—

“Are you gonna go to Chelsea Hanover’s Halloween party?” Eddie asked, long legs hanging out the back of his van. His stained Reeboks were planted firmly on the concrete, knees pushing out of the rips in his black jeans. You sat in the parking lot of the movie theater, eating the remainder of the snacks you hadn’t finished earlier. The night was quiet, most Hawkins residents already tucked safely into their beds.

You paused midway through trying to shove a handful of popcorn into your mouth, is Eddie going insane? “Are you going to Chelsea Hanover’s Halloween party?” You were practically gawking as you swung your sock-covered feet in the crisp night air. The sneakers you wore had been abandoned in a pile on the shag carpet. 

You thought Eddie was over all the stupid high school activities at this point, with it being his third go at senior-year and all. He’d never talked about going to a party in the past six months of your budding friendship, and, in Hawkins, there were plenty of parties to attend. 

He was quiet as he took another drink from his slushie, red-stained lips turning up into a smirk. “I was thinking about going to sell. Make some money off the rich kids.” 

“What, do you want me to come entertain you?” There was an edge to your voice that you didn’t expect. Your chest felt tight as soon as he brought up the party, anxiety knitting your lungs together. You traced the cracks in the asphalt with your eyes. 

Your frustration wasn’t meant for Eddie, it rarely ever was.

You had to stop pretending that all your so-called friends from your junior year of high school weren’t because of Billy. None of them had even bothered to speak to you since he dumped you like trash last summer. And especially not since the day of his funeral. They were fake and plastic people.

Eddie chuckled, fishing his carton of cigarettes out of his jacket pocket. He didn’t seem to notice how stiff you’d become, your legs rigid in the night air. “Well, yeah. If you want. It could be a night of making fun of Hawkins’ finest.” 

You smiled weakly, trying to hide the sour mood that had come over you. Eddie just wanted a friend to be there–you knew Gareth and Jeff would say no immediately. You didn’t want to throw him to the wolves alone. Chelsea Hanover’s parties were awful if you didn’t know anyone or didn’t want to dance. Eddie didn’t seem like much of a dancer to you. “You know what, sure. Count me in, Munson.”

His pearly white teeth lit up in the glow of his lighter as he brought the cigarette to his lips, a smile radiating across his masculine features. A tendril of anxiety wrapped around your throat as you filed through worst-case-scenarios, each growing more and more catastrophic. 

Your stomach did a flip as you pushed the bucket of popcorn aside, trying to be subtle as your thoughts raced. You suddenly obsessed about how your thighs pressed together and your bra cut into the layer of excess fat in your back, all new discoveries in the past couple of months. Your mother had reminded you that being thin at eighteen would be harder than being thin at seventeen—you’d locked yourself in your bathroom to cry for the better part of your birthday after stepping on the scale.

Eddie didn’t seem to notice your turmoil, methodically chewing as though everything was fine. Of course he wouldn’t notice, he didn’t understand the intricacies of girlhood that made your skin feel too tight. You fluffed your sweater out, suddenly self-conscious about what areas of your body it was snug against. 

Robin would help you find a costume. 

—

The high socks squeezed just above your knees as you made your way up to the front door, red skirt swishing around the middles of your plush thighs with each step. You took a deep breath, a wave of heat and sound rolling over you as you opened the door. There were people in a variety of costumes everywhere inside. A few classmates nodded at you in acknowledgment as you shut the door and stepped into the humid living room, quickly turning their attention back to their friends. 

Where was Eddie? You did a once over of the room, scanning the edges of the dance floor for the shaggy-haired boy. The couches had all been pushed out of the way to make space for a makeshift dance floor, the stereo in the corner booming Cyndi Lauper. It was a miracle that it couldn’t be heard outside. 

The clusters of people spilled into the kitchen. There was limited space to weave through the crowd, you kept whispering apologies as you made your way to the other room. Upon entering, you were handed a cup of red punch from a boy you vaguely knew from English. You offered him a smile, a nod in his direction as you raised the cup to your lips.

You wrinkled your nose as you took a sip, it was strong. 

There were no traces of Eddie anywhere. The room was filled with Indiana Joneses and Maddonas and Ghostbusters and Flashdance characters. No curly-headed metalheads in sight, though. Eddie didn’t seem like someone who would wear a Halloween costume, not for a party he was planning on dealing at. 

You leaned against the breakfast counter lazily, watching the people on the dance floor bump into one another. The plastic cup stuck to your fingers as you gulped down the rest of the drink, grimacing at the after taste of vodka. You traced the edges of the porcelain tiles as you took up your place as a designated wallflower. 

You downed four more cups of the punch before you got restless, deciding to investigate the rest of the party before accepting defeat. Your feet shuffled in slow motion as you approached the sliding glass door on the other end of the room. It was open, allowing teens to trickle outside and spread across the dark backyard. 

The smell of cigarettes and weed wafted through the door as the autumn breeze picked it up, sparking a small flame of hope that your best friend was outside.

You tripped on the door track as you stepped into the much cooler night, steadying yourself and your sloshing drink against the doorframe before looking up. There were a few groups outside, most nursing drinks or joints or cigarettes and murmuring to one another. The music coming from the living room was so faint that you could barely make out the lyrics.

“Hey, Velma!” Your head slowly turned towards the voice, your lips buzzing as the alcohol settled in. Eddie was illuminated by the soft light diffused by the curtains in the kitchen window. He sat at a metal table with his trusty lunch box, head cocked slightly to the side as he absorbed your costume. You realized he was wearing a dark green “Corroded Coffin” t-shirt under his leather jacket and dark jeans, meaning you vaguely matched. 

If you squinted, or drank too much.

You fell into the chair next to him with an oof!, crossing your legs at the ankles as you leaned back. Your head lolled back to rest on the weathered cushion as a breathy laugh escaped your throat. “We match,” you said, looking at how the stars were swirling in the sky. Your breaths were heavy as you waited for the world to still, a smile stretching its way across your face regardless. 

“I didn’t know you were gonna come in costume, princess,” Eddie laughed, busily rolling joints to keep his hands occupied. You placed the sticky plastic cup on the table before stretching your arms out in front of you. Your gaze traced the wide cable-knit of the orange sweater, wiggling your fingers as you contemplated.

Self-consciousness reared its ugly head, making you sit up and lean closer to the brunette. “Do I look bad?” you whispered, fingertips finding the edge of your skirt. Your eyes were wide as he paused to study you, a soft grin breaking out on his face. You waited for his judgment, fiddling with anything in your reach before landing on braiding a thin strip of your hair.

“You look great,” he assured. There was a beat of silence, your heads still bent together conspiratorially. Eddie looked like he was thinking, his tongue licked his bottom lip. “You should’ve told me you were gonna dress up, I would’ve done it with you.” 

“You already look like you did, Shaggy,” you murmured with a sly half smile, taking another drink as you settled back into the metal chair. Eddie grinned, glancing down at his own outfit. 

Everything got all fuzzy on the edges as you finished the red liquid in your cup, joking with Eddie between drug deals. The basketball players who came by barely looked at you, only sparing glances as Eddie overcharged them for weed. 

He didn’t notice the cold shoulders, or he at least pretended not to, making fun of their costume choices as soon as they walked away. You pretended like they didn’t bother you. It felt strange to be at one of these parties after everything that happened with Billy, you’d never felt more invisible. 

But Eddie saw you, his brown eyes drifting to you more often than usual. You couldn’t tell if it was just because he was worried about how much you were drinking. You found yourself liking the way he talked, hands waving wildly as his voice slid into different impersonations of the people around you. He was always so genuinely Eddie, you wondered what it would feel like to be like that.

“I’m gonna grab another drink,” you said as Eddie’s attention was pulled away by a group of juniors with wide eyes and crumpled dollar bills. He gave you a thumbs up as he rifled through the contents of his stash. 

You swayed a bit as you stood, your grip on the plastic cup crumpling it slightly. The juniors eyed you as you walked around the edge of their little group, Eddie’s voice spitting out prices calling their attention back to him.  

Armed with a deep breath to ground yourself, you shouldered your way back into the house. There were even more people than before. With no room to move properly, you jammed yourself into the throng of people that were making their way to the kitchen. Despite how many people were here there was surprisingly still plenty to drink. 

You had never known Chelsea to be so generous, at least not during your short-lived friendship.

You stopped in front of the punch bowl, staring at your wobbling reflection in the liquid as you filled your cup with the ladle. Maybe it was the alcohol, but you hardly recognized yourself. The proportions of your face were so different than when you primped and prepped in the mirror, your gaze felt less harsh as you stared at the girl in the punch bowl. You could feel the heat radiating off your cheeks as you glared at the rose-colored image of yourself, wondering what you actually looked like. 

A hand clasped your shoulder, an anchor back to reality. You pivoted on your heel, thinking that Eddie had come to talk to you about something, maybe ready to leave and go find somewhere to park and talk and listen to music. 

Your face fell when you recognized Jason Carver’s blue eyes.

It had been ages since Jason had so much as talked to you. He used to follow Billy around like a puppy, hoping that it would make him the captain of the basketball team after graduation. Of course, Billy had treated Jason like the rest of you, rewarding his neediness with a cold shoulder.  

“You know, Billy would be so disappointed if he was still here.” Jason may as well have spit on you. You stepped back, your spine pressing into the chilly counter as you tried to put some space between you. His eyes had a hard time settling, staring you up and down as you tried to remain still under his gaze. “He probably wouldn’t even recognize you, especially now that you’re hanging out with the losers.”

You scowled, rage making your throat tighten. “He didn’t even like you, Jason.” Blonde eyebrows rose in surprise. “I’m sure he’s rolling in his grave knowing that the pathetic Jesus kid who would’ve blown him if he asked is in charge of the basketball team.” 

