You were absolutely right in everything you said. I can’t even believe how wildly Ziggy was misinterpreting everything you were saying, it’s honestly mind boggling. Plus there’s nothing in either of those asks that suggest they were attacking Aly, but Ziggy was trying to claim she was just defending her? What?? Telling you to “just” block artists that make fanart with white reader. Are you serious?? You cannot just “curate” white centricity away. The Eddie fandom is crumbling, with more and more people leaving and this is the kind of thing that contributes to it. People have been saying the vibes here have been rancid recently and it absolutely has been. I cannot tell you the extent to which this sours my feeling towards this fandom. If anything this confirms that I could not use my voice here to point out legitimate issues or try to be any voice of reason like you did.
this was from a little while ago and I deleted the other asks I got about it, but I wanted to say you should absolutely feel safe to use your voice in this fandom and I’m sorry they made you feel like you can’t. USE YOUR VOICE! If people like that can, so can you.
unfortunately I also got some dms saying something similar and that they don’t feel welcome here as black people, and seeing that interaction as well as seeing me be silenced(esp as one pointed out, I was only blocked after I said I experienced a lot of racism after posting Eddie X poc/black!reader fanart, something a lot of poc, ESPECIALLY black artists and writers experience)was basically the last straw. One of them is deactivated and the other hasn’t been active since. This is the real impact these types of people/reactions have on poc fandom members. People can act like “oh well most of this fandom is just white anyway so that’s why so much of the content is white washed” but that’s not the full truth. The truth is this space drives away poc and many of the creators here don’t take the time to examine that and their role in it.
Making out with virgin!Eddie, and you decide to try and find his sweet spots, and when you get to a certain place on his neck and nip at it, he lets out the most pornographic sound you've ever heard
summary: Sometimes life can become too much, and when that happens, when it feels like you are drowning in a dark sea without a raft or a lifeline to cling to, when the tumultuous storm of despondent emotions raging inside of you can not be contained anymore, that is when you do what many would consider an unspeakable thing: you escape into a tiny, dark room, and you take your anguish out on yourself.
You didn't think anyone did or would care if they found out what you were doing to yourself, but then one day you are proven wrong when a certain long-haired metalhead follows you into the darkness.
word count: 2907
rating: T+
tags: Eddie x Reader, Self-Harm, Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Eddie being a sweetheart
triggers: GRAPHIC DESCRIPTIONS OF SELF HARM! So read at your own discretion.
a/n: Another oneshot that was born from an imagine on my old blog - Imagine Eddie Finding Your Self Harm Scars - so please, please be careful reading this if that sort of thing triggers you, okay? <3
You dragged the razor over your skin and watched as beads of red began dotting a delicate line across your wrist. Gritting your teeth you let out a hiss of pain, yet somehow also enjoyed the sting.
Pain was good. It was grounding. It brought you back to reality.
When the world felt like it was going to crush you, when your own brain felt like it was going to tear itself apart from the maelstrom of emotions that ravaged your every waking thought.
When everything became... just too much.
When you felt like you were drowning, that’s when you came here.
This was your secret place. Your special place where you could just let your walls down and fall apart and no one could catch you being vulnerable and tear into you for it.
This was where you were safe.
It was a room in the very back of the drama department. An old storage room you assumed, a place where they stowed unused and unneeded props or costumes between performances. No one came in here during the day except for drama class, and even then the students and teachers almost always stayed in the front where the actual classroom was.
This tiny, dark corner was for the rejects. Just like you.
You crouched down amongst some old costumes, their musty smell and heavy fabric comforting to you, and dug the razorblade one more time against the exposed flesh of your forearm.
No one ever asked why you always wore long sleeves, and you were grateful for that.
It had been the Worst Day. You’d woken up late and had to do the walk of shame to your desk when you showed up to class twenty minutes after it had started. You hadn’t even had time to eat breakfast and the lack of food mixed with the humiliation of your classmates’ burning stares and piercing snickers caused you to dissociate from sheer anxiety.
Then it all came to a head when That Bitch Regina and her squad of airheaded cronies caught you outside of the cafeteria. You’d been looking forward to finally eating when you’d heard their grating, high pitched, squealing giggles, and your heart dropped out of your chest and down to the floor.
“Well well, if it isn’t Hawkins’ residential mental case,” Regina's sugary sweet voice sang out, wrapping around you like a boa constrictor trapping its prey and squeezing . You’d just hugged your books to your chest and kept your head down, eyes glued to the shiny linoleum floor. You felt nauseous, and you were still dissociating, so it was almost like you were experiencing all of this under water. But that didn’t make her piercing stare or poisonous smile any less painful to bear.
Regina and her gang of clones were the residential mean girls; each coming from a family that was as filthy rich as they were privileged. And for whatever reason they seemed to take a particularly keen interest on targeting you.
“What? Not gonna say anything? Thank god for that.”
“Oh my god what is wrong with her?” Crony #1 laughed.
“Guess they ran out of room over at Pennhurst and had to start bringing the psych patients over here,” snickered Crony #2.
“Ah look guys, I think she’s going to cry,” giggled Crony #3. They all put their hands over their mouths and gave mock-sympathetic looks.
“Ooh, poor baby,” Regina crooned, her eyes shining with malice.
Rage pierced through your numb thoughts as you tightened your grip around your books. This was the part of bullying that you hated the most: the inability to fight back. Because you knew that if you threw the first punch, no matter how justified it may be, you would be seen as the bad guy.
You couldn’t do anything, you just had to stand there and take it.
And that’s what fucking killed you every time.
Unable to handle the storm brewing inside of you, your eyes stinging with tears, which only pissed you off more, you turned heel and fled, Regina’s laughter echoing after you down the hall like arrows piercing into your back.
You were breathing heavily, tears already trailing down your face by the time you’d reached your hideout.
You tossed your books to the side without looking at them and reached into your pocket, pulling out a single razorblade.
You couldn’t take your anger or pain or humiliation out on others, not even those who caused it, so you took it out on yourself.
Pulling the sleeve of your jacket back revealed an already accumulated grid of scars ranging in size and noticeability. You’d been doing this for a long time. Since you started high school, basically, and the bullying had started.
Why did they hate you? Why didn’t they accept you?
What was wrong with you?
As you dragged the razor over your skin and the blood began to flow, a wave of serenity washed over you. The rage was gone, leaving instead a strange sort of bliss.
And exhaustion. You’d been on edge since that morning, and now all you wanted to do was curl up in this warm, dark place and sleep.
Sleep forever .
You were so wrapped up in the thought of what drifting off into eternal bliss would actually feel like, that you hadn’t heard the door to the storage room open, or the sound of footsteps coming your way.
“What the hell are you doing?”
Your head snapped up and you found yourself staring right into the eyes of Hawkins’ residential Freak: Eddie Munson.
Automatically you pressed your injured arm to your chest to try and hide the fresh marks you’d made and pressed the hand holding the razor to the floor, hiding it under your palm.
“Um, nothing,” you quickly squeaked out, hoping to god he hadn’t seen you.
But the clear shock written all over his face told you he had. You clenched your jaw and waited for the worst to come, waited for him to immediately run to the principal’s office or the guidance counselor or the nurse or even just the first teacher he saw, waited for him to start laughing at you and asking “What the hell is wrong with you?”
Waited for the jeering and mocking to start.
But what you didn’t expect was for Eddie to take three long, quick strides towards you, drop down on his knees in front of you, and, with a strong but not unkind or rough grip, take both of your wrists in his hands and pull them forward so both of your arms were exposed.
And the razor you were still holding.
You pulled at your bottom lip with your teeth as a wave of fresh hot humiliation washed over you, each of your scars laid out for him to see. The newest additions were streaked with blood that was now also smeared on the front of your jacket from where you’d tried to hide your wrist.
You ducked your head down and braced for the oncoming string of curses and harsh remarks….
But they never came.
You clenched your jaw and tried to keep the tears from rolling down your face, but they did, and you almost felt betrayed by your body.
Dammit, keep it together.
You sat like that for an agonizing long time, just waiting for him to say something. Why wasn’t he saying anything?
“Okay,” he finally murmured, in a voice that surprised you; it was quiet. It wasn’t the voice of the Eddie Munson you knew, the one who, almost daily, walked across a cafeteria table yelling insults at the other cliques in the school. Especially the jocks.
In all honesty his Loud and Proud personality was something that always intimidated you. Which sucked because you always thought he was actually pretty cool and you would have loved to go and talk to him and ask him about his jacket, but you were always too scared to.
And now he was holding your wrists in his hands and speaking in the most gentlest voice you’d ever heard from him.
“Okay,” he repeated. “Just a sec.” Slowly he released your wrist, the one with the fresh cuts on it, and reached around for something you couldn’t see; you kept your eyes glued solely to a spot on the floor between the two of you. A second later his hand reappeared in your vision, holding the familiar black and white bandana he always kept tucked into his back pocket.
He let go of your other wrist in a way that you swore was almost reluctant in how slowly he moved, and took your injured wrist in his hand once again, holding it still while he dabbed away the blood that had accumulated on your skin.
“Should really be doing this with water,” he murmured, so quietly it was as if he were speaking to himself. “But I left my canteen back in my van and….” After doing what he could to clean away the blood, he tied his bandana around your wrist to cover the wound. “There. Though we really should get a bandaid or something for it.”
You licked your lip and glanced to the side, where you had thrown your things. “My bag,” you whispered.
You could feel the heat of Eddie’s eyes on your face, as if he were examining you or searching for something in your expression, before he slowly stood and walked over to where your things were, abandoned in a dark corner of the room. He rooted around in your backpack for a few seconds before producing an open box of bandaids.
“Well at least you’re… prepared. I guess,” he stated, dropping back down onto his knees before you.
He undid his bandana from your wrist and began replacing it with bandaids. He still held your wrist carefully as he did this, thumb idly rubbing a soothing pattern across your hand.
You hadn’t expected such…. Such gentleness from the man. Such softness.
It was too much. It was all too much. You felt your face tighten up and a sob force itself out of your throat, tears flowing out of your eyes and down your face.
Hesitating for only a second, Eddie reached forward and put an arm around your back, pulling you into his chest.
“Oh, hey,” he murmured. “It’s okay. You’re gonna be okay.”
You sucked in a sharp breath. “Why are you being so nice to me?” you sobbed.
“What are you talking about?”
“Why…. why…..” But you couldn’t get a word out. You couldn’t get two words out. Not for a while.
For several minutes you couldn’t do anything except sob into Eddie “The Freak” Munson’s chest while he just held you close and let you process your emotions.
“Why are you being so nice to me?” you asked once more, after most of your energy had been spent, after you could take deep breaths again, and after the sobs had trickled out to just the occasional hiccup and sniffle.
“You look like you needed it,” he answered. He’d moved you so he had one arm around you with your head tucked securely under his chin. You only had the energy to lean limply against him, but it was enough. He was warm, you noticed. And he smelled nice. Like sun-warmed leather and clean laundry.
But when he said that, a fresh hot sting pierced your already tender heart. Oh, so it’s a pity thing .
“Look,” he continued. “I saw the resident Bitch Regina, and her gang of walking barbie dolls, corner you outside of the cafeteria.”
You winced at the memory, and at the knowledge that your humiliation had been seen.
“I was gonna go up and talk to you, ask if you wanted to sit at our table today, but you ran off before I could get there. I wanted to make sure you were okay so I…. I followed you.”
That was surprising. You hadn’t thought you’d even registered on his radar. You always kind of thought of the Hellfire Club and his close-knit group of friends to be pretty exclusive.
“I didn’t think you’d be…. That I’d find….”
You felt his hold on you tighten just a fraction.
You moved finally, for the first time since Eddie found you. You reached up and wiped your nose with the sleeve of your jacket.
“Sorry,” you croaked out. Sorry you found me like this, sorry you had to make it your problem, sorry I’m such a freak, sorrysorrysorrysorrysorry-
“Don’t be.”
His answer was so surprising it actually made you laugh. A dry, bitter laugh, but still a laugh. Still a smile.
“What?”
“Don’t be sorry.” He reached down and took your hand, turning it so your now bandaged wrist was facing up. “Not for this. Don’t ever be sorry for this .”
The way he said it, the firmness in his voice, finally made you look up at him. It wasn't harshness, he wasn't judging you or trying to make you feel bad about what you had done, that was obvious: he was worried, he was trying to get across the exact opposite; that being in pain, this level of pain, was not something to be sorry for. Not something to be ashamed of. You took in his furrowed brow, his shining dark eyes, almost black in the shadowed room, but overflowing with warmth and worry and concern.
Concern for you.
Those eyes. Those beautiful, dark, warm eyes.
You realized for the first time that when Eddie looked at you like that, you felt seen.
You held each other's gaze for only a few seconds before he broke the spell he had cast on you to stare down at your wrists. His hands positively dwarfed yours, long fingers completely encircling your wrists with no problem. But you didn't feel threatened or trapped by him holding you like that.
Quite the opposite, actually.
“Will you just, promise me something?” He murmured, voice still low, still gentle. As if he were speaking to a spooked animal.
You sniffled again, twisting your head around to wipe your nose on your shoulder, as he still held your hands.
“Sure. What?”
“Instead of, you know, this…. Could you just come and find me? Please? I’ll talk to you, I’ll do whatever with you.” Suddenly, his mouth quirked up into a small, hesitant crooked smile. “Hell, I’ll even help you burn this place to the ground if you wanted.”
That earned another laugh from you. A more genuine one this time. One that felt like someone was stitching your heart back together.
“Just…. Remember that those bitches, Regina and literally whoever else, they aren’t worth this.” He turned his gaze down to your hands again and whispered so softly you wondered if he was speaking to you, or just himself, “They aren’t worth you hurting yourself like this.”
You tugged at your bottom lip again and followed his line of sight down to your hands, being held in his. His were so big, and warm, and they were gentle, but with an underlying strength that you found surprising, but comforting. Like, as long as he was holding your hands, he could hold you together.
The two of you sat like that for a long moment before you finally worked up the courage to whisper out, “Thank you.”
“Don’t mention it,” he said. He looked back up at you and, as if suddenly realizing how close the two of you were, finally released his hold on your hands and in one fluid motion swept up to his feet and slipped his hands into his jacket pockets.
You immediately missed his warmth.
"Seriously," he stated, before turning and beginning to make his way to the door. But he hesitated in the doorway, one hand holding the frame, the rings on his fingers glinting dully in what little light was in the room. He glanced back at you over his shoulder, his wild mane of curls framing his face like a curtain.
“So uh, I’ll see you at lunch tomorrow?” he asked.
You stared up at him, absentmindedly pulling the sleeves of your jacket down to hide the scars beneath. There was a light in his eyes, and a kind but hesitant smile on his face. He was being serious.
Smiling felt awkward and heavy on your face. You were never good at faking being happy or putting on a mask for others, so you rarely ever smiled. But even though it felt unnatural, this was the first time in a long time you genuinely had something to smile about.
“Yeah,” you said. “I promise.”
Promise.
A wide grin spread across Eddie's face, causing his eyes to crinkle and shine. “Cool. Keep it real.”
Then he did the most adorkable thing that made you start laughing for real: he shot you finger guns, and left.
It wasn’t until you had gathered your things and gotten yourself put together enough to leave that you realized something: at some point while he was holding your hands, Eddie had slipped the razorblade out of your grip and had taken it with him.
And for whatever reason, that made you smile too.
You really are making sure I come back to you, huh, Munson?
Suddenly, the rest of the day felt more bearable; because now you had lunchtime with your new friend to look forward to tomorrow.
Okay I don’t know whether anyone already noticed but. I just noticed.
The Eddie novel will be written by Caitlin Schneiderhan, who wrote the episode “The Monster And Teh Superhero” and was part of the writer’s room for the entire fourth season of ST.
And of ALL the authors of the six Stranger Things novels (Suspicious Minds, Darkness At The Edge Of Town, Runaway Max, Rebel Robin, Lucas On The Line, Flight Of Icarus) she’s THE ONLY ONE who actually was part of the Stranger Things writers room and involved in the actual season.
Which means she knows what’s been planned for ST5, she’s been part of creating Eddie’s character and she most probably knows whether and how his story continues.
Why hire one of their own writers for Eddie’s novel when they didn’t do that for the other characters? Sure, they want the novel to be a success, but they could have that with another bestselling author, too, if they have a little talk what they want to include like they surely did with teh other five authors for the other five novels.
But Eddie’s novel will be written by someone who most probably knows where ST5 is heading and what they plan to do.
Very weird thing for a character they claim will stay dead, indeed. Why go to that effort if they haven’t done the same for the alive, recurring characters who got their own novels?
I’ve answered an ask about the book, which I’ll post later, but this realization just hit me when I did research on the writer(s) and I needed to share this.
tagging my speculation-homies @songforeddiemunson @eddie-munson-lives and @hellfiredm
i actually like the idea of eddie dating someone who is the complete opposite. i do think he learns a lot from someone who is more gentle and has different interests.
✏︎ Catalyst — an agent that provokes or speeds significant change or action.
✏︎ Series Summary: Forced to move back home to Hawkins after your fiancé cheats on you, you begin to fall in love again with an audacious 20 year old metalhead, only there’s one problem — he’s still in high school and you’re his English teacher.
While you struggle starting over in a place you never thought you would return, Eddie struggles feeling stuck in a place he can’t manage to leave — until you offer to help him. Of all the lessons learned, the most important are the ones you teach each other.
✏︎ Series CW: forbidden romance, slow burn, true love, smut (18+ mdni), internal conflict, student-teacher relationship, 10 year age gap, mutual pining, sexual tension, emotions, drama, angst, character development, happy ending :)
Chapter warnings: angst, drama, implied partner abuse, harm to fantasy creature
Monday, December 9th 1985
Eddie propped his cheek against his knuckles as he watched you from the back of the classroom, just like he did every day. You were radiant on this one, brimming with excitement as you lectured on your favorite subject.
“We’re still in the planning phase for our short stories, but now that you all have a general idea of what you want to write about, I want you to start putting together an outline,” you prompted.
