dear reader

bee, 30s, writer, reader and fanfic enthusiast ✨ masterlist pinned below ✨

[beezusvreeland]

masterlist

hi, I'm bee and these are the characters that I write for:

Steve Harrington

great responsibility: Alright, let’s do this one last time! As Spider-Man, Steve Harrington has a lot on his plate. Including giving relationship advice to his best friend’s sister, who is broken hearted and has no idea who is the man under the mask.

Frankie Morales

second best: Frankie is put on the spot by the guys, who want to know if he would date you or not. He feels bad about his answer, but not as bad when he hears yours. 

Santiago "Pope" Garcia

santi's journal: After the break up, Santiago is advised to write a journal to deal with his feelings, an exercise that brings back memories and, maybe, a new hope for your relationship.

Miguel O'Hara

a very good idea: After your boyfriend cheats on you at a party, you break up with him, who tells you nobody else is willing to be with you like him. You decide to prove him wrong, with a little help from a new friend.

dear reader: Miguel took the reader’s love and friendship for granted. Something he learns reading her column, when it’s too late…Or is it?

Poe Dameron

now that we don't talk: After being rejected by Poe, the two of you are assigned a mission together. And a lot can happen during a mission.

I'm also on ao3

fic recommendations

Beautiful dividers by @diviniyae

[teenidlegirl]

　　⠀꣑ৎ　　𝒾𝑛𝘵𝑟𝘰　　. . .　　 FUTBOLISTA!MIGUEL　　♡

⠀.　　⊹　　ℳ𝑒𝑥𝑖𝑐𝘰’𝑠 ℬ𝑒𝑠𝘵 𝒫𝑙𝑎𝑦𝑒𝑟 𝒜𝑛𝑑 𝒮𝑚𝑎𝑟𝘵𝑒𝑠𝘵 ℳ𝑎𝑛　　୭　　.

　　꣑ৎ　　𝓯utbolista!𝓜iguel　　. . .　　who is team captain and star player of the mexico national football team [ selección de fútbol de méxico ] of five years. considered as the best center midfielder. wears his signature '99' on the back of his jersey, the most iconic number.

　　꣑ৎ　　𝓯utbolista!𝓜iguel　　. . .　　who is famously referred to as ‘la araña’ due to his giant spider tattoo on his muscular back. there’s fanmade merch of spiderman plushies wearing a mini version of his jersey with ‘la araña 99’ on the back. miguel finds it as the cutest thing ever.

　　꣑ৎ　　𝓯utbolista!𝓜iguel　　. . .　　adores his fans and fanclubs established in his honor. what he loves the most is seeing children wearing his jersey, it warms his heart but also amazes him to see how many kids look up to him and view him as their hero or inspiration. this also boosts his desire to have kids of his own, but keeps it to himself of course. it’s definitely a dream of his.

　　꣑ৎ　　𝓯utbolista!𝓜iguel　　. . .　　rose to fame due to his astronomical performance on the field with impressive goals, charming sportsmanship, and expressive admiration for his heritage. says he is a proud mexican football player.

　　꣑ৎ　　𝓯utbolista!𝓜iguel　　. . .　　always awards himself with tacos de carne con horchata, his two favorite things, after every win. as on cherry top, a concha de chocolate.

　　꣑ৎ　　𝓯utbolista!𝓜iguel　　. . .　　he signed up for the national team freshly out of college after his outstanding performance in school gained attention from the media.

　　꣑ৎ　　𝓯utbolista!𝓜iguel　　. . .　　been playing fútbol since he was a child, playing in the dirt backyard with his younger brother gabriel in his casita. he developed a passion for the sport from watching games on tv, especially the world cup. mexico’s immense adoration for the sport also plays a role since it’s widely common in the country.

　　꣑ৎ　　𝓯utbolista!𝓜iguel　　. . .　　besides his passion for fútbol, he adores science. in between practices as a child, miguel participated in science clubs and tournaments demonstrating his astounding knowledge in biology. although he obtained a scholarship, he earned a bachelors in genetics. a soccer player with impressive intelligence.

　　꣑ৎ　　𝓯utbolista!𝓜iguel　　. . .　　never disclosed to the public, but a reason why he grew up watching games was to draw out the constant yelling of his mother conchata and his asshole step-father george, gabriel’s father. watching those games was a form of escapism.

　　𓍢 . ✉️ྀི　༘　　i know the world cup is ending very soon but i can’t stop thinking about soccer player!miguel 😫 btw idk jackshit about fútbol so i’m sorry if i offended any soccer / fútbol lover, please don’t murder me lmao 😭

©⠀𝐓𝐄𝐄𝐍𝐈𝐃𝐋𝐄𝐆𝐈𝐑𝐋⠀♡⠀don’t⠀plagiarize⠀or⠀steal⠀my⠀work.

[aurorairi]

ᴡʜᴀᴛ ᴀʀᴇ ʏᴏᴜ ᴡɪʟʟɪɴɢ ᴛᴏ ᴅᴏ?

Steve Harrington x Fem!Reader

࿓ Summary: Steve had always thought he was into shyer girls, girls who let him very willingly take the lead, girls with cute and timid natures. Until he met you.

࿓ CW: 18+,MDNI, P in V, unprotected sex (WRAP IT UP), nasty filthy smut, biting, oral f!receiving, dirty talk, the list goes on, lmk if i missed anything

࿓ A/N: As promised- my 200 follower special <3 thanks for all the love and support! I hope this is filthy enough for you freaks.

࿓ WC: 5k

࿓ Song Inspo: ↻ ◁ | Kiss It Better by Rihanna| ▷ ↺

Steve had a type: shy, soft around the edges, careful, sugary sweet, and modest.

From Nancy to all of the girls he had taken out after, he never truly strayed from what he knew best. Those kinds of girls made him feel confident, made him feel like he had a purpose. He was eager to ‘show them the ropes’ and give them a safe place for their first time. And maybe that was exactly the problem. Because once they had gotten the gist of things, they left Steve high and dry. Not because he wasn’t a great guy, he was, but because he had a reputation. 

Steve pretended like it didn’t bother him. But oh god it drove him mad. For the life of him he couldn’t understand why he was incapable of holding onto a girl for more than a few months. And it wasn’t because he had lost his charm or was doing anything wrong, it was just he hadn’t found a girl that was willing to be as into him as he was to her.

So, Steve did what did best: complained. Oh my god, he fucking droned on and on and on about his girl problems. And not just to Robin. To literally anyone. Dustin? Yep. Max? Yep. Eddie? Oh yeah. Even Nancy. And they had all had enough. 

“I swear to god, if I have to sit through another hour of his sad failed date stories I’m going to lose my mind.” Max rubbed her temples.

Dustin nodded, carefully placing his character sheet back into its laminated slot in his D&D binder. “It’s bad.”

Eddie looked up from behind what he called ‘the master's wall of secrets’ which was simply a divider with helpful stats and tricks for the dungeon master. “Harrington have another bust of a date?”

The room had emptied out save for Dustin, Will, Mike, Lucas, and Max (who had been bored out of her mind until they got to combat where she got increasingly scarier). They all groaned and nodded. Mike looked over at Eddie with an exasperated expression, “I could hear him whining about it to Nancy over the phone all night.”

“I think I know what his problem is.” Eddie carefully began packing up.

“If you do, would you please tell him?” 

“Better yet, I think I might just show him.” Eddie smirked, a devious plan swirling in his head.

Eddie had invited the older kids over for a simple hang out. Nothing too crazy, just some drinks, weed, food, movies… and oh yeah, a surprise for Steve. He had of course informed everyone he would have a friend over, but that she was cool and they didn’t need to worry about it. Actually, Eddie had informed everyone BUT Steve of exactly who you were and what he was planning. 

Steve and Robin came bearing chips and salsa, which promptly fell out of Steve’s hands at the mere sight of you. Hair messy without care, eyes half lidded as you took another slow drag of the cigarette in your hand, your body splayed out across Eddie’s couch, the swell of your breasts shining under the low lamp light so perfectly, your thighs slightly parted, the red straps of your thong peaking out from the waistband of the tiny piece of fabric called sleep shorts. Mascara smudged every so slightly. 

“Well fuck-” Steve muttered to himself.

You smiled over at the pair, swinging your legs off the couch and crossing the small distance to greet them. You pulled Robin into a sweet hug, introducing yourself properly. And then your attention was on Steve. Eddie had mentioned him. Eddie had not mentioned how much of a stud he was. You licked your lips, eyeing him without shame. You smiled sweetly as you stepped into his space, wrapping your arms around his neck and pushing your chest against his.

“It’s nice to meet you…?” You prompted him.

He swallowed hard, his arms slowly wrapping around your waist. He fought the insane urge to hold your hips. “Steve.” He answered.

You pulled back ever so slightly, arms loose around his neck. “Steve.” Your voice dripped with honey. You smiled to yourself as you took a long glance over his face, eyes lingering on his lips. Your hands slid from around his neck to the top of his chest, ever so slightly pushing yourself away. You let out a hum of approval, glancing over at Eddie. “I see why you kept this one a secret from me, wanted him all to yourself huh, Ed’s?”

Eddie’s head popped out from his room, a victorious smile on his lips as he took in the sight of Steve. “Guilty as charged. But I figured I’d finally share the wealth with the needy.” Eddie directed the last part to Steve, who of course hadn’t heard a thing. 

You bit at your lip as you turned your attention back to Steve. His eyes slowly lit up with a gentle fire the longer you stared. You hummed again. “You sure are needy aren’t you, Harrington?”

Steve half expected himself to grow shy under your stare. Instead, he felt a wave of confidence ooze from his skin. “What makes you say that?”

You smiled more, eyes lighting up with the same kind of fire. “Well, for starters, you’re playing with my thong.”

Steve’s eyes widened. Steve hadn’t realized, but his hands had slowly drifted from your waist to your hips, his thumb carefully tracing the straps of your thong. He carefully detached his hand, not fast, just the right pace to show you he didn’t really want to move his hand. “Sorry.”

“Don’t be. If I wasn’t enjoying it, you would’ve known. Plus I like your hands, big and warm.” You revelled in the way Steve instinctively leaned closer. “I bet you hold onto your girl real tight at night.” You staged the question perfectly. A statement used to draw out the information you wanted. Did Steve Harrington have a girl?

 Robin, who was watching the whole interaction with Eddie from down the hall, felt a nervous ping in her chest. Either you had just jumpstarted an hour of the ‘steve harrington is lonely’ conversation, or you were incredibly good at getting what you wanted.

Steve caught on, and had no problem playing right into your hand. “I would if I had one.” There was no ounce of self pity behind it. Instead, a promise.

You smiled again, an intoxicating little grin of delight. “Carefull what you wish for, Harrington.”

That night had been the spark that lit the blazing fire that was you and Steve. You were unlike anything he had ever known. Off the handle, fiercely confident, a masterful tease, and just as crazy for him as he was for you. 

Life with you in the passenger's seat gave Steve a whole new purpose. No, it wasn’t to tame you or bring you down to earth. It was to hold you up and show you off. The same way you showed him off. You had no problem making it well known that you and Steve were an item, and a blazing hot one at that. 

You would happily latch yourself to his side at parties, not in a clingy way, just in a way that exuded fulfillment. You had no problem staking your claim on the man with a long kiss or a slap on the ass or the occasional frequent mark on his neck in the shape and shade of your lipstick. You didn’t do those things because you felt jealous, or threatened when another woman openly flirted. You did those things because you were incredibly proud to call the tall, thick haired, gorgeous man beside you yours. It came from a place of pride, and god it made Steve dizzy. He liked being loved loudly. He enjoyed your bold moves, and brash admiration.

Steve had always doubted if feelings were truly reciprocated in his past relationships.

He did NOT doubt you. 

And he made damn sure you didn’t doubt him. With you, Steve finally didn’t feel ashamed to love with his whole chest. He didn’t feel like he needed to pull back his affections, or reign in his sweet words. Much like you, Steve had no reservations letting his hands roam your body under the lights of whatever party Robin or Eddie had dragged you along to. Steve liked holding you tight into his side, he liked holding your drink while you and Robin took to the floor. Steve happily got lost in your eyes while you retold some work horror story, and he happily twirled you around as you showed off your outfit to your friends. And he LOVED pulling you onto one of his legs while he leaned back against whoever's couch he was taking over. 

The love you had built with Steve was a wildfire, bursting with every loving emotion known to man. The two of you were fiery hot even on your own, and together… It was lethal. Every emotion was heightened around the two of you. Which made fighting particularly brutal… but the making up was other worldly. 

Parties in particular seemed to really stir things up between the two of you. Especially Eddies after parties, which were becoming more and more frequent as his band started booking more and more gigs. Eddies after parties involved a lot of things: loud music, drugs, dancing, tight spaces, unsolicited flirting, eye fucking, and the occasional shut down from the cops. 

You got incredibly rowdy at said after parties, something Steve had no problem with. He liked seeing you let loose, liked seeing you dance freely. He liked the way you would find his eyes as you swayed your hips in that irresistible way. What he didn’t like was that one of Eddie’s band mates simply couldn’t seem to understand that you had no interest in him.

Frank was a nice guy, truly. On any regular day, Steve liked Frank, thought he did a great job playing the keyboard or whatever it was he did. But when Frank was two edibles in, that’s when Steve had a bit of a problem with him. Steve could feel the agitation itching under his skin. You and Frank stood close, pushed together in the sea of bodies. You politely held your drink between his body and yours, creating space despite the way you leaned in closer to hear him and the playful laughs that fell from your lips. Steve knew you liked playing little games with him, it was your way of getting him riled up. 

Steve watched the exchange closely, half amused and half annoyed. Amused because you kept looking over at him, biting your lip as your eyes raked up and down his body. Steve caught the subtle way you rubbed your thighs together, bringing a smirk to his face as he imagined which lacy number you had decided to go with tonight. Annoyed because Frank was inching closer, eyes hungry as he got a good look at your chest. You shot a wink at Steve quickly as you leaned closer, giving Frank a better look. 

Steve felt his dick twitch with irritation and lust as you toyed with him from 10 feet away. To others, it looked like you might have been playing right in Steve's face, making a fool out of him. You and Steve knew better. He knew you were just setting up the tone for the rest of the night. He trusted you. And he was right to, because when Frank tried to tuck a strain of hair behind your ear you easily avoided the touch, pretending to have heard your name from somewhere across the house. Steve laughed to himself as the ends of your hair hit Frank right in the face, and laughed more when you patted the poor guy on the shoulder before announcing you were missing your darling boyfriend. 

Steve smiled as you easily slipped away, making your way to him with a sly smile. He opened his arms, letting you pull yourself into his chest. The heat from your body lit him on fire. You stared up at him with amused eyes. “Hey, baby.”

“There’s my little minx.” He smiled down at you, his hands finding your hips with ease.

You gave him a wicked little grin, “Oh come on, you’re telling me that didn’t turn you on?”

Steve laughed, his head tipping back slightly. “You know it did. Just wish you’d pick another target.”

You looked up at him carefully. “Do my ears deceive me or is Steve Harrington actually jealous of Frank the Keyboarder?” 

He rolled his eyes, sucking at his teeth. He let one hand slowly drift from your hip down your thigh and under your skirt. “Nah, m’not jealous. Wanna know why?” He leaned close, his lips brushing that sensitive spot beneath your ear.

You leaned closer, fingers digging into his bicep. “Why?” Your breath hitched slightly as your felt two thick fingers carefully graze against the wet spot in your panties.

Steve pulled his hand away, examining his fingers momentarily. “Becuase his fingers know how to work a keyboard, mine know how to work you.” He carefully slotted his fingers in his mouth, licking them clean and pulling them out with a sharp pop.

You squeezed your thighs together, scared you would genuinely start dripping on the carpet. “Fuck, baby. That was so-”

Steve hummed, gripping your jaw and bringing your lips to his. Your arms slid up around his neck, pulling him closer.

“Slut.”

You and Steve froze. He pulled away, eyes finding the guy who had officially dug his own grave. You grabbed Steve’s arm carefully, “It’s fine.”

Steve let a low growl through his teeth, eyes staring down the guy. “You wish.” he directed his words at the man. He wrapped a protective arm around your shoulder.

The guy slowly turned towards you and Steve again, a confused look on his face. “What?”

“I said you wish. Just so you know, calling her a slut isn’t gonna compel her to use you to turn me on.” 

You bit back a laugh, literally biting his arm to keep yourself from full on laughing in the guy’s face.

The douche was at a loss for words, him looking between you and Steve like you had lost your minds. “S-sorry.” He quickled turned away, drifting deeper into the house.

You pulled your teeth away from Steve’s bicep. “Wow, way to air out our dirty little secret.”

He shrugged, “I don’t feel too inclined to hide anything when it comes to you.” He twisted his arm to look at the indent of your teeth in his arm. “Damn, if you wanted a piece of me just ask.”

You smiled wider, linking your index fingers through his belt loops and tugging his hips against your own. “I don’t want just a piece of you, Steve.”

“Let’s get out of here, yeah?” His nose brushed against yours. You nodded eagerly and let him pull you from the house. 

When you were comfortably seated beside Steve in the beamer you shot him a wild smile. As Steve drove down the familiar path to your shared space, you carefully leaned over the center console. You let one hand grip his shoulder to steady yourself as you pushed your face into the crook of his neck. Your lips brushed against his warm skin, pulling a sharp shiver from him.

Steve kept his eyes glued to the road, clearing his voice as he asked, “Baby, what are you doin?”

You smiled against his skin, your tongue licking at the spot you had just teethed at. “What’s it feel like I’m doin?”

His grip on the steering wheel tightened. “Distracting me. I’m driving baby, I gotta focus.”

You took a deep inhale of his cologne, “Then tell me to stop.”

You waited, lips hovering so close he could feel your breath fanning across his neck. Steve blinked hard, shifting in his seat to try and give his growing boner some room. The small house was only a mile down the road. He could make it. “Fuck it- keep going.”

You immediately latched your mouth back onto his exposed skin. Sucking and soothing over his sweet spots. Your lips dragged up and down his skin, trailing warm kisses along his jaw line. You shifted closer, head dipping into the space where his neck met his shoulders. You carefully pulled at the skin with your teeth before letting your tongue run over the sore spot. Steve reached down, adjusting his jeans carefully. You caught the motion, smiling against his skin as the car jerked to a stop outside of the house. 

Steve quickly turned, his hand sliding between your thighs with ease. You pulled back, staring at him with hazy eyes. “Fuck- need you, Steve.”

Steve squeezed the plush of your thigh with one hand, the other coming up and gripping your chin hard. “Yeah? Tell me what you’re willin to do.” 

You stared at him hard, “Anything, just want you.” You brushed your nose against his, giving him sultry eyes.

“Fuck- can’t say no to you.” He smiled, pressing a hot kiss to the side of your mouth before unbuckling your seat bet. You both scrambled out of the car, Steve unlocking the house with ease and kicking the door shut behind him.

You pounced the moment the door was shut, leaping into his arms with a wicked grin. He caught you with ease, pushing your thighs around his waist. You happily wrapped your arms around his neck, fingers tugging at his hair. “You looked so good tonight, Steve. And god, the way you told off that guy… fuck- I would’ve let you take me right there.” 

Steve smirked, his hands gripping the fat of your ass as he walked you towards the bedroom. “Wish you would’ve said that, I would have done that. Shown that guy exactly what he was missing out on.” You practically let out a moan at his words, pulling his hair harder. Steve grinned wide, “Oh you like that, huh? You want me to fuck you in public baby? Show everyone exactly how good I make you feel?”

You bit your lip hard, his words shooting straight down to your aching heat. He carefully walked you backwards until the backs of your knees hit the edge of the bed. Steve wrapped a careful arm around, keeping you standing and pressed against him. Your fingers curled into the edges of his jack to keep you steady. He stared down at you, eyes attached to the sight of your top slightly disheveled and giving him the most mouthwatering view of your chest. His hands eagerly slid under your top, pulling it over your head expertly before cupping your tits and thumbing over your hard nipples with his thumb. A needy moan fell from your lips, your head tilting back as his large hands squeezed and played with your sensitive mounds.

Steve smiled to himself before giving you a gentle push, letting you fall down onto the plush mattress behind you. You propped yourself up on your forearms, chest high and legs already parted for him. Steve watched you from above, the sight of you splayed out like that for him, sending a new wave of heat down to his cock. He carefully kneeled on the edge of the bed, hands running up your legs as he admired you before climbing further up. 

Your skirt had carefully ridden up to your waist, granting him the most delectable view of your glistening cunt. He felt his dick strain against his jeans even more. “Fuck, look at you-”

You smiled, “Already so wet for you.” You finished his sentence. 

He carefully pressed his knee up against your aching cunt, revelling in the way you pushed yourself to meet him. A slow whimper drifted through the air as you rubbed yourself against him, letting a wet spot form quickly against his jeans. He pushed his knee up harder, driving out a string of curses from your mouth. 

Steve quickly rid himself of his shirt, flinging it somewhere in the room. His hands moved to your hips, pressing them down against the mattress and halting your attack on his leg. “Tell me what you’re feeling, baby.”

You squirmed under his touch, hips trying to chase his knee as he pulled it away. “Needy. Fuck- so needy Steve. I want you so bad it hurts. I need all of you, however you want me. But, please, just fuck me.”

Steve's eyes traveled from your face to your soaked panties, a broad smile finding its spot on his face. “It hurts, hm?” He easily slotted his head between your thighs. You nodded, watching him dip his head low. His fingers curl around the strings of your thong, pulling it down in one fell sweep and letting his warm breath fan across your wet slit. “How bout I kiss it better?”

You nod feverishly before your head flies back against the pillows as Steve licks a long stripe against your cunt. He lets the cold air rush in for a small moment before peppering kissing against your folds. A groan catched in your throat as he carefully knocks your legs wider and nudges his nose against your heat. “Fuck- stop teasing”

“What? A man can’t take his time with his dinner?” He looks up at you with a devious glint.

“Steve- please!” You carefully grab a fist full of his hair, pushing his head back down.

He laughs and grips your thighs harder, fingers digging into the fat of your skin. “So damn needy-”

“Yes! Now please fuck me with your tongue!” You call out from above him.

Steve obliges, his tongue diving in between your slick folds and taking in a whole mouthful of you. You moan out wildly, letting the feeling spread out warm and hot in your stomach. You push his head deeper, your legs tightening slightly as he brings his thumb to the outside of your heat, rubbing sweet circles against you. His tongue moves at an alarming pace, lapping up every ounce of your juices. He pushes his tongue deeper, lifting up your hips so he can get the perfect angle. Steve lets a moan fall against you, sending the vibrations up your body. Your eyes squeeze shut as he devours you like a man starved. He carefully guides in two thick fingers, letting them brush against your walls and pulling out more of your wet. You clench tightly around his digits, not wanting them to leave your needy cunt. His tongue rolls deeper, licking into you like he needs your taste to live. He pushed his fingers deeper, finding that aching spot waiting to be caressed. He curls his fingers against it, causing your body to jolt forward slightly, your eyes shooting up, and your hand yanking at his hair.

“Oh- Steve- fuck, that’s it. Fuck, yeah right there.” You urge him on, feeling the knot in your stomach begin to pull tight.

He moans again as you pull at his hair, his fingers dipping back in and working at your velvety walls. He feels your breathing pick up, and stuffs his face deeper working his fingers faster. He catches the tiny hiccup in your breath as it catches, your walls clenching down around his fingers, sucking them deeper. Your legs squeeze around his head so hard he thinks he might suffocate between your legs. What a perfect way to go. You moan his name loudly as your orgasm wracks through your body, before your legs loosen around him. 

You reach down carefully, grabbing his chin and pulling him up. And fuck, the sight of him lathered in you, chin dripping in your wet, lips mixed with saliva and your cum, it has you seeing stars. Steve carefully licks his lips, his fingers collecting you off his chin before licking them clean. You shutter at the sight, eyes burning into his skin. 

“Fuck, you taste so good, baby.” He crawls over you, planting a hard kiss on your lips. Your tongue swipes against his bottom lip before meeting his own tongue in the cave of his mouth. The taste of you on his tongue has you clenching around nothing. He trails sloppy kisses along your jaw, his warm hands splaying out against your waist. 

You carefully reach down in between your bodies, and palm him through his jeans. Steve hisses at the touch, looking up at you with fiery eyes. “Shit- baby be careful-”

Your fingers make quick work of his belt and jeans, pulling them down to his knees. You let your hand dip below his underwear, your hand gently stroking his hard length. His head falls into your shoulder as he groans low. You gently squeeze at his base, causing the feeling of teeth sinking into your shoulder. Your senses ignite at the feeling. You quickly stroke him again before he’s reaching down and completely discarding his pants and boxers. You bite your lip at the beautiful sight of his dick twitching in his hands and leaking droplets of precum. 

Steve takes in the desperate look in your eyes and quickly crawls back over you, his dick sliding between your folds. “Look at you, already cock drunk and I’m not even inside you yet.”

You loop your arms around his neck, pulling him closer. Your lips latch onto his neck, before trailing up to his ear. You gently nibble at his ear lobe, earning you a shutter and a groan. “Steve, I need you inside me so so so bad. Please? Just need to feel you fuck me senseless. Please baby? I’ll be so good for you, just need you bad.” You beg against his ear, the words and hot breath mixing against his skin. 

Steve groans low, and pushes himself to the hilt in one go, drawing out a desperate moan from your mouth. Your legs wrap around his waist instantly, your pussy sucking him deeper. He groans out as you clench around him. 

“Oh fuck- look at you, so tight and wet for me. Fuck, this pussy was made for me huh?”

You nod, mouth open but unable to form an actual sentence. “Made… ngh..you” 

Steve pulls back slightly before ramming himself back in, your body jolting against the sheets and the headboard slamming hard into the wall. His head ducks into your shoulder, pressing light kisses down your arm as the room fills up with the sound of his skip slapping against yours. Steve presses a kiss to your palm before his teeth sink into it as you squeeze around him.

You feel his dick kissing the edge of your cervix, hitting that sweet spot over and over again. You clench down on him, eyes screwing shut as you moan out his name. “Steve- right there. Fuck that’s it. Don’t stop, don’t stop, you feel so good”

Steve's fingers lace with yours beside your head, his forehead meeting yours. “I got you. Fuck you look so good taking me like this. I got you, baby, let go for me.”

Your legs shake as a second, harder, orgasm washes over you. Your walls squeeze around Steve, pulling him to the edge with you. He moans into your shoulder as you milk him. 

His hips come to a slow stop as he helps the both of you ease out of intense feeling. You plant kisses all along his face and neck, whining slightly as he pulls out. His arms wrap around your waist as he falls to the side of you, bringing you half onto his chest. 

He stares up at you with a dizzy smile, “I don’t think I’ll ever get used to that.” He laughs.

You smile, resting your head on his chest, drawing random shapes against his skin. “Me neither.” 

His hand wanders up to your shoulder, fingers tracing the indent he left with his teeth. He sits up slightly startled. “Shit- baby, did I do that?”

You laugh, “Yup, and this.” You show him your palm.

“Fuck, I’m sorry. I don’t even-”

You cut him off with a long kiss, “Don’t be sorry, it was fucking hot. Like really really really hot. Like if I think about it too long I might need a round two.”

He relaxes and laughs, “I dunno if I’m up for that, I’m pretty spent.” He kisses the tip of your nose.

“Oh I know, just beware, tomorrow morning… you’re getting the best head in your life.” You cuddle into his side with a happy smile.

Steve laughs, wrapping you up tighter. “You want to shower or just go to sleep?”

“Sleep, please. I’m so warm right here. Don’t want to leave your arms.” You smiled sweetly, “Plus what’s the point if tomorrow morning your cum is gonna be all over me again.”

Steve barked out a laugh, pulling the blankets around your shoulders, “You’ve sure got a mouth on you.” He paused slightly, feeling you smirk against his skin. “Wow, I really just set myself up, didn't I?”

“Yup. But.. I’ll give you a pass on this one, m’too tired to keep making sex jokes.” 

He smiled wider, pressing a kiss to your temple as the two of you drifted to sleep. Steve hummed contently, so happy to have finally broken away from his usual type to find his perfect match.