You were getting a little too loud, the people standing nearest to you were turning their heads to see what the commotion was about. Jason evaluated the crowd before grabbing your wrist, a sick smile spreading across his face. “I think you’ve had enough.” There was a threatening edge to his voice as he leaned to whisper in your ear. 

You strained against him, the punch sloshing over the edges of the cup and down your fingers. Droplets flecked onto his yellow Teen Wolf costume like blood. Panic started to creep up your throat, the reminder that none of the other people at the party were going to help you made your blood run cold.

“Jason, stop,” you muttered, your voice thick. More punch slid down your hand as you tried to tug yourself from his grip. Your heart fluttered in your chest as you attempted to find a way out. “Let me go.”

He squeezed your wrist even tighter as hot tears pricked at the corners of your eyes and rolled down your cheeks. You were sure long lines of mascara were left behind, you couldn’t even move your free hand to wipe them away. Fear paralyzed you as the pounding of the music filled every space in your mind. Your mind whirred uselessly, so caught off guard by the aggression that you hardly knew how to respond. 

A ringed hand wrapped around Jason’s forearm; you flinched at the sudden intrusion. Eddie was bristling next to you, squeezing the jock’s arm until he let you go. You pulled your wrist back to your chest, your brows knitting together as your lips fell into a pout.

The metalhead pushed his lunchbox into your stomach, his eyes dark as they scoured your face. “How about you go wait in the van, princess? The keys are inside the box,” he murmured, his expression leaving no room for protest. You hesitated a moment, causing him to jerk his chin smoothly toward the front door. His Adam’s apple bobbed in his throat as he swallowed, his jaw set.

Suddenly shy, you dropped your gaze to the floor. Everything was swimming around you, the party too loud and the room too hot and your hands were so sticky with punch. You’d never felt more overwhelmed. 

Nodding once, you gripped the handle of the lunchbox for dear life as you scurried out of the house. By the time the night air hit you, you realized you were still holding the cup, most of it empty as it coated your hand and stained the skin. You choked back the rest of its contents, crumpling it in your hand and tossing it into the grass. Eddie’s van was parked across the street, looking out of place amongst the other cars.

–

You were almost asleep in the passenger seat by the time Eddie threw the door open, scaring you into waking up. He was obscured by the lights of the house behind him as he climbed inside. “Eddie, what happened?” you croaked as he tried to jam the keys into the ignition, his hands practically vibrating. 

You gasped as he turned to look in the center console. His right eyebrow was caked entirely with blood, a gash splitting it nearly in two. Blood was smeared in a trail down his face, following the curve of his nostril and making its way over his pale throat and to his shirt collar. He plucked a cigarette carton out of the glove box, the streetlamp illuminating the smears of blood across his pale fingers. His knuckles were blown apart. 

“Eddie,” you murmured, reaching across the center console hesitantly. He still didn’t look at you, rummaging around for his zippo. The house beyond was relatively quiet, no signs of a party other than all the cars parked along the sidewalk. Jason walked into view of the upstairs bathroom window, glaring at the van before pulling down the shade. His face was smeared with blood, his costume ruffled.

The chains on Eddie’s jacket sleeve jingled as he lit the cigarette, taking a drag with a sigh. “Eddie.” You hesitated for a moment before you pressed your palm into the worn leather. You could feel the muscles in his shoulder jump under your fingertips–you rarely ever touched him. It just felt like a boundary the two of you never crossed. “Y-you didn’t have to do that,” you said. 

The heater and the radio jumped to life, Dio blasting in the small space. Eddie’s brows furrowed as he turned to study your face. “Of course I had to,” his voice was surprisingly soft. His hand came out of nowhere, a warm thumb wiping your cheek. Your nerves must have been fried, because you leaned into his touch without thinking about it. “That idiot made you cry, couldn’t just let him get away with it.”

You pulled in a ragged breath, a bit surprised by the amount of tenderness in his voice. His hand was so warm, his fingers wiping away the lines of makeup that ran down your cheeks when you cried. Shaking fingers brought the cigarette back to his pink lips, you watched him take a drag and blow the smoke out of the corner of his mouth. 

“Can we go?” you whispered, your voice hoarse as your throat tightened. It was all you could do to keep from crying, you didn’t even know why you wanted to cry this time.

He smiled, nodding as he pulled away from the curb like a maniac. His hand dropped from your face, turning the radio up until the heavy sound of a guitar riff was blasting through the speakers.

—

Apparently it was Wayne’s night off, so the trailer was off-limits for a late night sanctuary. That was how you ended up at the quarry, the side door pulled open as you and Eddie sprawled out in the back of the van. You’d guzzled a bottle of water as soon as you parked, already starting to feel like a bit of a human being again.

Eddie had cleaned up his face with the bandana he kept in his back pocket. The gash in his eyebrow looked painful, but he kept assuring you it was fine. He sat against the wall of the van as he wiped his knuckles, the largest one on his right hand slightly torn.

It was like once you all had crossed the barrier of touch, Eddie didn’t want to stop. He just kept touching you, be it a hand brushing against your arm or his leg jostling yours. It felt shockingly comfortable, making you wonder why you had been so resistant to touching him before. 

“Those rings must not have felt nice,” you commented absentmindedly, laying on your stomach on the carpet as you watched him. Moonlight flooded in the van through the open door, glinting off the silver that adorned his fingers.

He smiled, flexing his hands as he looked down at them. “Carver didn’t seem too excited about them,” he murmured, glancing at you out of the corner of his eye. 

You’d cleaned most of the makeup off your face on the drive to the quarry using a baby wipe you kept in your purse. He hardly ever saw you with a clean face, the moonlight revealing a few blemishes on your skin. The urge to cover your cheeks still lingered, but it felt nice to have it off.

“Thanks for like, defending my honor and stuff,” you murmured, looking down at your chipped nail polish. “You really didn’t have to do that, Eddie.”

The idea that he would go out of his way to fight Jason Carver on your behalf was still hard for you to wrap your head around. Eddie loved to talk and bitch and complain about the basketball team and larger society regularly, but he wasn’t violent. 

“I did.” His eyes searched yours, wide and honest as always. A joint found its way between his long fingers, he took a deep drag. You watched him through heavy eyelids as he exhaled a thick cloud of smoke, he continued until he’d finished nearly half the joint. “I couldn’t just let him mess with you like that, not my girl.” 

My girl. My girl. My girl. The phrase went off in your head like a bell. You didn’t know if he’d said it just because he was high or if he actually meant it like that. You wet your lips with your tongue, glancing at him for a moment.

“Well, thanks,” you breathed, twirling your fingers in a loose thread on one of the weaved blankets he kept in the back of the van. You had wrapped yourself in it on multiple occasions, mostly on cold nights when you were ungodly high. But tonight, alcohol thrummed through you like liquid fire.

Eddie finished the remainder of the joint on his own, his warm brown eyes tinged with pink as his smile stretched easier. There was a fluidity to him when he was stoned, his normally theatrical mannerisms mellowing out to something that seemed less like a performance and more genuine. His movements became more languid, his lanky form sprawling out on a half-deflated bean bag. His calf rested on top of your leg.

The cassette that was playing ended, the power chords fading into silence as you heard the player whir to a stop. The water lapping at the cliff face below and the breeze rustling the foliage outside the van seemed louder, indicative of the transition from fall to winter that was soon to come.

“You want to pick the next one?” Eddie asked, his voice soft and breathy like it always got when he was stoned. It was sweet of him to ask, considering you knew that he already had a playlist of what he wanted to put on next written out in his head. He was particular about music, always wanting to be in-control of what was playing no matter where you were. 

You knew he meant for you to pick from his cassette collection.

“Yeah,” you answered, a smirk starting to spread on your face. You stood up, your feet digging into the shag carpet as you crouched to avoid hitting your head. “I’ve got a Madonna tape in my purse that I’ve been wanting to listen to.” 

“Madonna?” You could hear the anguish in his voice as you stepped over his long legs to reach the front. There was an air of disbelief at your choice, Eddie couldn’t stand Madonna.

You laughed, nodding as you pulled the aforementioned tape from your bag and flashing it to Eddie. “You said I could pick,” you teased, hunkering down in front of the radio to exchange the cassettes. Stunned silence filled the space behind you as you waited for the Dio tape to be spit out, you tapped the Madonna cassette against your kneecap.

What at first was silence burst into a flurry of motion behind you.

Before you could react, Eddie’s hands locked around your waist from behind and elicited a squeal from your throat as he yanked you back. “I’m not listening to Madonna,” he said, twisting his body around yours to try to snatch the tape from your hand. 

You scrambled, holding the cassette out of his reach and angling your shoulders to keep him away. “Eddie! You said I could pick!” you exclaimed with a peal of laughter, feeling the length of his body pressed against the back of yours. He pulled you close with a forearm curled around your waist, reaching over your shoulder. 

“Yeah, you can pick from good music!” His chin bumped the top of your head as you both fell forward from losing your balance. The floor absorbed most of the impact, Eddie’s shoulder banging into the floorboards next to you. You let out a soft grunt as Eddie landed partially on top of you, pressing you into the carpet. 

“This is good music,” you insisted, digging your elbow and knees into the thick carpet so you could shimmy forward. Eddie slammed an elbow in front of your shoulder, stopping any forward movement. There was no time to redirect as he melded you into his shadows, lanky limbs moving over where you were prone. His other hand curled around your wrist, so close to taking the tape. “You’re just judgmental!”

In a last ditch effort you twisted your arm from his grip, pulling your hand under your body and pressing the tape between your stomach and the rustled blanket. “You’re not being fair!” You were still giggling, Eddie stuffed his fingers between your forearm and your stomach in an attempt to follow the path of your arm. 