His eyes traced down the back of your blouse to where it met the waistline of your trousers. His hands still itched to hold you there. Burned was a better word now. He watched your hand scratch words onto the board with a nub of chalk, following the bend and curve of your fingers as they formed letters.
The past three weeks had been much of the same. You and him, behind the big desk every Monday and Wednesday after school. You; trying to focus on his schoolwork. Him; trying to focus on you. You; letting him get away with it.
There was plenty of studying happening too. In between studying the curve of your lips, the hue of your laugh, and the bones of your knuckles under his thumb, there were shining moments were something would click and he would solve an equation. Perhaps it was something to do with memory association or whatever textbook word you used to describe the psychology of learning, but something about the way you presented things made it easier for him to absorb. Perhaps it was your gentle patience, or your intuition. Knowing when to press forward and when to back off. Knowing how to show something differently than he’d been taught. Maybe it was just sweeter coming from your lips instead of Ms. O’Donnell’s.
Eddie shifted in his desk as you clicked the end of your sentence against the board with a flourish. Stretching against the confines of the tiny chair, he hunched over the slab wood barely big enough to fit his notebook, and picked up his own chewed utensil to copy what you’d written. Maybe it was the bulk of his jacket, thicker and warmer with padding for winter, but suddenly he felt claustrophobic.
You whipped around brightly to face the class. “Alright, who remembers what three things inform character action?”
The question was met with restless silence. A cough. A sniffle.
With a defeated sigh, you turned back around to scratch desires, fears, and misbeliefs onto the board.
Glancing out the window at the pale grey sky and naked trees, Eddie counted on his fingers the number of months until there would be leaves on them again.
Five.
He just knew it would be an agonizing winter. One that dragged on and on, long after the groundhog saw its shadow. Huffing, he stared down at his beat up spiral notebook, blue lines blurring in his tired vision. The pen went slack in his hand. He closed his eyes and listened to your voice.
“I know these are short stories, but in the end something should have changed internally or interpersonally for your characters as a result of the plot. Remember, the plot is what happens, the story is how it affects the characters,” you said, jotting down the last bit.
It took on a different tone in front of the class. More rigid and professional, louder so it carried to the back of the room. It lacked the warmth and softness that it held when he was next to you. He imagined, for a sweet moment, how it would sound even closer; against the shell of his ear as you breathed a sigh beneath him. The gentle feather of your lips as they traveled south, just below his ear, where his jaw met his neck. In the playground of his mind, he could show you what a man he really was. Here, his hands were free to wander wherever they wanted; dip into the valleys of your clavicles, over the hills of your breasts, around the bend of your waist, the peaks of your hips, the mound of your—
A snicker broke his reverie. When he opened his eyes, Jason’s were already on him.
“Taking a nap, Munson?” he mouthed mockingly.
Eddie rolled his eyes and seethed as he glared down at his notebook again. He shifted against the back of the hard plastic chair, against the tight cage of the desk. Finding no relief, he huffed and stared blankly ahead at the chalkboard, at the beige concrete wall, at the big desk, and then—at you. The gap had never been more enormous. An ocean of desks, a gaping chasm between where he was and where he wanted to be.
He must have looked downright pitiful, because the look you returned brimmed with a soft concern. In the two seconds he held you, Eddie released a deep sigh. Then you were back to the board.
“L-let’s start by highlighting the main point of each scene,” you said quickly, turning as you cleared your throat. Eddie caught your hand dart behind your neck before it fell promptly to your side. “Basically, why a scene exists and what it needs to accomplish. Does it provide information about the characters or move the story forward? Remember, these are short stories, so we want to make each scene really count.”
Eddie gripped the chewed pen and dutifully copied what you wrote. He knew he could have asked you later, had you explain it all again, given him tips, and pointers, and strategies, even helped him with his outline. But he wanted you to see that he was trying. He wanted you to see that he cared. He was always bad at school. Bad at paying attention. Bad at turning in assignments. Bad at following rules and keeping his mouth shut.
He wanted to be good for you.
When the bell rang, chair legs screeched against tile, notebooks crinkled, zippers ripped open and shut in a frenzied cacophony. Eddie hung back until the room filtered out. Until the only person left was you. Slinging his backpack over his shoulder, he padded up the long isle of desks until he reached yours. A standard routine.
“Hey,” he said, just like every other day. Just to savor another couple seconds in your presence, alone.
You looked up at him from the mess on your desk as you did countless times before, same tired smile, same soft eyes, same response. “Hey.”
Eddie rocked back and forth on his heels, holding your gaze for a little too long. “I’ll—uh, I’ll see you later, yeah?”
Your face grew bright and warm, a glint of summer against the pale, grey sky. “Yeah, see you later, Eddie.”
There it was, the thing he really came for — his name. He sighed a smile and gave a single nod, turning slowly toward the door.
______
By the time he made it to chemistry class, Eddie was ready for a nap. Maybe it was the pizza that sat like a rock in the pit of his stomach. Maybe it was the fact that, yet again, he had stayed up entirely too late, lost in your world.
But he couldn’t just stop, not when Cybelle was being attacked by a ferocious fenfink — like a weasel, only much larger. Sharper claws, bigger teeth, and fatally attracted to something Cybelle had on her person. They were packing up camp in the morning when it happened. Perhaps it had been drawn to the smell of sweet Myrnish breakfast cakes, or the herbs stuffed inside Cybelle’s mask, or perhaps it was her gold amulet that sparkled in the glow of the fire. In hindsight, they really should have picked up a sword in Fenwood. Not that Lazarus had ever swung one. Not that he would trust himself to when the beast was grappling with the neckline of Cybelle’s coat as she struggled to fling it off her. Too much movement. Too many opportunities to miss. Instead, Lazarus had done the only thing he could manage to do in a panic, which is to grab the animal’s back and try to pry it off.
The path through the boglands was narrow with small allowance for a camp site. On either side lay deep, murky water spotted with mounds of moss and pale, petrified trees. The fenfink didn’t give up easy. It tore at her silk with its claws, sniffing and growling at her crescent moon mask as Lazarus tugged at its furry body. As Cybelle’s boots threatened stumble back over the berm of the trail and into the wet abyss, Lazarus tugged as hard as he could, but the animal snatched a lifeline; a shiny gold chain that glimmered in the pale blue light of the early morning.
It bent Cybelle forward at the neck. Time froze as her golden promise, his future, dangled in the space between them. Her hands fumbled at the animal’s rear claws to unlatch them from her abdomen. Eyes desperate, mask askew, Lazarus knew what he had to do. One good yank and the chain would break. She would be free, and he could hurl the beast into the bog to buy them time. He knew it could be done, in theory. What would become of the treasure, however, would be left entirely to fate.
In the glittering twinkle, he saw his cottage, his garden, his full size bed, his curtains billowing in the salty air. It swayed and skirted across the taught chain, dangling dangerously close to the edge of the murky water.
With a strangled cry, Cybelle worked the claws free of her dress, and he was left with a split second to decide. The golden tether winked in the fire’s glow. Fear flickered in her umber eyes. With a firm, decided tug, Lazarus broke the chain. Time slowed to a halt as the glimmering treasure launched upward with the force of it all. Cybelle stumbled back over the berm, grasping desperately at the air. It followed the arc that she took, hovering just out of reach. She just about bumped it with her fingertip, but the cold, wet shock at her back knocked the wind out of her.
Lazarus watched his dreams tumble into the water, helpless to stop it. As he grappled with the snarling beast, his eyes caught the last golden glimmer of hope before it plunked beneath the inky surface of the bog. He pivoted quickly, launching the creature in a heartbroken rage, and it flailed in the air before its headfirst collision with a tree scattered the birds for miles.
A wet, sobbing cough from the other side of path sent him scrambling toward it. Cybelle was a mess. Clambering on her knees, waist deep in a peaty, black filth that soaked through her gold coat. Her hands raked desperately, blindly, at the thick decay beneath the murky water.
Lazarus stumbled over the mossy ledge and into the bog, extending his hand, but she could not meet his eyes.
“I-I can find it,” she choked, sucking what little breath she could muster as the soaked fabric clung to her face. “It-it is somewhere here… I heard it.”
His heart sunk deeper than the treasure. “Please, Cybelle,” he pleaded.
“I can find it,” she insisted weakly, and another desperate grasp beneath the water sent her tumbling further down.
He dove in after her then, sinking deep into the muck to grab her by the waist before she slipped beneath the surface. Cybelle was persistent, twisting in his arms as sobs shook her tiny body. He simply gripped her tighter, drawing her toward his chest and out of the water. Her struggles paled to his strength.
“Please,” she whimpered, stamping his white linen shoulders with muddy hands. “I can—I can…” she could barely catch a breath, silk crescent now crooked and blackened with peat.
With both arms clasped tightly around her back, Lazarus shushed her. “It’s gone, Cybelle.” He could not hide the mourning in his voice.
She shut her eyes with a defeated grimace and went limp. Tears burned her lash line as she sobbed against his chest. They opened when she felt a finger brush behind her ear. Gingerly, slowly, Lazarus hooked his fingers through the loop of her mask, eyes darting back and forth between hers in a wordless request for permission. Her stillness granted it, and with that, he peeled it away.
In the pale blue light of the early morning, waist deep in muck and mire, Lazarus saw Cybelle. Not for the first time ever, but for the first time like this. Raw, and ragged, and inches apart. She inhaled deeply, freely, and for the first time when she breathed out, there were no barriers between them. They stood there a moment in a captivated stillness with nothing but the hum of frogs and song of birds.
Cybelle was the one to break the silence. “We might as well turn around then,” she wavered bitterly. “I have…” her breath hitched, “nothing to offer you.”
Lazarus sighed, shaking his head as he raked in her soft features. “Your company,” he began, “is enough.”
Cybelle shut her eyes, blinking tears over her lashes to streak trails through her the dirt on her cheeks, and for the first time, her muddy arms drew around his waist, and she embraced him.
Eddie pressed his heated forehead to the cool slate of the lab table and shifted his stool back against the floor with a loud screech. Images of fenfinks, and pendants, and bog mire danced behind his eyelids. He could hear the weary exhaustion in Mr. Westfield’s voice. He didn’t even need to look up to know he was leaning against his desk and running his hand through his thinning hairline as he’d done a hundred times before at the top of sixth period.
“Alright, so today we’re going to be creating magnesium oxide. Magnesium plus oxygen. Get it?” The question was answered with sleepy eyes and a few stray sniffles. Mr. Westfield sighed. “Right. Since the school can’t afford enough bunsen burners for all of you, this week you’ll be splitting up into pairs.”
The room came alive, eyes meeting eyes as claims flew across the room. Eddie peeked over his arms at the table in front of him. Tina was practically falling out of her stool as she reached for Chrissy on the other side of the room with grabby hands.
Mr. Westfield looked thoroughly unamused by the commotion. “I’ll be assigning them.”
The classroom groaned almost unanimously.
“Hate to be a party pooper,” he started, his tone indicating quite the opposite, “but you’re here to learn, not to chit-chat. Ok, let’s see here…” Mr. Westfield adjusted his glasses on his nose as he scanned down the list of names in his attendance book.
A restless silence fell over the room as the students awaited their fate.
“Looks like we have an even number, excellent. Tina, you’ll be with Bobby.”
Eddie could see Tina’s eyes roll through the back of her head.
Mr. Westfield peered up from his glasses. “Don’t act so excited. Ok, then we’ll have Ricky and Carmen, Sally and Janae…” he went down the list of names, checking them off and scribbling them on the side of the sheet to keep track.
Eddie sat up and glanced around the room as pairs were made, mentally checking off classmates as their names were called, ears perked and primed to hear his own. As the ones who remained dwindled and dwindled down to only two, his pulse quickened.
“Ok and then that just leaves Ms. Cunningham,” he punctuated with his pen, “and Mr. Munson.”
Fuck.
Eddie turned his head slowly, reluctantly, toward the other side of the room where Chrissy Cunningham sat, and was met with a soft, coy smile. He swallowed and whipped his head to face forward.
Un-fucking believable. If there was a God, which Eddie sincerely doubted, he sure had a twisted sense of humor.
Since their brief confrontation in the hallway following Tina’s Halloween party, Chrissy had, to his honest surprise, respected his wishes and kept her distance. It never stopped her from looking though. Stares, he would discover, were something you could feel. Burning into his temple from behind the curtain of his hair in class, heating the back of his neck at his locker as her perfume wafted up the hall. It was almost a daily occurrence.
As the classroom rearranged itself in a cacophony of screeching stools and shuffling backpacks, Eddie remained planted right were he was, thumbing at the bent spiral of his notebook, mind racing as his eyes glazed over. It was less than a minute before he smelled that familiar perfume and heard the stool next to him scoot against the floor.
“Hey,” came a voice like powdered sugar.
Eddie looked up from his notebook with a slow hesitance. “Hey.”
“I…grabbed you some safety glasses and an apron,” she said, setting the items on the counter.
Silently lamenting the idea of spending the remaining hour wearing them, he gave a single nod and thanked her.
The room bustled with chatter as Mr. Westfield came around to dole out the bunsen burners, crucibles, scales, and other small tools. “You got a hair tie, Munson?” he asked.
Eddie patted himself down and feigned disappointment. “Fresh out I’m afraid.”
“I’ve got one,” Chrissy interjected, rolling a powder blue scrunchie from her wrist to swing from the curve of her finger.
Eddie stared at it a second as it dangled in the space between them before snatching it. “Thanks,” he conceded. As he twisted the satin band around his curls to form a low ponytail, he could feel the heat from her gaze. It lingered as he put on his goggles, even as he tied the ribbons of the stiff apron behind his back.
Wayne, perceptive as ever, had been right all those years ago outside the auditorium. He did, at eleven, have a crush on Chrissy Cunningham, but there were only so many times a person could ignore him before he got the memo. Before he figured out he wasn’t worth their time. It wasn’t the first time it happened. In fact, Eddie had become so accustomed to getting looked through instead of at that he’d made it a lifestyle to stand out. To talk loud, and dress loud, and play loud. To bite back, and shirk rules, and cause a scene. And over the course of a year he barely remembered, he’d left whatever feelings he might have had for her exactly where they belonged; in the graveyard with everything else he would rather forget.
But for some reason this year was different. He wasn’t sure what switch flipped that caused her to suddenly see him. Maybe it was because she was tired of her meathead boyfriend and needed a distraction. Maybe it was because he looked especially dangerous this year. Maybe it was because he’d been held back so many times that he’d become more forbidden than ever; an odd and tempting fascination.
Eleven year old Eddie would have been elated. Twenty year old Eddie was, to put it simply, annoyed.
Mr. Westfield returned to the front of the classroom to give instruction, and Eddie tried his best to follow along with the handout.
The room sparked to life with the hiss of gas and the whump of it igniting from all corners. As the tall flame dance in front of him, Eddie tried to ignore the little voice in the back of his head that tempted him to dangle the sleeve of his flannel a little too close so he could escape to the nurse’s office. Freshman Eddie wouldn’t have thought twice.
Chrissy turned on the scale between them and set the empty clay crucible on top of it as instructed. She leaned in to record the weight and copied it onto her worksheet. Eddie did the same. According to the worksheet, the next step was to add the magnesium and weigh it again.
“Make sure the coil isn’t too tight,” advised Mr. Westfield, “you’re gonna want to leave room for air.”
Eddie picked up the clay triangle, doing his best to stay focused on the task, and set it on the metal ring above the flame as demonstrated.
“I think the ring is too high,” said Chrissy, leaning in to twist the clamp loose enough to lower it. “It’s gotta be like, in the blue part of the flame I think.” Her arm grazed his as she reached into his bubble, and suddenly he was back on that couch, feeling the her phantom fingers on the pins of his vest again, gold halo crooked, lips ghosting cherry alcohol. Eddie shot his gaze forward.
“Ok, now place the crucible in the center of the triangle,” Mr. Westfield instructed.
Eddie grabbed hold of the metal tongs and used them to pinch the pale clay vessel. Chrissy leaned closer as he lowered it to rest above the flame.
Then they would wait. In the waiting, the classroom grew louder. Tina stood by her stool, arms crossed, eyes cast sideways in annoyance as Mr. Westfield came over to address the lack of flame coming out of her bunsen burner.
Eddie sat there in tense silence, eyes fixed forward as the flame licked the crucible with its blue heat.
“You know, this definitely beats equations,” Chrissy remarked with a soft chuckle.
He couldn’t really argue with that. Eddie didn’t say that though, instead he just nodded quietly.
“Say um,” Chrissy thumbed at the gummy eraser of her pencil, “Jason hasn’t given you any trouble, has he?”
Resentment rose up from the graveyard. “Define trouble,” he groused.
Chrissy sighed. “He can be a real asshole sometimes,” she admitted, to his surprise.
Eddie took a deep breath. It was vivid — the way she stumbled off that couch. How she nearly tripped over her own shoes. How Jason barked at her. The crazed look in his eyes. The fear in hers. “Sometimes?” he bit back.
Chrissy toyed at the hem of her skirt. “He’s not all bad.”
He wasn’t sure if it was the inflection of her voice, or the way her eyes cast down in shameful denial, but it transported him — all the way back to that small kitchen table, feet dangling from the chair as the red wax in his hand filled in the flame from a dragon’s mouth. He could see his mother in the kitchen doorway, her finger coiled tightly around the telephone cord, uttering the same words to a concerned voice on the other end.
Eddie hardened his lips and shook his head bitterly. “Yeah, well, doesn’t make him good.”
“Alright folks, listen up,” Mr. Westfield called out, drawing the attention of the class. “Next you’ll add the oxygen by lifting the lid to let some air in.”
With a sudden, determined movement, Chrissy reached across him to grab the tongs, bracing herself against the slate table. She gave them a few clicks before pinching the handle to lift the small, clay lid. A reaction occurred; blinding and white, igniting the gap between crucible and lid in a flickering flare.
They jumped back in unison.
“Try not to stare,” advised Mr. Westfield with monotone enthusiasm. “You could damage your eyes.”