Taglist: @lunabears-stuff @susu6944 @mandoskenobi @sydssvalntyne @eggjuice @rustyguitars @87sassy @idontread4 @kalunacow @livsters @eller41 @enchantedsharddetective @midnights-19 @ottotheotter2 @2noopythedog @boreddemigodd @kurtsw7rld96 @fandomxoxo@claire77bear00-blog @cciessuzi @planets-and-stars @jajajhaahaha

(Also if you guys wanted to be added to only a certain taglist like just the deprived series just shoot me a message and I'll remove you from the general taglist <3)

[beezusvreeland]

Great responsibility - Part 2

Spider-Man!Steve Harrington x Henderson!Reader

Word count: 1,7k

Summary: Alright, let’s do this one last time! As Spider-Man, Steve Harrington has a lot on his plate. Including giving relationship advice to his best friend’s sister, who is broken hearted and has no idea who is the man under the mask.

Part 1

Another friday night came around, but this time, instead of being up above the skyscrapers, Steve was walking out of the subway station headed towards Robin’s apartment. For the last couple of days, he couldn’t be Spider-Man even if he tried: after a violent (and very annoying) fight with the Green Goblin, his suit was left shredded to pieces. It was the motivation Dustin needed to develop a new suit and Steve’s excuse to spend a night with friends for the first time in a while. 

“Steve?”, Vicky answered the door, looking pleasantly surprised to see him there. 

“Holy shit! Do my eyes deceive me? Is there a real life dingus on our door step?”, Robin’s voice came from inside the apartment. 

Steve laughed softly as he entered their place, giving Vicky a hug first and then Robin.

“Are you okay, Dingus?”, she asked quietly. Steve just nodded.

“My old suit is dunzo. The nerd is busy developing a new one.”

“It was about time!”, Robin said, holding his biceps and taking a step back as if assessing his body for any cuts or bruises. She exhaled, looking relieved, when she found none. “Alright, come on, we’ve got a ridiculous amount of snacks!”

“There is no such thing as too many snacks, Buckley”, you said, looking down at your plate, as the two friends entered the kitchen. 

“That’s exactly what I was gonna say!”, said Steve. 

You looked up, eyes wide at first, but you tried your best to soften your expression.

“Hey! I didn’t know you were coming.”

“Yeah, it’s been a while”, he shrugged, putting his hands inside his pants’ pockets. “How have you been?”

One of the weirdest parts of being Spider-Man was having convos as the superhero with people that he knew from his everyday life as Steve. Once he rescued Corroded Coffin’s instruments from a burglar and then had to give them back to a very drunk Eddie who thought he was hallucinating so badly he peed in his pants. It took Steve a few months to stop feeling the smell of urine and an urge to laugh every time he saw his metalhead friend.

The thing about you, though, is that you actually trusted Spider-Man by sharing a vulnerability with him. Steve caught himself thinking about it after that night: who was this guy you were so into and what kind of spell did he have over you for you to think he was so great even after being rejected? 

The truth was that he was so used to your brother’s demanding nature and your discrete disposition that it surprised him to see you ask for help for once. You were usually so calm and composed, the one everybody could count on when they needed help. In many ways, you were the anchor of the group. 

There were many aspects of his double life that made him feel guilty, but Steve particularly hated to consider the fact that you might have been hurting and he didn’t notice. That maybe no one had. 

That’s why he hoped you would take his advice to go for someone new to heart. Even if, deep inside that idea made him feel weird, it was better than imagining you hurting. He was curious about how your week had gone after your encounter with Spider-Man but, needless to say, he couldn’t reveal what he knew whatsoever. Steve would have to find another way to approach the subject.

“Good. A lot of work, you know how it is.”

“Yeah, right.”

It was going to be harder than he thought. 

“So…”, he started.

“Oh, excuse me, I need to wash my hands”, you said, quickly crossing the kitchen towards the restroom. 

A loud bite took him out of his stupor. Robin, who he had completely forgotten about, was studying him as she bit a carrot. 

“She could’ve just used the kitchen sink.”

Steve’s hopes to talk to you went down the drain when you left the bathroom saying you had a headache and had to go home.

“Do you want me to call you an Uber? Or I can walk you home”, suggested Steve. You denied and left in a hurry. 

Robin stood at the door, looking at the hallway, watching you enter the elevator. She looked at Steve suspiciously when she came back inside. 

Spider-Steve spent his monday on the clock: helping the NYPD by monitoring the surroundings of a big government event happening in town, chasing some ninjas all the way to Hell’s Kitchen — weird ass criminals that were Daredevil’s problem now —, and helping out anyone that might need him.

“Okay, dude, I think it’s enough for today”, said Dustin on comms. 

“Yeah, no shit”, answered Steve, cracking his neck and back, trying to release the tension of the day. “Don’t you have your nerdy study group tonight or whatever?”

“My girlfriend’s totally awesome study group meets on monday nights, that’s correct.”

Steve rolled his eyes. 

“Just go, Henderson.”

“You too, okay? Everything is under control and your suit’s intel shows me your body is in desperate need of some rest.”

“Yeah yeah.”

“I’m serious, man, what does Robin always say?”

“Please, don’t…”

Dustin interrupted: “You can’t help others if you can’t help yourself first”. 

“Ugh, just go already before I’m forced to admit you’re right.”

“You’d hate that, huh? Alright, dude, take care. Henderson out.”

The ear piece inside Steve’s suit went quiet. He took a few deep breaths, resting his hands on his tights. 

“You okay?”

Steve looked up to find your eyes on him. Or rather, Spider-Man. 

“I, uh…”

He tried to assess what was happening. You were at the side walk, a few steps from him at the alleyway. There was a lot of noise emanating from within the city: sirens, people talking, car horns. It was probably rush hour and, if so, you were just now leaving work. He looked up to both sides to find you were both between huge buildings, one of them being Alchemax’s, where you’ve been working as an assistant researcher for a little more than a year.

“Are you…”, you started again, with caution.

“Yes! Hi! Yes!”, Steve recovered, quite nervously. “We’ve got to stop meeting like this.”

“Wait, how do you even remember me? You certainly can’t, among all the faces you must see every day.”

“Well, I certainly don’t, just the ones that almost throw up all over me.”

You covered your face with your hands, earning a laugh from Steve.

“I’m so so so sorry, Mr. Spider-Man…”

“Just Spidey, Mr. Spider-Man was my father.”

You kept going without even processing his joke.

“Of course, Spidey. Listen, I’m so sorry”, your hands went from your face up to your hair. “Listen, I had the worst night that night and just…Jesus.”

Steve thought to himself that he should interrupt and assure you at some point, but it was kind of adorable and wholesome to see you trying to make sense of your feelings. Wait, what?

“What I mean is, you probably have much more important matters to attend to and I’m deeply sorry for wasting your time with my pathetic love life and excessive alcohol consumption.”

You looked at him, expectantly. 

“Okay, I guess I should go”, you said quietly.

“No no no!”, Steve got closer to you. “To be honest, my back is killing me and I kind of just blanked for a minute”, that wasn’t a complete lie. 

“Oh, I’m…”, you said, reaching inside your purse.

“Please don’t say you're sorry, we’re all good. You didn’t vomit on me, after all.”

“Okay, then, can I at least offer you some ibuprofen?”, you hold the medicine and your water bottle towards him. “I’m not sure how your DNA works, but it can’t hurt, right?”

Steve got the pill and the bottle and turned away from you, so you wouldn’t see his mask partially coming up. “Thank you.”

“Sure”, you shrugged. 

He gave you the bottle back.

“It’s the least I can do. Thank you for calling my friend, by the way, instead of just leaving me there.”

“What type of guy do you think I am?”, Steve couldn’t help but be insulted. Pigs would learn how to fly before he left a drunk girl by herself on the street. Mask or no mask.

“I really don’t know”, you answered, earnestly. 

That disarmed Steve. You looked at him like you were really trying to understand him. 

“Do you remember the rest of our conversation?”

“The part where I complained about feeling rejected? Yes, unfortunately.”

“Why is that? I was the one who gave you advice.”

“Well…”

“Did you follow it?”

“Not really.”

“Come on! Why not?”

“Why do you care?”

“Because I’m invested now!”

“Are you now?”, you scoffed, shaking your head. “I guess I’m just…scared of being so forward. Besides, I don’t even have a crush. I mean, except the guy I’m trying to forget, which would be counterproductive.”

“It doesn’t really have to be a crush. Isn’t there any guy in your life who you think is kind of interesting and wouldn’t mind getting to know better?”

A tiny, minuscule, atom sized part of Steve hopped you would think of him. That maybe that was what caused you to run away last time you saw each other. Perhaps you had a thing for him and didn’t know how to express yourself. He wasn’t sure what prompted those thoughts, it had been a long time since the last time he allowed himself to wonder what it would be like to share these types of feelings with someone.

You seemed to think for a moment. “There is this one guy, I guess.”

Excitement filled Steve to the point where he forgot about his physical pain for a few instants. 

“See? That’s what I’m talking about!”, he clapped and pointed at you. 

“Are you, like, my relationship coach now, Spidey?”

“You can call me Spider-Hitch.”

You made a face and he quickly tried to mend it.

“That wasn’t it, was it?”

“Please never say those words combined again.”

You both laughed, tickling Steve spider senses pleasantly. 

“But, really, you should give it a try, have some fun. You’ll be healing in no time.”

“Yeah, maybe. Let’s see how this goes.”

A/N: This mini series is a part of the THE STEVE HARRINGTON SUMMER SLEEPOVER event, hosted by @graywrenhart and @moonstoneandmoonlight. I got the movie Hitch and mixed its concept with a Spider-Steve idea I’ve been meaning to write for a while.

tagging people who interacted with the first part. let me know if you don't want to be a part of it, no questions asked ;) @madeafoolofyou @imsothoroughlymodern @angstlovingfreak @nerdekuhero @graywrenhart @nestrika @iamwarrenspeace @faithbydesignsblog @fromtheworldtoyou-blog @emistrash @fallingforthoseeyes @katscozykorner @chocolatecoveredraisin @jazzisinmyveins @cavaliercatalina @marie-the-muse @madeafoolofyou @clawdeannn @revivingtheded @p4lm5prings @splatwidow @xstaticandsilence @xceafh @angel-dust-cb @youreasnack @espressovz @readheadwriter @blk-silk @thebreadboyswife @cluvver @madssss112 @djocaine @kirksgreeny @darthbeebles @okeydokeyoh-blog @hvrricanq @orphicdoll @keerycharm @yailology @queencookie1234-blog @eli0eli0

Dividers by @saradika-graphics | Polaroid by @diviniyae

[invisibleangelx]

a case of the sniffles

when you come down with a fever during your shift at family video, steve takes it upon himself to get you feeling better.

steve harrington x fem!reader, fluff fluff fluff, reader being in denial, steve being crazy down bad. word count: 2.3k

when you woke up this morning with a stuffy nose, you'd assumed it was your allergies acting up. it's the middle of autumn—not unusual for you to come down with a case of the sniffles (as your coworker steve affectionately calls it) with the weather getting colder. so you'd taken your antihistamines, standard procedure, and went into work as normal. there's also a strange tickle at the back of your throat this time, but you decide to ignore it. once the meds kick in, you'd be fine.

you glance up at the clock—it appears only a minute has passed since you last checked the time. still five whole hours to go.

the morning shift is always a drag. usually steve keeps you going, making jokes and informing you of every thought that crosses his mind, leaving the actual work part of your job on the back burner. even on the quietest of days, there's never a spare moment that steve won't spend finding you. you used to find that highly annoying, never being able to just sit in the silence, but you had to admit, you've grown to enjoy it. crave it, even. especially right now—the meds don't seem to have done anything to relieve your sinuses. if anything, you only feel worse. you could really use steve to distract you from the dull ache growing at the back of your head.

however, today of all days, he's busy at the back, leaving you working the front desk and robin on the other end of the store, shelving tapes. you try and focus on auditing the tapes, doing your best to blow your nose discreetly every so often.

after what feels like hours, steve finally emerges from the back room carrying a huge cardboard box, filled to the brim with worn, old tapes. the second you lay eyes on him, you feel your heart settle back into place. just being in the same room as him has that effect on you.

"hey," steve comes up to the front of the counter and sets the box down heavily. "haven't seen ya all morning. keith's got me cleaning out all the broken tapes. there's gotta be hundreds back there. this is just one box," he pats the box, which rattles. "what've you been up to?"

"audit, usual stuff." you respond, clearly congested. you cringe at how your voice sounds.

"woah. are you ok?" he turns fully to you, and inspects your face.

"yeah, i'm fine. just allergies." you try to play it off.

he places the back of his hand against your forehead. even in your indisposed state, the contact of his hand sends shivers through your skin, and makes your stomach flutter.

"allergies don't give you a fever. you're not well."

"i don't have a fever. and either way, it's fine. the meds will kick in soon."

"how long ago did you take them?"

"three hours ago—" a sneeze interrupts you.

"yeah. no way. i'm taking you home. get your stuff."

"what? no, we still have all day."

"exactly. you need to rest and get better. wait here."

steve hurries to the back and returns a minute later with your bag. "come on."

"steve, i appreciate your concern, but i'm fine, really."

"y/n, you really don't look well. you're only gonna feel worse at the end of the day. plus, don't think i haven't noticed the mountain of tissues in the trash," steve points to the small trash can under the desk. your cheeks flush—the absolute last thing you'd want steve to see.

"and anyways, it's noon on a monday, it's hardly peak time for customers. we'll do just fine without you."

"but- we can't leave robin all alone" you try as a final excuse.

steve turns and yells "hey, robin!"

she pops up from behind a shelf, busy shelving away tapes.

"yeah, dingus?"

"i'm taking y/n home. she's got a fever. will you let keith know when he gets back? 'kay, thanks bye!"

"steve!!" robin yells annoyedly, but then defeatedly adds, "feel better, y/n."

the door closes behind you as the two of you walk to the beamer.

you make it five feet before you stop.

"what if we get fired? just walking out of work in the middle of the day? we should at least wait to tell keith in person." you suggest.

"keith could be back in two minutes or two hours, you know how he is. let me worry about that, okay?"

you feel bad, making any of this steve's problem. but you're more concerned with the shiver that has settled over you.

"okay... is it just me or is it chilly out here?" you say through chattering teeth.

steve looks at you with concern, then walks you faster to the car. "that would be just you. there's no way you could've lasted all day in there."

he opens the passenger side door for you and you drop in.

"oh shit. i can't go home. i don't have a key." you rub your eyes with the heel of your hands.

"what do you mean, you don't you have a key?"

"my mom usually gets home before me, so she unlocks the door when she gets home and i just go in. i don't have my own key."

steve runs a hand through his hair, quiet for a minute. "not a problem. we'll get you home."

he starts the car and pulls out of the parking lot.

your fever starts to get to you, not to mention the headache, so you decide to stop fighting it and let steve do whatever he's about to do. you won't admit it, but you're happy steve dragged you out of there.

you let your eyes close for the ride.

you hear steve turn the car off and you force yourself to open your eyes. immediately the unfamiliar house before you has you thinking if your illness has you hallucinating.

"we're here" steve says, taking the keys out of the ignition.

"...but, this isn't... you said you were taking me home?" your voice comes out slow and shaky.

"oh, not your home. my home."

"steve, what?" you say, sleepy and shivering. "i thought you were taking me to my home. that's usually what people mean when they say 'home'."

"yeah, well, unless you wanted to try breaking into your own house, which you're in no condition to, this was the next best thing. now come on, let's fix you up."

you're too sick and tired to protest. and what else could you even do? it's not like he'd take you back to work.

you unbuckle your seatbelt and steve opens your door for you. "sure, i'll be a willing participant in being held hostage at your house."

"never seen someone be so snarky even all shivering and snotty."

"ugh please don't bring that up, the... snottiness." you cringe. this is the last state you'd wanted steve to see you in, all icky and feeling gross. but you were too far in now.

"well, i mean, you are. can't deny that" he boops your nose and you glare at him grumpily.

"ok, not in the mood. got it." he unlocks the door and lets you two in.

you barely get to take in the fact that you're in steve's house. you try to get a look at your surroundings as he helps you to his room.

he sits you down on the edge of his bed, and you can't help but feel your heartbeat flutter, even if it's not the exact way you'd imagined you'd ever be doing so.

"wanna put on something more comfortable?" he pulls open his drawers and pulls out a hoodie and pajama pants. "you put these on, i'll get you some meds."

"what? no steve, i'm not gonna put your clothes on. that's absurd."

"why's that absurd?"

"they're- they're gonna get all coughed on and possibly snotted on, which is like really gross." you say, punctuating your point by coughing into your elbow almost on cue.

"well you're not getting into my bed with your family video vest on, that's for sure."

you look at him incredulously. "i'm not getting into your bed either. you have a couch, i can take that."

"please. just let me take care of you." he looks down at you with his big puppy dog eyes, and you've already lost the battle. there's no saying no to those eyes.

you take the clothes from him.

"good girl. i'll be right back. put them on," he points at the bundle in your hands again before closing his bedroom door behind him.

you put on his clothes, and naturally you're drowning in them. you had to admit, they felt great. your outfit had started sticking to you from the fever, and you already felt so much better being out of it. you would give anything to be able to have your nose clear up for even five seconds so you could bury it in his hoodie and drink in his scent.

it starts to sink in—you're in his room. you decide to take a little advantage of the situation. you have a look at the plethora of hair products scattered on his dresser, chuckling to yourself. going over to his desk, you see a stack of cassettes. you're about to look through them when you hear his footsteps approaching.

"hey, can i come in?" steve's voice comes from the other side of the door.

"yeah, i'm done," you say, padding back over to his bed.

he opens the door, pausing for a moment when he lays eyes on you. his eyes drift down your body, his hoodie swallowing your form. his face softens as he looks at you, a smile spreading across his face. heat rushes to your face as he walks into the room.

"alright. this should bring the fever down. but it's gonna make you pretty drowsy" steve hands you a pill and a glass of water. you take it without protest, wanting the icky feeling to leave you as soon as possible.

"that'll take about ten minutes to fully kick in. do you need anything? heating pad? cool cloth? tissues? blanket?"

you look up at him, aching with gratitude for the man in front of you, taking care of you even when he had no obligation to. instinctively, you pull him into a hug.

"thank you," a major understatement, but it's all you can manage to say at the moment.

"it's no problem," he moves his hands to your arms. "woah, you really are burning. good thing the medication's already in your system."

he pulls back his comforter, and you get in. you feel better just being under the covers, and the fact that it's steve's bed somehow makes it cozier.

"i'll be back right after the shift. feel free to go make something to eat or watch TV or anything, alright?"

you nod, your eyes half-lidded and sleep finally taking over you.

steve is quiet for a moment, then does something which catches you off guard, and softly moves the hair out of your face, gently holding the side of your head. the way he's looking at you is unlike he ever has before.

"see you later, sweetheart."

your heart skips a beat at the name. you're so sleepy you almost think you've dreamt it.

"bye, steve." you say softly. you close your eyes, and you're out before steve even leaves the driveway.

"hey sleepyhead", steve gently rubs your arm over the comforter. you stir, blinking open your eyes. it takes you a second to remember where you are.

"there she is," says steve, as you sit up.

"hey, steve." you say drowsily, rubbing the sleep from your eyes.

"how are you feeling?"

you test out a breath through your nose, and surprisingly you can breathe. and your headache is gone.

"much better, actually."

"that's great news," he says brightly, with that same soft look on his face. he walks around the bed to sit next to you on the other side. "what did you get up to while i was out?"

"i think i was knocked out the whole time," you reply.

"wow, you slept for like five hours. you really needed the rest." steve brings out a plastic bag and pulls out a takeout container. "i got you some soup. went with chicken noodle, hope that's alright. plus it was the soup of the day at the diner." steve says sheepishly as he hands you the polystyrene cup.

you feel your heart swell in your chest. of course he'd go the extra mile and get you soup too, on top of everything he's already done.

"chicken noodle's perfect. thank you," you say gratefully. "how was the rest of the shift?"

"same as the morning, barely any customers. told you we'd do fine without you. if there ever was a convenient day for the flu to strike, it would've been today." steve rambles, and you're right back in your usual dynamic with him.

"ok, that's good. was keith okay with me leaving early unannounced?" you ask, slightly afraid to hear the answer.

"yeah, he came back about an hour after i got back. to be honest, he was a little upset at first. but i talked it out with him. it's all good now, you don't have to worry about it."

you drop your head into your hands for a second, before responding, "oh my god, i know you're probably leaving out keith having a small hissy fit. i'm so sorry for making you do that—for this whole situation in fact. for majorly imposing on you like this."

"hey, remember this was my idea. you're not imposing on anyone. i wanted to do this."

you decide to ask the question boggling your mind since all this started, "why are you doing this?"

"what, helping you?"

"it's not just 'helping' me, you've gone insanely above and beyond. i'm in your clothes, for goodness' sake. don't get me wrong, i'm eternally grateful, but... i'm just your coworker. you could've just let me wait it out."

"you're not just my coworker. you're my... friend." there's a slight hesitation on the word 'friend'. "and i couldn't just let you suffer in silence. besides, you look cute in my clothes."

"even with my nose all red and my face puffy and generally being all gross?"

"you always look cute."

you both look at each other for a moment. you're trying to read his face, find the meaning behind his words. you set the soup down on the bedside table and face him fully.

"hey like i'm in a weird state right now, so this might be the meds talking, but that was... super flirty, right? or was that just to make me feel better about being unwell."

steve runs a hand down his face. "well, okay, let's see—you're in my house, in my bed, in my clothes and i got rid of your fever. have you ever seen someone do that for just their coworker?"

"see you're gonna have to spell it out, or i'm just gonna assume you're just really generous."

he sighs and runs a hand through his hair. "goddamn it, i guess i'm doing this now. i like you. a lot. you're my favourite part of every day. and working that job really sucks sometimes but you're there so its really great. and yeah, i'd... i'd do anything for you, even... this." he gestures to you in his bed. "that spelled out enough for you?"

you're quiet for a moment, as you look at him. your heart has just about exploded in your chest.

"if i wasn't sick right now, i'd totally kiss you." you say, blaming your sudden boldness on your medicated state.

steve lets out a sigh of relief. "good, 'cos i thought i might've just made things really awkward if you didn't." he pulls you against his chest and kisses the top of your head, lacing his fingers between yours. "this'll do just fine."

a/n: sorry couldn't avoid using 'y/n' this time 🥀 also did you catch that kurt reference? lol. thanks for reading!

[beezusvreeland]

Great responsibility - Part 1 

Spider-Man!Steve Harrington x Henderson!Reader

Word count: 1,1k

Summary: Alright, let’s do this one last time! As Spider-Man, Steve Harrington has a lot on his plate. Including giving relationship advice to his best friend’s sister, who is broken hearted and has no idea who is the man under the mask.

A/N: This fic is a part of the THE STEVE HARRINGTON SUMMER SLEEPOVER event, hosted by @graywrenhart and @moonstoneandmoonlight. I got the movie Hitch and mixed its concept with a Spider-Steve idea I’ve been meaning to write for a while. This is meant to be a mini series, hope you enjoy <3 Divider by @pepsipoet | Masterlist

Alright, let’s do this one last time. My name is Steve Harrington. I was high school royalty until my poor life decisions made me fall from grace. But it’s okay, because thanks to my loser status, I met my new best friends, Robin and Dustin, and became a pretty normal guy. Well, except for one thing…while visiting the natural history museum, I was bit by a radioactive spider and, for the past two years, I’ve been the one and only Spider-Man.

New York city at night. To Steve, there is nothing quite like the feeling of flying around, one web at a time, watching everything from up above. Those were the only times he would allow his mind to go completely blank, letting gravity do its job, stretching seconds into minutes, and, eventually, being led by his body back to skies or the streets, depending on what evil was tormenting the city at the time.

Surprisingly, the patrol had been pretty chill for a friday night. There was one armed robbery earlier, a couple pick pockets here and there and one very stubborn cat on top of a tree. The movement was so slow that Steve gave Dustin the night off. Not that he had that kind of authority, if anything, it was otherwise, with the boy, now a college freshman, being Steve’s self proclaimed guy in a chair. 

It was good for Dustin to go out there every once in a while, doing whatever nerdy college guys were doing on a friday night. Robin, though, didn’t need any incentive to take a night off and go drinking with her girlfriend, Vicky, and friends. Steve missed going out with them, or doing anything that didn’t involve wearing his very tight costume. He was in a desperate need of a new one. 

Steve decided to head towards Brooklyn, where his friends were reunited. He would do this every now and then, checking on everyone as they headed home, especially when there was drinking involved. 

As he got closer to the bar Robin mentioned, he was able to sense a few people from their group: Robin and Vicky dancing, Eddie and Gareth higher than the clouds checking girls out, and Nancy and Jonathan making out in the bathroom. Ugh, he hated that. His powers were useful and sometimes, even funny to use, but there was also that very inconvenient side. 

He tried concentrating on the surroundings to tune them out.  

“Yo, Spidey! You’re a guy, right?”

Steve thanked the universe for his coordination skills, because dear God, you scared the shit out of him, he almost fell from the side of the building next to the bar where he was stationed at.

Wait, why were you outside instead of hanging out with your friends inside?

“Because everyone is in a fucking couple!”

Steve had no idea he said that out loud. He got down from the building, walking slowly towards you, trying not to freak you out. That was something that happened with a certain frequency.  

“Shit, why am I screaming?”, you whispered to yourself, trying to control the volume of your voice. Steve tried not to laugh, you clearly had more than your normal quota of alcohol for the night.

“Are you okay?”

“You’re a guy, right?”, you asked at the same time.

Steve stopped, one hand on his waist, the other scratching his cap. His poor hair was suffocating inside it. 

“I mean, yeah. That's why they call me Spider-Man.”

“Huh”, you hold your purse closer to your body. “I’m so stupid!”

This time, Steve couldn’t hold the laughter. You couldn’t be farther from the truth: you were the smartest person he knew besides your own brother. But Dustin was a special case, you actually worked extremely hard to get good grades and do well academically. Graduated college with honours and all. 

“No no, you’re good”, Steve tried to intervene. “But I am, uh, indeed a man.”

“You sound more like a guy than a man”, you looked at him suspiciously. 

“Hey, I’m very manly, ok?” 

You laughed with your whole body, dominating Steve’s spidey senses, giving him full body chills. He guessed it was probably because he hadn’t seen you in weeks, there was barely any time in the day for him to rest, let alone socialize. Still, he was glad Dustin wasn’t monitoring this whole exchange with his older sister. Steve would never hear the end of it.

“But why do you ask?”

As you recovered from the laugh, your expression saddened. 

“Well, I need some advice in that department.”

Steve’s goggles betrayed him, going up in surprise like his eyebrows did. He had never thought much about it, just assumed you were always studying, but he hadn’t seen you with a guy before. It’s when he realized the meaning of what you said earlier: “Everyone is in a fucking couple!”. 

“Okay, yeah, sure. I’m a guy.”

“That has been established”, you laughed quietly. “It’s just…if you have tried everything to be noticed by a guy and he never has, does it mean he is not interested or just really oblivious?”

“I think you know the answer to that.”

You smiled sadly. 

“Yeah, that’s what I thought.”

“For what is worth, you deserve better than that”, said Steve. It sounded like the right thing to say. He just hated seeing people he cared about so sad. “This guy must be a real jerk.”

“No”, you said desperately. “He is…everything.”

That caught Steve out of surprise. But your mind seemed to be elsewhere. 

“How can I get over him, Spidey?”

Steve crossed his arms, trying to keep his composure. You looked at him like he might have all the answers to your problems and that had him panicking a bit. This was way above his paygrade. You were friends, sure, but never talked about your respective love lives. Your friendship started with being his best friend’s sister and ended with the two of you being in the same friend group. Dustin and Robin, and now, Spider-Man, demanded too much for him to consider deepening other friendships. 

“I dunno, I mean… You should try dating other guys”, Steve wasn’t entirely satisfied with his advice, but that was the best he could do under pressure. 

“Yeah, well, they might just not like me either.” 

“Change your approach”, said Steve, nervously. Even in your drunken state, he could tell you were paying close attention to what he was saying. “Maybe go for a totally different type of guy, do the opposite of what you did this time around.”

You gave that some thought.

“I guess I have nothing more to…”

And you threw up. Steve guided you towards a trash can. With one hand, he held your hair, while with the other he got his phone and texted Robin for help. 

[harringtonsugar]

I Do Need You

summary: you’ve lived your entire life without depending on anybody. steve harrington walked into your life ready to change that.

warnings: mayfield!reader, angst, little bit of arguing, canon violence, blood and bit of gore, avoidant issues to the max, she’s so stubborn, and lowkey mean, crying kiss and makeup, cursing, the kids <3,

word count: 6.7k

Early in life, you learned pretty quickly the only person you could depend on was yourself. Your parents were always too busy fighting each other to pay any attention to you and no matter how much you wanted someone to care for you and hold you in your hard times, nobody ever did.