“It’s my van, princess,” Eddie said with a breathy laugh of his own. He lifted himself off you, letting you breathe for a moment before his hands scooped beneath your shoulders and flipped you onto your back. “I can judge however I want to.” 

You tried to push him away with your feet, matching smiles on your faces as he reached for you around the assault. With a shove your legs were out of the way, his torso settling between them with your knees on either side of his ribs. He leaned over you, managing to pry the tape from your hands and slide it into the pocket of his leather jacket. 

You still had some fight in you, reaching for Eddie’s pocket before he grabbed your wrists and pressed them to the floor. “Eddie!” you whined, squirming in an attempt to throw him off. 

He was smiling above you with all his teeth, the two of you panting as you stared at one another. The distance between you decreased, long fingers threading through yours as his head dipped lower. You were so close that you could practically count his eyelashes. Eddie scraped his teeth over  his lower lip, a clear sign that he was about to ask you something. You nodded before he could, your heart pounding in your chest as you prayed that you weren’t reading into things.

When he pressed his lips against yours you knew you guessed right.

You sighed into it, your eyes fluttering closed as your mouth moulded to his. Butterflies had made a home in your stomach, part of you wondering when you started having feelings for Eddie. Why did it take you so long to do something about them?

His mouth was so soft, slotting against yours in clumsy open-mouthed kisses. You both were smiling, giggling nervously when your teeth clashed or noses bumped. It was as though you both were clumsy and new to this, the anxiety of wanting to impress making you forget how to relax for a moment. His hair tickled your cheeks and neck, curling wildly in every direction. You desperately wanted to thread your fingers into it, your hands flexing against his.

A strong gust of wind blew dried leaves into the open door of the van, the chill cutting through your clothes making the two of you pull away from one another with laughs. Eddie tugged the door closed in a quick motion, leaning back on a bean bag and patting the side of his thigh in a motion to come over there. 

The moonlight was diffused through the windows on the sliding side doors, illuminating Eddie in a beautiful silver as you practically crawled on your hands and knees to him. You were a bit off-balance, partially falling against his chest. He chuckled, curling an arm around your back and pulling you closer with a wide hand pressed against the curve of your spine.

“Been waiting to kiss you like this for months,” Eddie murmured, his calloused fingers tracing along your cheek. You leaned into his touch, your hands resting on the soft Corroded Coffin shirt he wore. 

“Yeah?” you asked, your eyes wide as you looked at him. Part of you didn’t want to believe him, you’d thought his taste in women leaned on either far-end of the Morticia Addams to Chrissy Cunningham spectrum. Maybe you were wrong, or at least you prayed that you were. When considering the Eddie Spectrum of eligible women, you were situated somewhere near the middle.

He nodded, stamping a quick kiss to your lips. “Of course, princess,” he said, his other hand coming to rest on the curve of your thigh. Goosebumps pricked along your skin, his fingertips tracing up and down the bare section of your leg between the skirt and high socks. “And you make a very cute, Velma.”

You rolled your eyes at the compliment, shrugging it off. “You don’t mean that,” you whispered, eyes cast down at the blood soaked into the collar of his shirt. Shyness consumed you, it had been a while since a guy had flirted with you like this.

Well, Eddie’s fingers drawing figure-eights on the outside of your thigh felt like a little more than flirting.

One of his eyebrows lifted, disappearing beneath his bangs as he looked at you. “I do mean it.” Before you could argue with him, he pulled you into another kiss. 

It was enough to take your mind off of it, your head tilting up toward his as you twisted your body closer to him. Your hips turned, the handcuffs serving as his belt buckle digging into you through the thick fabric of your skirt. Thick thighs split apart over his knee, your spine curving on instinct. 

Normally, you wouldn’t have considered the back of Eddie’s van to be romantic, but now there was nowhere else you would rather be. 

Unable to think of much else, the kisses became messier. The sloppy smacks of your mouth against his made you giddy, fingers curling over his shoulders and keeping him close. His hand slipped under your sweater, palm pressing into your ribs like a brand. A submissive whimper was pulled from your throat, a dizzy feeling filling your head. You didn’t know if it was from the lack of oxygen or the alcohol you’d drank earlier.

Heat was pooling between your legs, making your thighs momentarily squeeze against his. The feeling of Eddie touching you made your insecurities about how your body had changed melt away, he didn’t seem to mind the softer parts of you as much as you did. Your hands traveled to his belt and traced the silver buckle of it, making Eddie pull away with a shake of his head. “Not tonight, baby,” he murmured, a sheepish smile curling his pink lips.

Despite the small part of your mind that was still rational, it felt like a slap to the face. You stiffened in his hold as you yanked your hands back like you’d touched a hot stove. “Oh, uh, sorry. I misunderstood,” you murmured, trying to tamp down the sting of rejection. You didn’t want him to feel bad, there wasn’t anything to feel guilty for.

Eddie snorted, shaking his head again. “Trust me, I want to,” he breathed, gently cupping your cheek. Something burned in his gaze. His thumb pressed into the corner of your spit-slicked lips, his chocolate brown eyes lingering for a moment. “Just don’t want to when you’re drunk, not in the back of my van.”

There was a sincerity in his tone that made you melt, rejection fading into yet another reason you felt like you were starting to fall head over heels for Eddie. “Okay, you’re right,” you said sweetly, turning your head to kiss the pad of his thumb.

“You want me to pick another tape?” The silence that had fallen over the van became noticeable. 

He laughed, seemingly having forgotten what had gotten the two of you tangled together in the first place. “No Madonna in the van, those are the rules,” he said, his fingers caressing your jaw. “Even for pretty girls like you.”

“Oh shut up,” you sighed, your face heating up despite yourself. “You’re just trying to butter me up so I pick Metallica.” 

Eddie snorted, the width of his shoulders squaring with confidence as he kept you in the space between his arm and torso. You could feel how warm he was. “You really think so?” he asked, the soft lilt of a tease in his voice.

“I wouldn’t put it past you.” It still felt like there was lightning between your ribs, electricity pooling at every juncture where you and Eddie touched. 

“But, I was teasing you. It’s a Van Halen cassette… you would know that if you’d bothered to read it before you decided to wrestle me for it.” You stamped another kiss against the tip of his nose. He wrinkled it endearingly, making you smile.

“Well now I’m glad I didn’t.”

this made me audibly scream 🫢

whiplash - e.m.

eddie munson x fem reader

warnings: teeny tiny violence, reader has a panic attack, eddie is the sweetest, eddie and reader are in college

a/n: this is absolutely inspired by my first experience being shoved into a mosh pit at an avenged sevenfold concert when i was a wee teen. i hope you enjoy xx.

also shout out to my love @xxbimbobunnyxx for helping me with the title and some of the dialogue, and my bby @undead-supernova for beta reading for me. ILY BOTH SO MUCH 💕

hot, sweaty bodies were pressed against you at all angles, nearly suffocating you. at this point you couldn’t even see the band playing on the stage, a sea of taller bodies now blocking your view.

when your best friend asked you to attend a metallica concert with her you didn’t exactly know what to expect.

but this definitely wasn’t it.

the small venue was packed, the air filled with the smell of sweat, marijuana and cigarettes. your choice of a leather jacket felt incredibly stupid as it was now tied around your waist due to the growing heat surrounding you.

your palms felt clammy as they clutched onto the hem of your friend’s shirt. the constant moving of the crowd seems to pull her farther and farther away from you. until the swirling pit of metalheads swallowed you both whole, losing sight of her head of blonde hair instantly.

your panicked shouts of her name were drowned out by the screech of an electric guitar— your body now being shoved around to the chants of ‘pounding out aggression.’ the song eerily fitting as you see a ringed fist connecting with another man’s jaw.

your heart is beating in your ears, that familiar feeling of panic washing over you as you continue to be shoved around like a rag doll amongst the group of men. until you somehow landed on top of someone… who had been knocked to the ground moments before you.

before you have time to react a large hand quickly wraps around your forearm, yanking you up and out of the dizzying circle of death. you all but let the stranger carry you through the crowd. the male shoving past throngs of people until you’ve safely reached the back of the bar.

you barely register his voice as you lean against the brick wall, chest rising and falling at an embarrassingly fast rate. your eyes squeeze shut as you attempt to get your breathing under control. those same hands that pulled you out now resting carefully on your shoulders, helping to ground you.

“hey sweetheart, you alright?”

his face finally comes into focus as you blink your eyes open, your heart now beating against your ribs for a completely different reason.

he was painstakingly gorgeous, full lips lifting up into a soft, dimpled smile. “there she is— hey man can i get some water?”

he slaps his hand on the bar top, the clear liquid sloshing out as a glass is slid over to him. his chunky rings clinking against the side as he grips it, now holding it up to your lips. “it’ll help, trust me.” you gladly take the glass from him, gulping down the lukewarm tap water.

“thank you…” you mumble, setting the now empty glass back on the bar and wiping the corners of your mouth. mentally forcing yourself to stay put, despite the bigger part of you wanting to run out of the bar from sheer embarrassment.

“are you here by yourself?” he asks, as you shake your head in reply before resting it against the brick wall behind you. the brunette seems to be studying you as you take in some slow but shaky deep breaths. letting yourself do the same as your heart begins to return to a normal rhythm.

even in the muted light you can see his dark curls were damp with perspiration, bangs sticking to his forehead. no doubt from being in the middle of that pit for quite a while. his cut off band tee showing off an extensive collection of tattoos. that soft smile morphs into a small smirk, as you realize you’ve been gawking at him.

calming breaths long forgotten.