Timely advice. Eddie blinked the white dots that clung to his vision away, and a smile caught him by surprise, betraying his steely resolve.
Chrissy caught it, and her sea green eyes found his from across the bunsen burner as she lowered the lid again. “That was awesome,” she whispered wildly.
It was kind of cool, he had to admit. He would take playing with fire over staring numbly at numbers on a page any day. Eddie peered over the rim of his plastic safety glasses and offered a tentative smile.
The heating continued, allowing for air every once in a while until finally there was no more reaction. There wasn’t much to say. Eddie removed the crucible from the burner. Chrissy added water from the pipette until the contents formed a paste. Eddie returned the crucible to the heat. The water evaporated. In the silence of their cooperation, in the passing of tools and scribbling of notes, Eddie wondered how long it would be before Chrissy came to her own conclusions. If she would ever figure out that even though Jason wasn’t all bad, she could do so much better.
Not with him, but on her own.
Clutching the crucible in the tongs, Chrissy set it on the scale for the final time. They both copied the weight onto their worksheets — different than when they started.
With five minutes to the bell, the cleanup was frenzied; a clammer of equipment hastily returned to shelves and boxes backdropped against the hissing water of half a dozen sinks. Even Mr. Westfield had given up on volume control in favor of tidiness. Eddie rid himself of the dreaded apron and goggles just in time for the bell to ring, and with that he snatched his backpack from the floor and followed the flow of his classmates out the door.
It wasn’t until he made it to the hallway that he remembered. Reaching back behind his neck, he felt it; ruffled satin. The owner was only a few feet ahead, ponytail swaying in ruffled white cotton as she walked.
“Chrissy!”
Her footsteps slowed, eyes brimming with a coy mischief that shot dread down his spine when turned against traffic to face him.
______
“Outlines are due on Friday,” you called to your class as you wiped down the board, a cloud of chalk dusted the air as you swiped the soft eraser over the letters. Like the wave of a magic wand, the bell had turned your practically snoring class into an eruption of noise. Before you could hear a pin drop, now you had to shout. With two periods left in the day, you wondered how many more times you would answer the same question. How many more times you would ask one only to be met with coughs and tired eyes.
Your feet hurt. Even the boots you had chosen for comfort and practicality were causing an ache in the soles of them, the hard heel putting too much pressure on your own. The lukewarm coffee you’d savored during fifth period had long since run its course through you. Glancing up at the clock, you realized you had about five minutes to take care of business or be forced to suffer for the duration of seventh period as well. Setting down the eraser, the decision was easy.
Your tired feet clicked down the crowded hallway with a sense of urgency that seemed to evade the rest of traffic. Scent pockets of perfume, mint gum, cigarettes, and body odors wafted through the air as you hurried past the rows of slamming lockers, dodging a pair of students overcome with the temptation to roughhouse, one grabbing the other by the backpack and yanking, sprinting ahead so his friend couldn’t catch him. You sighed, voice too tired to conjure discipline.
As you picked up on that strange, familiar scent of the approaching science lab, your eyes, like a magnet, were drawn to a familiar silhouette, standing just outside the door. You would have recognized him anywhere, picked him out of a crowd of thousands. Flutters bloomed in your chest. His long, dark curls bounced as he shook them out with his hand, like he was scratching the back of his head.
It was enchanting; the way he did just about anything. The way he moved, his sharp elbows and quick hands, the bright timbre of his voice, how his energy could shift on a dime from a soft breeze to a ripping gust.
The past three weeks had been much of the same. Conversations that strayed from educational to casual. Lingering glances. Secret touches. Stolen moments. Never speaking the truth of your heart. Never offering more than your hand.
The flow of students swept you forward, and as you passed, a figure emerged from behind where his shoulders obscured. In the seconds that slowed to a crawl, your eyes gathered volumes.
Strawberry blonde, petite, clutching a book to her soft, white cardigan. Sparkling eyes under soft blue shadow, cocked head, fluttering lashes, a smile bright enough to draw a moth.
Craning your neck back as traffic surged, you searched for his eyes.
Eddie didn’t see you.
You blinked, hard, and snapped your gaze forward over the sea of students as your heart leapt into your throat.
It was fine.
Click.
It was nothing.
Click.
He’s allowed to talk to people.
Click.
He didn’t see you.
Click.
Of course not, it’s crowded.
Click.
It burned, like the image was seared into your retinas. Her clean, white sneaker coyly toeing at the tile. Teeth that teased at plump, pink lips. Heavy lidded eyes. Arched back. Delicate fingers curled around a textbook spine. You tried to blink it away.
It was fine. It was nothing.
You rounded the corner for the faculty bathroom, relieved to find it empty, and shut yourself inside. The tried old light bathed the room in a yellow wash. You locked the door and stood there for a moment, heart racing, chest heaving in the quiet reprieve from the bells, lockers, and voices. Space for your thoughts to grow louder as you went about your business.
Why shouldn’t he talk to some girl? There was nothing wrong with that. In the glimpse that you caught of his face, it was lacking in distinct expression. Listening. Nothing worth noting. It was hers that really stuck with you. Her rosy cheeks and perky ponytail. The way she batted her eyes and licked her lips like she wanted to make a meal out of him.
Eddie Munson; summer wind. Tall and roguish, charming and animated, full of surprises. It was shocking he was single. Downright unbelievable that no other woman in this entire school would harbor any feelings. There had to be at least a handful that cast shy gazes as they passed him in the hallway. At least a few that floated curious whispers across lunch tables. In the dark corners of your imagination you had always figured, you’d just never seen it. And now the image wouldn’t leave you. Sticky. Clinging like you’d stepped in gum.
You met your tired eyes in the mirror above the sink. Timeless, it mocked, as the whisper of lines became canyons.
On the other side of the door was sea of young women. Free to talk and gawk and get into the sort of trouble he surely had a taste for. The kind of trouble you only had the freedom to imagine. How long before the novelty of you wore off? Before his restless hands sought something more? Something he could grasp in broad daylight? Someone who could keep his stride, share a milkshake or a bucket of popcorn?
You cast your welling eyes downward, turned on the water, wet your hands, and pumped the soap.
It started subtle, last spring. Started with the way he looked at you; a flame that dimmed to embers over months of dinners spent alone, plates gone cold, beds left empty, leaving you with nothing but to wonder how he looked at her.
Time moves quickly for young men. You of all people would know it. Like a wildfire; hungry and insatiable, devouring everything in its path. It renders promises of meaning, leaves the past in charred remains. It surges ever forward, seeking fuel.
It left behind an ice in you. Stalling over the sink as the world surged on outside, you felt it seize your chest again.
Eddie Munson; wildfire. Twenty years old. Restless. Reckless. He wasn’t your boyfriend. You weren’t an item. You were nothing.
The water was scalding. Bubbles erupted as you worked up a lather. Scrubbing your knuckles, your palms, the space between your fingers where his had nestled once.
No. You weren’t nothing.
The bell had you flinching; a loud and shrill summons back to your post, your place, your duty.
You were his teacher.
Pinballs. Louder than the shrieking bell. Louder than ever before. You didn’t dare meet your eyes again, frightened of what sort of monster would stare back.
What am I doing?
You turned off the water and paused, hands weeping over the sink.
It was foolish, to play with fire. It was foolish just about anywhere, but here the walls were made of tinder, the desks of charcoal. His fingers like matches, striking you with every touch. But oh, how you craved the heat. Close enough to thaw you; the ice deep in your chest, weeping as it melted, pooling in your lap, making puddles on the floor.
Droplets fell to the tile as you turned to grab a paper towel. It soaked through, blooming dark, wet patches as the brown paper blotted up the dampness.
You shook your head bitterly. No. You certainly weren’t nothing. You were a phase. A passing fancy. An odd fascination. You would never make it to May. You’d be lucky if you made it to January without losing his interest entirely.
You crumpled the soggy paper in your fists and threw it in the trash. Blinking back tears, you pressed your hand to the door and took one deep, final breath as you prepared to face the world again — to put on your mask and perform in front of twenty pairs of judging eyes.
The gap was enormous. Cavernous and treacherous. He deserved someone he could be with in public. Someone he could take to a park or a movie. Someone he could go to fucking prom with.
With a ragged exhale, you pressed open the door.
He deserved someone his own age.
The hall was a flurry of slamming lockers, a scattering of the few straggling students who rushed to find their classrooms. The wind cooled your heated face as you marched, one foot in front of the other, to your post. Shoulders back, deep breaths, sore feet making echos off the polished tile.
He’d get tired of you too.
Click.
Click.
They always do.
Click.
Click.
Click.
Click.
The hall stretched on like an Escher drawing, twisting and distorting in your vision as you neared your classroom door. Tears threatened your lashes, and you huffed them away with a determined shrug of your shoulders.
As your fingers grazed the cold metal handle, you caught your own eyes in the glass. Sad and droopy, welling with longing and resentment. On the other side you could already hear the commotion, the questions, the stares, the awkward silence. The bell rang again — a final warning.
With a heavy sigh, you turned the handle.
______
Eddie twisted the ridged dial of his locker in his fingers, left and right until he heard a click. Popping the door open and slinging his backpack forward on his shoulder, he unloaded three weighty textbooks into the dark, cluttered enclosure. He grabbed his thick, leather coat, tucked it under his arm, and slammed the door shut.
In the absence of the books, and of the dimming noise as it filtered out through the front doors and into the parking lot, he felt another weight lift in him. In a matter of minutes, the mindless chatter, the tried scenery of this dull prison, the days worth of stares that clung to him like glue would fall away as he passed the threshold of your door.
With every step he took, Eddie felt lighter. The slamming lockers didn’t phase him, the weird looks from freshmen went right through him, even the shoulder check from a jock coming around the corner glanced right off. In a million years he never would have expected to feel relieved to stay after school, or a pep in his step as he approached a classroom, but in a million years he never expected to find you behind the big desk.
He could feel the warmth already as he approached your open door. Hear your laughter at his stupid jokes, feel the heat of your arm graze his, catch your hand, and you, by surprise. But when he turned into threshold, knuckles raising out of habit to rap against it, he was met with a different scene.
You didn’t look up. Not even when tapped his knuckles to the wood in a shave-and-a-haircut—two-bits pattern. Head cast down over a sea of papers, you looked like you were drowning. He padded slowly toward the big desk, face dropping as he noticed another detail: the wooden folding chair—his chair—sat empty and open. Across from you.
Eddie dropped his backpack to the floor with a heavy thump, making his presence known. “Hey,” he started, tentative and cautious.
It wasn’t until he was practically towering over you that you finally looked up at him, face heavy, expressionless, tired. “Hey,” you stated plainly.
Eddie craned his head and searched your eyes. “You ok?”
You blinked and swallowed. “Yeah, everything’s fine.”
He stood like this a moment, vision locked with yours, dark eyes roving, searching. When you offered nothing more, he simply nodded once, strolled around to the front of your desk, grabbed the back of the chair with a determined slap, and dragged it around to where it belonged — beside you.
He took his place in it; draping his coat over the back of it like always, creaking the wood with his weight as he plunked himself down.
You resumed wading through the sea, heavy gaze cast over it.
Eddie toyed with a pencil on your desk, tapping the eraser to the wood as his eyes bored a hole into the side of your head. You just kept on roving, shoulders tense, lips worried. He could have been invisible, watching you from a hole in a poster, or a crack in the wall. You offered him the same level of attention. “Something’s wrong,” he confronted, unable to take the frigid silence for a moment longer.
You sighed and set your pen down. “I’m sorry, it’s just…” your hand worried the back of your neck, “…a lot, this time of year, work wise.” Your eyes met his only for a second before casting downward again at the pages. “Here, let me clear this up.” Your hands busied themselves with the mess, shuffling the paper into a clumsy, hurried pile.
“No—no, it’s…it’s ok.” He scooted his chair closer, feeling so useless all of a sudden, burdensome, like his presence added to your task load. He wanted to help, to alleviate the tension, but his hands simply fumbled in his lap as you collected the clutter with your chalk dusted knuckles. As you tapped the pile of papers against the desk in haste to form a semblance of a pile, his hand gained a mind of its own.
As if possessed by its own separate consciousness, an impulse deep and thrumming with the need to soothe, it took up refuge in the place between your shoulders; warm and firm, drawing slow, caring circles at your blouse.
You froze, papers stiff against the surface, gaze straight ahead. His hand followed suit, freezing, twitching, arm locked in its extension.
“Y-you should—” you stuttered, blinking wildly as you found your breath. “Why don’t you go grab your schoolwork?” you asked with a curtness that startled him.
Eddie lurched his hand away like you were a hot stove. “I—I’m sorry I just… w-wanted to help. I’m sorry.” His mind became a whirlpool, swirling with worry as his stomach did backflips. He fumbled with the zipper on his backpack.
“No—no, Eddie, I’m… I’m sorry,” you lamented.
He’d never seen your face so fraught. Like you’d stepped on a cat’s tail, chased it through the house with apologies.
“It’s not your fault, it’s…” You swallowed, breaking his gaze. You couldn’t finish the sentence. You didn’t need to.
Mine.
He was losing you.
He should have expected it by now. What could he possibly offer you anyway? His hand? A few stolen moments? Some flirty comments to make you feel good about yourself for a second or two?
He wondered when the other shoe would drop. When you would open your eyes and see this for what it really was — that you were a grown ass woman with a college degree and a real career, and he was twenty years old repeating his senior year of high school for the third fucking time, selling drugs to teenagers, and oh, your student for fuck’s sake.
It wasn’t lost on him; that he was playing tee-ball in a big league stadium. He stared into the crumpled contents of his backpack with a deep, shaking breath, and pulled out his notebook. It fell from his hand with a dejected slap against the big desk; juvenile amidst the tidy assortment of office supplies. The spiral was bent and crumpled, the cover worn soft from abuse. He sat there a moment and stared at it as the heavy silence swallowed you both.
Your lips hardened to a bitter line, eyes cast down over the evidence of your position. Over the evidence of his. You wouldn’t look at him, like you were afraid to. Finally, after a suffocating minute, you spoke — frigidly professional. “What do you want to work on today?”
The question sent a hot rage coursing through him. So that was it, then? Business as usual? Pretending like nothing happened? That none of this was real? Eddie sat back in his seat and boiled with a gaze so intense it could have burned right through you. He wouldn’t give you the satisfaction of an answer. Not until you gave him enough respect to look him in the eyes when you asked the question.
You just sat there, frozen, shoulders locked, eyes cast down at the big desk for an agonizing moment that stretched well past the point of comfort. His gaze was unrelenting, fueled by stubborn indignation. You felt it. He knew you did, because when you finally did submit your eyes to him, you flinched.
He almost felt bad for it. For causing you to shrink so small, to look so fragile, like how you did when you’d relinquished a fragment of your past, when the impulse to soothe you drove him to your hand. The impulse rose again, as did some annoyance by it; the grip you had on him, even in his most determined anger.
“What?” you choked out, barely above a whisper.
You knew damn well what. The audacity to ask sent heat coursing through his veins again, but the look in your eyes, like cornered prey, quelled the fire enough to sigh his way to a level-headed response. “You’re acting different,” he said simply.
You swallowed, breaking his gaze like you’d been caught. It would be insulting to deny it. He could see the gears turning over in your head, the thoughts forming careful words behind your eyes, but in the end, all you could muster was, “I’m sorry.”
It was a weak admission. It answered nothing, really, other than confirming his suspicions. But it was something. He wanted to press, to poke, to pry, and get to the bottom of what caused this shift in you, but in the silence of the classroom, with floors that echoed and walls that listened, words like “you won’t let me touch you,” seemed too far too direct, far too pointed. In the end, it was your eyes that said the most; welling like pools with all the words he knew would pierce the ever thinning veil, poke holes in your shared secrets, make them monstrous and real.
In the end, your eyes just tugged him forward, made him soft and pliant until all he could muster was decency. “It’s…” he sighed, raking his hand through his hair, “it’s fine.” Soft as he intended it, he couldn’t hide the broken edge.
There was little relief in sigh you gave, heavy and ragged. Your fingers grazed the curled, beaten corner of his notebook with a caring reverence that made him wish that he was paper.
He wondered how much longer it could go on like this, before you craved something more than he could offer. Before you tired of secret touches and passing glances. Before some hot-shot with a convertible saw you at a bar somewhere and swept you away. The crushing realization hung heavy in the space between you, the gap more cavernous than ever.
Eddie twisted his rings in his lap, fingers burning. It was a miracle you’d let him touch you to begin with. But you did, and he had, and by god, he refused to go back. He couldn’t, he wouldn’t. Not when you’d let him into your world, given him more than he ever thought possible — a sliver of hope. For you. For himself.
When the silence became too much for him to bear, he broke it with your name.
Your first name.
Bitter grief melted to soft shock as your lips parted, eyes widened. At last, he had your full attention.
With a deep breath, he started. “I don’t… know what happened. If it’s something I did o-or something someone said, or, fuck,” he ran hand through his hair, exasperated, words trailing off into nothing.
“Eddie,” you started, eyes softening deeper; into sympathy, into pity. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”
“Then why won’t you look at me?” he snapped, but the quiver in his voice betrayed him.
You swallowed, shaking your head, but before you could give an answer he didn’t want to hear, he continued.
“I know, it—it’s ludicrous, this whole thing. To think that I—” he breathed a bitter laugh, “that you,” he glanced at the door.
But instead of shutting him down with the ugly truth, you leaned closer, like your whole world hinged on him. He saw it then, hope, glimmering like a golden treasure in the tremble of your lips, in the pinching of your brow, in the welling of your eyes that threatened to spill over.
“I know,” you whispered, like it caused you pain.
Slowly, Eddie raised his hand to rest on top of his notebook, a fractional distance from yours. Close enough to feel your heat, to catch the subtle tremble of your knuckles. So transfixed by the curve of your delicate fingers beside the broad, ruddy angles of his, that had he not dared to draw his eyes away, he might have missed the tear that pinched through your lashes when you closed them.