You tucked yourself into bed. You soothed yourself after a nightmare. You took care of yourself and never let anyone see how much you ached for help.

Eventually, the ache dulled and you found some sort of sick comfort in having yourself. At least you never had to deal with disappointment.

Then your baby sister came along.

You were overwhelmed by the intense need to protect her from everything you weren’t. As you two grew up, you began to tuck her in, soothe her back to sleep, care for her every morning.  

You distracted her when your parents argued and when their marriage finally met it’s inevitable end, you held her tight. Then, and without input from either of you, your mom moved you half way across the world to move in with her new husband and his step son.

It wasn’t so much the move that upset you. You couldn’t have cared less about California or being far from your dad – it was how much it upset Max.

Even though your mom promised it would be a fresh start, it wasn’t. Nothing good changed in Hawkins. Your mom and Neil fought just as much as your parents. You and Billy fought even worse than them. It was the exact reminder as to why you never depended on anybody.

And then Steve Harrington entered your life.

He was like a breath of fresh air entering your lungs. Floppy hair, charming eyes and a dizzying smile. You were a goner before he even said his name.

But admitting that was another story.

It was obvious by the time you came into town, he’d gone through a pretty messy breakup but whatever happened, it got him to clean up his act. He was right beside you when you and Max got roped into fighting monsters in the junkyard. He was there when Billy tried to attack you and Lucas in the Byers home. He was the one who pulled you into a plot of underground Russians and it was him who held you and Max after Billy died.

It took him a year to finally break through your walls, but he proved himself to you. It was Steve Harrington who proved that there was at least one person you could depend on. Steve told you he loved you first – even though you already knew – and surprising to everyone, you let him in.

Steve was yours and you were his.

But as good as it felt, you couldn’t let go of your bad habits. Grief and guilt tried to swallow you whole – mostly because you didn’t even actually care that Billy died and how could you feel like that over someone who’s supposed to be family?

You knew Steve would love you no matter what but the idea of letting him see the darkest parts of yourself? Leaving you bare and open to his scrutiny? It was terrifying. Slowly, you gave him pieces, enough to satisfy him, but you knew it wouldn’t be enough forever.

Steve was patient, incredibly so, and sometimes you wondered how long it would be before he realized you weren’t worth it.

Loving him came to you as easy as breathing did. Asking him for help? That felt humiliating. Like you were weak.

But soon, your mind wasn’t on yourself anymore. It was on Max and when you all got sucked into a reality where she was next on a monsters kill list?

Well, shit hit the fan.

You, Steve and the rest of the group form a circle in the Wheeler’s basement. It’s been three days since the random deaths started hitting the town and yesterday, Max told you all about the visions she’d been having.

Sneaking into the high school and watching the way her eyes clouded over and she drifted somewhere else, had your heart dropping to hell itself.

Your biggest fear was now happening right in front of you and you’ve never felt more helpless in your life.

You can hear Nancy talking about the plan for tonight and how the groups are supposed to be split up, but you’re not actually listening. You’re standing right next to Max, one hand resting over the side of her chair and itching to grab her instead.

You’ve barely been able to take your eyes off her for more than a few seconds all night – it’s like you’re afraid if you blink, she’ll be taken from you. Right now, it actually feels plausible.

It’s obvious to everyone, including her, just how much you’re hovering and you know it’s beginning to irritate her but you can’t find it in yourself to care even a little bit. This isn’t just you being an overprotective older sister – this is her life. You’ll be damned if you let anything happen to her.

Nancy calling your name pulls your attention from Max and you look up at her. “You’ll go with me, Steve and Robin to check out the site closest to the lab. We can’t risk anybody seeing Eddie, so he’ll stay with the kids,”

There’s not a moments hesitation when you speak. “I’m staying with Max.”

She glances around the others before she sighs. You can tell she wants to argue but she doesn’t. “Okay. Just me, Steve and Robin then. You guys have to check out the woods and make sure the gate already closed. If anybody hears anything, you radio it in, okay?” Her voice is full of conviction, something no one tries to challenge.

Everyone nods, except for Steve.

“Take Henderson,” He says. Your gaze flickers up to where he stands beside you. “I’ll stay with them instead,”

In all fairness, it’s a sweet gesture. The idea of Steve wanting to stay close to you and Max but lately, it’s all he’s been doing. Ever since Max’s depression hit its highest peak, you’ve been hovering her and Steve’s been hovering you.

You’ve tried to ignore the irritation that bubbles inside you every time he does it. It’s ironic really – he’s only doing to you, the exact thing you’re doing to Max, but she’s used to that with you. You’re still not used to it with Steve.

“You don’t have to come with us, Steve.” You interrupt carefully. “I can handle it alone,”

He frowns down at you. “I want to.”

You don’t respond before looking away and you let Nancy’s voice fill the silence you created. You can feel his eyes still on you but you don’t look back up at him.

A few minutes later and everyone has dispersed, quickly gathering their things to head out. You took the opportunity to pull Max aside.

“Hey,” You murmur, gently holding her arm. You’re staring at her adorably freckled face, your heart aching at the sight of the braid you put in her hair. “Are you sure you’re okay to do this? If you don’t want to, we can stay back and let them handle it.”

She groans and pulls away from you. “I told you, I’m fine. You’re treating me like a baby,”

Your mouth pulls down as you watch her fill her bag . “I don’t think you’re a baby, Max. I think this is a real problem and I..”You quickly grow irritated over the fact that she won’t look at you, busying herself with her bag. You grab her hand and force her gaze back on you. “Hey, I don’t want you getting hurt.”

She stares back at you, her expression unreadable. “If you don’t want me to get hurt, then stop babying me and let me figure this out.”

The tone in her voice takes you aback but before you can even respond, she rips her arm from your grasp and walks towards Lucas and follows everyone else upstairs.

Your shoulders deflate as you watch her leave.

Maybe she was right – maybe you were babying her, just a little, but what did she expect? This wasn’t just a game – it was her life on the line.

All you want is to protect her. To lock her somewhere safe, far away where nobody and nothing could ever hurt her. Instead, you’re stuck on a ticking time bomb to save her.

Suddenly, Steve appears in front of you and holds your arm the same way you held hers only minutes ago. His large hands circle your arms, his thumbs brushing over your skin.

He gives you a small smile. “Everything’s gonna be okay, baby,”

You glance up at him and sigh. “I’m not worried about me, Steve.” You pull away from his grasp and step around him to grab your jacket.

There’s a beat of silence.

“I know you’re not but I am,”

Your eyes flutter shut and you take a deep breath. You can feel the tension in your body begging to snap – at him.  

“I don’t need you to babysit me, Steve.”

You see him step next to you out of your peripheral vision. “I’m not babysitting you, I’m – I’m trying to be there for you,”

You can hear the confusion in his voice and your heart tugs at the sound, but it’s not enough to reel in your annoyance.

Steve hasn’t taken his eyes off the side of your face and you don’t move to look at him. “You’re not though, you’re hovering. I don’t need you to coddle me, I need you to help me find this Vecna guy and save my sister.”

Your frustration has bled through your voice and Steve picks up on it in seconds.

His brows furrow and his mouth is turned down in a permanent frown. “I am trying to do that. What – what do you think I’ve been doing these past couple of days?” He pauses for a second and shifts on his feet, moving until he’s right in front of you. You still keep your eyes downward, fixated on snapping in every button of your jacket. “But baby, it’s not just Max I’m worried about. It’s you too, I can see the way it’s affecting you.”

Finally, your head snaps up at him, eyes blazing. “Of course it’s affecting me, Steve, she’s my sister! But you treating me like glass isn’t going to help. You’re not helping, you’re just - you’re just suffocating me!”

As soon as the words leave you, you feel overwhelmed with regret. And the look on his face? He looks devastated. You watch as his entire body stills and his shoulders tense. He take a step back, as if your words physically struck him.

Your lips part, almost like you’re ready to say something but nothing comes out. It’s completely silent.

You stand across from each other without a word, only the sound of uneven breathing surrounding you two.

Then, he shakes his head.

His eyes flicker away from you and he rakes his hand through his hair.

“Fine,” He starts. His voice is low and broken – you can hear the hidden anger beneath it. “If I’m suffocating you then fine. I can’t keep sitting here, trying to guess how to love you. You’re right – you’re better off alone.”

Steve doesn’t wait for you to respond before he’s walking away too, leaving you alone in the basement.

Your eyes burn and you can feel your throat tighten. It’s shame and regret and guilt hitting you all at once but there’s no taking it back. There’s no apology to fix it.

You had meant it – maybe not entirely – but you’re not used to the comfort Steve’s offering and instead of letting him help, you hurt him.

You hurt him.

You’ve never felt worse in your life.

A few minutes later, you made your own way upstairs and the only thing you could focus on was the way Steve completely avoided you.

He kept his back turned towards you while everyone filled Nancy’s car. The car ride was awkward to say the least. Nancy let him drive and instead of you taking the passenger seat beside him, Nancy sat there and you occupied the seat directly behind him and next to Max.

You hoped maybe his eyes would watch yours in the rear view mirror.

They didn’t.

Not once did he make eye contact or offer any comforting touches.

It wasn’t until then did you realize how much it actually helped you. Before, it felt like his touch was burning. Now, you yearned for it back.

It’s a painful twenty minute car ride and once you make it to the middle of the woods, everyone barrels out of the wagon. You all stand around in another circle, listening to Nancy talk about the meetup point. Everyone is ready to split up when Steve reaches down to grab the bag from her hand and begins passing out flashlights.

Your eyes are hopeful when he moves to hand you yours. He still hasn’t looked at you, instead keeping his eyes locked on the flashlight. Your fingers close around the object and you take a step closer to him, ready to try and initiate a conversation before you walk away but before you can, his grip drops and he brushes past you.

He was barely close enough for his shoulder to press against yours and you could smell his cologne as he passed you. Your heart ached as you turned around and watched him walk away – following Nancy further down the path of their own route.

But you don’t stop him.

Instead, you flip your flashlight on and walk in the opposite direction. Away from him.

It’s been nearly half an hour of walking towards the gate. The woods are dark and silent – save from the leaves rusting and crunching beneath your feet. You’re not sure if the way the wind whistles is from whatever could be lurking between the trees or to blame on nature.

Still, not once has your mind wandered from Steve.

From the argument, the look on his face, his words. You couldn’t blame him for what he said – you weren’t exactly nice with the things you said but it still stung to think about.

You always knew you didn’t make it easy for people to be around you – let alone love you but Steve did. He did wholeheartedly and unapologetically.

And what did you give him in return?

Basically a slap in the face.

It’s hardly a surprise he’s met his wits end with you.

Max quietly steps beside you, her footsteps matching your own. For a few seconds, you don’t really register her presence or the way she keeps side eyeing you.

“It’s okay to let someone in, you know.” She finally breaks the silence. “Like all the way,”

You glance up at her. Your response isn’t immediate – you’re not even truly sure how to respond.

You choose deflection.

“You’re one to talk,” You huff. “You broke up with Lucas a few months ago.”

Max rolls her eyes. “Yeah, and look where that got me,”

Your hand shoots out to grab her arm; forcing her to a halt. “Don’t joke about that,” You say firmly. “You’re going to be fine.”

She doesn’t flinch at your tone and she doesn’t pull away either. Your fingers tighten around her skin, as if her words were a declaration for someone to snatch her away.

She sighs quickly. “My point is I let my shit control me. I could’ve asked for help – Lucas spent months trying and all I did was push him away. This wouldn’t be happening if I just let him.”

Your eyes gloss over at the thought of her regretting the way she handled everything. She couldn’t have known.

“You don’t know that, Maxie,” You murmur and for once, she doesn’t bite your head off for calling her that.

Instead she shrugs and continues walking, letting you follow her. “Maybe not. But I do know if I make it out of this alive,” She looks away from you then and you follow to where her gaze lands on Lucas walking a few feet ahead of Dustin. “I’m going to fix it with Lucas because I love him and he loves me.” She looks back at you, a newfound sadness deep in her eyes. “And Steve really loves you. So get your shit together and stop pushing him away,”

Her words land exactly where she intended. Embedded deep beneath your ribs, stabbing through your heart. She was right – in every aspect.

If Steve was going to leave, he would’ve done so already, but he hasn’t. He’s held you through almost every ugly part of your life and still loves you with every ounce of himself.

And if you haven’t completely ruined everything between you two, you were going to fix it. Even if you didn’t deserve him.

You glance at Max from the corner of your eye. “You’re making it out of this alive by the way. Even if I have to burn the upside down to the ground myself.”

Max smirks at your words, even though you both catch the way your voice breaks. “Whatever you say.”

You and the kids keep walking further into the woods, so far until the trees begin to blend and you almost worry you won’t be able to find your way back.

You still haven’t found the gate and you’re ready to pull everyone back and retreat before Dustin suddenly springs upwards. He murmurs out a string of curses and spins in a circle.

“Henderson, I’m getting dizzy just looking at you. What’re you doing?” You grimace at the curly headed boy.

“The compass. It’s – it’s acting crazy. It’s pointing in every direction.” He distractedly responds. His face is pulled tight, brows furrowed and a frown plastered on his mouth.

“Maybe it’s broken?” Lucas asks. Dustin glares at him.

“I know how to take care of my things, Lucas,” He hissed. Lucas glares back harder.

“I didn’t say you didn’t, Dustin, but why else would it be going haywire?”

“I don’t know! That’s what I’m trying to figure out, asshole – ,”

“You’re the asshole!”

“No, you’re the – .”

Max cuts them off with an obnoxious groan.

“Are you two ladies finished?” She snaps. “If it’s not broken then that could mean the gate is near here. We need to try and find it, so stop your cat fight, alright?”

The two boys huff but ultimately listen.

The four of you walk in opposite directions, flashlights stuck to the ground as you inspect the floor for an opening. For a few minutes, the only sound around you is the branches snapping under your feet – everyone is quiet as they search for any evidence of the opening.

Suddenly, your light does catch something. Something red.

You move closer without thinking, but your steps are slow and careful. As you approach the sight, it almost looks like a cocoon reaching one tree, all the way across to the other. There’s dark, thick vine like branches surrounding what looks like the rift. The red flashes beam from beneath it, lighting up the dark woods around you.

But the closer you get, the worse it looks. It’s not just sitting there - it’s moving. The thin layer covering it pulses like a heart beats rhythm. Slowly, lean just a little closer.

Without looking away, you speak up. “Hey guys..” You start hesitantly. “I think – I think I found it,”

You know without looking the kids have wandered a little further than a few feet but still close enough to hear you. The sound of their distant voices fills the air around you.

“Are you sure?” Dustin’s voice rings out.

“I’m pretty sure,” You reply. You sink to the floor, squatting in front of the rift. “This isn’t something I’ve randomly come across bef– ,”

Suddenly, you’re cut off when one of the thick vines snaps through the cocoon like layer.

A fearful yelp tears from your throat and you jerk backwards, landing on your bottom against the hard ground. Your flashlight falls from your hand, rolling away and taking away any light you had before.

You hear the kids shout your name from far behind you and the sound of their footsteps rushing closer.

Your stomach sinks as you watch the vine slither across the ground and within seconds, wrap itself around your thigh. Even through your jeans, you can feel the cold and slippery skin of the vine – just before its hold tightens, tight enough to nearly cut off circulation.

Pain shoots from the skin of your thigh, traveling through every inch of your body. You don’t even have time to react before it yanks you across the dirt.

It’s white hot pain coursing through your veins, setting every nerve on fire. It feels like nails are sinking into your skin – almost like it has teeth it’s holding you by – as it drags you around. The pain is enough for a real scream to tear out of you this time.

The vine flips you around and your nails dig into the dirt of the forest, desperate to grab any leverage you can. Your skin fills with a hundred tiny cuts from branches and rocks digging into your skin as it pulls you across the floor.

Your legs kick with every movement of the vine in an attempt to break free but the more you struggle, the tighter its hold gets. You can’t suppress the cry that launches from your chest – the sound bouncing off the trees around you.

Your chest is pressed to the floor when you see the kids running to you but before they can reach you, it pulls you further down. Max screams your name and even through your pain, it’s enough to gather all your strength. The vine pulls you past a pile of leaves and rocks.

You barely have a second to think about it before your hand yanks the sharpest rock you find and you’re slamming it into the flesh like surface of the vine. You drive the sharpest point again, and again and again until it begins to squeal around your skin.

The grip slowly loosens but still tries to tug you further into the forest. You keep stabbing wildly, your vision clouded from pain and the dirt stuck to your face. Your arms burn from the movement until you strike directly at the top.

The rock slashes through the head of the vine, hard enough to slide right through its skin and pierce your own thigh.

The adrenaline coursing through your veins isn’t enough to mask the pain and you scream in agony at the feeling of the rock puncturing your skin.

Finally, the vine forces itself out from under the rock and slowly slithers back deep into the trees.

You’re gasping for breath, your entire body trembling as you drop the rock to the ground. Your gaze drops down to your thigh.

Blood soaks your jeans and you can see the way your thigh shakes from pain. Gingerly, your hands grasp the skin of your thigh, trying to apply pressure but your hands quickly stain from the blood.

The kids finally reach you and Max sinks to the ground beneath you, launching herself around you. You catch her as best you can with one arm, the other pressed firm against your wound.

“Oh thank God!” She cries. You groan in pain – from both her bone crushing hug and your leg.

The boys shine their lights over you two, both letting out a sigh of relief until they catch sight of your leg.

“Holy shit,” Dustin gasps. You wince, breath shuddering.

“It’s – it’s not as bad as it looks,” You force out through your teeth. Max pulls away and looks at your legs next.

“Are you kidding me?” She exclaims. “You’re literally gushing blood – that’s as bad as it gets!”

“Max, calm down,” You mutter and it only pisses her off more.

“Don’t tell me to calm down! That could’ve killed you,”

“Yeah except it didn’t,” You bite back.

You take a deep breath and swallow down a cry as you try to push yourself up. Lucas quickly drops beside you, arms slipping under your arms to help you up.

You wince at the pain shooting from your thigh, up to your chest, but you try to hide it. The last thing you want is for them to panic. Dustin appears in front of you.

He says your name carefully. “Your leg looks really bad, okay? We have to call –.”

You cut him off. “I’m fine, Dustin.” He looks ready to argue but you cut him off. “Is that a favorite shirt?”

The boy glances down at his shirt, brows pulled tight. “What? No, not really. It’s just –.”

This time, you cut him off by yanking the bottom towards you and tearing a long piece.

“Hey – what the hell!” He shouts, eyes wide.

Your only response is a groan as you wrap the fabric around your cut, tying a knot tight enough to burn. Max quickly pulls your arm around your waist, holding you from falling. There’s a muffled cry in your throat as you feel more blood slide down your leg but the makeshift tourniquet will have to do for now.

“I said I’m fine,” You breathe out, one arm sliding across Max’s shoulders. “We can’t just sit here and wait for someone to find us, alright? It’s too dangerous out here,”

Despite the pain filling your body, your voice is firm and unyielding. The three kids look up at you and silence fills the air for a few moments before they all nod, murmuring agreements towards you.

The four of you begin to move forward together, back in the direction of the meetup point. Max holds onto you – one arm snaked around your waist and the other holding your hand draped over her shoulder. Lucas walks behind you two, carefully looking in every direction for any sign of danger. Dustin walks ahead of you all, flashlight beaming in front of him as he tries to make contact with the radio.

“I repeat – this is a code red. We are in dire need of rescue and we need a response!” His angry voice rings through the trees. “Nancy? Steve? Anybody? Damnit!” He shouts.

You wince at the shrill sound. Everything around you feels heightened – the pain in your leg, the way your blood soaked jeans cling to your skin, the way blood continues to pour out of your cut and into your shoe.

“We’re too deep in the woods, Dustin. The chances of getting a signal are slim,” Lucas points out behind you.

The walk towards the gate felt long enough but now, it feels endless. It feels like you’re walking in circles – every tree looks the same and every time you think you’re almost to the end, you’re met with the same sight of never ending darkness ahead of you.

“How much further?” Max asks, her hold around your waist tightening.

Your face twists in pain but you stay quiet.

“I don’t think it’s that far anymore. We passed this hill like ten minutes after we started walking,” Dustin says.

It should give you some hope but you don’t think you have ten minutes of walking left in you.

You look at Max and you can see the complete fear covering her face. A sight you haven’t seen since Billy attacked the group back at Starcourt last year. It kills you.

You can’t give up now. It’s not about you. She’s depending on you – they all are. Getting them back to safety is all that matters, no matter what.

Despite your mind telling you to keep pushing through the pain, your leg has decided it’s had enough. Before you even realize it’s happening, your knee buckles beneath you and you slip from Max’s hold.

A sharp gasp slips past your lips as you crash into the floor. Your knees smack against the ground, a shattering feeling shooting up to your wound. Your hands barely catch you in time, the sticks and rocks digging into the skin of your palm.

Max’s hand miss as they shoot out to catch you. Lucas appears next to you in the blink of an eye and the three kids huddle around you.

Max says your name tearfully. “You can’t keep going, we – we have to wait here,”

“We can’t,” You grit out. “It’s not safe out here for you guys, I can – I can keep going, I just need a min-minute,”

The kids all glance at each other before Dustin speaks up.

“Okay, you guys stay here with her. I’m gonna walk further down, see if I can reach them on the walkie,”

“No!” You try to manage your firmest tone but your voice cracks right down the middle. “Henderson, you’re not going alone. I can walk.”

You brace your palms against the ground and try to push up. Your elbows wobble beneath you and you barely make it into an upright kneeling position before they give out beneath you.

You cry out in pain but this time, Max catches you.

“Lucas, go with him. I’ll stay here with her.” She orders.

“I said no!” You shout but the boys don’t listen to you this time. They walk a few feet further away, Dustin’s voice echoing through the woods as he calls out their names.

“Stop it!” Max snaps. “You’re no help if you’re dead, alright! We need the others,”

Tears prick your eyes as her words settle in your chest.

Not from the pain but from frustration.

You were supposed to protect her. All of them.

Instead, you’re kneeling in dirt, grime and a pool of your own blood. Instead, you’re relying on three teenagers to take care of you.

The only thing you’re grateful for is the fact that you can still see the boys when you finally hear Nancy’s voice fills the air too.

“Dus – Dustin?” Her voice cracks over the static. You watch the way the boys practically jump for joy at the sound of her voice and you can feel Max’s body loosen just barely beside you.

“Oh thank fuck!” Dustin curses over the radio. “Nancy, we need help. We found the gate but Y/N, she’s – she’s hurt really bad.”

“What hap-happened?”

The cracks over the radio prove how weak the signal is and you worry you’re about to lose it entirely.

“It was like, a vine from the damn rift. I don’t – I don’t know but it’s bad, she can’t walk,” He explains.

The reminder of what happened has your face twisting. The way Dustin sounds explaining to Nancy how you got hurt – like you can’t handle things. Like you’re weak. It’s irrational, it really is but it’s all you can focus on.

Max notices the pained look on your face and the way your breathing turns uneven. She shifts to kneel in front of you and pulls your gaze towards her.

“What do you need?” She asks softly.

Your lip wobbles as you look at her.

Don’t say it. Don’t say it. Don’t say it.

“I – I want Steve,” You choke out. Her eyes soften immediately and she squeezes your hands before turning her head.

“She wants Steve!” She shouts to the boys. They both look over at where you both kneel on the ground and Dustin quickly locks in.

“Where’s Steve? She’s asking for Steve,” He relays over the walkie.

There’s a beat of silence.

And then you hear him.

“Dustin! I’m right here. What happened? Where is she?”

Steve.

His voice is loud and frantic, almost like he’s too close to the speaker. It’s hard to understand him completely and you can feel your eyes get heavier as Dustin gives him a quick rundown of what happened.

“I’m coming.” His voice cracks through the line.

It’s two simple words, but it’s enough to bring you to tears.

You will them back with every bit of strength you have left. You already feel weak enough – actually crying in front of your baby sister will kill you before your wound ever can.

You try not to focus on the way embarrassment slowly begins to creep up on you but it’s hard not to feel it. Because Steve is coming and he’s going to see you – covered in blood and tears, helpless and exposed.

But as overwhelming as that feels, you also feel relief.  

Because Steve is coming back to you.

As much as you fought against admitting it, all you want is him. You want to be wrapped in his arms, buried in his chest, and surrounded by his warmth.

You just want him.

It’s barely five minutes before you can hear his voice shouting in the distance.

He’s calling out for you – your name echoing through the air and off the trees. Your chest aches at the sound of his voice so close.

Finally, you see his flashlight through the trees a few feet in front of you and then you see him. He appears from between the trees, his eyes wide and frantic. He lands on Dustin first, the light flickering from him, to where you kneel on the ground.

The second his eyes land on you, he’s rushing towards you. He’s within arms reach in seconds and he drops to his knees in front of you, the flashlight long forgotten at his side.

“Hey, hey, hey,” He whispers, carefully pulling you from Max’s hold. His eyes lock on the blood seeping from your thigh. “You’re gonna be okay, baby,” He nods. “Where does it hurt?”

Your lips part to answer but the words get caught in your throat.

The sight of him in front of you again – his puppy dog brown eyes wide with concern for you. His gentle voice soothing you. The warmth of his skin radiating from his body to yours.

Your resolve breaks.

Thick and hot tears slide down your cheeks, dripping down your face and soaking your neck. Your arms reach out to grab him and he doesn’t even hesitate.

Steve meets you half way and you collapse into his chest. Your shoulders shake as you finally let yourself feel it all. You feel the pain of your cut and the pain of accepting help.

His arms wrap tightly around your body, holding you just as tight as you hold him. Your fists clutch the back of his jacket so hard you can hear your nails scratching the leather. You bury your face into his neck, soaking his skin in tears. He whispers gentle reassurances against your hair.

Your body wracks with sobs and not a single part of you cares about the others around you. You don’t care that they’re watching you two. You don’t care if you look weak. All you care about is Steve.

“I got you baby, I got you,” He murmurs. Carefully, Steve shifts so he can slide one arm around your back and the other beneath your knees. He moves to stand and pull you with him, settling over his arms.

You cry out from the pain of your leg bending, eyes squeezing shut and your fingers tighten their grip on his shoulders.

“I know baby, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” He soothes. “I just gotta get you out of here, okay?”

You nod timidly, breath shuddering as you try to calm yourself down. Steve doesn’t wait for anyone else before carrying you through the woods and back towards the car. He holds you as if you weigh nothing and turns what should’ve been a ten minute walk into a four minute one.

The second the car is in view, Max runs to open the back door for Steve. He easily slides in, still holding you in his arms and settles against the window of the wagon. He holds you in his lap, your arms still wrapped around his neck and your head tucked under his chin.

Everyone quickly jumps into the car and before anyone can even buckle, Nancy is peeling off the gravel and onto the main road.

Steve holds you tight to his chest the entire car ride and you don’t miss the way his eyes keep falling back to your leg.

“I’m – I’m sorry,” You whimper against his skin. Steve shakes his head.

“Don’t apologize baby, it’s okay. Everything’s okay, I promise,” He reassures you.

Steve does his best to keep you conscious even as your eyelids grow heavy and begin to drop. Nancy breaks multiple speeding laws getting back to her house and when you finally make it back, he quickly pulls you out of the car and onto the extra bed they pulled into the basement.

Steve holds your hand the entire time Nancy cleans your leg. You were right before – as bad as it was, it definitely looked worse than it was. You squeezed his hand every time the antiseptic burned against your skin and he gently wiped your tears with his thumb.

He whispered sweet reassurances into your ears, planting gentle kisses to your face every time you winced in pain. Nancy managed to clean and dress the wound fairly quickly and once she finished, she steered everyone back upstairs to give you space.

Exhaustion has embedded itself deep in your bones and you gather all your strength to keep looking at Steve. He’s kneeling on the side of the bed, one hand stroking your hair and the other laced with yours.

He looks completely content just watching you for the rest of the night but your guilt hasn’t subsided even a bit.

“Steve,” You whisper so softly, he would’ve missed it if he wasn’t so hyperaware of you.

“What is it, baby?”

Your wide eyes stare up at him. “I’m sorry,”

Tears line your eyes again, hot and unyielding, and your lip wobbles. His eyes soften at you and he moves to lay beside you instead. He settles beside you, carefully pulling you into his chest.

“You don’t have to –.”