“you can g-go back out there… w-wouldn’t want to keep you from the show.” you fumble over your words, now finding the sticky floor and your beat up sneakers far more interesting than the gorgeous metalhead before you.

the male chuckles, casually resting his shoulder against the wall next to you. his hot breath fanning over your cheek as he leans closer, “not a chance sweetheart. until we find your friends, you’re stuck with me.”

you glance back up at him, surprise crossing your features. knowing most people would gladly leave you behind in the shadows, especially considering the band that’s owning the stage. that sentiment alone makes the butterflies raging your insides flutter even faster. the chaos of the crowd is now forgotten as he grins sweetly down at you.

“i’m eddie by the way.”

the music has seemingly gotten louder since the two of you left the crowd, now having to shout your name back in reply despite the lack of space between you. his smile only widens as you turn to face him fully, crossing your arms over your chest. “and what is a fair maiden like yourself doing in a place like this?”

you can’t stop the giggle from leaving your lips as he gestures dramatically around the dingy bar before his dark eyes are back on you. “oh no reason at all… just needed a study break.” he can tell from the ride the lightning t-shirt adorning your frame that you’re teasing him, but he plays along anyway.

“so you stumble into a random metal concert, only to get caught in a circle of death? that’s quite the break sweetheart.” he nudges your foot with his own, earning another giggle from you. “something like that, yeah.”

he hums in response, running a hand through his unruly curls. “duly noted— i’ll have to take study breaks like that more often,” the two of you quickly fall into easy conversation, no longer paying attention to the concert goers surrounding you.

despite having only met him less than half an hour ago, you both seem quite comfortable with each other. any embarrassment from your small panic attack now a fleeting memory as he tosses his head back with laughter. the sound warming you from the inside, out.

“gotta say i’m a little shocked, first show and you’re already hitting the pits like a pro.” he jokes, leaning in a little closer to you. the scent of his spicy cologne washes over you, making your head spin, “practically took that guy out by sitting on him.”

you groan in embarrassment, playfully shoving his shoulder as he laughs again.

“i’ll have you know i’m quite fond of the music… just not the…” you gesture towards the sea of bodies that are jumping, shoving and headbanging to for whom the bell tolls. “moshing?” he finishes for you, as you nod sheepishly.

before he has a chance to say anything else, a loud squeal fills your ears as a body slams into you at full force. nearly knocking you over in the process, “there you are babes! i’ve been looking for you everywhere!”

earlier you would’ve been relieved to hear your best friend’s voice, but now you can’t help but feel a twinge of disappointment. hoping your emotions aren’t written across your face, but she doesn’t seem to notice. she’s a little too preoccupied with staring at the male leaning next to you.

“now who is this?” her tone is overly playful, wiggling her eyebrows at you suggestively. before she can embarrass you further, you elbow her in the ribs. effectively stopping anything else from leaving her mouth besides a little huff.

“eddie munson, certified mosh pit rescuer at your service ladies.”

he does a little half bow, causing both of you to break into a fit of giggles. “wow… a modern day knight in shining armor huh?” she teases but seems impressed nonetheless, “wish i had a hot guy to pull me out of there, i basically had to army crawl my way out.”

even in the shitty bar lighting you can see his cheeks are tinted pink from her compliment, nervously rubbing the back of his neck. “it was nothing really, just happy to help.” he shrugs before pushing himself off the wall, sliding his hands in the pockets of his ripped jeans.

“modest too? where did you find him?” she gushes, gently bumping her hip into yours. “and does he have a brother?” she whispers that part to you, ignoring the way you roll your eyes at her.

“well i see you’re in good hands now sweetheart, i hope you enjoy the rest of the show.” as he turns to leave you feel your friend shove you forward, giving you a look that screams, ‘are you insane? don’t let him get away!’

“eddie wait!” you shout, gently tugging on the male’s wrist before he gets too far. that dimple making another appearance as he turns back to you, “miss me already?” eddie teases, fully enjoying the flustered look that crosses your features.

“i uh, i-i’d really like to thank my knight in shining armor properly… maybe over coffee?” you nervously chew on your lower lip, praying that you didn’t read this entire interaction wrong.

but seeing his face light up squashes any doubt, watching as he grabs a pen off the bar. holding the cap between his teeth as he takes your hand, scribbling his phone number onto your palm with a satisfied grin.

“looking forward to it sweetheart.”

he mumbles, pressing a kiss to the back of your hand before disappearing into the rowdy crowd.

tagging some moots who seemed interested 💛

@babygorewhore @hellfirenacht @thepurplelovewitch @impmunson @voyeurmunson @madelynraemunson @take-everything-you-can @corrodedcorpses @serasvictoria @munsonhoneybaby @splendiferous-bitch @eddiesxangel @taintedcigs

all dividers made by yours truly 💕

BFF!Eddie Munson x Fem!Reader

friends to lovers

★Locations ★My Masterlist

Summary: Eddie calls on you to help him plan his first date, and you wish that you were the one going on it with him.

Author's Note: This isn't quite as polished as I'd like it to be. But, I'm pushing through my last few weeks of college, so I'm working with the few brain cells I've got left lol. I still love how it turned out and the ending is worth all of the self-loathing, I promise.

No use of Y/N, est. friendship, ages aren’t specified but E & R are approx. in their early twenties & it’s an early 90s AU, Reader has never been asked on a date before. Mild angst with happy ending!

Word count: 8.9k

Warnings: Reader dwells on poor self-worth & feels undesirable, acts of eating and multiple mentions of food, includes swearing.

Nestled in the quaint corner of Campbell Ave and 2nd Street, you’re engrossed in a call with a customer, jotting down an order for two bouquets consisting of pink-white lilies and snapdragons. Your eyes follow the effortless glide of your glitter gel pen across the paper, detailing their contact information.

Similarly to Goldilocks, you’ve found a place of employment where the pace is just right. You can handle whatever tasks Joan, the owner, asks of you. Sweeping the wood floors with a stiff-bristled broom, tending to the plants, and arranging flowers adorned with decorative ribbon and crisp paper are all within your grasp.

This place gets steady business, but the concept of a lunch or dinner rush is nonexistent. However, you do face a unique kind of rush occasionally. Now and then, a frantic lover bursts through the doors, bug-eyed, having realized they’ve forgotten a special anniversary or birthday at the very last minute. 

As you recite the customer’s order and callback number into the phone’s receiver, their confirmational “uh huhs” cut through the buzz of the line. Suddenly, your attention is diverted by the sight of a van pulling into the parking spot out front, slightly askew. A small smile teases the corners of your mouth as you make a conscious effort to refocus on closing the conversation at hand.

The plastic shell of the phone clacks as you hang up, and you watch Eddie hop out of his van, and round the front of it with an unusual pep in his step—more than you’d see his best days.

“What’s up, buttercup?” Eddie’s voice carries across the room, accompanied by a genuine smile that lights up his face. He strides to the register counter you’re currently manning, wearing a vermillion polo shirt embellished with the neatly embroidered String and Strum shop logo on the breast. His hair is pushed back from his face with a black bandana, resembling a biker-like edge, tied firmly to ensure no stray curls disrupt his work as he repairs guitars and sells instruments for commission.

In seconds flat, he’s already scrunching his nose like a bunny, sensing a sneeze on the horizon. Being in a room packed with fresh plants is nothing short of hell, but he’s willing to endure it for the sake of seeing you. While he can handle flowers in small quantities, the confined space never fails to tickle his system like nobody’s business.

Vision blurring with mild irritation, Eddie blinks hard to disperse it. “Hey, how’s today going?”

You shrug, suppressing a giggle at the wiggle of his nose. “As good as it can, I guess. To what do I owe this unexpected visit?”

Eddie sets a grease-stained paper bag on the counter that separates you, along with a cup of soda. “Figured you could use a midday pick-me-up.”

“Must be my lucky day because I overslept and didn’t have time to pack a lunch. Well, that and I found a penny on the sidewalk.”

Eddie crosses his arms and tilts his head. “Don’t give luck all the credit. I have instinctual powers, y’know. My Munson senses were tingling and I knew you were in need.”

“My hero,” You exclaim, clasping your hands and swinging them to the side like a swooning princess. 

Eddie chuckles with you, watching as you wipe your palms on your apron and eagerly dig into the bag, pulling out a foam to-go box. As you promptly open it and take a bite of your lunch, you can’t help but groan and throw your head back in satisfaction. Your eyes meet his thereafter, causing him to twist his mouth to the side and momentarily look away.

“How much do I owe you?” You ask, your words slightly muffled as you continue to chew.

Minnie, Joan’s cat, gracefully leaps onto the counter to greet Eddie. She perches herself beside the cash register, allowing him to scratch under her chin. “Nothin, consider it a favor,” He says with a wet sniffle, the tingling in his nose unrelenting.

The silence that falls is comfortable for you, but he’s seemingly lost in his thoughts as he continues to pet Minnie. Then, he looks at you with a mischievous twinkle in his eyes. “Speaking of which, I just so happen to know a way that you can return the favor.”

Having taken a sip from your drink and another bite of your food, the inflection of Eddie’s voice causes you to slow your chewing. “And what might that be?”

“Come over later to find out.”

Your shoulders slump, eyes widened with mock defeat. “No! I can’t stand here and wonder all day. I'll die. The suspense will kill me.”

Eddie pouts mockingly, his sweet honey eyes betraying his faux-frown. “Then I'll be sure to have the prettiest floral arrangement for your funeral. Only the best for you.”

Your brows knit together in an authentic pouting. The irony of needing to meet an untimely demise to receive flowers from a guy isn’t lost on you.

He motions toward the untrimmed bundle of carnations on the workbench behind you. “Actually, if you’re not too busy,” Eddie smirks. “Could you string those up for me quick so they’re ready to go for your wake?”