Slowly, bravely, he inched his pinky forward. Just close enough to graze yours. It was a phantom of a touch, but you didn’t pull away. In fact, when he looked up, he was surprised to see a whisper of a smile. A sad, soft thing, like it was breaking through layers to surface. Emboldened, he raised his pinky, ever so slightly, to gently stroke yours. The gesture was small and silly, but enough to earn a puff of laughter through the smile that cracked the gloom upon your features.
It opened up a narrow passage, and he entered with the boldest thing that he had ever said.
Maybe it was the fact that he was too stubborn, or perhaps too stupid for his own good, but the sheer audacity of what came out of his mouth next surprised even himself. “Um, my band is playing at the Hideout tomorrow—a-and—” he swallowed, gaining composure as he raised his eyes to your level with conviction. “I want you to come.”
It was all he could offer. An experience.
Your jaw dropped.
“I think—I-Iwant you to see some of the new stuff we’ve been working on. I think you’d like it,” he peddled on.
“Oh, Eddie I—” you shook your head. “I don’t know, I mean—”
He doubled down, brows level and serious. “We—we don’t have to come together. Hell, bring a friend, bring several. It doesn’t have to be a big deal if we don’t make it a big deal. People go to bars all the time.”
As you worried your lips in your teeth, he could see the scales tipping back and forth, weighing the odds and risks against the want. “Oh god, I don’t know.”
“You’re allowed to exist in public. You don’t just like… fold your arms and retreat into the walls here at night,” he laughed.
It snapped a chuckle out of you, like sunlight peeking through the clouds. “Oh yeah? Tell that to the students I run into at the grocery store,” you quipped. Then, as quickly as the sunlight came, the clouds were back. You surveyed the room and dropped your eyes in pensive worry.
Eddie stroked his pinky over yours, slowly, sweetly. “Please?”
You gave him a look, one that threatened resistance but hiding just beneath it, surrender.
“It doesn’t have to be a big deal,” he persuaded, “just me on stage, and you in the audience cheering with your girlfriends or whatever, well, hopefully cheering. I mean ‘Hand of Doom’ is still a crapshoot sometimes but,” he breathed a laugh.
With a chuckling shake of your head, your resolve crumbled like sand in front of his eyes.
“You can boo us too, wouldn’t be the first time. We’ve got tough skin.”
You rolled your eyes and laughed. “I’m not gonna boo you.”
A wicked grin cracked like lightning across his face. “Not gonna, you mean you’ll come then?”
You sighed, deep and heavy, shifting the scales back and forth.
Eddie tipped his head and raised his eyebrows. “You know you want to.”
“Of course I want to,” you deadpanned.
His umber eyes glimmered, wild and auspicious. “Well then, do what you want,” he said, sitting back in his seat like the decision was easy.
Want. A shelved, forgotten thing, like something you’d lost in the move. Something you’d tucked away long before that. Left to grow stale inside a box, in the back of a closet, in a place you barely remembered.
It sat beside you now, loud and unignorable, with lips that begged and eyes that pleaded. And you, in all your years of practiced discipline, could no longer deny it.
Eddie Munson; wildfire. Restless, frenetic, warm, and compelling.
With a dignified sigh, and a verdant conviction that peeked through the ash, you turned to him at last, and surrendered.
______
A/N: So begins the craziest week in the whole story. Two words: Donkey Kong. 😈
The next chapter might take me a little longer than usual just because it's a moment we've all been waiting for and I want to make sure it's absolutely perfect.
Also, I've been featured on a PODCAST so if you want to hear me talk about this story and specifically the appeal of reader insert fics, check it out HERE!
✨ As always, nothing encourages me to continue writing this story more than hearing from you. Seriously, please give me your thoughts, your theories, your keyboard smashes. Hit up my inbox, my DMs, whatever suits your fancy.
summary you’re a not so single mom living three trailers down. eddie thinks you’re the prettiest girl he’s ever seen. queue movie night, a good sandwich, a better cry, and the best birthday party ever. [23k]
warnings afab!reader, fem!reader, mom!reader, mention of implied period/menstruation, money worries, unhealthy eating habits (not finding the time), food insecurity, physical/emotional fatigue. fluff heavy, love confessions, emotional hurt/comfort, idiots in love, slight angst.
𓆩❤︎𓆪
Eddie's carrying so much stuff he can barely see over the top of it, let alone open your front door. He stands fumbling at the top of the porch steps, hoping you'll hear the sounds of his arrival and come to help.
You must be in your room or the bathroom, as no one comes to save him. Eddie can hear the echo of the TV from the living room, kid's cable or one of Junie's VHS tapes, as well as the pulling sound of the pipes under the trailer. A faucet must be running.
When he finally manages to open the door, he's expecting to see you in the kitchenette with your back to him, humming as you clean the dishes and in your own little world.
You're not there, to his surprise.
Eddie puts all of his things on the kitchen table, takes off his shoes, and goes looking for you. There aren't many rooms to search, only your bedroom and the bathroom. He can hear running water the closer he gets to the bathroom, so he knocks on the door.
"Sweetheart, you in there?"
The tap turns off abruptly. The door opens, and Eddie frowns at the lack of you, finding only empty air. He looks down to find Junie standing there in the gap, short and small and completely soaked.
He can tell immediately what she's been up to, some mischievous playing while you're distracted elsewhere. She has a look on her face like she's both thrilled to see him and sorry to be caught.
Eddie bends down. “Hi, sweetheart. What are you doing?" he asks.
"Cold!" She giggles, wielding her wet palms at him threateningly.
He takes her little hands in his. "Freezing!" he agrees.
Eddie pulls a towel off of the hand towel rail and quickly rubs it up and down her wet arms. She's still in her clothes from daycare, which isn't necessarily unlike you. If she's having a shower tonight, you'll be waiting until after to change her into her clean pyjamas.
He checks his watch with a frown. It's well past bath time.
"Where's mom?" he asks.
"She's sleeping," Junie whispers, bringing a finger to her lips. "Shh."
Ah. That makes sense. He hangs the towel back on the rail and takes one of Junie's still-cold hands in his, walking her to your bedroom, where the door is closed. You wouldn't have closed it, not while June was in another room.
Eddie squeezes her hand fondly. She's becoming quite the deviant. He wonders if it's his fault.
He opens the door and sighs when he sees you, feeling sorry for his girl, all curled in on yourself sitting on the bedroom floor with a pile of unfolded laundry in your lap. He can imagine the ache brewing in your back, worse than the usual and persistent twinge you've mentioned between your shoulder blades.
Eddie kneels down beside you. Junie follows suit without instruction. Even her socks are wet, her soggy heel cold against his thigh.
"Y/N," he says softly, easing his hand under your chin.
He hooks his fingers behind your ear and lifts your heavy head, leaning forward to straighten you up. You rouse with a frown.
"What time is it?" you ask after a moment. Your voice barely comes out.
"Nearly seven. Are you feeling okay?" he asks, pushing your shoulders against the bed behind you for support, his hand falling to the juncture of your neck. Your skin is clammy. Your brow twists. "You coming down with something again?"
"Just tired," you mumble.
You close your eyes and cover them with one hand.
There's something to be said about it, how that, a few months ago, you would've sprung up to finish what you were doing, explaining to him in rushed tones that you don't usually fall asleep like that, you would never leave Junie unattended: he knows already. You're a parent, not a superhero (though sometimes he thinks you're both) —you aren't infallible. You get tired, and you try your best. Eddie wouldn't ever think that you don't. He certainly wouldn't think you're a bad parent for falling asleep sitting up in the middle of a chore, and you know that now. You know you can sit there and gather your bearings without explanation. That he'll look after you and Junie whenever you need him to.
A little shimmer of pride brims at the realisation.
He rubs your throat with his thumb before sitting back. Junie climbs into his lap and leans her soaking front into his chest, cold enough that Eddie quickly covers her with his arms in an attempt to warm her.
"What have you been up to?" he asks her.
She hums, pleased, and babbles about the water. "It dwas… it was cold and fast," she emphasises.
"You're not supposed to be in the bathroom without mommy."
"She's sleeping," Junie says quizzically. Like the rules don't apply when you're not awake to uphold them.
"I'm not sleeping," you say.
"You're still not supposed to be in there without me or mom," Eddie says, giving her a playful glare. "Now you're all wet."
Junie buries her face in his neck, hiding from his mild scolding and possibly trying to soak up some of his warmth. You rub your eyes.
You're in your work uniform with dishevelled hair, but you look cute anyhow.
Eddie pats Junie's back, unperturbed by her damp clothes. She's warming up the longer she sits there.
He supposes her willingness to simply sit and be cuddled is a conditioning of your unending affection. You're always praising and kissing and stroking her hair out of her face, always carrying her around when she could easily walk. You're ridiculously touchy, like a sponge for love. You want it just as often as you give it. He and Junie are both happy to humour you.
Eddie takes the initiative. He gives June a toss to the middle of your made bed and smiles when she giggles, grabbing a change of clothes for her from the wardrobe, and then a change of clothes for you. He's almost completely familiar with your wardrobe these days, having made multiple adoring contributions to it. Selfishly, maybe, he grabs a shirt he knows he got you, as well as a newer pair of pyjama pants.
You still haven't managed to stand when he finishes, but you've turned to see Junie, making kissy faces at her as you tickle the sole of her foot.
"My girl's all wet," you're saying, not a lick of tiredness in your voice. You hide it from her easily. "What trouble have you been up to while mommy slacked off, huh? You're soooo bad, I'm gonna have to lock you up."
Junie giggles thickly as she crawls toward you. You can't reach her foot when she turns but you aren't bothered, tickling her arms and sides instead. You and Junie stay like that for a second, eye to eye, Junie on her front and you hiding your mouth in the sheets like a cowboy shootout, waiting for someone to give in.
Junie shrieks with laughter and you sit up in time to stop her from headbutting you, gathering her up into your arms to kiss her forehead.
"Sorry," you say, to Eddie's displeasure. "Mommy's silly, huh, falling asleep when you're still awake?"
"She's human," he corrects lightly.
"Baby," you say, like you're going to say more. You don't, you just smile at him.
"Do you want me to have her? You can shower by yourself, have some 'me-time'?"
"No… she needs a bath. Don't you?" you ask her.
"Do you want me to–"
"Eddie," you say, struggling to stand with Junie in your arms, "I don't want anything. Except…"
He bounds the two steps it takes to get his arms around you both and plants a huge kiss on your cheek. You visibly relax, better when he presses a much softer one against the corner of your mouth.
"Except a kiss?" he asks into your skin.
You sound flustered, "Except a kiss. Another one. Please."
He pulls back enough for you to turn into his kiss and align your lips properly for a chaste peck.
"Hello," he says.
"Hi, baby," you say, shy even now.
"Hi." He steals another kiss. Junie makes a noise of offence and he dots one on her appled cheek. Her lips perk into a smile. "Girls. Let's get our movie night back on track. I brought presents."
You groan and Junie cheers. Finally getting to grips with certain words even if she hasn't said them aloud yet, Junie is well aware as to what presents are. She gets enough of them (to your chagrin).
"What did I say? Presents are for special occasions," you say mildly.
"Movie night is–"
"Not a special occasion."
"Kind of is. Especially if we make it a tradition. If you really don't want them then I'll take them back," he says. He really means it, no guilt trip involved.
You look down at Junie, back up at him, and puff out a theatrical breath.
"Sorry, I've made it hard to say no," he says.
"Don't be sorry. Thank you for the presents, really. We'll look after a shower, okay?" you ask, darting up to give him a quick kiss and then nudging him aside.
"I'll make dinner real quick while you shower and you can open your presents after that." He catches your sleeve. "Deal?"
"Deal."
Another round of kisses are exchanged. Kisses like a first love, excited and quick and wanting a little bit more each time.
You leave for the bathroom to set up Junie's fold out baby bath in the shower and fill it with water. He smiles on his way back down the slim hall to the kitchen at the sound of her laughter, hidden beneath the hurried rain of the shower head.
Eddie makes two cans of vegetable soup with pasta shapes in a saucepan on the stove, cooking it through and letting it simmer while he waits for you.
The bathroom door opens. He gives it a minute before pouring the soup into bowls, knowing it'll take you a while to powder and lotion you and your baby, especially when getting her into jammies lately has been like clothing an eel.
A few minutes later, Junie comes sprinting down the hall quick as a lightning bolt, barefoot to stop from crashing face first into a cabinet. You have no clue why, but lately she's extremely energetic. You've done some more baby-proofing around the house to avoid injury, moving tables completely out of her way and sticky taping your rug in the living room flat to the floor so she can't slip over it at speed, but nothing works as well as bare feet for good grip. Not even dragon themed grippy socks, Eddie laments. They looked so cool.
He pours soup into three bowls and adds a splash of cold water from the faucet to Junie's, giving it a good stir and dipping the tip of a clean pinky finger in it to check it's not hot.
"Hi, trouble," he greets, following her into the living room with her bowl. "You want some dinner?"
He doesn't give her much chance to answer, grabbing her up in his free arm with a heaving groan and carrying her like a curled weight to the sofa. She's giggly to a fault, happy to be shuttled from one place to another if there's a kiss or some food promised at the end.
He sets her down, puts the bowl on his thigh, and pulls out the bib he'd tucked into his pocket to secure it nice and loose around her neck. He's careful not to get any of her hair in the velcro.
"Tada!" he says. "Let's get eating."
Junie's amazing. Eddie lifts a spoon and her lips part expectantly. He could let her eat by herself, she's old enough and she's getting much better with a spoon, but he wants to avoid the mess and get her fed quickly. She's eaten every last morsel by the time you emerge. He's more pleased than he started, because you trust him to do this while you get dressed without rushing, and you'll allow yourself the luxury of ten minutes alone.
Your footsteps sound across the kitchen. You turn into the living room, your face tacky with something, and even from the middle of the room Eddie can smell your deodorant and moisturisers, maybe even the lingering scent of conditioner on your hands.
"My poor baby was so hungry," you say upon seeing Junie's empty bowl. You kiss the top of her head. "Sorry, Junie. Good thing Eddie's here to take such good care of you, hmm?" You kiss her cheek. You lean over her head and kiss Eddie's. He's about to start running a temperature, you're so affectionate tonight. "Thank you."
"Don't," he says gently.
You straighten up. Like you've been caught in a trap, you stop suddenly and peer down at him, hiding your smile with a pout. He's already seen it, but he lets you get away with it.
"Your bangs are growing long again," you say, brushing them away from his forehead.
You comb down the lengths of his curls with your fingers, partitioning the tangles with care.
"Maybe you can trim 'em for me tomorrow," he says.
Your eyes light up. "Yeah, for sure."
"Good. Our soup is getting cold."
"Oh, gotcha. I'll warm it up. You want more, junebug? More soup?"
Junie doesn't answer, distracted by the TV. She's stopped bothering to support herself, her weight splayed over Eddie's thigh, her soup-stained cheek dangerously close to his pants. He has to admit that since knowing you a lot of his clothes have been stained irredeemably. He doesn't worry about the sweatpants, though. It's only soup.
Eddie thumbs hair out of her face and smiles.
"She could probably eat more."
You know it already, but he says it because it feels nice to say. Plus, you like it. You'd told him so, a whispered admission sometime last week.
I like that someone else worries about her, you'd said, your lips soft on his naked bicep, your face hidden by the lack of light and a few of his rogue curls. I like that you take some of the load. I'm sorry if that's not fair.
Baby, he'd said, voice gritty with how much he meant it, it's not unfair. I'm happy to do it. And I know you're not expecting it from me.
No, you'd said quickly.
I know. He'd kissed the top of your head, laughed against your skin, his breath fanning every which way. Don't think about it like that, like it's costing me something.
I'm not saying it costs anything. I know it does, even if you don't feel it. And I'm not saying she isn't easy to love 'cos she is, but loving someone and taking care of them are different, and I know you want to do it–
Eddie had cut you off, sitting up enough that you'd been forced to take your weight off of his shoulder where you'd been laying down across the well-loved couch. He'd felt a familiar spring under his thigh as he shifted, the TV painting your face in a milky white that had your eyes shining like gemstone.
I do want to do it, he'd affirmed. You guys– you're my girls. Eddie could've told you he loved you right then and there. He's sure you already knew. Why are you worrying about this stuff?
Have to worry about something. These days my options are slim pickings, thanks to you.
He'd pulled you in for a hug, trying to squeeze the misplaced gratitude out of you uselessly. He's happy you're happy, happy you feel like he's draining your impossible levy, but he doesn't want you thinking you owe him anything. That's not why he's with you.
You trek back into the kitchen with Junie's empty bowl and spoon, your pyjama pants slightly too long for you and dragging across the floor. You hadn't been with him when he bought them —he eyeballed. They fit around your waist and thighs just fine, but both of the pairs he got that day are too long.
Eddie wipes Junie's face with the end of her bib and reluctantly hands her over when you return, reheated soup in hand. You swap him for his own bowl and feed Junie whatever she wants from yours, blowing on each spoonful as you go.
"How was work today, sugarpea?" he asks between bites of pasta.
"No," you say immediately.
"Not a sugarpea fan?"
"Not when you say it like that," you tease.
"What about sweetcheeks?" He grins at your grim expression. "It's not that different to sweetheart, 'n' you like that one."
You glance at him over Junie's head. "I think I'm used to sweetheart. You say it enough. Sweetcheeks is like a foreign object my brain is rejecting on the grounds that it is super duper weird." You smile as you talk and your voice takes shape through it, all smooth and silky and warm.
"Honeybuns?" he tries, nearly choking on a pasta shape when you laugh. He can't help himself; whenever you laugh he instinctively wants to join in.
"Work was fine," you say, stealing a big spoonful of soup. Junie huffs. "It was good, really, I got an amazing tip from Bernard, you know Bernard?"
"Bernard," he repeats menacingly.
"Your competition. He gave me twenty dollars 'n' told me to put it in the Junie jar, so that was awesome. Now my little lady's gonna get some new shoes."
You don't like handouts you haven't worked for. It's why his gifts can be hard to accept, as much as you appreciate them. Eddie insisted months ago that being friends was 'doing things for other people', and letting people do things for you —as in, letting him buy you small presents is actually a service to him and a credit to you.