“Yes I do,” You interrupt. Your voice is slow, but he lets you talk. “I didn’t – I didn’t mean it, Steve, I swear. I was just scared. I’ve only ever needed Max and now it just feels like I’m losing her and I was scared if I admitted I needed you, I would lose you too,” You confess, tears staining your cheeks.

His face twists in pain at the sight of you crying. He raises his hand to cup your cheek. “I didn’t mean what I said either,” He begins. “About you being better off alone. I was angry and I tried to hurt you back but it wasn’t true baby, not for a second. I’m sorry,”

His thumb glides across the skin of your cheek. You lean into his touch, brows pulled tight.

“I don’t want to be alone anymore, Steve.”

He nods, his eyes glossing over. “You’re not baby, you have me,”

You stare up at him and every instinct to shut him out disappears. “I need you, Steve. More than anything and I don’t ever want to lose you,”

He exhales sharply. “You will never lose me, okay? I swear to you. It doesn’t matter what’s going on – you’ll have me until the end of fucking time, baby,”

Without another word, you bury yourself back in his chest and cling to him like second skin.

For twenty years, you convinced yourself you didn’t need anybody else. You convinced yourself that accepting help meant admitting failure. But now, as you lay against Steve’s chest – completely bare and vulnerable to him – fully allowing him to take care of you, it all changed.

You finally admitted that you needed him and the world didn't end. He kept his promise. He was here, and he always would be.

[justmeinadaze]

In Your Corner Masterlist (Boxer Steve x Plus Size Y/N)

Steve has wanted you since high school but you always told him you would never date someone who couldn't be themselves knowing he always followed whatever his popular friends wanted. From that moment, he worked hard and disappeared only to return a year later with a new sense of confidence. You learn he became a boxer and after getting to know this new version of him, you fell in love. Steve can have a temper and be overly passionate but after 3 years you learned how to handle it inside and outside of the bedroom ;)

Warnings: Daddy Dom Boxer Steve/ Sub Fem Plus size Y/N

I'm making a master list for this because I come and go at random into this series :P

In Your Corner: Part 1

In Your Corner: Part 2

In Your Corner: Prequel

In Your Corner Part 3

[honey-and-halos]

Call It Clingy

Pairing: Steve Harrington x Reader

Summary: You've spent your whole life being an afterthought. for a while, he made you forget that.

A/N: Based on THIS REQUEST!!! I dont know how many witnessed my minor crashout over Starved! the Joe request I was working on, BUT Tumblr read it, called me horny and removed it SO imma tweak it and it should be with you in a few days but ive moved all my posts forward so I can continue posting daily, ANYWAY have a great day my lovelies :)

You had learned a long time ago that the trick to being included was to make yourself useful and quiet at the same time. Not so quiet that people forgot you existed, but not so loud that anyone had to think about you longer than they needed to. It was a skill, honestly. You'd been perfecting it since you were a kid, since dinner table conversations that moved around you like you were furniture, since a mother who loved you the way you'd love a coat you kept in the closet, necessary, occasionally reached for, never really looked at.

So when you started dating Steve Harrington, you didn't expect anything to change. You figured you'd get folded into his orbit the way you got folded into everything else, tolerated, present, a plus-one nobody minded but nobody had asked for either.

Except it didn't happen like that.

The first time you came to game night at Mike's, you sat a little apart from the group, the way you always did, waiting to see if anyone would notice if you left. Steve noticed before you'd even finished the thought. He didn't say anything dramatic about it. He just shifted his chair back six inches so it was touching yours, draped his arm over the back of it, and kept arguing with Dustin about something you didn't understand and didn't need to. It wasn't a big gesture. That was the thing about Steve, he didn't do big gestures, not really. He did small ones, over and over, until you stopped flinching every time someone's attention landed on you.

He learned how you took your coffee without asking. He noticed when you went quiet in a way that meant you were spiraling instead of just being quiet, and he'd find some excuse to touch your hand, or ask you something small and specific enough that you had to come back into your body to answer it. He introduced you to people as his girlfriend before you introduced yourself as anything at all, like he wanted to make sure nobody got the chance to make you feel like an afterthought, not even for a second.

It scared you a little, actually. How good it felt. You kept waiting for the catch.

You told yourself you weren't waiting for it. But you were.

The Tuesday it happened, the party had gathered at Mike's to map out a plan, something about a pattern in the gate activity that Dustin swore meant something, spread out on the Wheeler basement floor in a mess of graph paper and highlighted notes. You sat next to Steve like always, half in the conversation and half just watching it happen around you, the way you did when you weren't sure your voice was wanted yet.

But you'd noticed something. The pattern they kept circling only worked if you assumed the timing was consistent, and it wasn't, you'd caught it twice while they argued over Dustin's theory, a gap that threw the whole thing off by almost a day each time. It nagged at you long enough that you finally spoke up.

"I think the timing's off," you said, leaning forward to point at the two dates that didn't line up. "Look, here and here. If you shift the interval to account for that, the whole pattern still holds, it just means the next one's not for another two days, not tomorrow like you're planning for."

There was a beat where you thought maybe you'd actually landed on something. And then Mike glanced at the paper for half a second, said, "I don't think that's it," and kept talking to Dustin like you hadn't said anything at all. Dustin didn't even glance up. Lucas asked Max something unrelated. The conversation just closed back over the space where your sentence had been, seamless, like water settling after a stone sinks. They kept the plan the same, tomorrow, like Dustin had originally called it, and moved on to arguing about who'd bring the walkie-talkies.

You sat back. Nobody had been cruel about it, that was almost the worst part, there was nothing to point to, no moment you could hold up and say that, that's what hurt. It was just that your idea hadn't registered as a real idea. It had registered as noise from the girl who came with Steve.

You told yourself it didn't matter. You told yourself you didn't actually need to be right, that this wasn't about being right, that you'd only said something because you thought it might help and it was fine, genuinely fine, if it turned out you were wrong or it didn't land. But some old, tender part of you had lit up hoping, just for a second, that this might be one of the times you got to matter to the group on your own, not as an extension of somebody else. And watching that hope get waved off without even the dignity of an argument stung more than you wanted to admit.

You didn't say anything else for the rest of the night. You nodded along, passed someone a pencil when they asked, laughed at the right moments so nobody would look twice. It was a skill. You were good at it.

Steve caught your eye once, halfway through, some silent you okay? passing between you, and you gave him the smallest nod, the one that meant later, not here, don't make this a thing. He let it go, which you were grateful for in the moment and would replay bitterly in your head a few hours later, how easily later had turned into never brought up at all, how the version of you that didn't want to cause a scene had, once again, made sure nothing got said.

By the time you left Mike's, the sting had settled into something quieter and heavier, sitting low in your chest the whole walk to Steve's car. You didn't bring it up on the drive. You told yourself it wasn't a big deal, that the party just got tunnel-visioned when they were deep in a theory, that it wasn't personal. But some part of you, the part that had spent a lifetime cataloguing every time it got overlooked, filed it away anyway, right where it could fester quietly until something else came along and gave it an opening.

That something else came along about an hour later, in Steve's living room, over a conversation that had nothing to do with the Upside Down at all.

The fight happened on a Tuesday, which felt insultingly mundane for something that ended up cracking your chest open. Steve had come over to your place after school like he did most days, and he'd been off from the second he walked in, jaw tight, answers clipped, the kind of tired that had nothing to do with sleep. You knew Robin had told you Steve had a rough shift at work, some blow-up with his dad on the phone before that. You knew, logically, that his mood had nothing to do with you.

Knowing that and feeling it were two different things.

"You've been weird for like an hour," you said, when you couldn't stand the silence anymore. You didn't mean it as an attack. You meant it as an opening, a door held ajar in case he wanted to walk through it and tell you what was wrong.

"I'm fine," Steve said, in the voice that meant the opposite.

"You don't have to be fine. You can just tell me."

"I said I'm fine." He dragged a hand through his hair, and something about the sharpness of the movement made your stomach drop. "Can you just- not do the thing right now?"

"What thing?"

"The thing where you need me to perform being okay for you every five minutes so you can relax." He said it fast, like it had been sitting loaded in his mouth for a while and your question had just pulled the trigger. "I had a garbage day, I don't have the energy to manage your feelings about my feelings right now."

It landed exactly where it was aimed. You felt your face do something you couldn't control, that old, familiar flinch, the one that used to show up at dinner tables, the one your body remembered even when you didn't want it to.

"Okay," you said quietly, because quiet was what you knew how to do when things got sharp. "Sorry."

"Don't do that either." Steve's voice cracked up a notch, frustration chasing itself in a circle now that had nothing to do with logic anymore. "Don't just- shut down and apologize like I kicked a puppy. I'm allowed to have a bad day without you needing constant reassurance that we're fine."

"I don't need constant reassurance-"

"You kind of do, though." And there it was, the thing that would sit in your chest for days after, long after he wished he could take it back. "I love you, but sometimes it's a lot, okay? You need me to notice everything, remember everything, be on top of how you're feeling every single second, and today I don't have it in me, and I'm sorry, but it's a little clingy, and I can't- I can't be everything for you all the time."

You opened your mouth to say something, but he wasn't finished, the words tumbling out now like he'd lost whatever grip he'd had on the dam. "And it's not just this. It's- you barely even try with the guys, you know that? Tonight you said one thing at Mike's and then you just went quiet for the rest of the night, like always, and I get it, I get that it's hard for you, but it's hard for me too, watching you act like everything anyone says is aimed at you. Mike wasn't trying to be a jerk earlier, he just didn't think your theory tracked, and you disappeared for two hours over it like he'd insulted you personally. Not everything is a personal attack. Sometimes people just disagree, or they're busy, or they forget to ask how your day was, and it doesn't mean anything, but you act like it's proof of something every single time."

"That's not-" Your voice came out smaller than you wanted, throat already tightening. "I wasn't making it a big deal. I didn't even say anything."

"You didn't have to say anything, I could feel it coming off you the whole car ride." Steve dragged both hands down his face, some of the anger already curdling into something closer to exhaustion. "I just- I want you to actually be part of the group. Not just show up because you're with me and then shrink into the corner the second something doesn't go your way. It's exhausting watching you brace for everyone to hurt you before they've even done anything."

Something in you wanted to laugh, except it would've come out broken instead of funny. You'd spent the entire ride over telling yourself, on a loop, that it hadn't been personal, that Mike was just focused, that nobody had meant anything by it, the exact speech you gave yourself almost daily, every time a door closed a little too fast or a conversation moved on without you in it. You worked so hard to talk yourself out of taking things personally that hearing Steve accuse you of doing the opposite, of treating every slight like a wound, felt like being punished for the one thing you actually tried to manage.

The word landed and just sat there. Clingy. You'd been called worse things by people who mattered less, and it had never hurt like this, because none of them had spent the last several months being the first person to ever make you feel like you were allowed to take up space. And now the person who'd built that feeling in you was the one tearing a hole through the floor of it.

"Okay," you said again, except this time your voice wasn't quiet so much as very, very careful, the tone of someone gathering their things off a table before it gets kicked over. "Got it."

"Wait, that's not-" Steve seemed to hear it as it left his mouth this time, the way it must've sounded from the outside. "That's not what I meant."

"You said what you meant." Your hands weren't quite steady, but you weren't going to give him the satisfaction, or yourself the humiliation, of falling apart in front of him. "I think you should go."

"Come on, don't-"

"I'll see you later, Steve."

You walked to the front door yourself and held it open, because it was your house and he'd have to be the one to leave it. He hesitated for a second on the threshold, like he wanted to say something else, then thought better of it and stepped out into the evening instead. You didn't slam the door behind him. You wanted to, some petty animal part of you wanted the noise, wanted him to feel the size of what he'd just done. But you'd spent a lifetime learning how to close a door quietly, and old habits, it turned out, came back fast.

You didn't cry until you heard his car pull out of the driveway, and then you cried the ugly kind, the kind that comes with the shame of having believed something too much. You'd known better. You'd known, somewhere in the back of your mind since the very first week, that this was too good to hold, that eventually the version of you that was too much would surface and remind everyone why you'd learned to disappear in the first place.

You didn't call anyone. It didn't even occur to you as an option, not really, you'd spent so long being the one who processed things alone, quietly, without asking anyone to hold space for it, that reaching out felt like a muscle you'd never built. You went up to your room instead, your own house suddenly feeling too big and too quiet around you, your mom working the late shift like always, nobody to hear you if you let the crying get loud. You sat down on the edge of your bed and just stayed there, turning the word over and over until it lost its shape: clingy, clingy, clingy, until it didn't even sound like English anymore, just a sound that meant too much, too much, too much.

You thought about all the small ways you'd let yourself believe things were different with Steve. The chair he moved six inches closer without being asked. The way he said your name like it was worth saying. You'd built something out of those small moments, something you'd let yourself trust, and it had taken exactly one bad day and four sentences to make you doubt every brick of it.

You didn't cry as hard as you thought you would. Mostly you just felt tired, the specific tired of having to talk yourself down from a feeling you'd had a hundred times before and hoped you'd never have to sit with again, the feeling of being someone people kept around out of obligation rather than choice. You told yourself, eventually, in the flat, exhausted voice you used when you were too worn out to argue with your own head anymore, that Steve had had a bad day and said something ugly, and that those two things weren't necessarily the same as the truth. You didn't fully believe it. But you let yourself hold the possibility of it anyway, curled up on top of your covers with your shoes still on, waiting for the ache in your chest to get tired before you did.

Steve showed up at your door around nine, which you knew because you heard the knock and your stupid heart leapt before your brain could catch up and remind it that it was supposed to be angry.

You almost didn't answer. You stood in the hallway for a full minute, arms crossed, doing the math on whether opening the door made you exactly the kind of needy he'd accused you of being, unable to hold a boundary for even a few hours. But that felt like punishing yourself for his mistake, so you opened it.

Steve looked wrecked. tired and sorry in the plain, unglamorous way people looked when they were guilty.

"Hey," he said.

"Hey."

"Can I come in? Or- you can say no. I just want to say something, and then if you want me to leave, I'll leave."

You stepped aside. He came in and didn't sit down, like he didn't think he'd earned the couch yet.

"I've been driving around for like an hour trying to figure out how to say this without it sounding like an excuse," he started, "so I'm just gonna say the true part first and then get to the rest of it. What I said was really messed up. And it wasn't true. Any of it."

You didn't say anything, just watched him, arms still crossed, guarding something.

"My dad called before I came over," he said. "Said some stuff about how I'm never gonna make anything of myself, working retail, no direction, all his greatest hits. And I hate that it still gets to me, but it does, every time, and today it got under my skin worse than usual. And then you asked me what was wrong, which, you always ask, because you care, because that's just who you are, and instead of just telling you the truth, which would've taken ten seconds, I decided to make it about you instead. Because it was easier to be mad at something in front of me than to sit with the thing actually hurting."

"That doesn't really-"

"I know it doesn't fix it. I'm not saying it to fix it. I'm saying it because you deserve to know none of it was about you actually needing too much. You don't need too much. You ask if I'm okay because you love me, and instead of being grateful for that, I used it as a weapon because I was in a bad mood, and that's on me, not you." His voice cracked slightly, and he pushed forward before he could lose the thread. "You're not clingy. I don't even know why I reached for that word, I think I knew it would hurt, and I said it anyway, and I've hated myself for it every minute since."

"It hurt," you said quietly, "because it's the thing I've been scared of the whole time. That eventually I'd be too much. That the version of me that notices everything and needs to check in and gets scared when people go quiet would finally be the thing that made you tired of me. Everyone else got tired of it eventually. My whole life, I've been- extra. Tolerated. And you were the first person who made me feel like I wasn't, and then today you took that away in like four sentences."

Steve's face did something complicated, guilt and grief tangled together. "Can I tell you something, and I need you to actually hear it, not just let it bounce off?"

You nodded, throat too tight to speak.

"You're not extra to me. You've never been extra to me. Every single thing you think is too much, the checking in, the noticing, the needing to know we're okay, those are the things I love. You're not hard to love. You've just never had anyone stick around long enough to prove that to you, and I am so sorry that today, of all days, I made it feel like I was going to be one more person who didn't."

You felt your composure slip, the careful wall you'd built over the last few hours finally giving out. "I don't want you to just say the right things because you feel guilty."

"I'm not saying the right things. I'm saying the true things, and they happen to also be the right things, because you're not actually the problem here, I am." He took a step closer, slow, giving you room to stop him if you needed to. "I'm gonna do better with my bad days. I'm gonna tell you what's actually wrong instead of blowing it up at you. And you don't have to apologize for needing to know we're okay. I want you to ask. I want to be the person who always tells you the truth when you do."

You let him close the distance then, let yourself fold into him the way you hadn't let yourself do with anyone in years, hiding your face against his chest while he wrapped both arms around you like he was trying to make up the difference all at once.

"I'm sorry," he said again, quieter, into your hair. "You've spent your whole life not being put first. I don't ever want to be one more person who made you feel that way. Not when I've spent the last few months trying to be the opposite of that."

"You are the opposite of that," you admitted, voice muffled against his shirt. "Most of the time."

"I'll work on all of the time."

You stayed like that for a long while, not saying anything else, just breathing each other in until your heartbeat slowed down to match his. Eventually he pulled back just far enough to tilt your chin up, searching your face like he needed to see for himself that you believed him.

"For the record," he said, thumb brushing gently under your eye where a tear had escaped without your permission, "I like that you need me. I like being needed by you. I just had a bad day and forgot how to say that in a way that didn't sound like an insult."

You managed a small, watery laugh. "You're bad at fighting."

"I'm bad at fighting," he agreed, pressing a kiss to your forehead. "I'm better at this part, though."

"The apologizing part?"

"The making sure you know you matter part." He guided you over to the couch, tucking you against his side once you'd both sat down, one hand finding yours and lacing your fingers together like it was the easiest thing in the world. "You're not an afterthought here. Not to me, not to Robin, not to any of them. You never have been. I just did a really bad job of showing it today."

You let your head rest against his shoulder, the tightness in your chest finally starting to loosen for the first time since that Tuesday afternoon.

"I'm still a little scared," you admitted. "That it'll happen again. Not the fight, I know people fight. Just- the part where you say I'm too much and mean it."

"I know." Steve pressed his lips to the top of your head. "I can't promise I'll never have a bad day again. But I can promise I'm not gonna let you carry the blame for it when I do. You're allowed to need people, especially me. I want to be the person you get to need."

The phone rang before you'd even settled into the quiet, the landline in your hallway shrieking loud enough to make you both jump. Steve kissed your temple and went to grab it, since it was closer to him than to you, and you heard Dustin's voice come through frantic and tinny even from across the room, something about the gate reading wrong, about numbers not lining up, about how they were about to head out to the spot they'd marked for tomorrow and everything had just started going haywire an hour early.

"Wait- say that again," Steve said, and something in his tone made you sit up. "It's happening now? Tonight?"

You didn't need to hear the rest of it. You already knew, with a cold, sinking certainty, exactly what had gone wrong, they'd planned around tomorrow's date instead of tonight's, the same gap you'd tried to point out on Mike's basement floor hours earlier, the one nobody had bothered to double-check.

"It's tonight," you said, loud enough for Steve to hear over Dustin. "Tell him it's tonight, not tomorrow- I told you guys the interval was off, remember? It shifts it up a day. If they're seeing activity now, that's exactly what I said would happen."

Steve relayed it word for word, and you heard the scramble on the other end, Dustin swearing, someone shouting for Mike, the sound of the party mobilizing a full day earlier than they'd planned because the girl they'd waved off in the basement had been right the whole time.

By the time everyone regrouped, breathless, half-dressed for a fight they weren't ready for, arriving at the gate site with minutes instead of hours to spare, Mike had the decency to look almost sick about it. "You said this," he admitted, catching your eye across the yard, "and I just- I didn't even really look at it. That's on me. Good catch. Seriously."

It wasn't a grand apology. It wasn't the party suddenly treating you like you'd always belonged. But it was something, an acknowledgment, out loud, in front of everyone, that your voice had been worth listening to the first time. Steve's hand found yours in the chaos, squeezing once, and you caught the small, fierce pride on his face that had nothing to do with guilt and everything to do with I told you she was right.

You didn't get to dwell on it long, the night dissolved into flashlights and static and the kind of adrenaline that didn't leave room for feelings until it was over, but hours later, once the gate had been sealed back up and the party had scattered home to sleep off the scare, you ended up back on your own couch anyway, Steve staying behind with you, exactly where you'd started the evening.

"Mike's gonna be insufferable about owing you an apology for a week," Steve said, tucking the blanket around you both. 

"I didn't do it to be right," you murmured, already half asleep against his chest.

"I know." He pressed a kiss to your hair. "But it's nice, isn't it? Being right and being heard, both at the same time, for once."

You fell asleep on your couch that night, tucked into his side under a blanket that smelled like his cologne anyway, his fingers idly tracing patterns against your arm long after you'd drifted off. And for the first time in longer than you could remember, the quiet didn't feel like something to be afraid of. It just felt like being home.

Dividers by: Cursed-Carmine

[aecd27]

physically cried

[beezusvreeland]

masterlist

hi, I'm bee and these are the characters that I write for:

Steve Harrington

great responsability: Alright, let’s do this one last time! As Spider-Man, Steve Harrington has a lot on his plate. Including giving relationship advice to his best friend’s sister, who is broken hearted and has no idea who is the man under the mask.

Frankie Morales

second best: Frankie is put on the spot by the guys, who want to know if he would date you or not. He feels bad about his answer, but not as bad when he hears yours. 

Santiago "Pope" Garcia

santi's journal: After the break up, Santiago is advised to write a journal to deal with his feelings, an exercise that brings back memories and, maybe, a new hope for your relationship.

Miguel O'Hara

a very good idea: After your boyfriend cheats on you at a party, you break up with him, who tells you nobody else is willing to be with you like him. You decide to prove him wrong, with a little help from a new friend.

dear reader: Miguel took the reader’s love and friendship for granted. Something he learns reading her column, when it’s too late…Or is it?

Poe Dameron

now that we don't talk: After being rejected by Poe, the two of you are assigned a mission together. And a lot can happen during a mission.

I'm also on ao3

fic recommendations

Beautiful dividers by @diviniyae

[beezusvreeland]

updated masterlist with beautiful dividers by @diviniyae 💙

[justmeinadaze]

Perfect to Me (Steve X Plus Size Y/N)

A/N: Ok so someone messaged me (asking to remain anonymous) with this request and I just had to do it immediately since I myself am working out more and trying to better my brain and my body <3. I have discussions with people sometimes about if Steve and Eddie would be into plus size baddies like us and I think they definitely would. But from my perspective I would be more insecure about my body around Steve. Boy's an athlete with dem sexy hands and arms and I get winded going up a flight of stairs lol

But I definitely think he'd be understanding and empathetic. Thus I present to you this story here. You meet Stevie at the gym and start a relationship but as your relationship gets more intimate you get worried about certain things alot of people deal with but more so us after you just start working out (i.e.chaffing, feeling icky cause we sweat, loose skin, etc)

Warnings: Steve & Plus Size Fem Y/N, SMUT, oral (m & f receiving), fingering (f receiving), p in v, sooooooo much dirty talk, praise, aftercare always, FLUFF, Steve is a good boy and definitely understanding.

ANGST, the most angsty bit is SUPER brief, Reader does notice a group of boys mocking her but nothing is said and no words are exchanged (Steve puts a stop to it immediately), She is self conscious about certain aspects of her body (mentioned above).

If you have any questions about this let me know. I've had people mention to me before they get triggered involving certain things that come along with being a bigger gal.

Word Count: 5294

Donate to Me (Kofi)

The first time you ever saw Steve Harrington will forever stick out in your mind. 

You hadn’t been looking for anyone relationship wise, choosing to spend your energy focusing on your health. Those first few months were hard on their own between battling cravings and sweating buckets at the gym, you didn’t have the time nor energy to focus on anything let alone dating.

Your doctor had recommended trying some exercises in the pool to alleviate some of the stresses working out was putting on your joints so you gave it a try, all be it a bit shakily as you kept a towel secured around you as you scooted shyly into the pool area. 

There were a few other people doing a workout of their own along with other members in the outer lanes diving in before swimming the length of the pool. 

That’s where you first laid eyes on this Adonis of a man on the opposite side, his amber irises zeroed in just as he took his pose and splashed into the water, swimming faster than you had ever seen anyone to the other side and utilized his muscular arms to push himself out on to the concrete.

Absently, he reached for his towel and ran it along his face as your own irises took him in now that he was beside you. The man’s frame was rather lean with a soft stomach that made you melt, accentuated by his swim trunks that were hanging just so on his hips. 

When he maneuvered his towel around to the back of his head, you were able to get a good look at his strong jaw and gorgeous eyes when they met yours briefly. 

You blushed immediately, shifting your gaze to the floor just as you felt him walk behind you to grab his things and head towards the locker room. 

After that, you began feeling like you saw him everywhere within the gym. 

In his handsome suit when he sauntered to the locker room to change or a few machines down from where you had been walking on the treadmill. Sometimes while you were stretching, you would see him lifting barbells with this slightly disgruntled look on his features that you couldn’t help but smile at. 

About a month after your first encounter with him, you finally heard him speak wishing, however, it was under different circumstances.

You had steadily begun lifting weights yourself, starting small like your doctor suggested but still struggling immensely. After a while you heard snickering, glancing in the mirror in front of you to see a couple of boys behind you pointing your way. 

Your confidence fell and all you wanted to do was get out of there. 

Just as you placed the weights back on their shelf, you noticed a tall figure walk with purpose behind you, your eyes shifting back to their reflection to see Steve placing himself in front of them to block you from their view. 

“Fuck off. Now.”

“Oh, come on. We were just messing around.”, one of the boys tried to defend before his large hand took hold of one of their arms and shoved them to the side. 

“That’s why she’s actually getting somewhere and you’re still here being and doing nothing. Now fuck off and if you ever make fun of her again, I’ll make sure you regret it. I have pull everywhere, gentlemen.”

What always amused you about that encounter was the fact that physically those boys could probably overpower him with the biceps that protruded from their obnoxiously tight short sleeve shirts but Steve himself had been much more intimidating; not just in his presence but the way he spoke and commanded attention. 

He made his threat and they believed it, immediately backing down. 

You decided then that you’d start going to the gym later in the evening when less people were there which was a double edge sword because you weren’t able to ogle your gym crush anymore. 

After a couple of weeks, however, while you were working out in the pool the man himself suddenly sauntered from the locker room into the area. You tried to contain your shock but failed when your jaw not so subtly dropped. 

Steve continued to do his thing while you did yours, silently swimming back and forth till you gradually realized… he was slowing down so his pace matched yours. 

When his luscious head of hair breached the water, he hastily pushed it back with his fingers before his eyes opened to meet your smirking face eliciting a cheeky smile from him. 

“You should try kicking your legs a bit more. Sometimes about mid-way, you use only your arms which can slow you down.”

“Oh.”, you muse as you nod, feeling his gaze take you in. “I feel like I look a bit silly sometimes kicking my feet like a toddler.”

“Naw, you don’t look silly. Plus, even if you did, who cares how you look.”

“Said the guy who has probably never looked bad a day in his life.”

“Said the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen.” You head snaps in his direction, eyes locking on his as his smile grows showing off all his teeth. “How about this? How about I race you to the other side of the pool and if I win…I get to buy you dinner.”

“Oh, ok.”, you giggle. “What if I win?”

“If you win then… you have to let me buy you dinner.”, he teases making you laugh harder. 

“You don’t even know my name.”

Water splashes slightly around you both as he extends his hand towards you. 

“I’m Steve Harrington.”

“Y/N Y/L/N.”, you relay, shaking his palm with your own. 

“It’s nice to meet you, honey.”

That night you let him buy you dinner, the smile never leaving your face as he pulled out your chair and held open the door. The two of you talked for hours, his charming demeanor never faltering for a second. 

“Yeah, my dad wanted me to get into corporate America but…that’s never been for me…”, he sighed. “I love teaching those kids, you know, and getting to coach them. It’s much more fun than some cubicle job.”

“I can imagine.”, you chuckle, a thought suddenly hitting you right at that moment. “Hang on. If you’re a teacher; don’t you have to like get up early in the morning?”

“During the weekdays, yeah.”

“Oh my God, then why are you working out so late then? I’d be so exhausted!”

As you laugh, the man in front of you laughs with you as he leans forward against the table on his elbows. 

“Yeah, I used to go right after work but this girl I have a crush on suddenly stopped going at that time.” Your eyes meet his glowing ones and you do everything you can to contain the shy smile that wants to break free. “At first I thought maybe she was going in the morning instead so I set my alarm the next day to this ungodly hour but when I showed up she didn’t. I was even almost late for work because I lagged behind a bit hoping to run into her.”