“Ha-ha,” you leer, taking the next bite of your food rather aggressively. “You’re cruel, you know that?”

“I beg to differ since I surprised you with your favorite from Val’s and all,” Eddie retorts, biting the inside of his cheek.

You grumble, “Yeah, and it’s fucking delicious.”

Eddie checks his watch and huffs, “Alright, I’ve gotta get goin’,” he says, rapping his knuckles on the countertop and beginning to walk backward. “See you later tonight,” He points at you before spinning on his heel and exiting the shop.

The bulky keyring on Eddie’s jeans jingles loudly as he steps onto the sidewalk. Abruptly, he stops in his tracks. For a moment he’s frozen, and then he braces himself against the nearby lamppost. It hits him like a brick wall and he sneezes mightily. 

Heads of nearby passersby turn in his direction, startled by the noise. As he straightens his posture, Eddie remains still, trying to find his center of gravity and regain his composure.

“You good?” You call out, your voice just barely reaching him through the propped-open doors. Taking a casual sip of your drink, you watch as Eddie steadies himself. Still clutching the street lamp with one hand, he manages to stick his other arm out and give a thumbs-up.

True to your word, you arrive at Eddie’s place straight after work. The sun is setting, casting a warm glow through the patio door onto the walls of the living room. The apartment is in its usual state of disarray, expectedly so, since it’s home to three guys who aren’t particularly concerned with tidiness.

Toeing off your shoes, you’re unphased by the subtle smell of dust in the air. What strikes you as odd is how quiet it is. Typically, at least one roommate is home, blasting the TV in the living room or music from their respective bedrooms. But the only sound permeating the silence is the erratic thumping and screech of the water pipes behind the paper-thin walls of the bathroom.  

As you snoop around the kitchen, hoping to find a box of saltine crackers or really anything to stop the gurgling in your belly. Having come up empty-handed, you turn your attention to the resilient plant that you challenged Eddie to care for—Keanu Leaves, as he so proudly named it. 

Finished with your fruitless search of the kitchen, you make your way into Eddie’s bedroom to settle comfortably into the chair that only you sit in; it’s your spot. While you get cozy, the beans rattle as they perfectly mold to your figure. You knock on the wall beside you, signaling your arrival to Eddie.

You resume the magazine left sitting open on the page you stopped on. You occupy yourself in the article about predicted spring fashion trends as you wait. After a minute or two, the pipes go quiet from the shower being turned off.

Eddie strolls into the room wearing nothing more than a clean pair of boxers. Droplets of water trickle down his toned and tatted chest. Harshly ruffling his curls with a bath towel, he smirks at you. “If it isn’t Little Miss Zombie, back from the dead.”

“Less than alive and in the flesh,” you reply, your annoyance at being made to wait all day still evident. You hold grudges better than anyone he knows, and Eddie is well aware that he’s not immune to being subject to it.

Your tummy rumbles loudly, the discomfort only emphasizing the sharpness of your tone. “When was the last time you got groceries? I didn’t see any preserved brains I could help myself to.”

“I’m definitely due for a restock,” Eddie says as he drapes his wet towel over the back of his desk chair. Then, he grabs the bottle of mousse from his dresser and dispenses a foamy dollop into his palm. “Funny you should ask, though. That’s sorta why you’re here.”

You flip the page of your magazine, not pulling your eyes from the glossy print. “You told me to come over to go grocery shopping?”

Eddie rubs his palms together to spread the product and then runs his fingers through his curls. “Not quite,” he starts, his tone cryptic. “I’ve been tasked with providing a meal, of sorts.” 

Finally, you look up at him. Watching him scrunch his damp hair with the remainder of the product that’s making his palms go tacky, you wait for him to elaborate.

Eddie’s eyes flit to the other side of the room, rather than meeting your awaiting gaze. “I have a date.”

You stare blankly at the back of his head, as still as a statue while your blinking intensifies. Dumbfounded, you struggle to survive the bombshell he just dropped on you. It’s as if a nuclear explosion has shattered your eardrums, leaving his continued words to sound muffled through the high-pitched ringing.

A million and one questions swirl in your mind, only adding to the disorienting whirlwind of emotions. Since when is he dating? Why all of a sudden? As you try to piece everything together, you note that he hasn’t had any recent romantic interactions, at least none that you’re aware of.

You always thought he’d confide in you if he was seeing someone, but now you’re not so sure; especially since you’re only finding out about this now. Without a doubt, Eddie has never had trouble attracting attention. But he’s always seemed so content with the ways things are. So why now?

Eddie turns to face you, a splash of desperation in his eyes. “I feel like doing this is the best way to know if she likes me back.”

Your mouth has gone dry, and you try to sound more curious than interrogative, but it doesn’t quite come off that way. “Who is this mystery woman, anyway?” A couple of names come to mind, some of the most beautiful girls in town—none of whom you hold a candle to.

His side of the room falls quiet when he’s hit with your question. Eddie’s eyes drop to the carpet. While it might seem like he’s lost in thought, it’s actually a glaring sign of evasion. You can’t help but feel a little hurt by his reluctance to tell you who it is.

A small smile forms as he leans back against his dresser, as though he can’t keep himself upright during his current daydream. Folding his arms across his pecs and rubbing his jaw, eyes still downcast, Eddie begins to gush about her. “She’s just- god, she’s something else. The way she laughs, it’s like... the sun coming out after a storm.”

“Sounds like quite the catch,” you mutter, trying to keep your tone neutral. You watch closely as blush tints Eddie’s cheeks and his smile threatens to grow. Without saying another word, Eddie walks out and returns to the bathroom.

You’re quick to follow, hopping up from your chair. “Do I know her?”

“Technically, yeah,” Eddie answers. Standing in front of the foggy mirror, he wipes it with the back of his forearm. Then, he starts rummaging through the counter drawer for his pair of shears.

You stand just outside the open door, the lingering humidity from his scorching hot shower kissing your skin as it disperses into the hallway. Leaning back against the wall, you cross your arms like he did moments ago, albeit far more tensely. Technically? It must be one of your ex-friends, then. That would explain why he’s been keeping you in the dark.

It’s your duty to be supportive, but right now, you could hurl. The thick nausea swirling deep in your gut is a storm raging within, overpowering your ability to stay present.

While trimming his bangs over the basin, the shears glint in the hushed light of the wall sconce. Eddie steals a glance in your direction, but his eyes dart back to his reflection too quickly to catch the discomfort etched on your face. “So you’ll help me, right?”

As you watch yourself anxiously wiggling your toes inside your sock, you mumble, “I can't if you won’t tell me who it is.“

“Sure you can, you’re a girl. You know how this stuff works.”

You scoff, your brows shooting up as your head jerks back. You open your mouth to object, but he promptly cuts you off.

“Ah, ah! Slow your roll,” Eddie cautions, pointing the shears in your direction. “I’m not saying you’re all the same, but there’s gotta be some common ground of expectations, right?”

You don’t have the strength to argue, so you reluctantly allow for his generalization. “I guess so.”

“Like yeah, I could just study one of those lady magazines you’re always reading. But then I wouldn’t have a way of knowing what is and isn’t bullshit,” Eddie explains, his tone half-joking. “That’s why I’m going straight to the source, oh, wise one.”

Far too consumed with trying to narrow down who the chick could possibly be, you can’t be bothered to give him a huff of amusement through your nose. “Can I at least have a hint?”

“Nope,” The shears hit the countertop, their metallic resonance echoing against the porcelain. He pivots to face you, hands resting on his hips. “Alright, Sherlock. How about you quit trying to crack the case and help me pick out a tie.”

“A what now?” You squawk, eyes widening in disbelief.

Eddie chuckles softly and rinses the hair trimmings down the drain, then flicks off the bathroom light. “I have to dress for the occasion. This is a big deal for me,” he elaborates as he strides back into his room. “For her and me.”

Once again, you find yourself on his tail, trailing close behind back into his bedroom. You unfold your arms and instead, start to rub the inside of your wrist with your opposite thumb. “Yeah, I get that. Just seems a bit out of character for you.”

Rifling through his closet, Eddie pulls out a hanger with a navy button-up shirt and nonchalantly tosses it onto the end of his bed. “Maybe, but at least she’ll know I’m taking this seriously,” Eddie says while reaching for the high shelf to retrieve a tattered shoebox. Lifting the lid, he presents it to you. “Here’s what we’re working with.”

You step closer, your fingers deftly plucking out the rolled ties one by one, laying them flat beside the slightly wrinkled shirt. Side by side, your shoulders nearly brush. Meticulously comparing the patterns and colors, neither of you seems drawn to any particular one.

“Here, maybe it’s better to do it this way,” Eddie suggests, picking up and beginning to slip into the shirt. His thick fingers falter as he attempts to maneuver each small white button through its corresponding hole. Once halfway dressed—having tastefully paired his plaid boxers with a dress shirt—he smooths out the material from his chest to his belly.

Eddie reaches for the nearest tie and lays it against his shoulder. He faces you expectantly, anticipation evident in his gaze, awaiting your feedback.

Your eyes flit between the tie he’s holding, the array laid out on the bed, and the hopefulness in his round eyes. “These are easily the three ugliest ties I've ever seen. No offense.”

He blows a playful raspberry at your harsh criticism and shakes his head. “None taken, they’re not mine. But Wayne might be a little hurt when I call him next and tell him you said that.”

Shooting him a pointed look, your brows furrow in skepticism. “You wouldn’t dare.”

“I just might,” Eddie teases with a smile before turning his attention back to the bed. He tosses the first tie aside and reaches for the mustard paisley one. “What about this one, does it compliment my eyes?” He bats his dark brown lashes.