You don't necessarily like it. You like presents, most people do, but you don't like his spending money on you because of some ill-conceived notion that you can't deserve them. It's why Eddie doesn't go out and spend his wages on the things that you want willy-nilly. It would embarrass you, put you out, and that's the last thing he wants. So while he's in a place where he's fortunate enough to have disposable income, and he doesn't think twice about spending it on the people he loves, he does think about how it makes you feel.
But boyfriend privileges are very real. The step up he took from a friend who's suspiciously affectionate to an actual proper boyfriend is large and luxurious —he gets away with doing a lot more than he could beforehand. Eddie can put gas in your car, pay for breakfast, bring by a gallon of laundry detergent when you're running low without a word of protest. It's little things, and they mean a lot to him.
He thinks they might mean a lot to you, too.
So he would buy Junie new shoes if she needed them, but she doesn't. If she did, you would've got them already. You want her to have new shoes, and you're saving up for a nice fancy pair that she'll grow out of within the year. You should take pride in that. There's nothing so sweet as treating your daughter.
"How come I can't contribute to the Junie jar?" he asks in a playful whine.
"Don't start with me, Munson. You tipped me ten dollars for a coffee yesterday, don't think I didn't notice. And the coffee was for me," you say, smiling still.
He grins down at his soup and kicks his socked foot against yours.
"That wasn't me," he lies. With no effort involved, the end result is lackluster.
"Yeah, well, it wasn't Davey," you say.
Davey's a grumpy regular. He never tips.
"It could've been. Maybe he had a change of heart. And, biassed as I may be, you are a very pretty waitress. I'd tip you if I was allowed," he flirts.
You turn the spoon in your hand so the well is toward your chest and pretend to load it at him like a trebuchet.
He wimps out, "June, mom's attacking me! Mommy's trying to get soup on me!"
"Am not!" you protest.
The damage is already done. Junie, her face a mirror of your own but smaller and with eyes a little bigger in their framing, glares at you and tries to take your spoon, babbling an outraged, "No no no!"
You make a funny squeaking sound and drop the spoon back in the bowl, your lips parted in mock shock.
"You don't really believe him, do you?" you ask, your bubbly talk saccharine. "Baby, I'm just playing."
She's your number one fan. The sound of your voice would win back her affections by itself, but your lovely smile, your hand behind her back, it's instantaneous. Junie forgets all about the imminent danger he's in and puts her hand on your chin. You close your eyes.
"Mommy, can we have kisses?" she asks.
"How many?" you ask, delighted. It's rhetorical. Eddie finishes his soup and you kiss her cheeks so many times he reckons you'll have dry lips, humming, "Mwah, mwah, mwah," as you go.
He'll make you something else tonight to make up for how little soup you've had. It's not a substantial meal either way, and he knows Benny feeds you well at work, but it's been a long time since lunch rush.
Junie wiggles out of your grip and drops to the floor, clearly having had enough kisses.
Eddie doesn't see what she's doing from the kitchenette where he's carried all the dirty dishes, but he listens intently to her babble talk, new words popping up in her chatter every day. She says, "Mr. Bear," and "pretty," and "let's go!" between gibberish.
"Oh, hey!" Eddie calls to be heard over the running water of the sink and the TV.
He can see your head through a gap between the counter and the cabinets attached to the ceiling. You turn at his voice, arms across the back of the sofa, chin resting on your hands. "Yeah?"
"She said, 'fast'!" he tells you. "When I grabbed her from the bathroom, she said the water was cold and fast. That's a new one."
"The bathroom. I need a lock. Do you have anything?"
"Do I have a lock? Maybe."
You nod hurriedly, eyebrows pinched in stress . "It's an accident waiting to happen. I had no idea she could reach that handle, I don't want her in there when I can't see her."
"Don't worry, we'll nab one of those child locks from the store tomorrow if it bothers you."
You're quiet for a moment. "I shouldn't have fallen asleep."
"You couldn't help it," He puts a dish down on the rack. "It's not a crime to nod off, I do it all the time. It was an accident."
"It doesn't matter. She can't be alone with water, it's dangerous."
"You said it yourself, you had no idea she could even get in there. Now you know, you'll make sure it doesn't happen again." He turns off the faucet, trying to snub your self-annoyance before it twists into something cruel. "Yeah?"
You hum.
He wipes his hands dry on a rag and slides around the kitchen counters, back into your living room. Your eyes flash wide as he approaches. You know what he's gonna do, tucking your arms away as he drops into your lap. "Woah," you groan.
"You're a good mom," he says seriously, shuffling back so his weight is on a couch cushion rather than your tired thighs. "I mean it, you're a good mom. You fell asleep. It happens, okay? Don't punish yourself for something that didn't happen. We can jam the door closed with a sock or something tonight, and I promise you she won't get in there again."
You bunch one of his legs in your lap to rest your mouth against his knee. He holds himself up with one arm, watching you relax with relief.
"She said 'fast'?" you ask, turning your face so your cheek is on his knee instead. Her building vocabulary excites you endlessly. You've been practicing descriptors.
"She said that the water was cold and fast," he says. She would know, she made your floor into a slip and slide.
"She's a genius." You rub your cheek against his pants. "I knew it."
He flops back into the couch cushions, arms behind his head. "Yeh. You can't help yourself, can you? Making that girl cooler every day."
You pinch his thigh. "Lay off."
He's serious and joking at the same time. It's a very cheesy thing to say and it isn't untrue. It's the juxtaposition of every parent, he supposes, the insurmountable task they perform on such a grand scale. It looks impossible, and yet people have been managing it for thousands of years anyways. At varying levels of success, sure.
He hasn't lied to you once. You're a good mom and you're raising a sweetheart, and while neither one of you could care less about Junie being an actual 'genius', singing her praises is a pass time you love.
He isn't tired enough to fall asleep sitting up, yet slouched down as he is with your hands on his legs stroking slow lines feels like a blanket has been thrown over him, fresh from the dryer. Speaking of…
"Can I give you the gifts now? I promise they're not too much," he says.
"Can I tell you something first?" He nods. You hug his knee to your chest and look him straight in the face, unabashed. "You have a really nice voice, Eddie. Listening to you talk, I don't know. You could read me the yellow pages and I think I'd like it."
"Wait, are you flirting with me?" he asks, making a show of sitting up slowly.
"It's nice and deep. Not too much, but it is. And you say things in such a particular way sometimes, it makes me want to smile even when I've had a garbage day." You stroke down his thigh with a fingertip. "Everything about you is nice, but I wanted to tell you."
"Thank you," he says warmly. "I'm glad you think so. 'Cos when I'm around you, all I want to do is talk. And I mean that in the best way." Eddie sits up, bending at the waist so he can kiss your cheek. He doesn't move away immediately, pressing the bridge of his nose flat to your skin as he continues, "I want to hug you really badly right now, like, a make-your-spine-click kind of hug. Think I can do that?"
"Yes, please, it's not even hurting. You can hug me as much as you want."
Eddie shuffles forward on the couch to be near you, his cheek smushed against your ear as he wraps his arms around you in a hug. He goes over your shoulders. Even if it isn't hurting today he doesn't want to inspire any backache, and you return his hugging eagerly.
You smell like your favourite lotion. He breathes it in.
"You're sniffing me," you murmur.
"You smell nice," he murmurs back.
"You smell nice, too."
"I smell like sweat."
"A little."
He encourages your face into the crook of his neck, beaming. "You're so weird," he dotes.
"Sorry," you say, rather shyly.
You're not shy because he said you're weird —he says that stuff all the time and when he means it, it's adoring— you're sorry because you're genuinely embarrassed that you like how he smells, sweat included. He wants to kiss you forever.
"Don't you dare be sorry. It's my irresistible musk."
"Ew," you say, "ew, ew, ew. Musk is a gross word."
"Yeah?" he asks, giving your cheek a quick stroke with the side of his knuckle.
"Yes. Definitely banned around my daughter."
He snorts. "Like it's a curse word."
You run your hands in sync up and down his side, his t-shirt hiking up with each swipe. Your eyes have softened and renewed you, your earlier fatigue a memory without evidence. The fine wrinkles at the corners of your eyes smooth away.
"I'm so happy," you whisper.
He takes your elbows into his hands, thumbs rubbing at the crooks fondly. "Me too."
Your hands fall to his waist. Eddie's never been more content; he's so grateful to feel as he does, whole at your side, affectionate and aflame and in love with your every attribute. Your timid admission, your knowing smile.
"Can I give you your present now?" he asks.
You lean back into the couch, mumbling, "Oh, if you must," with a pleased smile.
"I must, my lady. It's imperative that you and your charge receive the most splendiferous of gifts in haste."
"Then so be it, my liege."
He's morphing you into a nerd one corny joke at a time.
Eddie stands up. His movement grabs Junie's attention from her toys and make-believe, the small girl climbing to her feet. She hops toward him, hands out in expectancy to be picked up.
"Two seconds, June, let me get your present first."
His bags are exactly where he left them on the kitchen table. He rummages through them to make sure he's presenting the right gift to the right girl, before yanking the present from the bag it came in and putting it out of Junie's reach.
"Here," he says, sliding his hand under the gift's cardboard fastening and ripping it open.
The blanket he's bought for her, big, gorgeously soft and made up of pastel pinks and oranges, puffs out and reaches the floor. Junie strokes it.
"It's so soft!" he encourages. "Isn't it soft, sweetheart? This is going to keep you nice and cozy tonight for our movie. Do you want me to wrap you up?"
He drapes it around her shoulders. Little kids are temperamental even if they aren't bad-spirited, and chances are that she doesn't even want it on her, but she smiles as he wraps it around her and lets out a happy line of sounds.
"Do you like that?" he asks, beaming.
She drops her cheek to her shoulder and rubs it, her eyes slipping closed in happiness.
"Eddie," she says sweetly, "it's soft." She says 'soft' clumsily, with lots of weight on the 'oft'.
Her adorableness often sucker punches him. He kind of assumed he'd felt everything there was to feel, but there's a particular kind of awe that comes with watching her grow, and experiencing nice things. She's endearingly enticed by the material, putting her hand under the blanket so she can pull it to her face and feel it against her nose. He can't see more than the corner of her mouth, but he can tell from the way her cheek apples that she's smiling at hum.
"I'm glad you like it, junebug."
"Will you tell him thank you?" you ask, hand on the wall, looking down at her with a similar fondness as he is. "Say, 'thank you, Eddie'."
Junie has a different plan. She pulls as much of the blanket as she can to her chest and waddles toward him, where she leans her face into his legs. Eddie covers the short breadth of her shoulders with one hand.
"Thank you," Junie says.
"Of course, sweetheart. You're very welcome. I'm so happy, you look really comfy. Now we can watch movies in style."
He turns to his second bag and yanks out another blanket, this one a solid dark grey. He doesn't know if he should, but he does the same as he'd done for Junie, tearing the cardboard fastening off of the blanket and shaking it out, before beckoning you forward and wrapping it around your shoulders. You smile, and you look like you could cry, not that you will but you could, your lips pressed together and your eyebrows gently furrowed.
He takes your face into both hands.
"That's an acceptable present?" he asks.
You turn your head, your lips pressed to the base of his thumb. He strokes the top of your cheek, the skin there smooth and dewy, fresh from the shower.
"Do you want a kiss?" he asks knowingly.
You fluster at being read that easily, "No, I… yeah, I do, I do, don't be smug, please…"
"I'm not smug, I wanna kiss you just as bad as you want me to, I'd crawl into your skin if I could–"
Your laugh is a shock, your chest shaking where it touches his, and he can't take it anymore. He kisses your smile, his lips clumsy and too eager, a total mismatch as you giggle into his touch.
He gives your cheek a good rub with his thumb.
"Thank you," you say.
He shakes his head. "Don't mention it."
"This is nice. Did you get one for yourself?"
He did. "I'd love to say I got one for myself 'cos I thought you'd accept it easier, but I wanted one. They're so soft."
"So soft," Junie says, slipping on the ends of her blanket as she wobbles toward your embrace. "Up?"
—
While the blankets that Eddie's brought for you are, in fact, so soft, they're much too warm when the three of you are laying on top of one another. Eddie's like a superheater to your left, Junie's a hot water bottle on your chest, and your hair is damp with sweat.
You wipe your face with your sleeve and sit up on the couch, hand behind Junie's dozing back.
"You okay?" Eddie asks, pulling his attention from the movie.
"Too hot."
"Pass me the baby." He says 'baby' dramatically, like she's one of the rings from his books, or the prodigal child.
You hand her over. She mumbles something but settles, her nose jabbed into Eddie's clavicle. He pats her back.
You shrug off the blanket and pull the collar of your shirt away from your neck, fanning yourself lightly. When you're feeling less like you're cooking you stand up, squinting in the dark. Now you've moved the table to the side of the room you don't have to worry about catching your calf on a corner, but it's still a death trap in here when you haven't put away the toys.
"Do you want another drink?" you ask.
"Please. Coke if there's any left," Eddie says.
You walk to the kitchen on tired legs to make two drinks. You hadn't wanted to think about it but you're really hungry, your stomach hurting with it. You open the fridge for the bottle of coke and cast your eyes over the contents. There's more fresh food than you're used to having, but tired as you are, you can't think of anything to make. Something quiet and easy for the late hour would be nice.
You hear as Eddie follows you in. You look over your shoulder to see if he's brought Junie with him. He's alone.
"You didn't eat much," he says.
"I know, that's what I'm looking for."
"I," he says, melodic, his elbow up as he scratches behind his neck, "will make you whatever you want."
"Really?" you ask.
"Sure. Or I could go get you something?"
"I don't want you driving alone at night," you say.
"It's not dangerous."
"No, I know, but I don't want you to leave."
"Good. Me neither." He joins you in front of the fridge. "I could make you a huge sandwich," he says. "I got some of the fancy cheese at my place."
"I'm not eating Wayne's cheese."
"I paid for it," he insists. "No, look, you have cheddar, pepperjack, we don't need fancy cheese. Let me make you a sandwich."
You slip your hand behind his back and squeeze.
Eddie kind of grabs you, all jokes, and pushes you down into a chair like he thinks you're trying to run away. "Stay there, fiend," he demands.
He makes you a sandwich. It's a simple pleasure to watch. He washes his hands, grabs all the fillings, and makes it carefully. It's too much care to be put into a sandwich. It makes your chest ache.
He browns it in the frying pan and presents it to you with little fanfare. Odd, for him.
"What, no, ta-da? No kiss?" you ask.
"I was trying to keep it classy," he says, bending down to kiss the skin shy of the corner of your eye. "Now eat, please. I worry about you."
He doesn't need to ask. He likely couldn't stop you. You're glad he's already your boyfriend, otherwise the speed with which you take your first bite might have put him off.
"Do you want half?" you ask.
"No, you eat that whole thing."
He puts your glass right next to you on the table. There's something unsaid in his gaze, not judgement but close.
"I've been busy," you defend.
"How much did you even eat today? You had breakfast, right?"
You nod, taking a sip of your drink, and size him up. "Munson."
"Did you, sweetheart? Honestly?"
"I did! Eddie, please don't worry," you say, pushing him toward the open chair rather than let him crowd you. "You know I'm eating properly, you feed me ten times a week."
Eddie sits, propping his foot up on the chair by your thigh, and stretches his arms across the table toward you. He flicks your elbow.
"I don't like thinking about you going hungry," he says.
"Then it's a good thing I'm not." You take a showy bite of sandwich.
"Promise?" he asks.
"Yes!" You pat his shin. "Promise promise. It was a busy day, but I had oatmeal and Benny made me a fancy salad, and now this. I'm all fed, thanks to other people. I'm lucky like that."
"You're not lucky. People want to take care of you because you take such good care of them," he says. You like how he says it, like it's no big deal.
"I just wish you'd take good care of yourself," he finishes, digging his heel into your thigh.
You squirm away from his attack, ditching the last couple of bites of your sandwich in favour of the paper towel he'd brought with your plate to wipe your fingers and mouth.
Clean, you get up from your chair before you can stop yourself and sit on one of his thighs, careful not to rest your full weight there.
"You're being dramatic," you say as you wrap your arms around his shoulders, nose close to his and getting closer. "I love that you worry about me, but you don't need to. Think of all the energy you're wasting on me that could be spent on your music, or your games."
Eddie pulls you into his lap properly.
"It's one game," he says, hooking you against him so you can't slide off of his legs. "Fine. I won't worry about you so much if you finish your sandwich. Cool?"
"Don't let me fall," you mumble, stretching back in his arms to grab your plate.
You slide it across the table, pick up the last quarter of your sandwich, and eat it there in his arms. He looks ridiculously happy to watch.
The night passes like that. No matter where you go it's in his arms. He calls you his barnacle and you like him so much you let it slide. You only part to carry Junie to bed, sliding her into her toddler bed with all the precision of a professional.
Eddie gets his hands on you soon after, pressing your back to his front as you brush your teeth half-asleep in the mirror opposite, his minty kisses pressed generously to the side of your head.
You don't remember getting into bed. When you wake up, it's to the sounds and smells of French toast, or Eddie's approximate version, a spatula scraping against the sides of your frying pan and Eddie singing a children's song. You scrunch your eyes together and groan as you turn into the sheets, hiding your head under the pillow from the noise. You love them, you're tired —maybe in half an hour you'll want to join in.
You're not sure how much time passes when you wake a second time. Rings slide across the curtain pole, quiet footsteps smushed into the carpet. You turn onto your side and pry your eyes open, lashes barely parted. A bleary slice of Eddie's back takes centre stage.
He shakes out Junie's blankets and tucks them in. He plumps up her pillow. Gentle, he rights her fallen teddies and sits them up one by one like proper gentlemen. His expression is handsome but blank.
Squared, Eddie moves away from Junie's bed to your forgotten pile of laundry. You'd fallen asleep folding it, and the unfolded stuff will no doubt be full of creases. He gathers everything into your laundry basket and heads for the door, not having looked your way once. You smile to yourself and close your eyes again, totally at ease.