“She probably thought there would be less aggressive ‘gym bros’ if she went at night.”

“That was my next thought. It took me awhile though because its baseball season and my team had a few games. The first chance I was able to though I went to that gym a little after normal hours and there she was…swimming in the pool…not kicking her legs.”

Steve smiles when you giggle, waiting for you patiently to respond as his eyes drink you in. 

“I’m a bit introverted so I try to keep to myself. Them laughing at me…kind of shook me…”

Unfolding his crossed arms, his palm reaches out to take yours in his grasp. 

“I know. I wish I had caught them sooner but…the only reason I noticed was because I saw that heartbroken look on your face. I didn’t know I was capable of feeling an anger like that…I got this like intense need to protect you.” His thumb caresses your skin and you wonder if he can feel your body tremble at his words. “Sorry, I, um, sometimes my mouth moves before my brain. Probably not the thing to say on a first date.”

Abruptly, you rise a bit out of your chair, lean over the table, and plant your lips on his before falling back down in your seat with a grin. 

“It’s ok, so does mine.”

Your relationship with him moved fairly quickly from that point on. 

You both had begun working out together, stealing kisses and flirty touches where you could with Steve usually being the instigator. The more intimate you two became the more aware you were about certain perceived flaws when it came to your body. 

“Holy shit.”, Steve panted as his fingers curled tighter in your hair, his eyes quickly assessing the gym parking lot to make sure no one was coming as your head bobbed lower down his throbbing cock. “Atta girl. Don’t—Don’t overwhelm yourself. I know I’m big.”

His free hand rubbed your back to your ass making you groan as you pushed him further into your mouth.

“Goddamn, baby, just like that.” Steve can’t help but grunt as your pace hastens. “Honey, Honey, you have to slow down or else…I’m gonna cum.” The moment one of your hands begins massaging his balls he knows he’s done for. “Y/N…wait-wait-wait, oh f-fuck.”

His grip on you tightens as a cute little whine escapes from his lips and he spills down your throat. 

“Fuck, that was…”, he murmurs softly with a smirk, guiding your lips to his. “Are you ok?”

“Yeah, I’m fine. I like the way you taste.”, you swoon, giggling when his kisses trail to your cheek to the side of your neck. 

“Yeah? Even though I’m all sweaty from our workout?”

“I didn’t even notice.”

“Hmmm…how about we go back to my apartment…and we can work on some sets in my…comfy bed…”

As his words effortlessly flow between kisses, your mind begins to race. You had just worked out so your bra and panties weren’t exactly “sexy”. You didn’t look or smell nearly as good as he did after a workout since being a bigger girl you definitely sweat more and in many crevices. Add in other factors about your body…

“I, um, I should actually…”, you start as you back away, his surprised expression hitting your heart. “I have to go home and do that thing for work and then, um, you have to grade papers and I don’t want to distract you.”

His brain finally seems to catch up with your actions, him adjusting his shorts as he opens his car door and runs around to catch you before you can scurry away. 

“You never distract me.”, he replies earnestly, noticing your face fall but unsure of the reason why. “We don’t have to do anything if you don’t want to. You can come over, I can make us dinner, and we can watch some tv or something.”

You wanted nothing more than to spend more time with him but your insecurities were winning the battle within your mind. 

“Let’s…Let’s do something next weekend, ok?”

Steve blinked as he leaned against the hood of his BMW.

“What’s going on, sweetheart?”

“Nothing—"

“Cause you know you can talk to me about anything.”

“I said nothing is wrong, Steve!”, you shout, eyes meeting his before he nods and folds his arms across his chest. 

“Ok, text me when you get home so I know you got there safely.”

You nod, preparing to walk to your car but your instincts take over as you turn and tackle your arms around his waist; the boy not even hesitating as his own limbs circle around you and he rests his chin on top of your head. 

“I’m sorry I snapped at you.”

“It’s ok. I just don’t want you to think that’s all I care about…sex and stuff.”, he quickly clarifies. “I like you a lot, Y/N.”

“I like you a lot to.”

Steve chuckles at your muffled response, gently tilting your head back to kiss your lips. 

You knew at some point you were going to have tell him your concerns and after a long day at work having an internal debate with yourself, you got in your car and sped to his apartment, banging your fist on his door a bit harder than you meant to. 

The moment he opens it, an unintentional, breathy moan escapes you as your eyes take him in. Usually on Friday’s he told you he spent his evenings grading papers so he could enjoy the weekend so you imagined he would be dressed casually. 

When he answered your knock, however, he was still donning what you assumed he wore to class that day; a pair of black slacks and a matching button up shirt that was tucked in perfectly with his sleeves rolled up to his elbows.

And the cherry on top?

The glasses on his face you had never seen him wear until now.

“Y/N? What’s going on? Is everything ok?”, Steve asked, his voice filled with concern.

The dam broke in your mind then and you allowed the words to flow as you pushed passed him to place yourself in his living room. 

“Of course. Of course, you look fucking sexy right now. Is there ever a time where you don’t look fucking delicious?!”

“Um—”

“No, wait. Let me get this out before I talk myself out of it. I don’t know if you ever saw me when I first started going to the gym but I was a lot heavier than I am now and I haven’t been in a relationship since I started getting healthier.” 

While you continued to ramble, the man before you came around to lean against the arm of his sofa, taking off his glasses as he gave you his attention. 

“Mostly because I needed to focus all my energy there but then I saw you swimming at the pool and I thought to myself ‘I can look. It’s ok. It’s not like a guy like him would want a girl like me— ‘”

“Define guy like me.”, he interjects, throwing you off slightly as your eyes find his own and you shrug. 

“I don’t know, Steven! A fucking hot…probably was prom king in school…had all the cheerleaders wanting to marry him…popular, you know?” When all he does is pout out his lips sarcastically and nod, you continue. “Someone who…probably wouldn’t have defended me in school…but you did, Steve, and then we talked and you’re so fucking sweet and adorable and perfect…”

The man’s head tilts slightly as he watches the confidence you flew in with slowly leave your frame; the same way it had when those boys were mocking you. 

“I’m—I’m proud of the weight I lost and how healthy I’m becoming but my body…it’s still kind of a work in progress. I sweat more than you do, part of my body chaffs especially in the thigh area here.” You pause as you gesture towards said area. “When I go home, my bathroom turns into that scene in Edward Scissor hands where he’s making ice sculptures because it’s like snowing powder I have to put in areas because it rubs and it hurts and it leaves marks… I have hanging flab in places you don’t see because it’s covered by my clothes… and then I get worried about my downstairs because what if it’s all gross now to like everything else?”

Again you pause, hugging your arms around yourself. 

“I meant what I said, Steve, I like you a lot but I’m terrified that when you see ME…you won’t want me anymore.” Steve blinks at your words, nodding his head a bit as his eyes shift to the void of the floor. “Ok…that’s, um, that’s it. That’s what I, um, came here to say.”

The silence between you two is deafening and anxiety gives your legs momentum as you start to head for his front door before his arm shoots out to the side to take hold of your bicep stopping you in your tracks. 

“You’re right. I was the popular kid…I didn’t make prom king but snowball king for sure. It was our small-town version of a homecoming dance.”, he explained when your flashed him a questioning look. “I was a fucking asshole. I made fun of people I thought were ‘beneath’ me and acted like a total dumbass.”

“Is this supposed to make me feel more comfortable or…?”

The man beside you smiles as he readjusts himself to face you more, taking your other hand in his. 

 “My dad always said my looks were all I had since I wasn’t exactly excelling in the brains department. My grades were trash and anytime I wanted to express myself I thought people would hear me and realize how dumb I actually was so I wanted to bring them down to ‘my level’.”

“I don’t think your dumb.”

“Thank you.”, he murmurs as his thumb caresses your skin. “I just…I’m not great at expressing my thoughts but I’m going to do my best here.” Anxiety once again flows through your system as your mind races through every possible painful outcome his next words will lead to. “I meant what I said the first time I spoke to you at the pool. You, Y/N, are the most beautiful woman I have ever seen. Not just physically but… before I actually met you I watched you come into the gym every day and give your all and it just inspired me, you know?

I remember there was this one day you were on the treadmill reading and when I walked by I realized it was one of the novels I teach my class—.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. What I’m trying to say is there’s more to you then what’s under here.”, he grins, lightly tugging on the bottom of your shirt. “I’m one to talk. I’ve been kinda nervous about you seeing me.”

“Steve…”, you giggle as you roll your eyes and playfully push his shoulder. 

“I’m serious!”

“I’ve seen you! You swim without your shirt on AND I’ve had you in my mouth a couple of times.” The man’s eyebrows quirk up flirtatiously making you laugh harder just as his palms come up to cup your cheeks and bring your lips to his. “To me everything about you is perfect.”

“To me everything about YOU is perfect.”, he mimes back. 

You kiss him once more, allowing them to grow my passionate as his tongue gently dances with your own. Firmly squeezing his shoulders, you silently signal for him to let you go which he does and you take a couple of steps away from him before sliding out of your shoes, pushing them to the side.

Unbuttoning your jeans, you shimmy your hips to grant you freedom from the denim eliciting a cute chuckle from him as you playfully kick them away. Steve’s gentle smile remains as your eyes glue to his and you gradually lift your shirt over your head. 

Your fingers nervously push your hair back as you dance on the balls of your feet allowing his honey irises to glide from your lips, along your chest to your stomach and around to your curvy hips. 

“I’m, um, it’s gotten a bit better. The crunches and weight training has helped with the lose skin here.” Even as you speak, he doesn’t move and you panic. “Say something please…Steve?...Come on, I’m freakin’ out here—”

Abruptly, he rises and crashes his lips to yours, his arms circling tightly around you. 

“You thought I wouldn’t want you? I should throw you over my knee and spank this sexy ass. Are you kidding me?”

At his husky, lust filled threat, you wrapped your arms around his neck and without missing a beat his large hands took hold of the back of your thighs. 

“Jump.”, Steve commanded and you listened, him catching you and adjusting you effortlessly in his grasp to carry you to his bedroom. 

You hissed slightly at the feeling of something cold when he placed you on his mattress but before you could process what it was, the former jock had began pushing all his papers and folders to the floor. 

Your own hands roamed his form, pulling desperately at the buttons of his shirt while his mouth kissed and sucked on your neck, humming against your skin as your palm ran rubbed along his warm, hairy chest around to his back pushing him as close to you as possible. 

His own fingers found their way behind you and expertly unhooked your bra, throwing it to the floor blindly as his lips immediately took one of your nipples into his mouth and his tongue flicked the bud. 

“Fuck, Steve.”, you mewled, hooking your legs tighter around his waist to grind your lower half against his own. 

You weren’t sure how long he lingered around your belly but you definitely didn’t mind when his tongue and mouth ran along your body; parts you were insecure about. After removing his shirt, Steve fell to his side, shifting his gaze to meet yours.

“I want to taste you, Y/N. Is that ok?”, he whispered, kissing your lips when you nodded. “Can you say it?”

“I want you to taste me.” 

Placing himself between your legs, his eyes remain on yours, slowly pulling your panties down and tenderly kissing your limbs along his decent. 

“Open your legs for me.” Pushing up onto your elbows, you do as he asks, biting your bottom lip when his eyelids flutter. “Fuck, baby, you’re so wet. Just, um, if you need me to stop—fuck, baby, I’m so fucking hard for you right now—if you need me to stop just tell me, ok?”

“Ok, I promise.”, you whimper, desperate for him to finally place his mouth where you need him most.

The moment his wide, flat tongue licks a long stripe through your folds you know you won’t last long. 

“Oh my god, Steve.”

“Jesus, sweetheart, you taste like heaven.” With a firm grip on your thigh, the man holds you in place as he devours you, making so many obscene noises that you struggled to keep still. “Shit, baby, that’s it. Those sounds you make are driving me crazy.”

Your fingers reach down to thread through his hair, a grunt of approval vibrating through as his eyes flick up to meet yours. 

“M-More—fuck—please…”, you beg and he instantly obliges, using his own fingers to spread your pussy lips wider as his tongue flicks against your bundle of nerves. 

Your eyes roll closed and your back falls flat against his mattress as your hips grind back against him. Your body trembles as he pushes you over the edge, pulling away for just a moment to allow his fingers to replace the appendage between his teeth. 

Climbing up your frame, his lips meet yours. 

“See? Nothing wrong with your…what did you call it?...Downstairs?”, Steve teases, smiling at your lop-sided grin. Lazily lifting one of your hands, you glide your fingertips along his skin and down his stomach, unbuttoning his jeans before finding your way under the waistband of his boxers. “You feel what you do to me?”, he whispers. “How hard you make me?”

“Can I feel you, Steve?”

“You think this little pussy can handle me?” At his words, his fingers inside of you curled making you whimper as your back arched. “She can barely handle my fingers.”

“I want to feel you inside me, baby, please.”

“Maybe I should make you wait. Watch you squirm and beg for making me wait.” After pulling his hand out from between your legs, his body fell flat on yours and he rolled his hips against your palm, groaning as his forehead pressed to yours. “I thought about what you would feel like constantly, Y/N. I’d lay right here with my hand around my dick and wonder. Even before we started dating.”

With his breathy words, you felt your core flutter with need as his face scrunched with pleasure. 

“How tight you’d be or how warm pussy would be. How your body would feel against mine. What you would sound like moaning my name.”

“Steve.”

“Fuck me… The noises and faces you’d make when my cock is stretching you open. How deep your body would let me go…pressing down on your stomach to feel it…”

“Please… I want that. I NEED that.”

“Fuck, Y/N…I-I didn’t expect you tonight. I don’t have any condoms and I can’t promise I can pull out in time. The thought of coming inside you just…” His hips press down hard against your palm and he grunts at the feeling.

“You can cum inside me, Steve. I want you to.” 

Lifting his head slightly, his gorgeous irises search your face and you nod your assurance eliciting his adorable needy whine you had come to love before watching as he bounces away from you to hurriedly pull off everything below his waist. 

Positioning himself between your legs once more, the man takes hold of his shaft and you both release a gentle moan as his drags his tip a couple of times between your folds, collecting your slick. 

“Just breathe for me, baby, ok?” 

“Okay.”

The moment the word left your lips, Steve gradually began pressing into your core and your stomach tightened as you couldn’t help but hold your breath at the unexpected stretch. 

“Breathe, honey.”, he instructed, his eyes zeroing in on where you two connected, slowly thrusting in every little delicious inch. “I know, beautiful, I know but you’re doing so good for me.”

Licking your fingertips, you reached down to massage your clit and he mewled as your body relaxed a bit more allowing him to push deeper inside you. 

“Goddamn, Y/N, you feel so fucking good. I’m almost all the way in.”

“Steve.”

As you whimpered his name, he felt caution and control begin to leave his body as need began to consume him. 

“Fuck, I’ve never felt a pussy this tight. You were made for me, pretty girl.”

Tilting towards him, your palms cupped his cheeks to kiss his lips, guiding him fully on top of you as your circle your legs around his waist, sheathing him fully inside you. 

“You were right.”, you whisper, breathlessly. “I can feel you—fuck—right here.”

His eyes remain on yours but he feels your palm glide between you both to your lower stomach.

“Yeah, baby? Right here?” 

Pulling back slightly, Steve rolled his hips roughly and smirked as your eyes rolled shut. Setting a steady pace, he continued to thrust his cock into that spongey spot inside you, the sound of skin hitting skin filling his room mixed in with the grunts and moans of pleasure from you both that were so loud you were sure his neighbors were going to complain. 

“Steve…fuck…”

“I gotcha, baby. I’m right here.”

“Harder…Please…”

“Like this?”, he asks, pounding into you so hard that his headboard begins to hit the wall. “Yeah, just like that. Cum for me, sweetheart. Cum on my cock.” He barely gets the command out before your frame trembles beneath him and the coil snaps. “Ah, fuck.”

Fully collapsing on top of you, Steve fucks you through your high while chasing his own as you repeatedly chant his name, your fingers tangling in his slightly damp hair so you could press his head into the side of your neck. 

With a few more sloppy thrusts and that cute little whine, you felt his spend paint your walls. 

“Holy shit.”, he exhales, his heavy pants warming the nook between your neck and shoulder as you place tender kisses along his skin. “Are—Are you ok?”

“Yeah, just go slow.”, you whisper, both your heads tilting between your bodies as Steve pushes up onto his palms to slowly pull his softening cock out of your now aching entrance. “Ah…ow…”

“I know, honey. That’s my good girl.”, he praises, lightly laughing when he feels your cunt flutter around him at the sound. “Fuck, Y/N, you can’t do that when I’m trying to be careful here.” 

“I’m sorry.”, you giggle along with him. “I guess I like being praised.”

“You guess?”, Steve inquires as he rises to his feet and takes hold of your hand to guide you to his bathroom. 

“I don’t get praised or complimented very much.”

The boy’s soft irises meet yours, fingers catching your chin just as you begin to hang your head. 

“I can’t believe that. Gorgeous girl like you?”

Your face heats up at his words as you bit your bottom lip to try and contain your grin. After a lengthy shower filled with tender words and gentle kisses along your body, Steve effortlessly dries you before jogging to his closet to find you something to wear. 

“I don’t think any of your clothes are going to fit me, baby. Not right now anyway.”

Tossing you a playful smirk, he returns to your side and hands you a shirt, insisting when you shake your head. To your surprise when you pull it over your noggin, it actually fits perfectly along with his shorts that hug your tummy. 

“When I’m done at the gym especially after swimming, I like to shower and then wear the most loose-fitting clothes possible. Hell, even after work because dressing ‘work appropriate’ is so suffocating.”, the man explains as you watch him pull on a pair of sweats and a white tank. “Add in that after a long run, clothes touching my body just hurts…the chaffing right here and here.”

When he gestures along his chest and between his legs, you can’t help but beam up at him.

“Now, if you’re up to it, I would like to make you something to eat. I imagine with how fast you flew in here you haven’t had dinner yet.”

“No, I haven’t.”

“Well then…”

Steve’s strong arms lift you off your feet, carrying you to his kitchen where he sets you down on the counter and places a quick kiss on your lips.

“Thank you for telling me what was going on in here.”, he murmurs gently, his fingers lightly tapping your forehead. “You never have to be afraid to tell me that stuff. I know our bodies are different but as a coach and man who’s been working out since he was like 15, I know it’s never as easy as doing the exercises and then going home. There’s a lot more to it than that and whenever you’re comfortable I’d like you to tell me more about how you do aftercare after a workout. It helps me understand and take care of you to.”

“You don’t…you don’t have to do that, Steve…”

The boy before you smiles shyly in a way you had never seen from him before causing your own grin to grow. 

“I want to. I like the idea of looking after you and making sure your safe and comfortable. I saw those fuckers being dicks to you and this feeling overwhelmed me like…how dare you disrespect her. Then you disappeared and I panicked. I thought I lost you.”

Wrapping your arms around his neck, you hold him to you as you kiss him again. 

“I’m not great at letting people in when it comes to this kind of stuff or letting go and letting people take care of me but I promise to try.”

“That’s all I ask, honey.”

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Steve Masterlist Here

Just tagging my regulars (if I forgot anyone its not you its me and my ptsd brain) : @debkk16 @micheledawn1975 @beainabottle2 @fireeyes-on-teller-dixon-grimes @twirls827 @utterlyinsanity @veemoon @pigwidgeonxo

[justmeinadaze]

Just saw a cute video of this muscley guy doing workouts in the front yard with his wife and he did the whole booty smack on their way out and you could tell they were in love and he adored her and my period is about to start and I need a part 2 cause im hormonal. Lol.

Maybe after this request im doing.

[honey-and-halos]

Pushing It Down And Praying (Alt Ending)

Pairing: Steve Harrington x Reader

Summary: Five weeks of silence, one panicked hallway apology, and a lot of unglamorous therapy later, you shows up ready to actually talk instead of letting the voice in your head keep talking

A/N: I know some of you were wanting a part 3 but in the moment I didn't know how to write it in a way that didn't seem like she was just settling, I hate the idea of going back to a guy out of fear because you forgot what It was like to be single. BUT but I am a romantic at heart so here is an alt ending for those who wanted Steve to be forgiven. Have a good day my lovelys :)

It was almost five weeks before you let yourself knock on his door.

Not because you didn't miss him. You missed him constantly, in the stupidest ways, reaching for the wrong side of the bed at Robin's, hearing a voice on the street that made your whole body turn before you realised it wasn't him. But you'd needed those five weeks. You'd needed to sit with the ache long enough to know what you wanted to say when you finally saw him again, instead of just saying whatever the hurt wanted you to say.

You'd called him that morning from Robin's kitchen phone, the cord stretched as far as it would go so no one could listen in. Can I come by tonight?

He'd barely let you finish the sentence. Yeah. Of course. Whenever you want.

Now you were standing outside the apartment you used to call home, keys still sitting heavy and unused in your coat pocket, because some part of you hadn't wanted to just let yourself in. Not yet. Some part of you needed him to open the door.

He did, almost before you'd finished knocking, like he'd been standing on the other side waiting.

He looked better than the last time you'd seen him, not fixed, exactly, but steadier. His hair was doing the thing where it looked like he'd run his hands through it too many times to count, and there were still faint shadows under his eyes, but he was wearing a shirt you recognised, one you used to steal to sleep in, and something about that small detail made your throat go tight.

"Hi," he said. Careful. Like the word itself might startle you off.

"Hi."

Neither of you moved for a second.

"Can I come in?"

"God, yeah. Sorry." He stepped back so fast he nearly tripped over his own feet, and despite everything, despite the five weeks and the ache and the name that still sat between you like a scar not quite healed, you almost laughed.

The apartment looked the same and completely different at once. Your coffee mug was still in the drying rack, like he hadn't been able to put it away. There was a blanket balled up on one end of the couch that hadn't been there before, like he'd taken to sleeping down here instead of in the bed you used to share.

"I've been meaning to ask Robin to grab the rest of your stuff," he said, following your gaze. "Wasn't sure if you wanted it, or if you wanted new stuff, or-" He stopped himself, exhaled. "Sorry. I'm nervous."

"I can tell."

"Yeah, well." A small, helpless smile. "You're kind of the most important person in the world to me and I have no idea what you came here to say, so."

You sat down on the couch. After a beat, he sat too, leaving space between you that felt both too far and exactly right.

"I've been thinking," you said, "about what you told me. That day on Robin's landing. About the name just... being there. Waiting for a crack to slip through."

His jaw tightened, but he didn't look away. "Yeah."

"I hated that you said it like that. Like it was inevitable. Like there was nothing you could've done."

"I know."

"But I've also been thinking that maybe I hated it because it scared me." You picked at a loose thread on the couch cushion, needing somewhere to put your hands. "Because if it's just... in there. If five years with someone leaves marks like that. Then what happens after five years with me?"

Steve was quiet for a moment. When he spoke, his voice was low, steady in a way it hadn't been that night in the hallway.

"You'd leave marks too," he said. "Good ones. I'd hope. But yeah, probably weird ones, too. Like I'll probably say something in twenty years that only makes sense because of some dumb argument we had about the thermostat. That's not a bad thing. That's just what happens when someone gets far enough into you that they're part of how your brain works."

"That's not really reassuring."

"No, I know, let me finish." He turned to face you properly, angling his whole body toward you the way he used to when he actually wanted you to hear him, not just wait for his turn to talk. "What happened with Nancy's name, that wasn't her getting into me twenty years from now. That was old. That was a scar, not a wound. It doesn't mean anything about what's happening between us right now, today. But you didn't know that in the moment, because I didn't explain it. I just got defensive because I was scared of what it meant if I admitted the truth, which is that some part of who I used to be is still going to show up sometimes, even in a life I built with you. And I panicked instead of just telling you that."

You looked at him for a long moment. "That's the most self-aware I think I've ever heard you sound."

"I've had a lot of time to think," he said, wry. "Robin made me go to actual therapy. Did she tell you that?"

"She mentioned it. I thought she was joking."

"Nope. Six sessions in. Guy's office smells like a candle store, and I hate it, and I've cried twice, and I'm still going." He rubbed the back of his neck. "Wanted you to know that. Not because I think it fixes anything automatically. Just, I didn't want to come to you again with nothing but an apology and no actual answer for why it happened."

Something in your chest loosened, just slightly, at that. Not because he'd fixed it, five weeks and six sessions didn't erase five seconds that still played on a loop in your head sometimes. But because he'd actually done something. He hadn't just waited for the hurt to fade on its own and hoped you'd come back to the same version of him.

"I'm not all the way there," you admitted. "I don't know if I will be for a while. Sometimes I still think about it and it just, hurts. Out of nowhere."

"That's okay."

"I don't want you to think I'm punishing you by taking this slow."

"I don't think that." He shifted closer, not touching you, just closing some of the distance. "I think you're being careful with something that matters to you. I'd rather have that than have you pretend you're fine when you're not."

You let out a breath you hadn't realised you were holding. "Can I ask you something?"

"Anything."

"Why her, in that argument? Out of everyone. Out of every name you've ever known."

He considered it honestly, the way you'd asked, instead of rushing to defend himself the way he had that night.

"Because we used to fight like that," he said finally. "Nancy and me. All shouting, no listening, both of us just waiting for the other person to stop talking so we could win. It was the only way I knew how to fight with someone I loved, for a long time. And when we started going at it like that, not you, me, I mean the shape of the argument, some old, dumb part of my brain reached for the name that used to go with that shape." He shook his head. "It's not an excuse. It's just, the actual answer, instead of the panicked one I gave you."

"That's a better answer."

"Therapy," he said, with a small, self-deprecating almost-smile. "Turns out paying a guy to make you sit with your feelings actually helps you understand your feelings. Who knew."

You laughed, really laughed, for the first time in weeks, and something about the sound of it seemed to hit him like relief made physical, his shoulders dropping, his whole face softening.

"I missed that," he said quietly. "You laughing. God, I missed that so much."

"I missed you too." You said it before you'd fully decided to, but once it was out, you didn't want to take it back. "That's the annoying part. I was so angry, and I still missed you the entire time."

"I'd take annoyed and missing me over not missing me at all."

"Low bar, Harrington."

"I contain multitudes." He reached out, slow, giving you every chance to pull away, and brushed his knuckles gently against the back of your hand where it rested on the couch cushion. You didn't pull away. "Can I say something that's going to sound insane?"

"When has that ever stopped you."

"I'm glad it happened," he said. "Not- not the hurting you part, God, not that. I'd take that back in a heartbeat if I could. But I think I needed to actually sit with why I do the things I do instead of just getting to coast because things were good. I don't think I would've gone to therapy if you hadn't left that night. I don't think I would've actually looked at the Nancy stuff instead of just deciding it didn't matter anymore because it was in the past." His thumb moved slowly against your knuckles. "You leaving made me become someone I actually want to be, instead of just someone who got lucky enough that you loved him anyway."

Your eyes stung. "That's really unfair to say to me right now."

"Yeah, probably." He smiled, small and crooked. "I've had five weeks to write this speech. Figured I should actually use it."

"You said you didn't think the speech that fixes it exists."

"It doesn't fix it," he said. "I don't think anything fixes it, exactly. I think we just, keep choosing each other, on purpose, even with the scar there. Every day, instead of once and done."

You turned your hand over under his, so your fingers could actually lace with his instead of just touching. He exhaled like he'd been holding his breath for five weeks too.

"I'm not moving back in tonight," you said.

"Okay."

"I mean it. I want to. I want to so badly it's stupid. But I don't want to do it because I'm scared of staying away, I want it to be because I actually trust you again, not just because I miss my own couch."

"Okay," he said again, softer. "Take whatever time you need. I meant that the first time, and I mean it now. I'm not going anywhere. I'll wait as long as it takes, even if that's annoying, even if Robin makes fun of me for moping."

"She's definitely going to make fun of you for moping."

"She already has. Extensively. She made a chart. An actual chart, on notebook paper, tracking how many days I've worn the same flannel."

You laughed again, and this time when he shifted closer, you let your head drop onto his shoulder, the way you used to on lazy Sunday mornings, before any of this happened. He went still for a second, like he couldn't quite believe you'd allowed it, and then carefully, so carefully, wrapped his arm around you.

"For what it's worth," he murmured into your hair, "you were never just the person I found after her. You were the person that made me understand what I actually wanted love to feel like. She was the practice. You're the person I'm trying to get it right for."

"That's a lot less humiliating than being called by her name in the middle of a fight."