You clutch your chin in contemplation, carefully assessing the combination of hues. However, the richness of his chocolate irises captures you. You wade in their depths. The hot flash that envelops your body is enough to break the trance he inadvertently put you under. With a disapproving shake of your head, you dismiss this tie as well. “Nope, next.”

Eddie looks at you for a moment longer, even though you’re not doing the same. A faint frown creases his features as he tosses the vetoed tie aside, forming a rejection pile.

You pick up the remaining tie and drape it over his shoulder, admiring the harmonious pairing of the navy in the tie with the shirt, accentuated by its white and black diagonal stripes. While you ponder, Eddie watches your face intently, holding his breath.

You nod, a trace of delighted approval in your expression. “We have a winner.”

“Hell yeah, blue on blue it is,” Eddie exclaims. He wraps the tie around the back of his neck but struggles to recall the proper technique for tying it. Attempting a few different nonsensical loopings, he groans, his determination waning. “Stupid son of a bitch, wouldya just-”

“Don’t hurt yourself. Let me do it," You offer. Not receiving protest, you step closer to him.

Eddie uses one hand to gather his product-enhanced curls into a makeshift ball, allowing you to access the collar of his shirt. He juts out his freshly shaved chin, granting you ample room to work. Standing this closely, you catch the clean scent of shaving cream lingering on his skin.

You begin to effortlessly tie the knot. Without pausing to consider what you’re about to say, the words spill from your lips, “Why’re you asking for my opinion on stuff like this, anyway? You should be doing what you think she’ll like, not me.”

“You always know best,” Eddie’s expression softens to something more vulnerable. “When you’re taking the next step in a relationship, you want everything to be as perfect as it can be, y’know?”

It’s common sense to him. No one understands him like you do, making you the perfect person for navigating this nerve-wracking experience. But for you, it’s perplexing. You’ve never been on a proper, formal date. The idea of one remains an unfulfilled pipe dream. Yet, here you are, agreeing to help Eddie plan his.

Your only frame of reference comes from romance movies and horror stories of dates gone wrong recounted by your girlfriends. Of all the things you could be in the world, you find yourself an unassuming tree. Sturdy and dependable, sure. You serve your purpose. But you don’t captivate onlookers with blooming petals like flowers do. Instead, you take pride in your intricately branched personality, valuing it as your true strength that often goes overlooked.

Even so, it feels as though your traits fail to enchant others regardless; nobody seems willing. You go unnoticed, and you’ve come to terms with that.

Beautiful wildflowers get plucked from the ground and carried away to be cherished. Meanwhile, you simply exist, rooted in no man’s land, devoid of admirers. You may stand tall, but you’re easily overshadowed by what other women have to offer.

Perhaps this is why you like working at the flower shop. It’s somewhat cathartic to witness the delicate petals fall from time to time. It brings you a strange sense of satisfaction to hack away at their stems. The best part, though? While it’s a little twisted, you know that those flowers that dazzle in their pristine state are destined to wilt. They’ll shrivel and brown.

Whilst among your shared group of friends in public, you’ve witnessed Eddie getting nudged by one of the guys to direct his attention to a smoke show walking by. You watched as they bit their knuckles and exaggeratedly gawked. You don’t compare, it’s not even apples to oranges. It’s like… apples to rocks. A delicious, shiny fruit compared to you, mere clunky chunks of earth.

If life were an album, you’re the track that everyone skips within seconds of hearing the intro. Except for those rare moments when someone half-listens by accident and they resonate with you—that’s how you and Eddie became friends. He’d stumbled upon his new favorite song, one worth revisiting. What he sees in you is what everyone else overlooks.

Eddie is the only man on the face of the earth who treats you like you’re worth being around. Only an oddball would prefer to spend time lounging beneath the shade of a crooked tree instead of homing a rose in a crystal vase. That’s one thing you love about your best friend; he doesn’t make you feel like you fade into the background.

All fairytale cliché bullshit included, you want to be sought out in a crowd. You want to light up the room for someone. Much to your dismay, that can happen platonically too, and it has in this case.

If Eddie only knew how much the little moments matter to you—the ones where he makes you feel prioritized and valued. You know you’re not anything close to special or remarkable, but he always made you second guess that thought.

Obviously, you hadn’t meant to fall for him. It was kind of like catching a cold; one day, there was a tickle in the back of your throat that you didn’t usually feel. Unsuspecting, the days went on, and that sensation only worsened. You started to panic a little but ultimately continued to deny your worst thoughts.

Before you knew it, you were bedridden, bitten by the love bug. You didn’t go down without a fight. You thought that you could be strong and deny it access to your heart, but it had already invaded. So, all you could do was wait it out.

You tried to distance yourself, hoping to recover and act like nothing ever changed inside of you. But Eddie didn’t let you get too far away.

It wasn’t love at first sight, rather, a creeping plague. There was no swooning and giggling, no struggling to keep your hands to yourself. The change was undetectable. You were a frog in boiling water, unaware of the gradually rising temperature until it was far too late.

It wasn’t until your chest started to ache every time you said goodbye at the end of spending time together that you realized you were in too deep. You genuinely debated going to the doctor to get the pang checked out, but luckily you didn’t. Otherwise, you’d have wasted a good chunk of money to find out that you’re a lovesick idiot.

Unfortunately, this is an illness you’ve been stuck with since, and you’ve at least learned how to distract yourself from it. But when you fail to do so, your imagination wanders. Naturally, you’ve wondered if pressing a mere kiss to his cheek would burn everything to the ground.

The forbidden territory beckons, tempting you to envision breaking those unspoken agreed-upon rules that forbid things like hand-holding and cuddling. The two of you uphold mutual respect, adhering to the expectations of friendship. Both of you reserve that level of touch for expressions of romantic affection. Actions such as those have no place in a true friendship.

That’s the most confusing part of this for you. How did you manage to catch such strong feelings for him when you’ve not crossed any lines? Sure, he’s a tactile person; maybe that has something to do with it. Eddie makes physical contact with those he trusts, but it’s not like he’s hanging off of you at any given moment. You receive the same treatment as the others in his inner circle: a hand on the shoulder, a pat on the back, and a brief gripping of the forearm to get your attention.

You’re not supposed to want the touches to be more frequent, much less of a different nature. The line has to be drawn somewhere, and it’s been plainly drawn in the sand. You understand and accept that. But why, of all lines in the world, does it have to be this one that you want to cross so badly?

Most of your days aren’t all that miserable. But there are those days that are more difficult than the rest, though it’s not his fault. Last weekend, the two of you were at a mall, and some chick waved at him flirtily. He returned it immediately, though playfully enough that it was almost mocking. He was fucking around and had no intention of entertaining the idea of approaching her. Regardless, it was humbling for you, to say the least.

In that moment, the world reminded you that there’s a reason you walk at his side at a respectable distance, not tucked under his arm. If anything, it’s for the best. There’s a sense of liberation in admiring him without the burden of articulating your feelings. There’s no pressure to meet a girlfriend quota or live up to a higher standard. What Eddie expects of you now is what you’re capable of, and clearly, all that you’re good for. You’re good for filling the void, but apparently not so much anymore.

You’re not lustrous and aching to jump his bones, and you’re certainly not desperate enough to kiss him on a whim by not allowing yourself to overthink it. But perhaps you are just desperate enough that a man simply paying your emotions, interests, and existence of any mind can shackle you to him. That has to be what’s done you in; Eddie gives a shit about you.

In reality, there’s more to it than that. Eddie is selective about who and what he lets in. He doesn’t care for conformity and lack of individuality. The idea of blending in with the majority of society repulses him. You find the flawed aspects of the Munson doctrine fascinating and raw. He’s not perfect and Eddie doesn’t care what others think of him, to a degree.

Not unlike you, he’s complex. Eddie is anti-establishment but still prefers a bit of structure over chaos in his day-to-day life. He’s independent and cynical as hell, but he’s also appreciative of his support systems and isn’t ashamed to rely on them. He’s not much of a rule breaker nor is he rebellious, but he’ll happily stir up a little trouble in good fun if given the opportunity.

Eddie is a hypocrite in some ways and a walking contradiction in others. You love that he’s unapologetic about being that way. He owns it for the most part, and you admire that.

His presence overstays its welcome in your thoughts. You’ve often yearned for him to call you in the dead of night, admitting that he can’t sleep without the sound of your voice. Many times, you’ve fought the urge to do that. He owes you sleep, countless nights of it. It’s a debt that will never be repaid, an outstanding balance.

Despite the attempts at trying to talk yourself out of it, you still can’t bring yourself to stop loving him. Even as he’s actively pursuing someone else, you’re unable to shake this. You could be paralyzed from head to toe, and you’d still feel the love you have for him in your bones.

Once Eddie is officially with someone, he won’t have much time or energy left for you. The anticipation of being thrown aside for something new and far prettier has shattered your heart before any changes have occurred. Yet, any fragment of his presence surpasses total absence. The greed isn’t worth it, and you know you should be grateful for getting any piece of him at all.

The phrase fizzles on the tip of your tongue like a smoldering ember, threatening to sear through the muscle… I’m happy for you.

You should say it, but you can’t. Because if you did, that would be a blatant lie. It’s not even possessiveness that has you so bitter, it’s envy. You wish you were in her place.

“There,” you adjust the knot with a delicate tug, ensuring its tightness before letting the material slip through your fingers. Unable to meet his appreciative gaze, you offer a sad smile and take a half-step backward.

Your sigh, cleverly concealed as a deep breath, escapes as you settle back into your chair with a plop. “So, um,” you begin, picking at your cuticles absentmindedly. “Where are you taking her? Somewhere fancy?”

“Nah,” Eddie meticulously revamps his curls one final time in the mirror, wanting them to fall just right. Then, with great care, he tames his bangs to lay perfectly in place. “She’s gonna come over here. I thought it’d be more intimate. Besides, I can’t exactly swing a reservation right now. I’ve been tight on cash this week.”