The door creaks. You haven't managed to open your eyes when a hand is on your shoulder and pressing you into the mattress gently. Eddie kisses your forehead, before dipping down to rest his own against it, sealing in the kiss. He laughs under his breath.
"This is nice," you say, lips like glue, voice an incoherent mumbling.
"I thought you were awake," he says.
"I'm not."
He rubs your shoulder, a long and loving sweep. "Stay in bed as long as you want to. Me and June are gonna go outside and try soccer."
You groan and throw your arms around him tiredly, "No," you say, "you better help me up so I can change her diaper."
Eddie helps you sit up. You blink blink blink, and rub your eyes, and when you can see again you stand up. He follows you into the hall. You don't question it when he starts to clean you up from behind, stroking your hair and pulling your pyjama pants back up the hip they'd been falling down.
"I feel like I've been run over," you tell him.
You feel heaps better when you see the main section of the trailer.
The kitchen is clean. Sparkling. The living room is the same when you peer around to find Junie. She's standing on the couch, Eddie clearly having brushed her hair, the mess of the night before nowhere to be seen. He's taken care of everything while you slept.
You about to turn around and collapse on him in a hug, but Junie sees you and starts talking, taking big bounding steps across the couch cushions until she's at the end of the one closest to you. You step forward to greet her.
"Hellooo, lovely girl," you say, dragging her up the length of your chest to meet her eyes. "Eddie says you're gonna play soccer outside. Do you think that sounds fun?"
"I want mommy," she murmurs.
"I'm right here," you say. She pouts. "What, you want me to come and play soccer?" you ask. "I'll play soccer, baby, just let me get you changed first."
She isn't happy, but she perks up when she's clean again, double when you squeeze her into a dress and tell her how nice she looks.
"Eddie did your hair already, so there's nothing left for me to do," you say sweetly, brushing your hands down the length of her skirt. "You're all ready!"
Junie is less ready for soccer than you thought. Eddie runs down to his home to get a ball and you, having changed and eaten, sit down outside in the growing grass surrounding your trailer on a towel. The sun shines, the sky is a beautiful ocean blue, and Junie does not want to get up from your lap.
You're content to let her sunbathe, applying sun cream to her face, neck, arms and legs just in case and which she abhors, wriggling and whining as you coo at her. She calms as you rub it in.
"You'll thank me one day," you say with a small laugh.
Junie goes quiet. It's not like her, she's a babbler, but you sit in it with her rather than talk for a moment.
She looks like you.
She's happy, and loved. So much has changed since you moved here. She was always loved unconditionally, and nearly always happy, but she's growing. You both are.
You thought moving here would be good for her, but you never stopped to think it might be good for you too. Eddie terrifies you, or rather the idea of losing him does. You have these moments where you think about him and plot the possibilities, that one day you'll be waiting for him to come calling and he won't, or one day Junie will ask you where he is and you'll have nothing good to say. It's a catastrophisation if you've ever had one —you trust Eddie, you've let him into almost every aspect of your life. It goes without saying that you trust him not to hurt you.
But trusting him doesn't mean you can stop yourself from worrying about the future. You told him already, maybe it's being a mom or something, that your brain chooses a new thing to needle at every day, and you roll with it the best that you can.
Junie smiles at you.
"Mom… so pretty," she says. You stop short.
She does this sometimes. You've taught her a lump sum of conversational tidbits from everyday life. Like, "Don't touch, baby," often referring to something hot, or, "Wow! Look at you!" when she's in new clothes. Every time she says one back to you it makes you laugh, but this one hits you like a freight train, right in the heart.
"You think I'm pretty?" you ask.
You don't know if Junie even knows what pretty is. You say it to her so often, it might feel like a strand of "I love you," or even, "Good morning." Maybe she doesn't get it.
She sits up in your lap and reaches up for your face with both hands. You bend to let her.
"Pretty," she says again. She squeezes your cheek.
Maybe she doesn't understand. Or maybe she does. Yeah, she does. Your baby thinks you're pretty. You pour love into her unfailingly and she's giving you some of her own.
"You really think that?" you ask, smiling in her little palms. "Gorgeous girl, I love you. I love you love you."
"I love you," she says back.
"You do?" you ask, delighted and selfish because of course she loves you. You wanna hear it again.
"Yes." She drags the 's' sound, her eyes crinkled up. "Mommy," she says.
"Yeah?"
Her hands fall back onto her chest, and she sags against your thigh. "Mom?"
"What, baby? You want something? You want some juice?" She doesn't respond. "You want something yummy to eat?"
She says a string of words you don't understand. Not a lick of sense start to end. You sigh, duck your lips to her neck, and blow the biggest raspberry that you can. At the same time, you press your fingers into her underarms, tickling down her sides. You laugh at her sudden shrieking and blow another raspberry, and another one, struggling to draw breath as her giggles infect you completely.
"I got you," you tease.
"No, mommy!" she squeals, sounding more pleased than her pleas might suggest.
"I do, I have you!"
"It tickles a lot!"
"I have to tickle you, it's part of my job."
"Mommy," she says, almost breathless. You ease up. You don't want to wear her out.
"Mwah," you say, giving her a sorry kiss.
She laughs again. You think she might attempt another sentence —you can practically see the cogs of her brain turning behind her eyes— but she's cut off by a familiar voice.
"Girls! Y/N!" Eddie hollers. "They're having way too much fun without me."
You look up at his call, frowning at his odd phrasing, and are immediately startled to see he isn't by himself.
At one side of him stands a pale girl with brown hair cropped to her chin, in a mock biker jacket despite the heat carrying the promised soccer ball Eddie left to retrieve. A half step behind her is a taller guy with dark blonde hair, a smile on his face. You meet his eyes accidentally, forcing yourself to smile despite your confusion so he doesn't get the wrong idea.
They must be Eddie's friends. You've met Gareth, from his old band, and Melanie, one of the cooks from The Hideout, but you haven't met these guys.
"Y/N, sweetheart," he says, rather proudly, if you do say so yourself, "these losers caught me at home. Robin," —he points at the girl, who smiles with all her teeth— "my very good friend, and Steve, her leech."
"Hi," Steve says first, surprising you again. "And that's Junie?"
"That's Junie," Eddie says, again so proudly.
"Hi Junie," Steve says. He's smiling at you, sure, but he's beaming at your baby. "Holy– she's bigger than I thought, I kind of pictured a baby baby, you know?"
"I showed you a picture, man," Eddie says.
"She didn't look this old in the picture," Steve says. He looks heistant for a second. "Can we sit down?"
"Yeah– yes, yeah, please. Can I get you guys something to drink?" you say, sitting up too quick and almost tipping Junie out of your lap. She says, "Woah!" in her little voice and Steve, Robin and Eddie all laugh.
"I'll get drinks, don't worry," Eddie says.
He walks around your towel to head up the trailer steps. Steve sits on the grass by your towel, and Robin kneels with the ball in her hands opposite. Neither is dressed for the sunny weather but they don't seem to mind.
"It's nice to meet you," Steve says, giving Robin a weighted look.
"We've been asking," Robin says.
"I didn't know," you say apologetically.
"No, we know, you're like Munson's best kept secret half the time. One minute he's showing us your picture all smug but when we ask about you he just rolls his eyes."
"'Wouldn't you like to know,'" Robin quotes with a smarmy smile.
"So he doesn't talk about me?" you ask.
"He doesn't shut up," Steve says. "Sorry, we're kind of kidding."
"Oh–" Junie wriggles in your arms. Her face is in your neck, but she keeps turning to sneak peeks at these friendly newcomers. For once, being a mom is gonna save you from awkwardness rather than subject you to it further. "June," you say softly, "you wanna say hello? These are Eddie's friends. You can say hi, baby."
Junie isn't shy around new people. After your reassurance and a couple more seconds looking at them with mild suspicion, Junie turns her face to Robin and says, "Hi."
"Hi," she says back. "She's a really pretty kid. Me and Steve have worked at the video store for like, almost three years, and we see some uggos."
"Rob," Steve says.
"What?" Robin asks.
"You can't say that."
"Mom," Junie says.
You look down as she looks up. "What?"
"Where's Eddie?" she asks.
You lean back and turn her encouragingly toward the open trailer door. "He's inside. He's coming back."
"He…" She looks between you and the doorway. Her voice is quiet. "Play soccer and me?"
"Yeah, he's gonna play soccer with you."
"With me," she says.
You grin. "Exactly."
You've only ever had Junie, so you don't know what counts as slow or advanced or normal, but you know kids all go at their own pace, and that most get there eventually without help.
Your girl's never been quiet. She speaks even when she doesn't have the words. Daycare and your dedicated encouragement have brought it on suddenly, leaps and bounds of words, but she's still slightly behind, you think, although you trust that she'll get there when she can. Her vocabulary grows every single day.
"How old is she?" Robin asks, pulling her knees to her chest, soccer ball held in front of her shoes.
"Uh, she'll be three really soon," you say.
"Oh, she's kind of small," Steve says.
"You just said she was big," Robin says belligerently.
"I already said, she looks different in the picture," Steve says, frowning at Robin forcefully. "Does she look three to you?"
"Yeah, doofus," Robin says.
"Her birthday's in June, so it's really coming," Eddie says, a tray in hand you barely remember owning and bedecked in drinks.
He has four big lemonades and June's sippy cup, the pink one that was supposed to help her transition from bottles to cups and has yet to be progressed from further. Like always, these things take time.
"Can you believe that?" you ask. "It's already summer."
"Ew, no. I need time to slow down. Summer at the video store is hell, and it's about to get worse because Steve's ditching me."
"How come?" you ask.
Eddie sits beside you with the tray. It impresses you that he doesn't tip a drop, until you remember that he's a bus boy, and at times when the Hideout gets super busy he acts as a regular waiter, just like you.
"Steve's gonna start working at Cork Kids," Eddie says.
"The daycare? No way, that's where Junie goes," you say excitedly.
"Really?" Steve asks, smiling again. "I just signed my contract with them. Looks like we might be seeing each other all the time, Junie."
"You'll have a friend before you start," you say.
"Oh, thanks," Steve says, looking down at his lap momentarily.
You side eye Eddie, who gives you a look that says he knows what you're thinking. At first glance, Steve looked like a normal, perhaps preppy guy, but it makes sense that there's some uncertainty there. Eddie seems to attract earnest people with self-esteem issues.
"Have you been around kids before?" you ask.
"I– yeah, I had to take a course, but this is my first go at it as a job. I can handle it though, I'm good with kids. I'm new to looking after the younger ones."
"It's hard work," Eddie says.
You shake your head. "No, it's easy, they're lovely. My June is a sweetheart, I promise."
"She makes it look easy," Eddie says, shaking his head vehemently.
Robin snickers at Eddie's fear mongering and drops the soccer ball in favour of one of the glasses of lemonade. Ice cubes clink against the side of the glass as she takes a sip.
Junie's interest is piqued by the ball. She sits up in your lap, looking tentatively between the adults surrounding her and the prize ahead. Robin nudges the ball toward her subtly with her foot. Junie's delighted as it rolls toward her, standing so she can grab it. It makes her look small to be holding something so big near her head.
"Do you wanna play?" Eddie asks her.
Junie shrugs. "With you?"
"Yeah, with me."
She looks at Robin. "Play?"
"Sure," Robin says.
"What about me?" Steve asks. "Can I play, too?"
Junie looks oddly hesitant. You rub one of her arms briefly. "Steve can play too, right, baby?"
She squints at him. "Okay. Steve too."
Eddie chokes on a laugh. "Exactly how I feel about him. Oh, come on, Harrington! You know I'm joking. Just get up already, Junie wants to play."
—
Eddie's lying down in the grass a couple of hours later when you sit at his hip. He's tuckered out from running, kicking, and throwing June around, and he's in desperate need of a shower. You clearly don't care, bending over his prone form, your arms around his stomach in a skewiff hug.
"Hi, handsome."
"Hi. She's sleeping?"
You'd dragged Junie inside and out of the sun to change and feed her, and Eddie had stayed outside to say a proper goodbye to his friends. Now they're gone, and the lack of her points to one obvious explanation.
"Missed her nap. She was asleep by her third mouthful."
"That's my bad."
"No, she had the most fun she's ever had today."
What's better than one person willing to dote on you? Four. Steve had been eager and honestly more than happy to meet Junie and get to know her, and Robin had been awkward at first but just as kind. Good thing: Junie declared Robin her new best friend. Eddie couldn't help feeling a little sorry for Steve, but she warmed up to him eventually.
You'd absolutely decimated your jeans with grass stains. Reluctant, you'd agreed to play soccer, or a mismatch game with way less players. You, Junie, and Robin against the boys. You were starting to enjoy yourself when you slid, and Eddie thought, Oh, fuck, she's gonna be embarrassed, ready to jump in and help you up, but you burst out laughing and Junie ran to your side, ecstatic at the sound.
"I'll get you new jeans."
"I'll get myself new jeans," you say, rubbing your nose against his chest. It tickles, butterflies erupting beneath your touch. "It'll wash out. Probably."
"I'll get you new jeans," he says firmly, searching for your hand.
He wraps his fingers around it and feels your skin without motive, the sky a calmed, darkening blue above him, orange and pink hints whispering at the horizon.
"Do you think they liked me?"
"They did. I know they did. Steve gave me that look guys give each other."
"That look," you croon, laying down in the grass beside him.
Eddie misses your hugging but lavishes in the feeling of you under his arm, your face turning into his chest. He lifts his head to see you've closed your eyes and pressed your mouth against his shirt.
"He's jealous."
"He's not jealous," you say fondly.
"He should be," Eddie says, curling his arm around you.
"Don't flirt with me."
"I can't stop."
You laugh. He doesn't hear it so much as feel it, the gentle shaking of your shoulders. Dropping his nose into your hair, Eddie closes his eyes as you have and breathes you in.
"Holy shit," he says, pretending to be alarmed.
"What?"
"Nothing."
"Tell me," you say.
"No, it's nothing."
You huff showfully and lift your head to look at him in question. The longer you look the weaker your resolve becomes, until you're cupping his face, total adoration in your eyes as you ask, "What?"
"Just can't believe we're together," he says. He lifts his chin. Your hand falls to his neck. "That's all."
You soften further. There's a hint of sadness to your tone, "Me neither."
"It shouldn't be feasible for someone to have as much luck as I do. Hey, d'you think you could kiss my dice before I leave tonight?"
You tuck a piece of hair behind his ear, your gaze on his lips and chin.
"Y/N?"
"Yeah, I'll kiss your dice… m'just thinking."
The wind blows mildly, lapping the smell of grass and dry dirt your way. Eddie finds he kind of likes it, but that could be the smell of you overtop, domineering as it is. Jasmine, the lingering scent of talcum powder, honey and milk hand soap. The last remnants of your shampoo, if he really thinks about it. You smell like everything he's ever wanted.
"What are you thinking about?" he asks quietly.
"You and me."
"I'm always thinking about you and me," he says.
You hug him, hiding your face in his chest for a second time. "I'm the lucky one," you say.
Eddie stretches back in the soft grass and looks up into the sky. Sunset approaches without any concern for what Eddie wants; to stay here with you for a long, long while. It's too bad that he has to find a lock for your bathroom, and go see Gareth and the remaining Hellfire Club (or rather, the remaining members of his Hellfire generation) for another session of D&D.
"Maybe I'll call. Cancel."
"No, you have to go. You spend too much time with me as it is. You need your friends, and you'll have fun when you're there, you always do."
"I don't spend enough time with you," he says.
If he had it his way, he'd happily spend forever locked in time with you here, the warmth of your body sinking into his side and his hair trapped under your weight. It tugs every time you move. He likes you so much that he doesn't consider asking you to stay still.
It's quiet. Eddie can hear the wind over the grass, the ticking wheel spokes of bikes somewhere not far, and your breathing. Slow, deep breaths.
"I'm glad I could fall in love with you before I noticed it was happening," he says, his voice low and a tad rough.
Your breath catches.
It's a half truth. He was well aware of how much he liked you, but hadn't realised it was going to be such an intense sort of reverential affection until he was already knee deep in it.
"I barely felt it," he says. "No, that's wrong," —he smiles, his words warmed by affection— "I did feel it. I felt it and it was intense, but it was ridiculously easy. Like I'd already done it before. One day I'm stealing looks at you over Friday dessert and the next I wanted you so badly I couldn't make myself ask for it.
"And… even though I wanted you, I think I fell in love with being your friend first. I'm fucking grateful for that, for you. You're everything to me." A best friend and a great love.
"Oh," you mumble, your hand sliding up his chest to the space opposite his heart. "You might actually have to cancel seeing your friends, I don't think I can let you leave after that."
You lift your chin, steer his face to yours, and kiss him. It's soft, but Eddie can feel an exuberance underneath it. Like a vibration. A thrumming fondness for him in the way you pull away and dive right back in.
One kiss turns to two, and a third lends itself to something deeper, his lips parting under the light pressure of your weight above him.
He drapes his arm behind your neck, hooking you into the crook of it. The kisses after that are endless and too short, heavy and not heavy enough. He can't tell his own touch from yours, your hands or his hands, the tip of your nose as it slides into his; as you search downward for something more.
"Public indecency," he says when he can't breathe, nudging you away.
You draw in a big breath and sit up so you're kneeling beside him. He sits up too in an attempt to minimise the space between you, feeling flushed as though he's done a forbidden thing, rather than having just kissed his partner.
He grabs your hands. He isn't ready to part with them.
"I think I fell in love with you when I cut your hair," you say. The setting sun is like gold, your skin aglow in its wash.
"Yeah?"
"Or maybe the first time that you came to see me at work." Your eyes light up at the memory. "You didn't even try to pretend it was for food. You didn't care."
He shakes your hands around mindlessly. "The haircut was a big event for me, too," he says through another smile.
They're constant when he's with you.
"Do you still want me to cut your hair?" you ask, tilting your head to one side in appraisal.
"Maybe tomorrow. I think I'd lose my mind tonight."