"I will be reminding myself of that every single day for the foreseeable future, yes."

You sat there for a long while, not talking, just breathing each other in, the apartment quiet in a way that finally felt peaceful instead of hollow. At some point his hand found yours again, and this time you let your fingers stay tangled together, and it felt less like forgiveness and more like the first small brick being laid back into place.

Your stomach picked that exact moment to growl, loudly, right into the quiet of the room.

Steve burst out laughing, the real kind, the kind that used to be your favourite sound in the world. "Was that you or the couch?"

"Shut up." You were laughing too now, pressing a hand over your face. "I haven't eaten since lunch."

"Okay, well, I refuse to let the woman I love starve on principle." He was already up, padding toward the kitchen in his socked feet, throwing the words over his shoulder like it was the easiest thing in the world. "Stay. I make a mean grilled cheese. It's the one thing I've perfected in five weeks of feeling sorry for myself."

"That's a low bar."

"I contain multitudes, I already told you that."

You should have said no. You'd meant to leave twenty minutes ago. Instead you found yourself trailing after him into the kitchen, hopping up to sit on the counter the way you always used to while he cooked, swinging your feet, watching him fumble the butter knife twice because he kept glancing over to check that you were actually still there.

"You're staring," you said.

"I am absolutely staring." He didn't even try to deny it. "I haven't seen you sit on that counter in five weeks. Forgive me for enjoying it."

Dinner was, objectively, just grilled cheese and canned tomato soup eaten standing up at the counter because neither of you wanted to sit at the table like actual adults. It was also, somehow, the best meal you'd had in a month. He told you about the notebook-paper flannel chart in horrifying detail. You told him about the customer at work who'd tried to return a pair of shoes with visible grass stains on the soles. He laughed so hard at that one he nearly choked, and you had to thump him on the back, and somewhere in the middle of it you realised your hand was still resting on his shoulder blade long after the choking had stopped, and neither of you moved it away.

By the time you actually did head for the door, it was nearly eleven, and the ache in your chest had rearranged itself into something warmer.

"I should really go," you said, not moving.

"Yeah." He didn't move either.

"I have work in the morning."

"Yeah." His hand found yours again, unhurried, like it belonged there. "You said that already."

"I know." You laughed, soft, and let him walk you to the door, his fingers laced loosely through yours the whole way, like some old habit his body couldn't unlearn even through the worst five weeks of his life.

At the door, you turned back to him.

"Same time next week?" you asked. "Grilled cheese?"

His whole face lit up, boyish and delighted, in a way that made your heart do something helpless and fond. "Yeah. Every week, if you want. I'll perfect a second dish. Really impress you."

"Don't get ambitious. The grilled cheese is doing a lot of the emotional labour tonight."

"Rude, but fair."

You were smiling, really smiling, the first easy, unguarded smile in five weeks, and he was looking at you like he couldn't quite believe his luck, like you were something he'd been given a second chance to deserve.

"Can I-" He stopped himself, glancing down at you almost shyly, which on a twenty-something-year-old Steve Harrington was somehow the most endearing thing you'd ever seen. "Can I kiss you goodnight? You can say no. I just, I've missed your face a stupid amount and I don't want to just assume."

Your chest went warm and full in a way it hadn't in weeks. "Yeah," you said. "You can kiss me goodnight."

He cupped your face like it was something precious, and kissed you slow and soft and a little disbelieving, like he still couldn't quite trust that you were really there. You melted into it despite yourself, one hand curling into the front of his shirt, and when he finally pulled back he was grinning, dopey and bright, forehead resting against yours.

"Okay," he breathed. "Okay, wow. Good. Great, even."

"Articulate."

"Give me a break, I just got kissed by my favourite person for the first time in a month." He laughed, delighted and a little dazed, and pressed one more quick kiss to your forehead before finally letting you step back. "Drive safe. Call me when you get to Robin's so I know you got there."

"I will."

"I mean it. I'll worry."

"I know you will." You smiled up at him, feeling lighter than you had in weeks, like something that had been clenched tight in your chest for five weeks had finally, gently, let go. "Goodnight, Steve."

"Goodnight." He watched you all the way to your car, hands shoved in his pockets, grinning like an idiot, and when you glanced in the rearview mirror as you pulled away, he was still standing there in the driveway under the porch light, waving, exactly the way he always had.

You called him the second you got to Robin's, just like you promised, and he picked up before the first ring even finished.

"That was fast," he said, and you could hear the smile in his voice.

"You told me to."

"I know. I just really like that you listened." A pause, warm and easy. "Same time next week?"

"Same time next week," you agreed, and for the first time in five weeks, you fell asleep without your chest aching, already looking forward to Tuesday.

Dividers by cursed-carmine

[beezusvreeland]

Great responsibility - Part 1 

Spider-Man!Steve Harrington x Henderson!Reader

Word count: 1,1k

Summary: Alright, let’s do this one last time! As Spider-Man, Steve Harrington has a lot on his plate. Including giving relationship advice to his best friend’s sister, who is broken hearted and has no idea who is the man under the mask.

A/N: This fic is a part of the THE STEVE HARRINGTON SUMMER SLEEPOVER event, hosted by @graywrenhart and @moonstoneandmoonlight. I got the movie Hitch and mixed its concept with a Spider-Steve idea I’ve been meaning to write for a while. This is meant to be a mini series, hope you enjoy <3 Divider by @pepsipoet | Masterlist

Alright, let’s do this one last time. My name is Steve Harrington. I was high school royalty until my poor life decisions made me fall from grace. But it’s okay, because thanks to my loser status, I met my new best friends, Robin and Dustin, and became a pretty normal guy. Well, except for one thing…while visiting the natural history museum, I was bit by a radioactive spider and, for the past two years, I’ve been the one and only Spider-Man.

New York city at night. To Steve, there is nothing quite like the feeling of flying around, one web at a time, watching everything from up above. Those were the only times he would allow his mind to go completely blank, letting gravity do its job, stretching seconds into minutes, and, eventually, being led by his body back to skies or the streets, depending on what evil was tormenting the city at the time.

Surprisingly, the patrol had been pretty chill for a friday night. There was one armed robbery earlier, a couple pick pockets here and there and one very stubborn cat on top of a tree. The movement was so slow that Steve gave Dustin the night off. Not that he had that kind of authority, if anything, it was otherwise, with the boy, now a college freshman, being Steve’s self proclaimed guy in a chair. 

It was good for Dustin to go out there every once in a while, doing whatever nerdy college guys were doing on a friday night. Robin, though, didn’t need any incentive to take a night off and go drinking with her girlfriend, Vicky, and friends. Steve missed going out with them, or doing anything that didn’t involve wearing his very tight costume. He was in a desperate need of a new one. 

Steve decided to head towards Brooklyn, where his friends were reunited. He would do this every now and then, checking on everyone as they headed home, especially when there was drinking involved. 

As he got closer to the bar Robin mentioned, he was able to sense a few people from their group: Robin and Vicky dancing, Eddie and Gareth higher than the clouds checking girls out, and Nancy and Jonathan making out in the bathroom. Ugh, he hated that. His powers were useful and sometimes, even funny to use, but there was also that very inconvenient side. 

He tried concentrating on the surroundings to tune them out.  

“Yo, Spidey! You’re a guy, right?”

Steve thanked the universe for his coordination skills, because dear God, you scared the shit out of him, he almost fell from the side of the building next to the bar where he was stationed at.

Wait, why were you outside instead of hanging out with your friends inside?

“Because everyone is in a fucking couple!”

Steve had no idea he said that out loud. He got down from the building, walking slowly towards you, trying not to freak you out. That was something that happened with a certain frequency.  

“Shit, why am I screaming?”, you whispered to yourself, trying to control the volume of your voice. Steve tried not to laugh, you clearly had more than your normal quota of alcohol for the night.

“Are you okay?”

“You’re a guy, right?”, you asked at the same time.

Steve stopped, one hand on his waist, the other scratching his cap. His poor hair was suffocating inside it. 

“I mean, yeah. That's why they call me Spider-Man.”

“Huh”, you hold your purse closer to your body. “I’m so stupid!”

This time, Steve couldn’t hold the laughter. You couldn’t be farther from the truth: you were the smartest person he knew besides your own brother. But Dustin was a special case, you actually worked extremely hard to get good grades and do well academically. Graduated college with honours and all. 

“No no, you’re good”, Steve tried to intervene. “But I am, uh, indeed a man.”

“You sound more like a guy than a man”, you looked at him suspiciously. 

“Hey, I’m very manly, ok?” 

You laughed with your whole body, dominating Steve’s spidey senses, giving him full body chills. He guessed it was probably because he hadn’t seen you in weeks, there was barely any time in the day for him to rest, let alone socialize. Still, he was glad Dustin wasn’t monitoring this whole exchange with his older sister. Steve would never hear the end of it.

“But why do you ask?”

As you recovered from the laugh, your expression saddened. 

“Well, I need some advice in that department.”

Steve’s goggles betrayed him, going up in surprise like his eyebrows did. He had never thought much about it, just assumed you were always studying, but he hadn’t seen you with a guy before. It’s when he realized the meaning of what you said earlier: “Everyone is in a fucking couple!”. 

“Okay, yeah, sure. I’m a guy.”

“That has been established”, you laughed quietly. “It’s just…if you have tried everything to be noticed by a guy and he never has, does it mean he is not interested or just really oblivious?”

“I think you know the answer to that.”

You smiled sadly. 

“Yeah, that’s what I thought.”

“For what is worth, you deserve better than that”, said Steve. It sounded like the right thing to say. He just hated seeing people he cared about so sad. “This guy must be a real jerk.”

“No”, you said desperately. “He is…everything.”

That caught Steve out of surprise. But your mind seemed to be elsewhere. 

“How can I get over him, Spidey?”

Steve crossed his arms, trying to keep his composure. You looked at him like he might have all the answers to your problems and that had him panicking a bit. This was way above his paygrade. You were friends, sure, but never talked about your respective love lives. Your friendship started with being his best friend’s sister and ended with the two of you being in the same friend group. Dustin and Robin, and now, Spider-Man, demanded too much for him to consider deepening other friendships. 

“I dunno, I mean… You should try dating other guys”, Steve wasn’t entirely satisfied with his advice, but that was the best he could do under pressure. 

“Yeah, well, they might just not like me either.” 

“Change your approach”, said Steve, nervously. Even in your drunken state, he could tell you were paying close attention to what he was saying. “Maybe go for a totally different type of guy, do the opposite of what you did this time around.”

You gave that some thought.

“I guess I have nothing more to…”

And you threw up. Steve guided you towards a trash can. With one hand, he held your hair, while with the other he got his phone and texted Robin for help. 

[amorieile]

A MATTER OF TIME ⸝⸝ part one

summary: ​What starts as Steve's desperate, clumsy attempt to play wingman for Robin quickly spirals into weeks of mutual suspicion, sharp bantering, and constantly misread intentions. You're convinced he's just another shallow rich boy with bad intentions, and Steve is convinced you're a threat to his best friends secret.

pairing: frat boy au!steve harrington x reader

content warnings: alcohol/intoxication, hangovers & morning-after regret, avoidant!reader, high emotional walls, party discomfort, sensory overload, misunderstandings/miscommunication, closeted characters (robin & lena), late 80's hawkins college au, period-typical angst & closeted anxiety, internalized avoidance, emotional distress, unresolved romantic tension, emotional confrontations, jealousy, arguing, banter, anxious attachment meets avoidant attachment (perfect match, right?), fear of abandonment, fear of being used/pawned off, vulnerability hangover, pre-situationship/situationship core (BOOOOO!), steve harrington's public affection crisis, steve's protective instincts, reader's commitment issues, reader's a little bit of a mess but she's OUR mess, stairwell heart-to-hearts, angst, heavy angst before comfort, slow burn, dual pov, eventual romance, happy ending (eventually!), it gets worse for plot's sake before it'll get better, un-beta'd we die like no one in here, lmk if I missed anything else!

comments and reblogs are greatly appreciated ♡

— amazing support banners used are from @moonstoneandmoonlight !

w/c: 10.9k

a/n: so i'm actually a day ahead of schedule with this update!! I'm having a procedure done tomorrow so I'm gonna be totally out of it for the next few days and posting and scheduling are definitely gonna be the last of my concerns for a bit haha 😭 but i really hope you guys enjoy this chapter!! I'm pretty sure the next one shouldn't take too long to get out once I'm feeling better, so hope you like it in the meantime!!

You had known Steve Harrington existed long before he started making himself your problem.

It was hard not to know him. Hawkins was not a big enough place for certain names to stay contained, even after high school stopped being the center of everyone’s universe. People carried reputations around town the way they carried winter coats: old, familiar, and hard to shake off.

Steve’s had followed him from Hawkins High to the small private college just outside town, stitched together from country club afternoons, basketball games, keg parties, pretty girls, and the kind of house on Maple Street that made people lower their voices into something either admiring or resentful.

You'd heard the stories before you ever had a real reason to look at him.

King Steve, somebody had called him once in the dining hall of freshman orientation, laughing through a mouthful of fries.

You remembered glancing over because the nickname sounded too stupid to be real. He had been standing near the jukebox by the student lounge, one shoulder propped against the wall, and his sleeves pushed up his forearms despite the November chill leaking in through the old windows. 

His hair looked unfairly deliberate. His jeans fit in that careless, expensive way that made it seem accidental. A couple of guys from his fraternity were crowded around him, loud and red-faced, and one girl in a denim skirt was pretending not to watch him from two tables away.

Steve had laughed at something. Not loudly, that was an irritating part. He did not need to be loud. The room moved around him anyway.

You looked away before anyone could notice you noticing.

People like that had always made you tired.

They seemed to pass through the world assuming the door would open; the chair would be saved, the joke would land, the girl would smile, the professor would give them one more day on an assignment because they looked sheepish enough when asking. They didn't always do it maliciously. Sometimes that made it worse. Privilege was more exhausting when it came with good manners.

So you had filed Steve Harrington away under rich boy, frat boy, former high school royalty, and didn't expect to need more categories.

Then he stepped into your path outside the student center on a wet Thursday afternoon and said your roommate’s name.

Not your name.

Hers.

You had been trying to balance a stack of used books against your hip, your canvas bag cutting into your shoulder, your fingers cold from refusing to wear gloves because you always forgot how bitter Hawkins got once October gave up pretending to be pretty. Your roommate Lena walked beside you, chewing gum and complaining about her women’s literature professor, who apparently believed every student had both unlimited free time and a personal relationship with Virginia Woolf.

Steve Harrington appeared in front of you with the unearned confidence of someone who had never had to wonder whether he was welcome.

“Hey,” he greeted vibrantly, his breath faintly visible in the gray air.

Your roommate slowed.

You didn't.

He shifted to block less of the sidewalk, which was the only reason you didn’t run directly into him.

“Is Robin around?” he asked and you stopped then.

Lena blinked beside you wearily at the name.  “Robin Buckley?”

Steve’s mouth twitched upwards and that only made your distrust worsen. “Unless there’s another Robin with a Walkman permanently attached to her body.”

You stared at him blankly in waiting.

Robin Buckley wasn't your friend in any way, but she was your roommate’s current problem. A very specific kind of problem. The kind that made your roommate pretend she had no interest in the campus radio station, then find three excuses a week to pass through the building. 

The kind that made her ask questions that were not questions, such as, “Do you think Robin likes girls?” while staring aggressively into a bowl of cereal at midnight.

Steve Harrington asking about Robin would have been odd enough.

Steve Harrington asking your roommate about Robin, while looking politely casual and not casual at all, was even worse.

“Why?” you asked before she could answer and his eyes cut to you.

They were brown, but not completely dark. You hadn't expected to notice that.

“No reason,” Steve frowned at your immediate hostility. 

“That’s usually what people say when there’s a reason.”

Your roommate made a quiet noise beside you. And Lena had the audacity to sound entertained.

Steve’s smile faltered for half a second, then returned with a small amount of effort. “I just haven’t seen her today.”

“Then maybe she doesn’t want to be seen.”

Steve’s smiled turned slightly confused then. “I’m her friend.”

“And yet, here you are, asking us.”

He glanced at Lena again, then back to you, measuring the situation too late. “Okay. Fair.”

You adjusted the books against your chest. One of them slid down an inch, the corner digging into your ribs. “If Robin wants to talk to you, I’m sure she’ll find you. You’re not exactly hard to locate.”

Beside you, Lena tried to call your name to pull you back but it did little to stop you. Steve’s eyebrows rose, not offended enough. “What does that mean?”

You seriously doubted he needed you to answer that. “It means half the campus knows where your fraternity house is against their will.”

“That’s not my fault—”

“No, I’m sure the giant banner and weekly parties happen without your knowledge.”

His mouth opened to respond and you walked around him before he could answer.

Your roommate followed, though she turned back once. You saw the movement from the corner of your eye and elbowed her.

“Ow,” Lena frowned and rubbed at her side.

You didn't turn to face her as you continued your pace. “Stop encouraging him.”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“Yeah? Well, you looked amused.”

“I was.”

And before you could scoff at her, behind you got your attention again, you heard Steve called, “It was nice meeting you too!”

You didn't turn around, you just went on with your day.

That really should have been the end of it.

It was not.

——

Steve wasn't trying to make things worse.

That was what he kept telling himself, usually right after making things worse.

Robin had been pacing his room three nights earlier, wearing a hole through the old rug he had stolen from his parents’ basement when he moved into the fraternity house. The room smelled faintly of laundry detergent, stale beer from the hallway, and the vanilla candle Robin had bought him because she said his room had “the tragic odor of boy.” He had never lit candles before. Now he lit that one whenever she came over, mostly because she looked smug about it.

“She has a roommate,” Robin seemed to reason with her hand kneading into her hair.

Steve was lying on his bed, tossing a basketball toward the ceiling and catching it before it hit him in the face. Sometimes, he wasn't lucky enough to catch it. Those times hurt his pride more than his face. “Most people do.”

“I mean a close roommate. You know the scary one.”

He laughed at the adjective. “She’s scary?”

Robin gave him a look, “you know, the one who sits with her in the dining hall. Dark sweater, permanently unimpressed, looks like she’d poison a man for using the word sweetheart.”

Steve caught the ball and held it against his chest. He kept his gaze trained upwards for the moment. “That’s specific.”

Robin shrugged. “I observe.”

“You panic-observe, you mean.”

“I’m very good at it.”

Robin liked your roommate. That was obvious to anyone who knew Robin well enough to understand her reverse language of affection. If she mocked someone’s shoes, she hated them. If she mocked someone’s handwriting, she wanted to talk to them again. If she mocked someone’s taste in music while remembering every band they mentioned, she was doomed.

Steve had watched it happen slowly. Robin lighting up whenever your roommate entered the room, then immediately acting annoyed by her own face. Robin talking too fast around her and then later calling herself a social disaster while lying across Steve’s floor with one arm over her eyes. Robin asking, in a voice that tried very hard to be nothing, whether he thought your roommate might be into girls.

He had said he’d find out.

Robin had sat up so fast her knee hit his dresser. “No. Absolutely not.”

Steve looked upset at the clear-cut rejection. “Why not?”

“Because you have no subtlety.”

“I have plenty of subtlety!”

“You once asked Nancy if she was mad at you in front of three people and a salad bar.”

He didn't appreciate reminder, he scowled on memory. “That was high school.”

“That was entirely you.”

He had thrown the basketball at her. She had caught it badly and nearly knocked over his lamp.

Steve knew Robin’s fear was not dramatic. Hawkins had a way of hearing things it was not supposed to hear. This college was technically a different world from Hawkins High, but the same parents funded bake sales, the same church ladies read the local paper, and the same boys who drank too much on Friday nights could turn cruel if given the right secret.

Robin joked because she had to.

Steve tried to help because he didn't know what else to do with his hands.

The problem was you.

You saw through him too quickly. Not through the whole thing, thank God, but enough to make every question sound worse coming out of his mouth. You looked at him with that flat, disbelieving stare, and every sentence he prepared fell apart before it reached the air.

He told himself he only noticed you because you were an obstacle.

Then, he noticed you when you were not in the way at all.

You always sat with your back near a wall. In the library, in the dining hall, in the student lounge with the old arcade machine nobody used unless they were drunk. You checked the room before settling anywhere, quick and practiced, and then pretended you hadn’t. You listened more than you spoke, but when you did speak, people either laughed or went quiet because you had said the thing everyone else had been walking around.

You dressed for comfort more than attention, sweaters slipping over your wrists, scuffed shoes, and a coat that had probably survived several winters before this one. You carried yourself with a guardedness that looked effortless until he caught the tiny adjustments: bag pulled closer in crowded hallways, shoulders tightening when loud boys passed too near, and eyes narrowing whenever someone said your roommate’s name with too much interest.

Steve understood protectiveness.

He was just not used to being on the wrong side of it.

By the second week, he had managed to ask your roommate exactly one useful question and you had interrupted three others.

“Do you do this professionally?” Steve asked one afternoon outside the campus bookstore.

You were crouched near the discount bin, flipping through battered paperbacks with yellowed pages. The windows behind you were fogged at the edges from the cold, and the whole place smelled of dust, wet wool, and burnt coffee from the shop next door.

You didn't look up. “Do what?”

“Appear whenever I’m about to have a normal conversation.”

You seriously doubted that assumption. “You’ve never had a normal conversation in your life.”

“That’s harsh.” Steve's brows furrowed together.

“That’s just pattern recognition.”

He crouched on the other side of the bin, partly because standing over you felt rude and partly because he wanted to see what book you were holding. “You know, most people warm up to me eventually.”

You glanced at him then, finally meeting his eyes. “What an awful thing to say out loud.”

Steve laughed before he could stop himself.

You looked back at the books, but he saw your mouth move. Not quite a smile. Something smaller, and more unwilling.

It got him through the rest of the day, which annoyed him.

After that, his plan became less organized. He still asked about Robin. He still tried to gauge whether your roommate looked at her the way Robin looked at your roommate. But more often, he found himself asking you other things instead.

What class had you just come from?

Why did you always buy the coffee if you hated it?

Was that your car with the bumper sticker peeling off?

You answered half of his questions with hostility and the other half with reluctant accuracy.

“Because it’s cheap.”

“Because my professor thinks attendance is a moral virtue.”

“Because my car has character, Harrington.”

You called him Harrington with a dry little bite, never Steve. He pretended not to like it. He pretended badly.

You pretended not to notice that he did.

The mistake happened on a Monday evening when the sky turned dark too early and the sidewalks glistened under weak campus lights.

You had been leaving the library alone, arms full of notes, and scarf loose around your neck. Steve had been waiting near the steps, though he told himself he had only happened to pause there after walking Robin to the radio station. It was a weak lie. He knew it before you saw him.

Your face changed immediately. “No, Harrington.”

Steve lifted both hands and felt an unneededamount of defensivenessrise in him. “I haven’t said anything.”

“You were about to.”

“You don’t know that!”

“You get a look.”

“I have a look?”

Your look was knowing. “You have several. This is your I’m-about-to-pretend-I’m-not-being-invasive look.”

Steve winced at the description, “that’s a mouthful.”

“It fits.” you could only shrug.

He stepped closer, lowering his voice because people were passing behind you. “I just need to know if your roommate is seeing anybody.”

Your expression flattened, “so there it is.”

Steve didn't know why the defense came quickly off his tongue. “Not for me—”

You stopped with immediate recognition. He knew it the second the words left his mouth.

A small silence opened between you. One student came down the library steps behind him, keys jingling, boots loud on wet concrete. Somewhere, a car door slammed.

Your eyes sharpened amd Steve felt the blood leave his face.

“Not for you,” you repeated the words, though the left your tongue numbly.

He immediately sputtered in a rescue attempt. “Forget I said that.”

“I don’t think I will.”

He rubbed both hands over his face, then dropped them. The tension in his shoulders appeared once more. “Damn it.”

You stared at him, and for once, your suspicion didn't look bored. It looked active, like it was piecing him together while he stood there with nothing useful to say.

Then your eyes changed, he could see the movemeng happen in real time.

Not disgust. Not exactly. Surprise first. Understanding next.

“Oh,” you blinked to yourself and repeated quietly.

The sound hit him wrong. His stomach clenched. Steve immediately felt something stab at his side. 

“Hey, don’t—” 

Your brow creased with immediacy. “Don’t what?”

“Don’t say it like that.”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“You looked—”

“I looked surprised.”

He swallowed. The air felt too cold going down. Steve could actively feel the situation getting out of his hand. “Yeah, well.”

You shifted the notes in your arms, slower now. Your words came unsure but not enntirely unaware now. “Robin?”

Steve looked past you toward the library doors. His hand randomly through his hair with intensity. “I shouldn’t have said anything.”

“No, you shouldn’t have.”

That stung because it was true. He nodded once, jaw tight. Then Steve’s worry got the best of him. “Are you going to—”

You didn't need to know what he'd ask. “No.”

“You don’t even know what I was going to ask.”

“You were going to ask if I’d tell anyone.”

Steve looked at you and your face had closed into something hard again, but it was not the same hardness. This one had a bruise under it.

“I wouldn’t,” you glared openly at him now, the implication of his words hit you in a negative way.

Steve said nothing. It was clear he didn't think you wouldn't. Your mouth pressed into a thin line at his clear suspicion of your motives. “My roommate’s gay.”

He blinked and opened his mouth, but you cut him off before Steve could say anything else.

“She’s not out to everyone,” you added with your voice low and scarf warming your neck. “So don’t shout it out at your house parties, Harrington.”

You looked away before you could see Steve’s frown, then back at him. “Robin has a chance. A good one, probably. My roommate asked me last week if combat boots could be considered flirting.”

Despite himself, Steve almost smiled.

Almost.

You saw it and pointed one finger at him. Already at odds with the whole interaction. “Don’t be smug.”

“I’m not—”

“You are internally.”

“A little.”

Your mouth flattened and your glare returned. “Keep it there then.”

The corner of his mouth twitched. Then the larger reality returned, heavy and immediate. Robin’s secret. Your roommate’s secret. His own carelessness.

“I’m sorry,” he shook his head, you could see where he bit at the inside of his cheek. You studied him long enough that he wanted to shift his weight and didn’t.

“You should be,” you scoffed, not specifying at what. And then you walked away.

For three days, Steve left you alone.

You noticed the absence. 

That was the unsual thing. You noticed before you meant to. You noticed the absence of him in all the places he had made himself inconveniently familiar. No Steve near the coffee cart pretending to decide between black coffee and the same overly sweet thing he always bought. No Steve leaning outside the radio building with Robin, sharing a cigarette neither of them finished. No Steve calling your name across the quad in that tone halfway between apology and annoyance.

You told yourself it was peaceful.

It was.

It should have stayed peaceful.

Then he came back with a new strategy, and somehow the new strategy was worse.

He became nice.

Not charmingly nice. Not flirtatious in the obvious, practiced way you imagined had worked for him since sophomore year of high school. Nice. Quietly, specifically, persistently nice.

When some drunk guy from his fraternity spilled beer near your shoes at a campus movie night, Steve appeared with napkins before you had fully processed the wet splash on the floor.

When your roommate got sick during midterms, he left a paper bag outside your apartment door with cough drops, soup cans, and a note in blocky handwriting that said, ROBIN SAID THIS BRAND DOESN’T TASTE LIKE WET CARDBOARD. FEEL BETTER.

When you forgot your scarf in the student lounge, he brought it to you outside your evening lecture and held it out without comment.

You took it slowly qith clear distrust resting in your expression. “Why do you have this?”

Steve attempted to shrug casually. He failed. “You left it.”

“And you recognized it?”

“You wear it a lot.”

Your face scrunched up before you could help it. “That’s unsettling.”

Steve looked down the hallway, and then back at you. “It’s red.”

“A lot of scarves are red.”

“Yours has a burn mark near the end.” You glanced down despite yourself.

It did. From a diner ashtray last winter.

You looked back at him, with your judgement still clear as day.. “Still unsettling.”

“Noted.”

You waited for him to make a joke, to ask something about Robin, to ruin the tiny exchange enough that you could return to hating him cleanly.

He only nodded and stepped back. “See you around.”

The scarf was warm from his hand when you put it on.

That night, you told your roommate Steve Harrington was acting weird.

Lena, who was pale and miserable under three blankets, opened one eye. “Maybe he’s being nice.”

Your voice was dry in its sarcasm.  “Yeah, right.”

Her voice came strained under the covers. “That’s a possibility.”

“It’s damage control.”

“Or guilt.”

“That’s damage control with better manners.” She coughed, then gave you a tired, knowing look that made you immediately regret the conversation.