Your fingers come to a halt, the stinging sensation apparent. Looking over at him, your eyes meet his in the reflection. “Ya big dummy, you shouldn’t have bought me lunch when that money could’ve gone toward buying her a nice dinner.”

“Don’t start with that shit,” Eddie warns as he digs through his dresser in search of pants to wear. “I’m happy to do that for you,” He adds, pulling a pair of dark jeans from the bottom drawer.

“It really did make my day, thank you.”

“Don’t mention it,” Having donned his pants, he nears his desk where his black grommet belt lies on the floor. Eddie threads his belt through the loops of his jeans, the buckle jingling before he secures it in place. “I felt better knowing you were taken care of.”

It’s only now occurring to you what he’s implied, and you think how absurd it is for him to host a dinner when he’s culinarily challenged. “Wait, since when do you cook?”

“Oh, I don’t. But you do.”

“Hardly,” you scoff, downplaying your abilities. Placing your magazine back in your lap, you flip the page despite not having read it. Unexpectedly, you feel the urge to quell his enthusiasm, to set him up for failure by trying to poke holes in his plan. “I mean, food is one thing, but atmosphere is another. Aren’t the guys going to be here?”

Eddie moves the clutter on his desk around in a quest to find something. “I kicked them out for the night.”

Like a spear plunged into your chest, you swallow hard. Not only is he having a girl over for dinner, but he’s gone out of his way to guarantee privacy because he’s hoping to get lucky too. More than likely right there, on that very bed, feet away from you. The cramped twin-sized mattress, where they’ll inevitably be body to body.

He turns to you after locating what he was searching for, fastening the slightly fancier watch around his wrist; it only supersedes his casio due to it being analog, as opposed to digital. “I’ve been wanting to try that dish you keep raving about. You can teach me how to make it. Two birds, one stone.”

“It’s not difficult, you could handle the recipe,” You shrug away the opportunity to cook with him because the domesticity of it would more than likely kill you.

“I wanna do it together,” his voice softens, genuinely asking as nicely as he’s capable. “Please.”

“Sure, yeah,” you maintain your downcast gaze and slump back in the chair, wishing for a black hole to open and swallow you up. “What if she doesn’t like it, or what if you don’t?”

“If you like it then it has to be good.”

Eddie’s seemingly endless compliments cause no sense of flattery. Instead, you’re consumed with persisting nausea as you envision a stunning girl seated across from him while they share laughter and partake in unspeakable activities in this very room.

Abruptly, a wave of heat washes over you, causing the soles of your feet and your palms to grow clammy. The scent of newly sprayed Old Spice floods the room and you’re overwhelmed by it, struggling to draw a breath. “I’ll be right back,” You all but choke on your words, swiftly rising to your feet and hastily leaving. Eddie watches curiously as you do.

In the living room, you push the heavy sliding door aside, stepping out onto the balcony to catch your breath. You inhale as deep as physically possible, and the stirring evening breeze cools the hot tears gathered along your lash line. Cars pass by, and you distract yourself by watching a person leisurely walking their dog. You do everything in your power to divert your thoughts away from him and the impending date.

A few minutes later, Eddie emerges from his room and slides open the door to the balcony, poking his head out to check on you. “Y’ready to go?” The shift in your energy is immediately evident to him, though he can’t quite pinpoint what’s amiss. He figures you’ve had a long day and you’re tired from your shift. Maybe you’re a little hangry, too.

With your arms folded on the balcony rail, you continue to look out into the neighborhood. “Go where?” 

“The store, duh. We’ve gotta get ingredients, do we not?” He says to the back of your head.

You nod meekly before turning to face him. “Right. Yeah, I’m ready.”

Eddie flashes a warm smile before sliding the door open wide enough for you to pass through. “Let’s blow this popsicle stand then, hot stuff. We’re losing daylight,” He says, striding toward the front door.

Arguably, you’re not losing daylight fast enough. You wish the sun would fall from the sky. That way, it would always be dark and you could hide in the shadows forever. You follow him inside and slide the closed with a subdued thud.

His car keys drag and jingle while he swipes them off of the counter. Once he reaches the entryway, Eddie drops the keys on the floor beside him as he kneels to put on his sneakers. A few seconds later, you’ve joined him to do the same. Eddie glances at you as he feels the evening breeze that slipped in finally reaching this side of the room. “It’s a little chilly out, wanna borrow a hoodie or something?”

Quickly tying your shoes to avoid prolonged eye contact, you get to your feet, hugging yourself as you do. “No, I’ll be fine.”

Eddie snorts and stands, his shoes now tied as well. “I’m getting you one,” He insists and heads to his room, gesturing for you to follow.

“I said I’ll be fine without one,” You opt not to follow, instead calling out to him to compensate for the distance and his half-open door.

“Shut up, I’m getting you one and you’re gonna wear it ‘cause I said so,” his tone drips with feigned amusement at your stubbornness. “Come in here.”

As you step into the room, Eddie offers you the hoodie, watching as you just stare at it. “Sweetheart, put it on. You’re gonna freeze to death if you don’t. Then, I’ll have no choice but to cancel my super hot date because I’ll be too busy defrosting my ice sculpture of a best friend with a blow drier. You want me to blow you all night? I know you-”

“Okay, okay! I’ll put the damn thing on,” you say, begrudgingly taking it from him. “Happy?”

“Try elated,” Eddie smiles from ear to ear and winks at you, content that you’re allowing him to do what he deems best for you, knowing you’re too stubborn to do so for yourself. He’s got your back, always. Even if it means enduring a bit of attitude in the process. Eddie likes that about you, he always has. With a final glance, he leaves the room, flicking off the light switch.

Left standing in the dark bedroom, you blindly navigate the article of clothing to locate the opening. However, as soon as you go to put it on, it occurs to you that this hoodie is not fresh out of the wash.

The distant floral scent left behind by dryer sheets mingles with his natural aroma, enveloping you as you pull the sweatshirt over your head. He grabbed whatever was at hand, inadvertently submerging you back into the very sensory experience you fled from. The spicey notes from his cologne turn you into a human lava lamp, effectively melting you on the inside.

The mingling of Old Spice, tobacco smoke, his unique essence, and a hint of spring meadow flood your mind. You consider the idea of keeping the hoodie. You could tell him that you forgot to return it, and he’ll forget about it. Eddie can afford to lose one hoodie, he’d survive.

“Let’s go!” He barks, impatience peaking as nerves gnaw at him with each passing minute bringing him closer to the dinner.

Exiting his bedroom, you find Eddie stationed at the front door, propping it open with his foot. Once within his view, you extend your arms and twist your expression to emphasize your annoyed compliance.

“One last thing,” Eddie withdraws his foot, causing the door to slam shut, its latch clanging twice against the wood from the force. He reaches out and pulls the hood up, adjusting it to cover most of your head. “There.”

You stick your tongue out at him, your grin eliciting one from him in return. “Alright, let’s-” He begins, but instead of turning, he fakes you out and grabs both drawstrings. Eddie tugs them, causing the hood to cinch tightly around your face.

“You’re an ass,” You whine.

“Yeah, well,” Eddie turns around to leave this time and holds the front door open for you. “You’re stuck with me.”

With a narrowed glare, you fix the hood and your hair on your way out of the apartment. Eddie is close behind, closing the door and locking it. You take the opportunity to collect yourself and adopt a supportive, cheerful demeanor.

These are gonna be the longest two hours of your life.

You can’t fucking believe it. You’re preparing a meal for another woman, and doing so willingly. You tried to guide him through the prep process, but he grew frustrated. Now, he’s on dish duty, conquering the mountain of dirty dishes piled up on the counter. 

She may be getting a delicious and intimate dinner, but at least you get moments like these. But soon enough, she’ll have them too. If everything goes to plan, the memories of these moments will be all you have left of Eddie. As you lose yourself in the sound of his voice, the ramblings about a sale he made at work eventually circle back to the topic of his evening.

As he excitedly goes on, his voice carries a boyish enthusiasm. Unseen by you, Eddie bounces on the balls of his feet while standing at the sink. Ten minutes seem to fly by unnoticed as you both focus on your tasks.

After taking the food out of the oven, his demeanor flips like a switch. “Oh, it’s time for me to leave apparently,” you acknowledge, barely having the chance to take off the oven mitt all the way before he’s practically pushing you out of the apartment. “Be sure to heat it up at 375 degrees,” You suggest as you struggle to put on your shoes fast enough.

“Sure thing,” Eddie confirms, “I’ll let you know how it goes!”

“Looking forward to it,” You lie. Eddie waves you off before closing the front door. Left standing alone in the eerily quiet hallway, you feel foolish.

Finally arriving home, you crawl onto your bed. The weight of reality crashes down upon you, and you physically collapse under the weight of your emotions. The pain in your chest burns up the back of your throat as you sob. This was a harsh wake-up call, but it’s what you needed to finally confront yourself.

It’s better this way. Not having to reject you outright or politely turn you down, Eddie doesn’t have to hurt simply because you are. This is best because Eddie doesn’t have to feel guilty or pity you. Just as you’ve loved him in silence, you can grieve the loss of him in it too.

Ten minutes pass and just as you’re starting to drift asleep from exhaustion, your telephone rings. The ringing in the kitchen pulls you from your room. You drag your feet on the way there, clearing your throat and taking a deep breath before answering the phone.

“Hey, uh,” Eddie sounds panicked, “Can you come back over? I forgot the most important fucking thing and-”

You cut him off, “Relax, I’ll be there in twelve,” Abruptly ending the call without another word, you rub your sore eyes, blow your stuffy nose, and splash your face with warm water. The last thing he needs is for his night to be ruined because he notices how hard you’ve been crying. If your feelings get in the way of him having a good time with the girl he’s head over heels for, then you don’t deserve his friendship.