"I think so, too," you say.
You lean down as you lift one of his hands to the underside of your chin, rubbing your skin with his knuckles. You draw a line with his hand, your chin to your jaw to your cheek.
His heart skips a beat at the sight. Your serene expression, your soft cheek, and the little smile that blooms as he opens his hand and strokes quarter circles into the desired space with his thumb.
"Are you gonna shower before you go?" you ask mildly, eyes half-lidded.
"Do I smell?"
"Kind of," you say.
"You never smell gross," he says, a tiny lie. Everybody smells bad sometimes, but the majority of the time you smell like heaven on earth.
You roll your eyes. "You're all talk."
"Maybe. Maybe not."
He leans in for a quick kiss, like a dotting of the lips. He does it another two times, to be sure you feel as loved as he feels. "Okay, I better go. I'll shower, and I'll see if there's a lock I can borrow for the bathroom 'til I have time to go to the store."
"You don't have to do that, I can take Junie and get one tonight."
He kisses you again. "It's okay," he says with a smile, his lips a hair's width from yours. He pulls away. "I don't mind. Saves you having to get her ready, I know she's a demon in the store lately."
"She used to be our little lady," you lament faux-tearfully.
"That she did, sweetheart. That she did."
Eddie pulls himself out of your arms reluctantly.
Wayne's eating a grilled cheese sandwich over the sink when Eddie gets home, and a second when he gets out of the shower, so he picks Wayne's brain and towel dries his hair.
"How do we stop June from getting into the bathroom?" he asks, hanging his head upside down and scrubbing at his stringy curls.
"Lock it."
"If we don't have a lock?" he asks, looking through his curtain of hair.
"Buy one." Wayne shrugs.
Eddie drops the towel onto the floor by his feet. "I'm going to. But for tonight?"
"Put a chair under the door of your room so she can't leave when you're asleep."
"Not my room," Eddie says. A flush colours his cheeks.
"Are you going to move in with her? You could get a new place, rent one of those houses by the elementary school. They're nice enough."
"Woah, woah, who says I'm moving out?" Eddie asks, laughing nervously.
Wayne takes a big bite of sandwich and Eddie suffers without an answer until he's done. "'We,'" Wayne says, "you keep saying 'we'. Sounds serious."
"I think it's a little soon to move in," Eddie says.
"Me too. But if you're thinking about it, it doesn't hurt to start saving. I'll help."
Eddie wants to say no, you definitely won't. "Yeah," he says instead, coughing to cover the tickle in his throat. "Alright. Thanks, Wayne."
"Moving is expensive, but she can't stay in that place forever. Junie'll outgrow it in a year."
"We live in almost the exact same trailer," Eddie says with a laugh.
"Exactly. And we're comfortable." Wayne swigs his coke. "But if I could've, we would've moved."
"You still could."
"Are you kidding me? This is my home. When you move out I think I'll stay in the front room, I like it in there. TV in bed, big windows."
"I bet you'll like it more when I'm not around keeping you up at night."
Wayne shrugs. "Most people live with their kids until they're eighteen, right? We had a late start. You're entitled to a couple more if you want them… but something tells me you'll be flying the coop soon enough."
"Not that soon."
Wayne sniffs like this is upsetting for him, "Well, whenever you're ready, kid."
—
Eddie comes back a little later to tell you to trap the baby in your room tonight and he'll get you a lock first thing in the morning, promise. You love him because he calls her 'the baby', and because he could've called rather than park up his van and tell you in person. He gives you another kiss, you can't count how many that makes it, saying he'll see you tomorrow, and that's that.
Junie wakes up from her nap not long after. She's startlingly grumpy considering, and she demonstrates the horror of motherhood concisely —she screams, she cries, she pushes your glass of juice off of the table. It smashes it into a hundred different pieces.
She screams louder when you pick her up to stop her from cutting her feet.
You love her, but it's been a long day. You're exhausted, your head hurts, and it's difficult to clean up smashed glass with a kid. You don't wanna leave her unattended when she's wound up in case she has a tantrum. She's given herself bruises before, and you don't want or need that to happen again.
If you put her down she might try to touch the glass. You clutch her to your chest and sweep the glass up one-handed. It takes a long time, and she only grows more irate as it passes, wiggling in your arms to be put down.
She squirms and pulls her arms from under yours, hitting you square in the face by mistake. You're lucky it hadn't happened earlier. They don't mean to, but babies in tantrums tend to flail around, and June's great at chinning you.
It's an accident, you know it is, but you flinch and almost drop her.
"Juniper," you say firmly, desperate for an intermission.
She quietens a touch. You take a very deep breath, abandon the almost full dustpan, and walk as quickly as you can to your room. You put Junie down on her toddler bed, put Mr. Bear in her lap, and crawl into bed with a pillow over your head.
You don't scream or anything, but you could. One sharp moment. You could really scream. You would if you thought it wouldn't scare her.
It's not Junie's fault. You have a shorter fuse than usual and it's incredibly frustrating when she gets in one of these moods, but she's your baby, you made her, and she's growing up. It must be frustrating for her, too.
She cries quietly in bed, the sound turning your heart. You try to stop your own tears and give yourself a minute in hiding. You nibble your lip. Why are you so stressed? You can't work it out.
You know she's hardwork sometimes, but it's not her fault. It's not your fault, either. You're both doing the best you can.
You take a breath, another, and peel the pillow from your head.
She has snot on her face, wide-eyed and hugging Mr. Bear to her cheek.
Your nose stings.
"You wanna come and lie in bed with me?" you ask, begging whoever it is that's watching over you to have her give in.
With Mr. Bear's ear in her fist, Junie slides off of the bed and crosses the small space of the room to yours. You pull her up onto your mattress and smile at her. Guilt is a leaden weight in your stomach. It aches, seeing her all covered in tears, worse because she looks properly scolded. You don't often tell her off.
"Your nose?" she says.
"It's okay." You clear your throat. "It's okay, lovely girl."
She blinks at you and raises her hand to your nose. You let her feel it, even though it hurts.
"Does it look like it's hurting?" you ask.
She doesn't usually connect her actions like this. A month ago she bit your index finger and couldn't figure out why you pulled your hand away. You're surprised that this is different.
"No…" She sniffles.
"I'm okay. Don't be worried, baby, mom's alright. It doesn't hurt. But you can give it a little kiss, if you want. That'll be good."
You bend down for her.
"Kiss?" you ask.
She leans up and kisses the tip of your nose. It's not a clean kiss. You don't mind.
"Thank you."
"You'w welcome," she mumbles.
You sigh, pulling your shirt sleeve over your hand so you can wipe her messy face. "Let me clean you up, you're all snotty. Make you feel better. There we go, there's my girl. I couldn't see you under all the tears." You stroke her cheek with your knuckle. "I'm sorry, baby. Everything was very overwhelming. Should we try again?"
She looks like she might grizzle.
"Let's have dinner, yeah? You can pick something from the freezer. Any dinner you want."
Dinner works for a time, but afterward she has more sulking to do. You keep her on her toes, playing games and watching TV. She's clean but you're pulling out all the stops, filling the baby bath for her and letting her play until the water's cold and you're soaked from her rubber ducks.
She still doesn't sleep. In a last ditch effort, you give her a bottle of warm milk, though she's aged out of formula now, and it works.
She falls asleep hours later than she should. It's nearly 11PM.
You look down at her asleep on your chest. Her eyes are swollen from crying buckets. Your own prickle, until tears swim and your vision blurs.
You press the back of your hand to your mouth, eyes scrunched closed, and try to make as little noise as possible. It's awful timing, you'll wake her before she's properly sleeping, but you've felt so tired today, and even when Eddie's friends came for a couple of hours you were already rubbed raw. You're tired all the time.
In compliance with the nature of being upset, the things that are upsetting you grow in size. They double, quadruple, until they're heavy enough to knock you down for the count, have you crying like a kid out of pure defeat. You cry so hard it pulls every bit of energy you have and kills it, so hard you couldn't make noise if you wanted to, about everything and nothing. You're at the end of your rope.
You rub Junie's back and wish someone was rubbing your own. It's an odd distress.
It's lucky you hear his footsteps on the steps outside.
If Eddie walked in on you like this, you'd never forgive yourself. You can't imagine it. He's seen you hungry, greasy. He's watched you put things back at the store, he knows you lived off of leftovers and saltiness for months. And you'd do it all again for your girl, but it still hurts thinking he's seen you that low.
You shudder, sucking in two big breaths that won't work.
You drag a rumpled sleeve over your cheeks and try not to move.
The knock is very gentle. You can picture him on the other side, stooped and waiting for you to let him in. If he thinks you're asleep he won't knock again, and it's late. If you can stay quiet for long enough, he'll go home.
He tries the handle.
"Oh, my god," he says when it opens, "I'm gonna fight her."
The her in question sniffs and wipes her eyes again. Eddie flinches at the sound, his head whipping to the side to find you where you're balled up on the couch.
"Holy shit, what's wrong?" he asks.
You shake your head. "N-nothing," you stammer quietly.
"What?" he asks, like this is preposterous, and you guess it is. Something seems very wrong.
He kicks his shoes off by the door as he closes it and doesn't waste any time, though he's quiet and careful as he crosses the room and sits down next to you.
His hand cups your cheek, feeling the tacky damp there for himself.
"What's wrong? Tell me… tell me,” he says.
"It's nothing," you say.
You'd wanted a hand to rub your back, but it's sudden. He's here, and he's seen you crying, and you have no control over it. You never really do.
"It looks like something," he whispers.
You cover Junie's head with your hand. Your smile is somehow more concerning than your frown, if Eddie's reaction is anything to go off of.
"I'm fine."
"How long has she been sleeping?" he asks.
"I don't know.” You sniffle.
For some reason, Eddie's question starts you off again, tears welling in your eyes like fat drops of dew and falling just as fast. One squeezes under his hand.
"Is something hurting?" he asks, his brow pinched now, nothing but patience in his tone.
"No."
"How about I put her to bed for you?" he asks.
"Yes, please."
His frown deepens as the tears build. You're horrified to notice his wince at your shuddering, but breath won't come right. His hands needle under Junie's front, tense as a taut string, and Eddie lifts her into his arms, not quite practised. He shushes her when she mumbles.
"I'll be right back," he mouths.
You nod at his promise. As soon as he's cleared the living room you curl forward, face in your hands, shoulders shaking hard as you wipe your cheeks, catching tears before they race the hill of your cheek.
Things must go well. Eddie's back thirty seconds later, and he's worried.
"Hey, hey. Tell me what happened," he murmurs, perching on the couch next to you.
You try. You're not sure what's upset you, and when you open your mouth nothing wants to come out. Eddie's never, ever seen you cry like this, and it's clear that it's freaking him out.
He curves his arm behind your shoulders and pulls you to his side, voice a pleading murmur as he says, "What's wrong? Please, sweetheart, tell me."
"I'm tired," you force out. The main issue.
"I know."
"Sorry, I don't– know why I'm crying so much," you say, words staggered.
Eddie encourages your head under his chin. There's nothing specific beyond that, no more talking from either of you. He hugs your shoulders tightly, likely tighter than he means to, as though he's worried you'll come apart if he doesn't. The strange feeling of helplessness abates slowly, like an ebbing tide guided away from the shore.
Your sobs turn to smaller, spluttering tears, until the panic fades completely, and the waterworks eventually stop.
"I'm sorry," you mumble, fighting the sore lump in your throat.
"It's okay." You can feel him swallow. "You scared me. You– Do you need something? Some water?"
"No…" You feel like a little kid and like you're too old at the same time. You haven't cried that hard in a long time, and you hadn't had Eddie there to sit with you through it. You're grateful for that, if nothing else. "Can you just–" You turn toward him. "Can I have a hug?"
He steel arms you into his chest, dropping a kiss against your hot forehead.
"Yes," he says, punctuating with more kisses. "No question about it. You can have anything you want from me. Would it make you feel better if I cried, too? I can do that, sweetheart, I could really go for it. In sixth grade, I made myself cry so hard I threw up 'cos I wanted to get out of gym."
You choke on a laugh.
He doubles down.
"I was dry heaving on the bleachers for an hour," he says, his hand behind your head and vying for your clammy neck, stroking a line when he finds it. "They wouldn't send me to the nurse."
"I don't need you to cry. It's… Junie's been wound up like a top all day, and she woke up and just screamed for hours, Eds, screamed. She couldn't have been asleep ten minutes when you got here."
"I'm sorry. That must have been overwhelming."
You peer up into his face to gauge his expression. Not that you think he's ingenuine, but you're worried he's humouring you.
"I got mad at her."
He hums. "Yeah?"
"I didn't mean to, but she hit me."
"What?"
"By accident."
"No, I figured. Where'd she get you?"
"My nose," you admit.
Eddie leans out of the circle of your arms to see your face, bringing a hand to your cheek. He assesses your nose. You want to tell him there's nothing to find, but it's nice to be checked over. His palm is warm.
"If you're crying because you got angry, I promise it's alright. Everybody has a breaking point."
"I know." You hadn't been cruel. You took what you could, and when it got too much you set her down and had a breather.
"Wayne got so mad at me one time he asked me to go get him rosemary toothpaste just so he could have an hour away from me."
"Rosemary toothpaste?"
He turns your head slightly to the side. "Doesn't exist."
"What did you do to make him mad?"
"Cut all the sleeves off of my t-shirts."
"All of them?"
"Every single shirt I owned. It was a cold winter."
He smiles, his pale cheeks appled, his big brown eyes reflecting your own.
"Did you get really mad?" he asks softly.
"No,” you say, cutting yourself some slack. “I didn’t.”
“You know you're allowed though?”
“I don't want to get mad at her. She can't help it.”
“Neither can you. I'm not saying you should yell at her, but don't beat yourself up for not enjoying a sucker punch.”
“It wasn’t that. I’m not upset about it, I mean, I’m not very happy but it’s not the first time I felt overwhelmed by her. I don’t care if she drives me up the wall sometimes, I don’t even care about the impromptu nose job,” —Eddie whoops, before covering his mouth apologetically— “or that she took awhile to go down. I really don't know why…”
“I'm going to say something.”
“Oh no.”
“Not trying to be a freak here, but maybe you're visiting with the devil.”
You sit back. His hands fall to your hips.
“Sorry?” you ask.
Eddie smiles ruefully. “You know. Riding the crimson wave.” He grimaces at your continued confusion. “Time of month?”
You’re embarrassed thinking he’s embarrassed by it, but luckily he furthers, “Sorry if that’s weird to say, I don’t know if that’s weird. I’d, like, crawl across hot coals for you, I really don’t care if that’s what it is, just girls get kind of intense. Emotionally. At that time.”
“Oh really?” you ask.
His skin turns ashen. “Um–”
“I'm kidding,” you say.
Your hand drifts to your stomach. It would make sense as to why you’re feeling very tired and confused about your emotions, and it might be nearing that time. You’re so busy you haven't been keeping track. “Maybe it is,” you say, mumbling still.
“I’m not saying you can't have a breakdown if you need one,” he says.
“No, I know. Maybe you’re right. I kind of hope you're right.”
“Is this awkward?”
“You sleep in my bed nearly every night, Eds. I dont think it's awkward unless you do.”
“Again, I’d crawl across hot coals for you, so… this is the most minor thing ever. Not for you, for me. For you, it sucks. For me?” He pinches your cheek gently. “I worship the ground you walk on, you loser, I don't care if it’s shark week. We’re not in middle school.
“But if it isn’t hormones making you unhappy, if you really feel this awful, you can tell me.”
“I don't know what it is," you say, embarrassed, a headache pounding in your temple.
“That’s okay though, right? Or is it too much?”
“I feel better,” you say. It's true and not true.
Fuck, he’s sweet. His lips pout ever so slightly in concern for you, his brows pinching down. His hands remain steadfast on your hips.
“Well, if it gets too much you gotta let me know. Legally. That’s the whole point of having a boyfriend, I think. You gotta let me take care of you… You're sure you feel better?”
“Yeah. I really am sorry.”
“For what?”
“Being a loser.” You laugh wetly.
“Ah, but you're my loser,” he says, arms curling behind your back again. “I don't want you to cry, but if you are going to then I’m glad it’s when you’re with me, yeah? I don’t like that you were crying alone. Think of all the amazing support you missed out on. I could’ve been rubbing your back that whole time.” He rubs your back in emphasis.
“That feels nice.”
“Do you have any aches?”
“I always have aches, I’m a waitress.”
“Me too.” He presses his lips to your skin. “Let me make you something to drink, and I’ll stay the night, if that’s cool? I can rub your back for hours without getting tired.”
“‘Cos you have such big muscles,” you agree indulgently. He has amazingly shaped biceps, but that’s besides the point.
“That is exactly why.”
He blows a breath out against your cheek and sits back into the couch. “Do me a favour? Next time I ask you what’s wrong, don't say nothing. Don’t hide when you’re feeling like shit, I need to know.”
"Okay. Yeah, I will. Just… you always see me at my worst."
Eddie chucks under your chin and begins to stand. "I get to see you at your best, too. It's a good deal."
It’s a good deal, you mouth to yourself.
“Get up,” he says from the front door, mock-cross when you don't immediately follow, “I can't go to bed by myself.” He locks the front door, sliding the deadbolt home. “You didn’t kiss my dice, you know? That’s why I came tonight, to harp at you.”
“And that couldn't wait until tomorrow?”
Eddie glares at you, “No?”
You hold your hands up, your voice still thick from tears but inarguably in love. “Alright. Harp at me. But carry me to bed first.”
It’s not long before he’s pushing his head against your side, arms at your waist in an attempt to lift you over his shoulder like a fireman, whisper-yelling, “What are you saying? You asked me to carry you! I can’t hear you, babe, just brace yourself.”
—
Junie has the sense that you're being weird. She’s three, or one day away from it, and she won’t remember anything you’re saying right now but she’ll remember how she felt, the warmth of your loving hand in her hair, stroking it from her face as you and Eddie titter at one another. Eddie’s like you, in a way, a mom but not around as much. Almost as much recently, though, which is great news.