“What?” you asked with a sharpness in your tone.

Lena only shrugged, you could see the action through the covers. “You’re thinking about him a lot.”

“I’m thinking about the pattern of harassment.”

“You called it a pattern.”

“It is a pattern.”

You didn't appreciate the self proclaimed knowing length her voice took. “You also know his class schedule now.”

“Against my will.”

Your roommate smiled faintly. “Sure.”

You threw a sock at her and Lena ducked to dodge it. But she was not wrong, and that was the part you hated.

Steve had become difficult not to think about. 

He sat too close to the center of too many rooms. He laughed with people you disliked and somehow looked embarrassed when they said something cruel. He carried Robin’s bag when she was too busy gesturing to remember she owned hands. He still attended parties, still knew every pretty girl in every hallway, and Steve still wore his reputation with enough ease that you wanted to resent him for it.

Only now, the resentment didn't land right.

You would see him talking to a girl outside the dining hall, her hand resting on his forearm, his head bent to hear her over the wind. Something small and ugly would twist in your stomach before you could reason it away. 

Not jealousy, you told yourself. Not exactly. Awareness. A miserable, humiliating awareness that he could belong anywhere and to anyone, while you were barely willing to admit you looked for him across a room.

That was worse than what liking him entailed.

Liking someone could be sweet in other people. In you, it felt inconvenient and undignified, a defect in judgment. It made you sharper when he came near, because softness had never felt safe unless you could hide it under something else.

So when he invited you to the party, you laughed right in his face.

Steve had expected that, and yet he still asked.

The party was technically a fundraiser, which meant there would be a shoebox near the door for donations and nobody would check whether any money made it to the campus literacy program until Monday. The fraternity house had been decorated with cheap orange lights because someone found them in the basement even though Halloween had passed two weeks ago. By Friday afternoon, half the campus had heard about it. By Friday evening, Steve had already broken up one argument about the keg, told Tommy H. he was not welcome if he planned on starting anything, and watched Robin change her outfit in his room with the panic of someone preparing for trial.

“Too much?” she asked nervously, yanking at the hem of her shirt.

Steve looked up from tying his shoe. He would have teased her if she didn't seem so wrecked in anxiety.  “It’s a shirt.”

“That’s your input?”

“It’s a good shirt!”

“You don’t know anything.”

“I know it’s clean.”

Robin groaned and threw herself backward onto his bed. “She’s going to come, right?”

“Your girl?”

“She is not my girl.”

“Your future girl then.”

“I hate you.”

“She might. Her roommate said no.”

Robin sat up. “The scary one?”

Steve laughed at the memory that surfaced,  and then promptly frowned. “She laughed at me.”

“That means she was listening.”

“It means she thinks I’m an idiot.”

“Both can be true.”

Steve leaned back in his chair and tossed a balled pair of his socks at her. She slapped them away without looking at them. 

He had invited you because your roommate wanted to come and because Robin wanted your roommate to come and because, somewhere under all that, Steve wanted to see if you would show up even after saying you wouldn’t.

That was the part he didn't tell Robin.

He also didn't ell her that he had started watching doors at every party. Not in the old way, scanning for who might want him, who might boost his ego, who might make the night easier. He watched for you now. For the reluctant set of your mouth. For your eyes adjusting to the room before you stepped fully inside. For the moment you decided whether to stay.

It was utterly embarrassing.

It was, also, far too late to stop.

When you arrived, you looked unhappy enough to turn around before reaching the porch.

Your roommate had one hand hooked around your wrist, dragging you forward with the bright, determined energy of someone pretending not to be terrified. You wore a fitted top that you kept tugging at near the hem and bottoms that made your movements stiffer than usual. Your hair was done differently. Not dramatically. But enough that Steve noticed the effort and then hated himself for staring.

You looked good.

You also looked miserable.

He pushed off the porch railing and came down the steps.

“You came,” Steve forced his voice not to seem as surprised as his heart felt. 

You looked at him with open distrust. “Don’t sound victorious now.”

He gave a quick, weary chuckle. His hands went to rub at the back of his neck where a splatter of freckles laid.  “I was going for pleasantly surprised.”

“Work harder than.”

Lena gave Steve a quick smile that looked more like a plea. “Is Robin here?”

“Inside,” he quickly gave the information up, nodding his head toward the door. “Near the kitchen earlier. Probably arguing with the tape deck.”

Your roommate inhaled in a way she clearly hoped nobody noticed.

You noticed. Steve noticed. Neither of you said anything.

“I hate both of you,” you muttered.

Lena squeezed your arm once,  “you love me.”

“I’m revising that then.” Then she was gone, pulled inside by music and hope. You stayed at the bottom of the porch steps with Steve above you, the house spilling noise behind him. For a second, he saw you considering escape.

“I can walk you back,” he offered and was surprised at how genuinely he meant it. 

Your eyes flicked up to meet his. “I just got here.”

“You look like you want to leave.”

You broke eye contact first. “I always look like that.”

“Not always.”

That caught you off guard and Steve wished he could take it back, not because it was untrue, but because it revealed too much attention he had placed on you.

Your gaze narrowed. “You watching me now, Harrington?”

There it was. Harrington. He should really not have liked it. He did anyway. 

“Hard not to,” Steve chuckled, then immediately wished for head trauma to happen to him.

Your expression changed by one careful degree.

He cleared his throat and stepped aside. “I mean—uh, you’re standing in front of me.”

“Smooth.” It wasn't. 

“Never claimed to be.”

You weren't convinced. “Several girls inside would disagree.”

He followed your glance toward the open door, where a group of girls from the nursing program were laughing near the entryway. One of them waved at him. He lifted a hand back automatically.

When he looked at you again, your face had gone flat.

“You want water?” he asked and his hands flexed restlessly at his side.

The response came sharp. “I’m not drunk.”

“I didn’t say you were.”

You keot you eyes dancing over everything except his face for too long. “It’s a party. Water is suspicious.”

His smile came earnest in its amusement. “Water is water.”

“How compelling.” He held the door open anyway. And you went inside without thanking him.

The house was too hot.

That was your first clear thought after the music hit your chest and the smell hit your throat. 

Beer, sweat, cigarette smoke clinging to jackets, drugstore perfume, cheap cologne, and the faint smell of popcorn burning somewhere in the kitchen. The living room furniture had been shoved against the walls, leaving a shifting crowd in the center, bodies packed too close under orange lights that made everyone look flushed and unreal.

You hated it immediately.

Your roommate disappeared before you could remind her she had dragged you there under moral contract. You caught one glimpse of Robin near the kitchen doorway, hair pushed behind one ear, speaking too quickly while Lena smiled down at her cup. Then the crowd closed.

You lasted by giving yourself small tasks.

Stand near the wall.

Hold a cup.

Refuse to dance.

Pretend you did not notice Steve.

That last one failed repeatedly.

He was everywhere because it was his house, his friends, amd ultimately  his scene. He moved through it with a familiarity that made your skin prickle. People touched him when he passed. A slap to the shoulder. A hand around his wrist. A girl leaning close to speak into his ear, mouth brushing too near the side of his face because the music demanded it or because she wanted it to.

Steve smiled. Steve listened. And Steve laughed.

Every time, your stomach tightened with the miserable awareness that nothing about it was yours to resent.

You drank because your hands needed something to do.

The first cup tasted mostly of fruit punch. The second tasted sharper. You did not even remember agreeing to a third, only that some guy with a backward cap had handed it to you after asking what your major was and then interrupting your answer to talk about his band. You drank to avoid speaking. That seemed logical at the time.

The room grew warmer and your clothes grew tighter.

Your hair bothered the back of your neck, then your cheek, and then your mouth. You shoved it away too roughly and nearly spilled your drink on your shoes. Someone bumped your hip. Someone else apologized too late. The orange lights smeared at the edges when you turned your head.

At some point, Lena had found you.

Her cheeks were bright, eyes wide and clearly delighted. “Robin said she liked my earrings!”

Your smile came small but real. “You’ve told me.”

“I did?”

“Twice.”

“What did I say?”

“That she said they were ‘aggressively cool’.”

Your roommate pressed both hands to her face. The warmth she probably felt internally was mirrored on her expression. “What does that mean?”

“It means she panicked.”

“Good panic?”

You could only shrug. “Gay panic.”

She made a sound that might have been a laugh or a prayer. You couldn't tell.

You tried to smile at her and managed something close. She looked happy. Nervous, but happy in that fragile way people were when something they wanted had moved one inch closer.

“You okay?” she asked, her focus sharpening in her hazy state. “You look—”

“Hot,” you supplied her with a nod of your head.

Lena's grin came wide and unapologetic. “You are hot.”

You snorted at her response. “No, I meant temperature.”

“Oh.” She touched your arm. “Do you want to go?”

You looked over her shoulder before a response made its way to your mind.

Steve was by the hall, talking to a girl in a red sweater. She had her hand on his chest, not flat, just two fingers pressing lightly while she said something that made him tilt his head and smile.

Your throat felt strange.

“No,” your voice came out quieter than you'd have liked it to be.

Your roommate followed your gaze and you were sure you looked away too late.

“Oh,” Lena's exhale only made you frown.

“Don’t, seriously.”

“I didn’t.”

You looked at her through your peripheral. “You breathed judgmentally.”

“I breathed normally.”

“Go talk to Robin.”

She hesitated and you only scoffed. And then, you gave her a push, gentler than your tone. “Go. I’m fine.”

You were not fine, but she went because Robin was watching from the kitchen, pretending not to. And becausr, you knew she needed this.

A few minutes later, or maybe twenty, the band guy came back. He said something about fresh air, but he stood too close while saying it. His shoulder boxed you in near the wall, the cup in his hand brushing your wrist. You said no once. He either didn’t hear or decided not to.

Before you could repeat it, Steve was there.

Not dramaticly loud, just annoyingly there. 

He stepped into the gap beside you and put a hand on the guy’s shoulder with enough friendliness to look casual from across the room.

“She’s good,” Steve said with a tone that felt too light for his stance.

The guy frowned at his interjection. “We were talking.”

“And now, you’re not.”

Something passed between them that you were too drunk and tired to read fully. Steve’s smile stayed on his face, but his fingers pressed into the guy’s shoulder until the guy shifted back with an annoyed laugh.

“Whatever, Harrington.” The guy left after.

Steve turned to you and his cove softened. “You okay?”

You hated the question on principle.  Not because it was wrong. But because he sounded sincere.

“Stop doing that,” you frowned up at him, and Steve's smile instantly dropped.

His brow furrowed. “Doing what?”

“Appearing.” It wasn't a good explanation. 

“I live here.”

“Not an excuse.”

“You want me to get your roommate?”

The response came quick. “No.”

“You want to leave?”

This time it was slower. “No.”

Steve’s mouth pulled to the side, and he tried again. “You want water?”

“No.”

“You’re doing the thing where every answer is no.”

You looked up at him. His face was too close and not close enough. The party moved around his shoulders, loud and blurred, but his attention stayed fixed on you with irritating steadiness.

You wanted to hurt him a little.

Not badly. Just enough to make him step back. Just enough to make yourself safer.

“Don’t you have someone else to rescue?” you asked, glancing toward the girl in red.

Steve’s expression shifted and you immediately felt childish. “What?”

“Never mind.”

His voice came firmer in its confusion. “No, what does that mean?”

“It means your fan club is waiting.”

Steve stared at you with an expression you really hated. You regretted it immediately. Not enough to apologize, but enough to feel the words curdle in your mouth.

Steve rubbed a hand over his jaw. “You’re drunk.”

You bit back because the mood brought it out of you. “That’s not an argument.”

“It’s a reason not to have this argument right now.”

Your frowned at the assumption he made, your expression turning displeased in the dim light. “I’m not arguing.”

“You are absolutely arguing.”

Your voice sharpened alongside your glare. “Then you’re losing.”

He looked at you for a second longer, then nodded once, more to himself than to you. “I’m getting you water.”

“I said no.”

“I heard you.” Steve just gave a small exhale and nodded. He left anyway.

That should have made you even angrier; instead, the moment he disappeared into the crowd, the room tipped hard enough that you reached for the wall.

You needed out.

Not outside. Too many people on the porch. Not the bathroom. There was a line and somebody crying behind the door. You moved toward the stairs because they looked darker, quieter, less full of hands and voices. Halfway up, you found a narrow bend where the railing met the wall and the noise softened into a heavy pulse beneath your feet.

You sat down before you could fall down.

The wood stair was cool through your clothes. Somebody’s abandoned coat lay against your ankle. You nudged it away and leaned your shoulder against the wall, breathing through your mouth. Your tongue tasted like sugar and vodka. Your head felt packed with cotton. Below you, the party carried on without noticing your absence, shoes flashing past the bottom of the stairs, laughter climbing and breaking apart before it reached you.

You stared at the banister when your eyes found it a point of focus.

Your hands looked strange under the dim light. Familiar, but distant. One nail chipped on the edge. A faint ink mark near your thumb from an ink pen used earlier. You focused on those details because they stayed still. And you let your mind drift off to static alongside the noise.

Steve came back carrying a bottle of water and found the place by the wall empty.

For one second, irritation flared before fear swallowed it.

He checked the kitchen, the entryway, the downstairs bathroom line. He found Robin by the back door with your roommate, both of them standing close enough to make the air around them feel private. Robin was mid-sentence, hands moving, while your roommate watched her with an expression so open Steve almost backed away without interrupting.

Then your roommate saw his face.

“Where is she?” she asked with alarming alertness for someone so dazed earlier. 

“I was hoping you knew.”

Her expression changed and he knew that must've been the wrong thing ti say because Robin stepped forward. “Steve—”

“I’m looking,” he said quickly, his hand extending. “Stay here. Both of you. I’ll find her.”

Your roommate looked ready to argue, but Robin touched her sleeve and said something quiet.

Steve moved back through the house, scanning corners, couches, doorways. He found you on the stairs after another minute that felt longer than it was. The exhale that left his lips could have readjusted his entire spine with how relieved it was.

You were slumped near the bend, one hand loose on the banister, and head tipped slightly to one side. Your eyes were open but not focused on anything useful. The light above you buzzed faintly, catching the shine in your hair and the tension around your mouth.

Steve slowed.

“Hey,” he greeted being far softer than the music deserved.

Your eyes shifted toward him. It took you a second to register him, your eyes dragged over his face lazily.

“Oh,” you tilted your head further back. “You again.”

Steve crouched one step below you so he would not tower. “Yeah. Me.”

“That keeps happening.”

“I know.” He held up the water, his smile came quieter now on his face. “I brought this.”

Your voice probably was gentler than you must've meant. “Congratulations.”

“Thank you. Big night for me really.”

Your mouth twitched, but your gaze dropped away before it became anything.

Steve watched you carefully. He had seen drunk people before. Too many, probably. He knew the difference between loud drunk, sick drunk, fine-until-standing drunk, and the kind of quiet drunk that meant someone had gone too far inside their own head. You looked like the last one.

“Do you feel sick?” he asked, leaning besides your form, but careful not to overwhelm you. The responses that returned to him would have frustrated him if they didn't ease the tension in his shoulders.

“Nope.”

“Dizzy?”

“The stairs are annoying.”

“That’s probably yes then, huh.”

“You’re annoying.”

“Also yes.”

He sat down beside you after that, leaving a careful stretch of space between your legs and his. The stairs were narrow, so the distance was not much, but he made it deliberate. You noticed. He knew because your eyes flicked down, then away.

He cracked open the bottle. “Small sip.”

You didn't reach to take it; nonetheless, Steve rested it on the step between you. “No rush.”

The party thudded below. Someone shouted his name from the living room. He ignored it.

Your gaze moved to his hands in their journey.

Steve looked down then too, suddenly aware of them. His fingers were tense around his knees. There was a faint scrape along his knuckle from earlier when he had caught the basement door wrong carrying a keg. He flexed his hand once and stopped when your eyes followed the movement.

“You don’t have to do this anymore,” you broke the silence.  The words were so quiet he almost missed them.

He turned his head toward you. “Do what?”

You gestured to the space between you. “This.”

“Sit on stairs?”

Your laugh came out empty. “Be nice.”

Steve went still.

You kept looking at his hands. Not his face. Never his face.

“It’s fine,” your shoulders shrugged. “You can stop.”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“Yes, you do.” Steve hated that he did.

You swallowed, your throat moving with effort. Your eyes looked bright, but you kept them lowered, lashes casting shadows over your cheeks. You seemed embarrassed by your own voice and yet, unable to stop it.

“I’m not going to tell anyone about Robin,” you said quieter now, far quieter than your mind felt. “I told you that.”

Steve’s mouth went dry on reminder.

“I’m not an asshole,” you continued. “Not that kind, anyway.”

His voice came low and strained. “I know.”

“No, you don’t.” Your hand tightened around the banister ridge, your fingers pressing into old varnished wood. “You’ve been following me around for weeks because you think if you’re nice enough, I won’t ruin her life.”

His chest tightened because of the truth of your words, and the incorrectness of it.

Downstairs, the music changed to something faster. People cheered forming a drinking game. The sound rolled up the stairwell and died before reaching the space between you.

Steve rested his elbows on his knees. “At first,” he said, then stopped.

Your face shifted, small and wounded, though you tried to bury it under a crooked smile.

“Yeah, there it is,” you murmured because you couldn't do anything else. 

“I was scared.” the words came out wrong. He heard it as soon as they left his mouth. 

“Good for you.” He took that because he deserved it.

“You messed up,” you repeated,  blankly now,  the noise in your mind turning back to static. “And somehow I got turned into the threat.”

“That’s not fair—”

“No,” you scoffed out, finally looking at him. “It wasn’t.”

Steve had nothing to say to that.

Your eyes held his for one charged second before you looked away again, back to his hands, the water bottle, and the scuffed edge of his sneaker against the stairs.

“You made it so weird,” you frowned, but you didn't know what it was for. “You were everywhere. Holding doors and bringing scarves and doing that stupid concerned forehead thing.”

He almost touched his forehead. He stopped himself.

“And you’re—” You inhaled unevenly, and then pressed your lips together. “You’re not supposed to be good at it.”

Steve’s voice came quieter now. “At what?”

“Being decent.”

The words should have offended him. They didn’t fully.

He looked down at his knees.

You were drunk and mean and hurting, but you were not wrong in the way he wanted you to be.

“You were supposed to be shallow,” you frowned with your face scrunching up familiarly. “It would’ve been easier.”

Steve’s fingers curled once against his jeans. You watched the movement and averted your gaze when you realized it. 

“That’s what I don’t get,” you continued. “Because everyone looks at you. Everyone already likes you. You don’t even have to try that hard. And then you started trying with me, except it wasn’t real, except sometimes it felt real, and then I felt stupid because I—”

You stopped because you didn't understand why your tongue seemed so intentional on betraying you.

The silence after was worse than the sentence.

Steve barely breathed and you cursed at the reaction. You laughed under your breath, harsh and embarrassed, and rubbed at one eye before anything could fall. “Forget it.”

His voice came quick in its arrival. “No.”

Your head turned slightly.

He lowered his voice as if he was scared of turning the thought away, “don’t forget it.”

“You don’t get to do that.”

“I know.”

You didn't think he did. “You don’t get to make me say things and then look at me like that.”

“What do I look at you like?”

“Like you’re sorry.”

He was.

He was so sorry he could feel it in his teeth.

You leaned back against the wall, exhausted by your own mouth. “This is pointless. You can go back to not knowing I exist. I won’t tell anyone. Robin’s secret is safe. My roommate’s secret is safe. Everybody can stop orbiting everybody.”

Steve looked at you carefully. “Is that what you want?”

Your jaw tightened and you looked away. There was his answer.

Then you settled on, “Robin has a really good chance, by the way.”

He blinked at the turn, but you kept going. 

You stared at the banister with a wry, miserable focus. “Lena kept asking if her earrings were too obvious. Nobody asks that unless they want somebody specific to notice.”

Steve let out a breath that almost became a laugh if he didn't feel his chest become unbearably tight. “Robin’s going to lose her mind.”

“She means a lot to you, huh?”

He softened his voice, and that's how you knew he meant it. “She’s my best friend.”

Your nod came faint. “One could infer.”

“I panicked because it wasn’t my secret to lose.”

You understood that better than you'd let him know. “I know that too.”

“But I treated you like a problem.”

You said nothing after that.

Steve picked up the bottle and held it out, not touching you with it. His voice turned pleading. “Drink some water and I’ll keep apologizing.”

“That’s manipulative.”

“I think that's just hydration.”

You stared at the bottle and after an unnecessarily long debate against yourself, you took it.

Your fingers brushed his, cold and unsteady. You drank one sip, made a face, then drank another.

“Good?” Steve’s question came murmured. 

You shook your head. “No.”

“Better?”

“Shut up, Harrington.”

You held the bottle in your lap with both hands, the plastic crackling softly under your grip. For a while, neither of you said anything. Below, the party kept happening. Somebody dropped something glass in the kitchen, and a chorus of groans followed. A pair of girls walked halfway up the stairs, saw Steve sitting with you, whispered to each other, and went back down.

You noticed and your shoulders tightened on instinct. 

Steve saw it and looked over the railing. “What's wrong?”

“Nothing.”

He followed your gaze too late. The girls were already gone.

Your mouth twisted and you kept your eyes to your lap.  “They’ll talk.”

“About what?” You looked at him then with such plain disbelief that he felt stupid.

“Right,” Steve nodded once.

You laughed once, quietly and without humor. “See? That. You don’t even think about it.”

He frowned. “I do.”

“Not the same way.”

“No,” Steve admitted. “Probably not.”

You looked tired suddenly. Not just drunk. Tired in a deeper, older way that had nothing to do with the party.

“I don’t want to be another girl people whisper about because Steve Harrington sat too close to her on a staircase.”

He flinched like you'd slapped him. But you saw it, and something like regret crossed your face. Still, you did not take it back.

“I deserve that,” Steve bit the inside of his cheek and the action had you speaking up.

“I wasn’t trying to—”

“You were.”

You looked away at the directness of his words, but even blunt he didn't seem harsh.

He let the honesty settle without punishing you for it. That was new for him. In high school, he surely would have gotten defensive. He would have tried to charm his way sideways, make a joke, and find a way to come out looking less guilty. College had not made him wise, but it had given him enough lonely nights to recognize when his pride was the least useful thing in the room.

“I’m not being nice because I think you’ll tell anymore,” your fingers tightened around the bottle when he continued. 

“I was at first,” he admitted and some part of you felt vindicated, and another felt sick at the direct confirmation. “Partly. Not all of it, but enough that I need to say it. I thought if I stayed close, I could tell whether everything was okay. Which was controlling and stupid.”

Steve rubbed his palms over his knees. He felt like a little kid with his sweaty palms and nervous voice. “Then I kept wanting to talk to you.”

You went very still at the confession. 

He should have stopped. You were drunk. He knew better. But the words were not a move, not a confession arranged for the best possible lighting. They came out because he had been holding them in for weeks and the stairwell had become too small for more lies.

“I liked that you didn’t care,” Steve found an absurd part of him smiling as he spoke, which only served to confuse your mind. “About the house, or the parties, or whatever people still say about me from Hawkins High. You just decided I was an idiot from your own evidence.”

You frowned because his smile felt like uncharted territory. “I had plenty.”

“Yeah,” Steve exhaled quietly. “You did.”

You looked at him, your eyes searching his face with a guardedness that hurt more now because he understood he had helped put it there.

“And then,” he said, softer than before, “I liked that you cared anyway.”

Your face changed.

“Not about me,” he added quickly. The distinction seemed needed for the both of you. “I mean—about your roommate. Robin. Uh–Just people. You act like you don’t, but you do.”

“That’s worse,” you sighed before you could control the escape and Steve looked up at you, waiting for you to continue.

“What is?”

“You noticing.” Steve didn't know what to do with that either.

You turned the water bottle in your hands, gaze dropping again because you couldn't handle it for much longer. “I don’t like being noticed by people who can leave.”

The sentence landed with no drama, so somehow, that only made it worse.

Steve sat beside you, stunned into stillness, while you seemed to realize what you had said. Your face tightened. You pushed the bottle back toward him abruptly.

“I want to go home.”

“Okay.”

He took the bottle and stood carefully. “I’ll get your roommate.”

“No.” You caught his wrist. And when his pulse jumped under your fingers, you let go almost immediately, staring at your hand as though it had betrayed you.

“She’s with Robin,” you murmured quieter than. “Don’t.”

Steve nodded then said, “I can tell her you’re leaving—”

“Don’t ruin it.”

“I won’t ruin it.”

Your words came out strangely light. “You ruin things accidentally.”

He looked at you.

You looked back, and for one second the almost-smile returned, faint and exhausted.

“That’s fair,” he exhaled, and the movement sounded a lot like a strained laugh.

Steve helped you stand without making a show of it. He offered his hand, and when you stared at it for too long, he added quickly, “you can ignore it if you want.”

“I know.” You took it anyway.

The stairs shifted under you. Your balance went sideways before you could pretend otherwise, and Steve’s other hand came up near your elbow without grabbing. You steadied yourself against the wall first, then, reluctantly, against his forearm.

His skin was warm.

You hated that warmth could feel accusing.,

“Okay?” Steve asked you.

You scoffed at the tone. “Don’t be gentle.”

His brow furrowed. “What?”

“It makes it worse.”

You didn't have to clarify what you meant. And he didn't as you too. He looked at you for a moment, then nodded once. “Okay.”

He didn't stop being gentle, you noticed that. Instead, he only stopped making it obvious.

Getting through the party took extreme concentration. Steve walked ahead, clearing space with small movements: a hand lifted here, a shoulder angled there, and a quiet “move” when politeness failed. People called to him. Someone tried to hand him a drink. A girl touched his sleeve and asked where he was going.

He didn't stop. You acted like you didn't notice.

You followed in the wake he made and tried not to care.

Outside, the cold struck clean through the damp heat on your skin. The porch boards creaked beneath your shoes. The yard was scattered with cups, cigarette butts, and bodies in letterman jackets huddled against the wind. Somewhere down the street, a car radio played too loudly through open windows, all tinny drums and electric guitar.

You sucked in a breath and wrapped your arms around yourself.

Steve noticed and it had you immediately reeling when he took off his jacket.

“I don't want it,” you rejected him with a sharp glare. 

“You’re cold.”

“I’m fine.”

“You’re shaking.”

“I’m a complex person then.”

“You’re freezing.” And before you could argue, he placed the jacket around your shoulders without forcing your arms into it. The worn denim lining held his body heat. It smelled faintly of smoke from the party, detergent, and something clean you refused to identify.

You should have shrugged it off, but you didn't have it in you.

Steve, for all his part, did not comment.

That helped more than you'd thought it would.

He walked you back across campus in the cold dark, the two of you quiet beneath the streetlights. The town pressed close beyond the college, all old brick storefronts, empty roads, and houses where porch lights burned yellow behind thin curtains. 

You felt every step in your head.

Steve stayed beside you, hands in his pockets, shoulders slightly hunched without his jacket. He didn't try to fill the silence. For someone you had accused of being everywhere, he was surprisingly good at leaving space when he finally understood he should.

That made you angry all over again.

You reached your apartment building too soon.

It was an old converted house divided into student rentals, white paint peeling near the porch, one upstairs window glowing blue from a television left on too late. Your roommate had stuck a crooked paper bat beside the door before Halloween and never taken it down. It trembled in the wind when you climbed the steps.

Steve stopped at the bottom.

You turned back, his jacket still around you.

For a moment, neither of you moved.

The porch light hummed overhead. Your fingers curled into the jacket collar. He looked cold, hands shoved deeper into his pockets, hair mussed from the wind and the party and the night going wrong.

“I’m sorry,” Steve repeated once more and you looked at the loose board near your shoe.

“You said that.”

“I still am.”

You nodded once. Your head hurt.

“I don’t know what you want me to do tomorrow,” he seemed more vulnerable now. 

That almost made you laugh.

Of course he wanted instructions. A route. Something to fix or follow.

“I don’t know either.”

“Okay.”

“And don’t act like this is something now.”

His face flickered and when you'd replay the scene in a better state, you were certain you'd smack yourself upside the head. “Something?”

“This.” You gestured vaguely between you, then regretted it. “Tonight. Me being drunk and stupid. You saying things.”

Steve frowned before he could reign it in. “I didn’t think you were stupid.”

“That’s not the point.”

“I know.”

“You don’t.”

“Okay,” he swallowed, and there was a faint roughness in his voice now. “Then I don’t.”

The concession should have satisfied you. It really didn’t.