Entering the building and letting yourself back into his apartment, you’re caught off guard by how different the space looks. He worked his butt off to tidy the living room and make certain that everything is presentable. Besides being notably neater, you also notice the faint smell of air freshener.

The apartment is blanketed in darkness, illuminated only by the flickering flames of candles and the light from the table lamp in the living room. Hushed music emanates from the record player in his room. It’s a genre you wouldn’t have expected him to own, because of how slow and romantic it sounds. You wonder whether he bought it specifically for this occasion.

Upon hearing the front door creak open, Eddie halts his pacing in the living room. “Thank god, you’re here.”

You teeter on the heels of your feet, feeling out of place in the carefully arranged setting that isn’t meant for you. “I really shouldn’t be. It’s quarter to seven, she’ll show up any minute now.”

Eddie makes his way over to you, rounding the dinner table and draping his arm along the back of the dining chair farthest from where you stand. “No, no. Don’t worry about that, she’s already here.”

Your eyes flit towards the bathroom, expecting to see a sliver of light escaping from beneath the door, yet the hallway is pitch black. There’s no dolled-up gal standing in his room either. You look back at him with a furrowed brow, confusion etched on your face. “Where, exactly?”

He can’t think of a time he’s ever had to remind himself how to breathe correctly. Eddie holds his hand out to you, his anxiety mounting. With hesitation, you extend your hand and place it in his. He wraps his trembling fingers around yours.

Rarely have you been in this position, and in those instances, it was never an act with deeper meaning. It’s only ever happened in urgent moments, like darting across a bustling street to avoid being separated—a mere safety measure.

Eddie’s attention fixates on your hands, willing them to respond to his touch. Then he notices your puffy, reddened eyes. “What’s the matter?” He asks, instinctively squeezing your joined hands.

“It’s stupid,” You pull away from him, retracting your hand to wipe away the smeared mascara beneath your eyes.

Rather than forcibly turning you to face him, Eddie gracefully moves around to stand in front of you once more. “I bet it’s not,” he says softly, his compassionate expression tinged with concern. He reaches for both of your hands this time, praying you can’t feel his pounding pulse through the contact.

Eddie delicately lifts your hands and peppers velvety kisses across the tops of your knuckles. The warmth of your skin against his lips sends a shiver shooting through his core, goosebumps rising across his body.

You emit a wet giggle from the shock, uncertainty, and embarrassment bubbling within you. “What the hell are you doing?”

He chuckles a little too, his eyes sparkling as they reflect the dancing flames behind you. “What’s it look like? This is all for you,” Eddie presses one more featherlight kiss to your hands before lowering them, but he doesn’t let go, keeping them securely in his own. “It’s our first date.”

You’re the prettiest little package of unusual. From the moment he first heard your song, he couldn’t shake you. Eddie couldn’t get your tune out of his system, but it’s not like he wanted to. Never before had anyone shown him such unconditional care; no one had ever gone out of their way to get to know him like you did. You’re the safest thing he’s ever known, but you’re also the scariest, in the best ways possible.

The thought of confessing how you make him complete, unlike anything he’s ever experienced, is nothing short of terrifying. Yet, the fear of not seizing the opportunity to love you outweighs the fear of rejection. There’s no turning back now.

Your eyes wander to the table, taking in the details: the thoughtfully arranged mismatched plates and silverware, the glasses filled with expensive wine. At the end of the kitchen island sits a teddy bear beside a bouquet. In addition to the flower petals, there are red, white, and pink balloons scattered across the floor.

You turn away before he can see your face contort, biting your lip harshly to suppress the sob rising in your throat. It’s all useless, though. A broken cry escapes your lips.

Eddie’s stomach lurches and pressure builds behind his own eyes. The change he just caused is palpable, the damage has been done. He releases both of your hands and plants his on the sides of his head, stepping away. “Shit, shit, shit. I’m such a fucking idiot. I read this all wrong, I thought-”

“You’re not and you didn’t,” you choke out. “They’re happy tears now.”

His frantic expression mellows out, his arms drop to his sides, and the tension in his body gradually dissipates. “Happy tears?”

You respond with a soft hum and nod, a grin forming as you admire the table setting and gifts once more before looking back at Eddie.

“Oh,” he chirps, wearing a cheek-splitting smile as he brings his palms to your face. He wipes away your fallen tears with his thumbs. Eddie studies your expression intently. “I didn’t mean to make you cry sad ones.”

“It’s not your fault,” You close your eyes, relishing the sensation of his fingers calmingly swiping along the apples of your cheeks.

“It is and I’m sorry,” Eddie inches closer, his toes now touching yours. “I wanted it to be a surprise ‘cause I thought spontaneity would make it more memorable.”

You look at him questioningly. “It’s not exactly spontaneous when you had me cook my own dinner.”

“Shit, fair enough. You’ve got me there,” Eddie thought it was a foolproof plan. If you made the food, there was no chance that you’d hate it. “I went about this all wrong, huh? I should scrap the whole thing and start from scratch,” He becomes distracted, his train of thought shifting to how he’s going to clean this up and figure out a different approach.

“Don’t do that. Just ask me,” you grasp his forearm to regain his attention. “Ask me out and maybe I'll say yes.”

“Maybe?” Eddie scoffs airily, unsure if you’re teasing or genuinely undecided. He clears his throat and theatrically composes himself, gesturing with a downward motion of his hand in front of his face. “Okay, uh, would you like to have dinner with me?”

“No.”

Eddie’s mouth falls open.

“I’m fucking with you,” You smile devilishly and wrap your arms around his middle.

Finally, he can hug you the way he’s always wanted. Eddie brings you in close and tight, his arms encircling your head. “You think you’re so funny, don’t you?” He murmurs into your hair, inhaling deeply to indulge in every aspect of you he can.

“A little,” You laugh. You remain in each other’s embrace for a moment longer before easing apart, though still connected by your pairs of lassoed arms.

Eddie’s laughter melds with yours, the relief in his tone evident. “Now that the cat's outta the bag, I can finally tell you that I absolutely love when you’re a crybaby.”

You pull a comical expression, raising your eyebrows and widening your eyes. “What, why?” You take in the scattering of freckles across his T-zone while he responds.

“Honest to god, it’s mesmerizing to watch you experience things so intensely. It’s fucking beautiful,” With nothing but adoration in his eyes, Eddie strokes your hair, relishing the way it feels against his skin. “Can I call you my crybaby?”

“No, you cannot!” You swat at his chest and attempt to push him away, but he laughs smugly and brings you back in close. Your hands find purchase on his biceps, surrendering to him entirely. Locked in each other’s gaze, time seems to crawl.

Eddie’s hands, having made their way down to caress your hips, settle on the small of your back. “How about just baby?” he nudges the tip of his nose against yours, his voice taking on an almost sultry tone. “You like the way that sounds?”

All you can do is nod dumbly, watching his eyes fall to your lips.

Eddie mumbles, “Me too,” His hands flex where they lay, tugging you slightly so that your bodies are flush and you have no choice but to lean against him. “Would it be okay if I kissed you?” Eddie licks his lips, his eyes finding yours again, the chocolate pools of his irises swirling.

You nod, slide your hands up his shoulders, and wrap them around his neck. The air was stolen from your lungs, rendering your voice a ghost. Eddie leans in and his lips hover over yours, your eyes fluttering closed in time with his. Then, you feel the gentle pressure of his lips against your own.

For a few moments, you’re out of sync, a mere beat behind due to nerves. But after taking a brief breath, you find each other without trouble. When you slot your lip between his, it’s as though there’s a sunrise in his veins; a new dawn spreads through his body. You tug a fistful of curls at the nape of his neck, your lips clicking wetly with one another, chests heaving in unison.

When the two of you finally have to part to breathe, Eddie whispers, “Holy shit.”

“You can say that again,” You exhale, releasing the grip you have on his hair and soothingly scratching the area with your nails.

“I mean I could,” Eddie borderline purrs, tightening his arms around your waist. “But I’d much rather keep kissing you.”

“Hard to argue with that,” you smile against his lips and give him a quick peck, which he happily returns. Then, your mind begins to wander. “You got me flowers?”

He can’t discern if there’s a trace of disdain or disbelief in your tone. Eddie knows that you consider flowers cliché and overrated; after all, you deal with them all day. But just because you see them that way doesn’t mean he does.

Eddie pulls away slightly to get a good look at you, “Yeah, of course I got flowers for my flower. How could I not?”

Truthfully, he’s bummed about not being able to find a bouquet as exceptional as you. You’re unlike anything from this world, resembling something from his cherished sci-fi novels. You’re resilient, showing up any old rose or daisy. You unfurled your petals solely for Eddie and allowed him to see you bloom. Nothing on earth compares to you. So, a regular bouquet would have to do.

You comment with a slightly teasing tone, “I had no idea you’re a hopeless romantic.”

“Too much?” Eddie bites his lower lip, afraid that you’re offended.

“No, not too much,” you remove your one hand from his hair and rest it on his chest, drawing mindless shapes while you avoid eye contact. “Far more than I deserve though,” You’re slightly taken aback when Eddie cups your face without hesitation, forcing you to look at him. Despite his assertiveness, his touch is tender.

“Sweetheart,” Eddie’s eyes carry an intensity you’ve never seen, brimming with affection and sincerity. “You deserve everything good that this world has to offer. I can’t give you that, but I can give you all of me. That much I can promise.”

Reblogs are greatly encouraged and appreciated! ♡

★My Masterlist

tags:@nj01@tlclick73