You hugged the jacket tighter around yourself, then realized what you were doing and shrugged it off quickly. The cold bit through your sleeves. You held it out to him.

Steve came up one step to take it.

His fingers brushed yours.

Again.

This time you both looked down.

The contact lasted less than a second, but your body reacted with humiliating precision, a small pull in your chest, a flutter you wanted to bury under the porch boards.

You let go first and Steve held the jacket against his side. “I’ll leave you alone.”

You looked up.

His expression was careful, but not empty. He meant it. That was the problem. He would do it if you asked, even if it hurt him, and some reckless part of you had wanted him to fight you just so you could hate him with less effort.

“Good,” you relayed and the word came out entirely too fast. Steve only nodded slowly. The silence after it felt colder than the air.

You put your hand on the doorknob. It stuck, because it always stuck when the weather turned damp. You twisted harder than necessary. It felt fitting. 

Behind you, Steve shifted.

You closed your eyes for half a second. Then you said, without turning around, “Robin really does have a chance.”

His voice was quiet, and evidently strained. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

A pause.

“Thank you,” you didn't know why he seemed to have sounded so earnest. 

You opened the door and warm apartment air brushed your face, stale with radiator heat and the lavender candle your roommate always forgot to blow out. The hallway was dark except for the kitchen light left on above the stove.

You should have gone inside. You should have shut the door. And you should have slept this horrible night away. 

Instead, you looked back at him. 

Steve stood on the porch step with his jacket in his hands, the wind lifting his hair off his forehead. He looked younger than his reputation. Less certain. Less untouchable.

“I meant it,” your eyes wanted desperately to break contact, but the moment was delicate enough as is. So, his eyes stayed on yours.

“About not telling,” you added to clarify. 

“I believe you.” The answer came too quickly to be a strategy. Too late to undo the hurt.

You only nodded.

Then you went inside and shut the door between you before either of you could make the night softer than it deserved to be.

For a while, you stood in the hallway with your back against the wood, listening to his footsteps retreat down the porch steps.

You hated that you counted them.

You hated more that when they faded, the apartment felt too quiet.

Lena came home an hour later with Robin’s number written on a gum wrapper and a face full of terrified happiness. She found you sitting on the kitchen floor in your party clothes, drinking tap water from a Garfield mug, shoes kicked off in opposite directions.

“Oh my God,” she whispered when she found you. “Are you alive?”

“Unfortunately.”

She crouched in front of you, smiling until she noticed your eyes. “What happened?”

You stared into the mug.

The water tasted metallic. Your head pulsed. Your throat hurt from all the things you had said and the ones still trapped behind your teeth.

“Steve Harrington is a problem,” you only murmured into the air. Lena’s smile faded into something gentler.

“Yeah,” she said softly. “I kind of figured.”

You looked up at her, “don’t start.”

“I didn’t!”

“You’re doing pity eyebrows.”

“These are concern eyebrows.”

You pursued your lips and glared up at her. “Yeah, well—I hate them.”

She sat down on the floor beside you, shoulder bumping yours.

Neither of you spoke for a minute.

Outside, a car passed slowly, tires hissing over damp pavement. Somewhere in the building, a pipe knocked. The old refrigerator clicked on and hummed beneath the silence.

Your roommate held up the gum wrapper after a while. “Robin gave me her number.”

Despite everything, your mouth softened. “Good.”

“She wrote it badly.”

“She was nervous then.”

You smiled at how her voice seemed excited. “Do you think so?”

“I know so.”

Your roommate smiled down at the wrapper, then tucked it carefully into her pocket. “Do you want to talk about Steve?”

“Not particularly.”

“Okay.”

You leaned your head back against the cabinet and closed your eyes.

After a pause, she turned to you with such quiet and earnest concern that it made the air still, “Do you want me to hate him?”

That almost broke something lightly in you.

You opened your eyes and stared at the ceiling, at the faint water stain above the stove shaped by years of leaks nobody fixed properly.

“No,” you sighed with a smile because you knew she meant well. 

Across campus, Steve returned to the fraternity house and found the party still going, though the energy had shifted into its uglier late-night stage. The music was louder because fewer people were listening. Somebody had broken a lamp. A guy from the baseball team was asleep on the couch with one shoe missing.

Robin was sitting on the front steps, coat wrapped around her knees, smoking a cigarette she barely touched.

Steve stopped beside her and she looked up. “She get home alright?”

He only bobbled his head in an answer. “Yeah.”

Robin studied his face and winced. “That bad?”

He sat down heavily on the step below her. “Bad enough.”

She exhaled smoke away from him. “Did you Steve it?”

He laughed once, but it came out entirely tired and humorless. “Probably.”

Robin’s expression softened. She bumped his shoulder with her knee.

For a while, they sat without speaking. Inside, someone shouted for Steve. He ignored it.

Robin flicked ash onto the porch. “My secret?”

“Safe,” Steve affirmed. 

“She said that?”

“Yeah.”

Robin nodded, but her hand trembled slightly when she lifted the cigarette again. Steve saw it and looked away so she could pretend he hadn’t.

“She told me her roommate likes girls,” he repeated your words quietly. “And that you have a chance.”

Robin went completely still. Then she whispered too calm for how she felt, “Oh.”

Steve looked over his shoulder at her.

Robin’s face had gone pale in the porch light, eyes wide and unfocused. She looked terrified, hopeful, and furious with herself for being both.

“We exchanged numbers,” Robin tried to keep the nervous smile off her face, and it failed. 

Steve’s mouth pulled into the first real smile he had managed in hours. “Yeah?”

“On gum wrappers.”

“That’s romantic in a concerning way.”

“I think I’m going to throw up.”

“Don’t. We’re low on clean bathrooms.”

Robin laughed, then pressed both hands over her face. After a second, her voice came muffled through her fingers.

“What about you?”

Steve looked out at the yard.

The grass was littered with cups. The orange lights blinked crookedly around the porch rail. Beyond the college street, Hawkins sat dark and familiar, keeping all its old stories and making room for new ones nobody knew how to tell yet.

“I told her I’d leave her alone,” he repeated almost dumbly.

Robin lowered her hands, the cigarette flickering slightly. “Did she ask you to?”

Steve rubbed a thumb over the scrape on his knuckle. “Not exactly.”

Robin said nothing, which meant she said everything and he gave her a tired look. “Don’t.”

“I didn’t say anything!”

“You were about to.”

“I was going to say you’re an idiot.”

“I'm aware.”

“No, I mean specifically here.”

Steve dropped his head back against the porch post and closed his eyes. Robin sighed and the steps creaked when she moved down to sit beside him.

“You can care about someone and still handle it badly,” she paused against her cigarette to turn to him. 

Steve opened one eye to stare at her from his side. “Since when are you emotionally wise?”

“Since I became the only person on this porch not making doomed eyes at someone who scares them.”

He closed his eyes again. “She doesn’t scare me.”

Robin snorted while Steve stayed quiet. After a moment, he exhaled a cloud into the cold air, “She said she doesn’t like being noticed by people who can leave.”

Robin’s humor faded and the cold moved around them.

Steve looked down at his jacket folded in his lap. He could still feel the shape of you in it, the brief warmth left behind, already disappearing into the night air.

“I don’t know what to do with that.”

Robin’s shoulder touched his. “Maybe don’t do anything.”

He looked at her.

“For once,” she added. And that made him laugh, low and reluctant.

Steve sat there until the cigarette burned down between Robin’s fingers and the porch light flickered twice overhead.

——

The next morning, you woke with a headache, a dry mouth, and one miserable shard of memory after another clicking into place.

The stairs.

The water.

Steve’s hands.

I don’t like being noticed by people who can leave.

You shoved your face into your pillow and groaned so loudly your roommate banged on the wall.

Your phone sat on the crate beside your bed.

For twenty minutes, you did not even attempt to touch it.

Then, it rang.

You stared at it until the second ring.

Then, the third.

Lena yelled from the kitchen, “If that’s him, answer it or throw it out the window, but pick a dramatic lane!”

You grabbed the receiver after severe hesitation. “Hello?”

There was a brief crackle of static, then Steve’s voice, rough with sleep or nerves.

“Hey.”

Your stomach dropped so hard you hated him for it.

You sat up slowly, blanket pooling around your waist. Morning light slipped through the blinds in thin stripes, touching the laundry pile near your closet, the glass of water you didn’t remember bringing to bed, the shoes still abandoned by the door.

“Hi,” you repeated, just as flat and weary as everything felt. 

A pause took place against your ear.  Then Steve cleared his throat. “Hey, uh—this is your water reminder.”

You closed your eyes.

Of course.

Of course that was what he chose.

“Toast too?” you asked and your voice was low and blank.

“I was getting there.”

Despite the headache, despite the shame, despite every sharp edge you had prepared, your mouth moved before you could stop it.

You leaned back against the wall, phone cord twisted around your fingers.

On the other end, Steve went quiet, waiting.

You could have told him to leave you alone.

You could have hung up.

You could have made the choice clean and cruel and simple.

Instead, you stared at the morning light on your floor. “I don't like toast that much.”

Steve breathed out, almost laughing.

“Okay,” his static pause could be heard against your ear. “Crackers then?”

You shut your eyes again. The answer sat in your throat for a long moment, refusing to escape. 

“Maybe.”

ᯓ𑣲 taglist... @snoopylover1, @eli0eli0, @kurtsw7rld96, @scoopsahoydjo, @lovelyuser1908, @libelunae, @skkeletonns

other links: ▪︎ series masterlist, ▪︎ my masterlist

[lofi-fics]

Our Love Cactus

chapter one

Steve Harrington x Reader

Loosely based on "How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days" (part of @graywrenhart & @moonstoneandmoonlight Steve Harrington Summer Sleepover event!)

Similar plot to the film, wherein the reader is writing a piece that she needs to use Steve for, while Steve is doing everything he can to make this work for at least ten dates so he can finally break his curse...and score tickets to a Red Sox game.

CW: 18+ MDNI; language

WC: 2.2k

August 1991 - Smith College

Subject: Advanced Principles of Sociology 529

Social Relationship: Intimate/Romantic

Assignment: You will be assigned a social relationship category and choose a subject(s) from within it. You will then perform 7-10 disruptions of societal norms and observe how your subject(s) respond. How did performing these disruptions affect them? How did it affect you? What implications does this have for society as a whole? Paper must be 9-10 pages (approximately 2,500 words) in length in APA format.

•••

Blank pages. Stupid fucking blank pages just staring back at you, waiting for your objective analysis of the last 3 weeks of your life for a whopping 45% of your Advanced Soc grade.

Unfortunately, it was hard to look at things clinically when you could still feel the brush of his fingers across your cheek as he tucked a strand of hair behind your ear; could still taste the cigarettes, minty gum, and sunflower seeds that flavored his kiss as his tongue danced softly over yours. More than anything you still had the dull, throbbing ache in your chest and the knot in your gut from the night it all ended, which was probably four or five days ago at this point.

He hasn't called, but neither have you. You haven't stopped thinking about him, and vice versa. This thing between you both - something born of your blind educational ambition and his determination to end his perpetual solitude (and, let's face it, win a bet) - turned into something quite real. Neither of you were really expecting that, so it hurt all the more now that you'd tasted it and it was just...gone.

How did your disruptions affect your subject?

Oh...so poorly.

How did performing your disruptions affect you?

See above.

What implications do these findings have for society as a whole?

You couldn't fucking care less.

You swipe your elbow across your desk and let those cruel, blank pages litter the ground. Snatching up your bag and keys and pulling your shoes on at a breakneck speed, you barrel through the front door of your apartment to go to him.

Outside, it's just started to rain.

♥

"Well, what about Lorraine? She was smoking hot, dude."

"What, the chick who wouldn't stop talking about her seven cats? She had seven cats, by the way."

"Okay, so she's an animal lover, Steve. She also had an ass that wouldn't quit, and her dad was loaded."

Steve picks at the label of his beer, the paper gone mushy from the condensation on the bottle. He just shrugs and gives his friend, Josh, a half-hearted smile.

"I dunno, it just...it wasn't there."

"What wasn't there? What are you waiting for, man? A neon sign that says PROPERTY OF STEVE HARRINGTON to pop on over their panties?"

"Jesus, dude. Gross."

"I'm serious, Harrington. The second these girls give the slightest indication they might deviate from your sky-high standards, you're running for the hills. Just pick a nice, cute girl, and like...love her, you know?"

Steve laughs, a genuine but slightly disbelieving laugh.

"Josh, it's not just high standards. There's gotta be a...spark, you know? Look, you talk like it's the simplest thing in the fucking world, why aren't you taken then?"

Josh shrugs casually, the perky, blonde bartender setting a fresh beer in front of him. He takes it, their fingers slipping past one another and lingering a little too long as they exchange a heated, knowing smile.

"It's different. Being single doesn't bother me like it does some people." He takes a long gulp of his beer while staring Steve down. "I'm not the one bitching about it all the time."

He glances around the bar, eyes fixing to a spot in the back where you stood nursing a strawberry daiquiri and surveying the room. The corner of his mouth curls upward, and he tips his head in your direction so Steve can observe, too.

"Okay, her. She's cute, and she's obviously looking for a date."

Steve tries to not make it painfully obvious when he turns to stare at you, opting for pretending to crack his back in his seat, and he'll happily admit it - you are stunning. Maybe a little shy judging from the way you didn't hold eye contact with any one person for too long; possibly a little on the anxious side, seeing how you drummed the bottom of your glass with your fingers in a steady, soothing rhythm to ground yourself; easy on the eyes all the same.

"How could you possibly know for a fact she's looking for a date? What if she's just waiting on her boyfriend to come out of the bathroom?"

Josh rolls his eyes and scowls at Steve, not understanding how this highly touted "ladies man" could be so clueless.

"Please. She's dressed to kill and sizing up every guy in the place. She's scared to make the first move, but I bet she'd love it if a nice, normal, decent-looking guy would do that for her..."

Josh flicks the lapel of Steve's sport coat to solidify his point, and Steve looks back at him like he's been shot.

"Okay, first off - decent-looking? Ouch. Second, how does this solve my problem? What if we go out and she's clingy, or nuts, or...smells weird? I'm just supposed to, what, suffer through it in the hopes that she's actually my dream girl?"

"Jesus, just go with the flow, Steve. You're seriously overthinking it, and you're gonna fuck it up before it even starts. Just start with the first thing you like about her, let it build from there. Don't focus on the negatives, accentuate the positives. Listen, I want you to take that girl right there out on 10 dates - for better or for worse. Just fucking try, man."

"Okay, and if she's like, an axe murderer?"

Josh ponders for a second, then reaches into his wallet and pulls out two rectangular pieces of thick, glossy paper. He holds them up to Steve's face tantalizingly.

"Dude, are those --"

"Sox tickets? Yeah. Two of em. If you manage to keep it up with her and put some fucking elbow grease into your love life for once, they're yours. Hell, you can even take her to the game with you. Consider it your 11th date insurance."

Steve scoffs, his brows pinching together at the ridiculous (albeit extremely tempting) offer.

"And if I don't? If I can't make it work?"

"Then I'm taking her to the game, and we're borrowing your Beamer for the trip. We'll make a weekend of it."

♥

"Hey, I'm Steve."

"Hey, Steve." You give him your name and hold your hand out. He takes it in his, making yours look positively puny in comparison, and gives it a few gentle shakes.

"Can I get you a refill?" He asks, gesturing at your nearly empty glass.

"Oh, sure. That'd be nice."

He takes it for you and leaves to go place the order at the bar, and you hurriedly wipe the sweat from your palms onto your skirt. God, you hope they weren't this damp when he was just fondling them.

This is just so not...you. Putting on this eye-catching shade of red lipstick (borrowed), scouting for men in a dive bar around the corner from your apartment, and letting them waltz right up and buy you a drink, no questions asked?

It helped a lot that Steve was really, really cute. Well-dressed, clean, smooth and suave; he actually almost looks familiar to you, but then again he could just have one of those faces. Strong features, a nice jawline, cute little moles and freckles on his neck and face, and a head of hair straight out of a men's fashion magazine.

Not to mention that right now, as he leans slightly over the bar top to get your drink, you can shamelessly ogle the tight, round curvature of his ass in those jeans. It's unfair that some dude could fill out a pair even better than you could, but then again who's really complaining?

Unfortunately, you've made a rookie mistake. You've stared too long, too overtly, and when he spins around with a freshly cracked beer and your bright red daiquiri in hand he sees the tell-tale upward snap of your head and the panicked look in your eyes. You've been caught.

His mouth twitches upward as he saunters back over, placing your drink in your slightly trembling hands. You speak first, trying to divert the attention away from your complete lack of self-control.

God, am I really no better than a man?

"So whaddya do, Steve?" You pitch your voice low, feigning confidence and channeling your inner temptress, but it betrays you and cracks on his name. You vigorously clear your throat while trying not to spontaneously combust.

Steve's smile is warm and sweet. He loves that you aren't this artificially-sweetened, professional flirt. He actually finds your lack of finesse so refreshing, and worries that he's going to have to tell Josh he was right after all. That meant Red Sox tickets, sure, but it also meant endless digs and "told ya so's" at practice.

"I'm the assistant coach for the swim team here at Smith."

Aah, that must be it.

You've heard all the titterings amongst students in their inner circles whenever the swim team would be out for their Monday morning jogs, led by two lean, tall, "insanely hot" coaches (Josh & Steve). You typically didn't make a huge spectacle of staring and swooning (usually focused on schoolwork or reading), but you must have absorbed his face at some point for it to seem so familiar to you now.

"Oh, yes! I think I've seen you around before!"

"You go to Smith?"

"Yeah, post-grad. Working on my PhD in Psychology at the moment."

"Damn, that's incredible. My best friend's working on hers too, she's actually the one who found me this job. Never lets me forget it. You may know her, name's Robin?"

"Buckley?!"

"You do know her!"

Well, sure you do. Robin was in your class, working on the same research paper you currently were. She was just lucky enough to have "Strangers" as her social relationship category, so she didn't have to do this "one-on-one" bullshit with some unwitting victim. She had the ability to cut and run. You were going to have to draw someone close, and watch them squirm on your hook. It was cruel.

But then it dawns on you, where you really recognize Steve from. It wasn't the early morning jogs in the loose running shorts and tank tops, or the backwards baseball caps at sweaty afternoon swim meets.

"You're...oh, God, are you...Scoops Ahoy Steve?"

His nostrils flare at the mention of the name, glancing around conspiratorially like he didn't want too many people to hear it.

"Shit. She told you about that?"

You struggle to suppress a giggling fit, nodding with wide eyes and pursed lips.

"I'm gonna kill her."

You bark a laugh into your fingertips, a habit you've had since middle school when you wanted to hide your braces. It's kind of a harsh sound, jarring and wild, but Steve doesn't dwell on it. In fact, he wants to make you laugh more. Wants to see the way your eyes wrinkle at the corners, how you bite the tip of your tongue between your teeth.

He thinks about how he broke up with Julie M. because of her obnoxious laugh, but with you it just doesn't seem to bother him.

Maybe it's because with you...there's a spark.

You end up talking non-stop for the next two and a half hours at the bar, gradually moving to an ice cream shop nearby for a late-night treat. When he finally walks you to your car an hour (or three) after that, you feel comfortable enough to slip your arm through his and press a little closer against him. Your eyes are all sparkly, looking up at him from under your lashes.

God, was this really working? Was Josh some kind of wizard? Maybe he really did just need to lighten the fuck up. You were...really, really great. And to think, if he had stayed wallowing in his own self-pity and defeatist attitude, he may not have even come up to you tonight.

Those tickets are as good as mine. No, ours. 10 dates with you is going to be a piece of cake, Steve thinks.

"Would you, um - would you wanna go out with me again? Maybe, grab a coffee, or dinner, or something?"

Your breath catches in your throat, but you nod and smile, looking down at your feet and toeing the gravel beneath them.

"Y-yeah. I'd love that, Steve. How about, um...Friday? We can meet at this little cafe near my house?"

He grins, gently brushing your cheek with his thumb as he moves one of your wispy hairs out of your eye for you. The warmth emanating from your skin is inviting, but he knows he needs to stop himself for now.

"Sounds like a plan. See you then, Doc. Have a good night."

He opens your door for you, ushering you inside. As he walks away to his own car (of course, a goddamn BMW), he turns once last time to wiggle his fingers at you. You wave back and start your car up with a heavy sigh.

This could actually work, you think. Sorry Steve...but I'm gonna make you wish you were dead.

[graywrenhart]

This is the masterlist for @graywrenhart & @moonstoneandmoonlight’s summer writing event!

READ MORE ABOUT IT HERE!!

Set it Up | The Proposal | Made of Honor | Mamma Mia | While You Were Sleeping | Pretty Woman | Runaway Bride | How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days | Notting Hill | Love, Rosie | Life As We Know It | Princess Diaries | 10 Things I Hate About You | Killers | The Back-up Plan | The Wedding Date | Hitch | The Wedding Planner | 50 First Dates | Cinderella Story | He's Just Not That Into You | Legally Blonde | What Happens in Vegas | Friends with Benefits | Sweet Home Alabama

READ THE RULES:

@graywrenhart ☆ The Wedding Date

@moonstoneandmoonlight ☆ What Happens in Vegas

@zinainblue ☆ While You Were Sleeping

@pr33tygirlavenue ☆ Sweet Home Alabama

@cha0ticstranger ☆ Mamma Mia

@lofi-fics ☆ How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days

@bells-bookshelf ☆ Pretty Woman

@djosnoopy ☆ Life As We Know It

@fangirlposts ☆ 10 Things I Hate About You

@cozymoonlight18 ☆ Set It Up

@whispersoflost ☆ Love, Rosie

@sweetlikenonsense ☆ Legally Blonde

@xpeachsunsidex ☆ Princess Diaries

@comfycosygirl ☆ The Proposal

@keeryspullman ☆ Notting Hill

@unclejeezysblog ☆ The Cinderella Story

@spacejjunk ☆ The Wedding Planner

@headoverharrington ☆ Runaway Bride

@ms-mountebank ☆ 50 First Dates

@harringtonfeels ☆ The Back-up Plan

@projections-mortal ☆ Friends With Benefits

@tinfoileddd ☆ He’s Just Not That Into You

@joekeerysbellybutton ☆ Killers

@goldiwrites ☆ Made of Honor

10 Things I Hate About Steve Harrington - @fangirlposts

Are You Lonely Just Like Me? - @waterc0lorstars

A Cinderella Story - @unclejeezysblog

Love Can’t Always Be Perfect - @spacejjunk

Our Love Cactus - @lofi-fics

Great Responsibility - @bee

[beezusvreeland]

Great responsibility - Part 1 

Spider-Man!Steve Harrington x Henderson!Reader

Word count: 1,1k

Summary: Alright, let’s do this one last time! As Spider-Man, Steve Harrington has a lot on his plate. Including giving relationship advice to his best friend’s sister, who is broken hearted and has no idea who is the man under the mask.

A/N: This fic is a part of the THE STEVE HARRINGTON SUMMER SLEEPOVER event, hosted by @graywrenhart and @moonstoneandmoonlight. I got the movie Hitch and mixed its concept with a Spider-Steve idea I’ve been meaning to write for a while. This is meant to be a mini series, hope you enjoy <3 Divider by @pepsipoet | Masterlist

Part 2

Alright, let’s do this one last time. My name is Steve Harrington. I was high school royalty until my poor life decisions made me fall from grace. But it’s okay, because thanks to my loser status, I met my new best friends, Robin and Dustin, and became a pretty normal guy. Well, except for one thing…while visiting the natural history museum, I was bit by a radioactive spider and, for the past two years, I’ve been the one and only Spider-Man.

New York city at night. To Steve, there is nothing quite like the feeling of flying around, one web at a time, watching everything from up above. Those were the only times he would allow his mind to go completely blank, letting gravity do its job, stretching seconds into minutes, and, eventually, being led by his body back to skies or the streets, depending on what evil was tormenting the city at the time.

Surprisingly, the patrol had been pretty chill for a friday night. There was one armed robbery earlier, a couple pick pockets here and there and one very stubborn cat on top of a tree. The movement was so slow that Steve gave Dustin the night off. Not that he had that kind of authority, if anything, it was otherwise, with the boy, now a college freshman, being Steve’s self proclaimed guy in a chair. 

It was good for Dustin to go out there every once in a while, doing whatever nerdy college guys were doing on a friday night. Robin, though, didn’t need any incentive to take a night off and go drinking with her girlfriend, Vicky, and friends. Steve missed going out with them, or doing anything that didn’t involve wearing his very tight costume. He was in a desperate need of a new one. 

Steve decided to head towards Brooklyn, where his friends were reunited. He would do this every now and then, checking on everyone as they headed home, especially when there was drinking involved. 

As he got closer to the bar Robin mentioned, he was able to sense a few people from their group: Robin and Vicky dancing, Eddie and Gareth higher than the clouds checking girls out, and Nancy and Jonathan making out in the bathroom. Ugh, he hated that. His powers were useful and sometimes, even funny to use, but there was also that very inconvenient side. 

He tried concentrating on the surroundings to tune them out.  

“Yo, Spidey! You’re a guy, right?”

Steve thanked the universe for his coordination skills, because dear God, you scared the shit out of him, he almost fell from the side of the building next to the bar where he was stationed at.

Wait, why were you outside instead of hanging out with your friends inside?

“Because everyone is in a fucking couple!”

Steve had no idea he said that out loud. He got down from the building, walking slowly towards you, trying not to freak you out. That was something that happened with a certain frequency.  

“Shit, why am I screaming?”, you whispered to yourself, trying to control the volume of your voice. Steve tried not to laugh, you clearly had more than your normal quota of alcohol for the night.

“Are you okay?”

“You’re a guy, right?”, you asked at the same time.

Steve stopped, one hand on his waist, the other scratching his cap. His poor hair was suffocating inside it. 

“I mean, yeah. That's why they call me Spider-Man.”

“Huh”, you hold your purse closer to your body. “I’m so stupid!”

This time, Steve couldn’t hold the laughter. You couldn’t be farther from the truth: you were the smartest person he knew besides your own brother. But Dustin was a special case, you actually worked extremely hard to get good grades and do well academically. Graduated college with honours and all. 

“No no, you’re good”, Steve tried to intervene. “But I am, uh, indeed a man.”

“You sound more like a guy than a man”, you looked at him suspiciously. 

“Hey, I’m very manly, ok?” 

You laughed with your whole body, dominating Steve’s spidey senses, giving him full body chills. He guessed it was probably because he hadn’t seen you in weeks, there was barely any time in the day for him to rest, let alone socialize. Still, he was glad Dustin wasn’t monitoring this whole exchange with his older sister. Steve would never hear the end of it.

“But why do you ask?”

As you recovered from the laugh, your expression saddened. 

“Well, I need some advice in that department.”

Steve’s goggles betrayed him, going up in surprise like his eyebrows did. He had never thought much about it, just assumed you were always studying, but he hadn’t seen you with a guy before. It’s when he realized the meaning of what you said earlier: “Everyone is in a fucking couple!”. 

“Okay, yeah, sure. I’m a guy.”

“That has been established”, you laughed quietly. “It’s just…if you have tried everything to be noticed by a guy and he never has, does it mean he is not interested or just really oblivious?”

“I think you know the answer to that.”

You smiled sadly. 

“Yeah, that’s what I thought.”

“For what is worth, you deserve better than that”, said Steve. It sounded like the right thing to say. He just hated seeing people he cared about so sad. “This guy must be a real jerk.”

“No”, you said desperately. “He is…everything.”

That caught Steve out of surprise. But your mind seemed to be elsewhere. 

“How can I get over him, Spidey?”

Steve crossed his arms, trying to keep his composure. You looked at him like he might have all the answers to your problems and that had him panicking a bit. This was way above his paygrade. You were friends, sure, but never talked about your respective love lives. Your friendship started with being his best friend’s sister and ended with the two of you being in the same friend group. Dustin and Robin, and now, Spider-Man, demanded too much for him to consider deepening other friendships. 

“I dunno, I mean… You should try dating other guys”, Steve wasn’t entirely satisfied with his advice, but that was the best he could do under pressure. 

“Yeah, well, they might just not like me either.” 

“Change your approach”, said Steve, nervously. Even in your drunken state, he could tell you were paying close attention to what he was saying. “Maybe go for a totally different type of guy, do the opposite of what you did this time around.”

You gave that some thought.

“I guess I have nothing more to…”

And you threw up. Steve guided you towards a trash can. With one hand, he held your hair, while with the other he got his phone and texted Robin for help.