“I saw one in the department store by the bus station,” Eddie says, strumming his guitar. It plinks.
Junie sniffs, her nose a little runny, and dips her head back against your chest. You smell like home, the sweet and soft swirl of lavender and jasmine laundry powder, a burning smell she doesn’t really care for that comes after you sit on the floor and press the clothes —hot hot hot, junebug— every other night, and the treats you’re sharing.
“Sounds expensive,” you say gently.
“So?”
“So,” you say, and Junie bristles at the mild annoyance in your tone, because you are incredibly soft-handed and have been since she was born, “I won’t be able to afford it, Eds.” Your annoyance fades as soon as it comes, and you say ‘Eds’ so nicely that Junie turns her face and rubs her cheek into your t-shirt.
“You okay, baby?” you ask her.
Junie huffs, pleased. She is very okay. Even better when you offer her another chocolatey cookie.
“It’s her birthday, she only gets one a year. And I’d be happy to pay for it, anyways.”
“Yeah, you’re always happy to pay for things, you have a screw loose.”
Eddie laughs. Junie laughs at his laughing; whenever he’s laughing there’s happiness afoot. He loves to swing her around in his arms, tickle her, play with her small army of teddies and make them speak. He beams at her from his seat on the floor in front of the TV, the guitar that she’s grown to revere twanging as he puts it down on the floor.
“Hearing that, bug? Your mommy can’t leave me alone today.”
Junie, for all her brilliant smarts, her growing mind, doesn’t really get what he means. She knows that she’s the bug he’s talking to, and that he’s doing something fun from the lilting cadence of his teasing, but beyond that it’s nonsense.
She loses interest quickly and returns to her melting cookie, unperturbed by the mess that it makes of her small hands and once-pristine sleeves. You never shout about stains, so Junie doesn’t see a problem, not until you laugh, the breath of it warm against her ear, and push the sleeves of her shirt up the lengths of her arms. She’s wearing her very favourite strawberry pyjamas today, though they make her agitated every now and then because they don’t feel quite right. She doesn’t see why. They’ve always been the best.
“Don’t listen to stinky,” you say.
Junie nods. Mom always knows best, she knows, in an abstract way. Except for when you say that the one-eyed stray that slinks around doesn’t like pets. He loves them when you’re not looking.
“We have a chance to make it a really special day, so why don’t we? It’ll pay for itself. The sun’ll be out morning, noon, and night soon, and she can use it every day.”
“Morning, noon, and night,” you repeat. “Very Tolkien of you.”
Eddie makes a pleased sound as he stands up. Junie thinks he is the tallest person in the world. “Thank you,” he says sincerely.
He squeezes Junie’s toes as he passes, and despite how weird it feels she kind of likes it. She loves Eddie, astronomically, gargantuanly, though these are big words to her.
Love can't be described in the words that she knows, but it can be acted out. She drops her cookie like it’s aflame and slips out of your comfortable lap: you are the very best seat, even better than being in bed. Still, she abandons you and your cookies and follows Eddie in a run to the kitchen where he’s opening the fridge.
“Drink, pretty girl?” he asks her, voice saccharine sweet.
She makes a sound of delight. “Up!”
“Say please,” he directs, already squatting down to grab her.
“Please up!” she demands, walking into his waiting arms.
Again, Eddie’s like you. As mom, you feel not too different from Junie herself. She doesn’t know that she misses you, but she does miss you heartily when you leave her at the daycare for the day, or sometimes when she wakes up first in the mornings and can’t climb into bed with you. She doesn’t understand missing you, only wanting you, and she wants Eddie in the same capacity. When he picks her up she feels better, and happy, and loved when his hand stretches palm-flat over her back and pats a turbulent rhythm.
He sings too fast to understand, one of his loud songs. Your music is quieter, because you’re a quiet mom. You whisper when she falls asleep on your chest, singing love songs under your breath as the night creeps in, and your footfall is carefully measured. But you laugh loudly, one of Junie’s favourite sounds in the whole world —up there with the Muppet Babies’ theme song and the squeak your tennis shoes make when you half-run to the baby gate at pick up.
Eddie laughs much, much louder, usually in tandem with you, or if not then only a few seconds before. He also growls, raspberries, and chortles. He does the best Animal impression ever, like the muppet himself is hiding around the corner.
“Here, June, you have your sippy cup, there's a good girl. You’re not drinking much today, what’s the matter? Is your juice not yummy enough?”
Junie takes the offered sippy cup and tries to formulate a response. It’s hard, because Eddie said lot’s of things all at once, and there were two different questions in the mix. She catches onto the very last, giving her sippy cup a good shake as she answers, “It’s yummy.”
You and Eddie love when Junie speaks. Your faces glow. It’s the best.
“Yeah?” Eddie asks.
“Yes,” she tries. “Juice.” She changes her mind. “Cookies?”
“One track mind,” Eddie says.
Junie takes it for an I love you, of sorts. The way he says it suggests affection, she can’t pinpoint exactly what, but it’s how you sound when you tell her every day. She pushes her hands into his hair and then around his neck to give him a deliberate hug. He does the humming thing he tends to do when he’s picked her up, pat-pat-patting her back even as she pulls away.
“Is the cuddle over?” he asks, pouting at her, his eyes widening. “Mom wasn’t even jealous yet.”
“Shut up,” you say happily.
“Have a drink,” Eddie insists to Junie, encouraging the mouth of her sippy cup to her chin. “It’s a warm day today, me and you and mommy have to drink lots and lots to stay healthy. Did you want another drink?”
Junie has a drink, but she doesn't bother correcting him.
“Please, handsome, if you don’t mind," you say.
Handsome is kind of like junebug, only you never call Junie handsome, so it must be Eddie’s alone. Junie doesn’t mind: she gets called baby and babe and bub and sweetheart and even little lady when she’s being really good.
It goes without saying that she feels very, very loved. Even her name feels like a pet name when you say it most the time.
"Junie doesn't need a super big one, she's just one girl. She'd be happy with a kiddie–" You cough. "Whatever size."
"I know she'd be happy," Eddie says, Junie still in his arms and confused.
He's multi-tasking, filling up your prettiest cup until the enamel flowers are starkly backgrounded by juice and ice. Eddie pulls Junie up higher on his side and kisses her forehead. "You've been a happy gal lately. Which is good, good for mom, and good for you." He smiles until she smiles back.
"What I'm saying," Eddie starts over Junie's head, carrying her and your cup back to the living room, "is that I want to get it for her, please. I'll go now while it's still open, and I'll have to get a hose and an air pump or something from somewhere so that'll take time, and filling it up might take an hour or two. 'Cos, listen, I'll pay for it and if the water bill is ridiculous I'll pay for that, too–"
"I don't want you to pay for it, Eds, you don't work ten hour shifts six days a week to spend it all on us."
"No," he says agreeably, sitting down beside you, Junie in his lap. She spots the cookies she'd been missing and reaches across to your lap. You take her on instinct, and boom, cookies achieved. "I barely ever work six days a week anymore, and you're right that I don't work to spend it all on you guys. I spend too much of on nerd crap, another too much on groceries, and some of it goes into savings–"
"What savings?" you say, laughing like this is a funny joke.
"–but really, I don't think of it as spending money on you, babe, and I bet you don't think of it like that either. We're not keeping a tally chart."
"Of course not," you say softly, putting your hand on Eddie's shoulder, "I didn't mean to imply that."
"You didn't," Eddie says, just as soft. "I'm just saying, it's not about money. You know it yourself, the less you have the more you want to give, and I have enough to blow her mind, so I think we should do it. But I don't want to make you uncomfortable or uneasy," —he says uneasy like it's a slimy word, making Junie giggle— "so if you don't want me to, I won't. We'll find something else, it really doesn't matter. Don't get stressed."
"I think I'm always stressed," you murmur, sinking down into your seat. Junie twists to look at you, startled at your sudden change in attitude. You've moved from happy to sad. It's odd. "Sorry, I'm not trying to be a nag."
Eddie laughs, the sound as startled as Junie's feeling. "You're not a nag! Do I make you feel like a nag?"
"No, I just know I am…"
"You are not a nag. You have a lot on your plate all the time, and you worry about money because you need to. I'm not blaming you for something that's not your fault," Eddie says.
Junie likes this part. Eddie slides an arm behind your shoulders, kisses your cheek, and speaks in murmurs as you relax under his touch, "You're allowed to be stressed, don't feel guilty. Just let me have some of the stress too, alright? Don't be greedy."
"This sucks."
"It doesn't suck." Eddie lowers his voice to a whisper, Junie can't hear what he says next. "Let me buy the pool, babe. She'll love it. It has a built-in slide."
"I know what one you're talking about, and it was one hundred and fifty dollars."
"I have it. If she uses it every day for the summer, that's like two dollars a day."
"She won't, though."
"Well, we waste money all the time. We bought that box of apples from that guy on the side of the road the other day for ten dollars and we didn't eat a single one."
"That's different, we forgot they were in the trunk. We probably would've died if we ate one, they got all squishy."
"If we all use the pool it's worth it. Me, you and June use it every day, it works out cheaper than a movie ticket."
"I'm gonna make you go in the pool every single day," you threaten without malice.
You obviously won't be doing that, you aren't that bitter, and Eddie says, "Yes," under his breath because it's practically permission.
"I will happily go in the pool every single day," he says.
"Pool?" Junie asks.
Junie already has a pool, and she loves it, and now she's heard the word, she wants it bad.
"Oh…" You kiss Eddie's jaw chastely. "Your fault."
"Shit," he says.
Junie takes a breath and repeats it, puzzled at your horror. You usually love it when she says new words.
—
The trailer is something out of a movie today. It's a warm and sunny day with enough cloud cover to defeat the brutal summer glare that sometimes smothers Hawkins. The breeze cools the sweat on the back of Eddie's neck, a blessed reprieve.
He couldn't ditch you yesterday after his 'pool' related slip up —you are, in fact, 'visiting with the devil', and it's making you miserable and stressed despite all your best intentions, so leaving you alone to get out and fill the pool, a sometimes stressful situation, was not on his agenda— resulting in a very early morning for him. He woke up at 6AM to drive to the department store by the Indianapolis bus station, had to hang around for half an hour before it even opened because he didn't time it right, and then had to drive back with the new pool hoping he could get it done before Junie was awake.
Juniper was, in fact, already awake and bounding around the trailer like a girl on fire, the decorations, banners and balloons and tablecloths, working her into a frenzy. Apparently she took a while to understand that the day was about her, but once she did she couldn't stop smiling.
"You should've seen it," you'd said, stretching the elastic string of a cardboard party hat over the head of Mr. Bear. "She went ballistic, Munson, absolutely crazy when she saw the cake, I don't think I've ever felt that happy in my life."
"Sorry I missed it," he'd said, in agony.
Eddie’s hoping the pool will get her to a similar level of excitement. He looks out over the grass behind your home and feels very, very smug. The pool has been successfully blown up with air and filled, and it looks like it was worth every penny with the hose running down the slide, the attached palm trees standing tall. Your favourite The Beat record is playing from the open window, and he can hear you and June singing along to Save It For Later, aceing the long na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na's. It makes him ridiculously happy.
"Looking good," Wayne says.
Eddie turns to his uncle where he's approaching from the left, a Teddy bear wrapped in purple-pink cellophane in hand.
"You think so?"
"Tyke's gonna love it. When's the grand reveal?"
"I'm all done, so right now," Eddie says. "Holy shit, this is sick, right?"
Wayne, in his most deluxe outfit, a light brown button down and a pair of unripped, unsullied jeans, gives Eddie what can only be described as his fond dad look. "It looks good, Eddie."
It should. There's the pool, the picnic blanket covered in cupcakes and finger sandwiches shielded by a big beach umbrella, and a sheet of green grass behind it.
"How are you gonna stop the strays getting at it?" Wayne asks.
"Who knows. I got a tarp in the van, that'll have to do it."
"You could, you know, pack it away."
"That is not how we do things," Eddie jokes.
"Didn't we just have a conversation about saving money?" Wayne asks.
"We did, yeah…" Eddie crosses his arms across his chest. "This honest living thing is tough."
"You love it," Wayne says. "You're a good kid."
Eddie sits on the foldout picnic bench he'd borrowed from Gareth and Wayne sits next to him, the two of them looking out at the pool, the sound of the hose and the crickets in the tall grass bordering the park a steadying company.
"Y/N invited the daycare kids. She didn't want me to get the pool, even though she kind of did, 'cos it wasn't cheap, but as soon as I brought it home she just–" Sparkled, Eddie wants to say, but he certainly won't be saying that to Wayne's face. Wayne would never let him live it down. "She called every mom she had the number for and invited the rest of the kids from daycare to come over. I don't even think she wants to brag, and shit, I want to. She just wants the kids to have a good time."
"Well, you picked a good one," Wayne says easily.
"I know you weren't sure. At first."
"That didn't have anything to do with her." Wayne rubs a hand over his chin. "It's hard, having kids. I feel for her doing it all by herself like that. I'm glad she has you now, but dating a woman with a kid isn't easy, and it isn't something you can do and move on from like nothing happened. I'm not saying you're that little girl's dad now, but you're doing the things a dad does, understand? You're not just a boyfriend."
Boyfriend is funny from Wayne's mouth. Juvenile. He doesn't think Eddie should call you his 'old lady' but he always laughs at 'girlfriend'. Wayne's a complicated dude. A little rough around the edges, and absolutely brimming to the neck with love.
"I get it," Eddie says, and he does.
He isn't Junie's dad, but he loves her like his own, he's sure of it. He's never had his own so he doesn't have a comparison, but still. And he gets that this is a layer to the relationship he shares with you. How it might complicate things. How it could go wrong.
"But you'd do anything for those girls, and I know that," Wayne says.
Eddie wishes Wayne would say a little more, explain it to him, because Eddie feels out of his element sometimes and needs a hand. He doesn't question if what he's doing is the right thing because it hasn't ever felt wrong. He doesn't worry about the future because the only thing he can see ahead are good times. But there's still an underlying anxiety, and he wishes his uncle would give him some relief. He also understands why Wayne doesn't.
"I would do anything for them," he agrees. "Which, I've been meaning to ask you something, a favour."
Wayne raises his eyebrows, looking tired. Eddie knows it's half charade.
"How do you feel about babysitting?"
"Now that's why I didn't want you hanging around her," Wayne says, deadpan.
Eddie laughs sharply, so suddenly he can't breathe and ends up hacking coughing into his hands.
Wayne laughs and pats Eddie on the back. "I can babysit. For an hour."
"Two? I'm trying to take her to dinner, you know. A real date, like a gentleman."
"We'll see. What's she think about it?"
"She's extremely protective, and you know she doesn't think you're a bad guy, or anything, but she's apprehensive."
"She'd be silly not to be. Some people are evil."
Eddie grimaces. "Exactly. But she trusts me and I trust you, so."
"I'd think you do. Only broke my back–"
"For the last ten years," Eddie finishes.
Wayne throws his arm around Eddie's shoulders. "Looking after you, son. God knows I'd do it again… As long as it's alright with Y/N, I'll babysit. But you know there's a ton of kids trying to make a buck around here who'd just love to help out," Wayne says. Eddie must have rubbed off on him or maybe Wayne's the source of all his theatrics; he puts on a hopeful, almost wistful sort of voice as he says it that has Eddie laughing all over again.
"We'll see. There's no hurry. Just wanna take her out sometimes, she deserves it."
"She sounds like she's having plenty of fun to me," Wayne says reassuringly.
You're singing and laughing through the words from the kitchen. You'd told Eddie you're going to give Junie a very intricate hairstyle so she can swim without worrying about washing it, and it's taken you the better part of the hour, yet neither your good mood nor June's has faded. He can see it, you feeding Junie cold cut-up fruit dipped in condensed milk, kissing her cheeks and massaging her scalp as you go. Junie on the counter, as happy as she's ever been.
"You almost done?" Eddie calls.
You turn down the music.
"What?" you ask, pushing the kitchen window open a little further, careful to push aside the shutters just enough to see him, but not let Junie see the backyard. "Oh, hi Mr. Munson, how are you? Can I get you something to drink?"
"Just here to give some birthday wishes," Wayne says, lifting the bear up. "How are you doing?"
"I'm awesome," you say brightly.
"You look good."
Wayne had pulled Eddie aside once, when you'd been dating for two weeks and bumped into him outside of Bradley's, as the fates should have it. He'd looked stern, hand on Eddie's shoulder, and said, "I'm not blaming you, son, but you gotta help her get some rest. Poor girl looks ready to fall over."
Eddie thinks you're pretty even when you're exhausted. In the fullest sense of the word, you meet every definition in his dictionary. You have these eyes that might not pull everyone in but more than hook him, and when you look at him sometimes it's with so much love you're basically an angel. Your smile is beautiful because it's yours. Your voice is lovely because of the words you choose to say, that endless sweetness and softness. He knows you well enough now to realise that there is an end to it in reality. When you're tired or fed up, you can be snappy and blunt and occasionally argumentative, but he likes that. He doesn't want you any other way, 'cos perfect doesn't exist and if it did he'd still end up on your doorstep with a plastic bag in the crook of his elbow, begging for one of those shitty mini pizzas you make and a place at your table.
You do look well, admittedly and despite your recent bout of restless upset. You had a good night's sleep, and Junie being happy makes you happier. You beam down at them from the window, your eyes sliding to the blown up pool and the mini picnic Eddie's set up.
"Thanks, Mr. Munson. Can I bring her down?" you ask.
"Absolutely," Eddie says, hand in the air and pulling toward his face, ushering you down, "right now."
The back door opens and you guide Junie out first. Eddie popped in to give a birthday cuddle and the card he'd picked out, but he hasn't seen Junie since you did her hair, and it looks so nice it melts his heart. She stands in the doorway in her swimming costume, pink and purple and green ombre with frills everywhere, her face slack.
"Happy birthday!" Eddie says, standing so he can hold out his hand and help her down the stairs. She takes it but doesn't move. "Me and mom know you like your pool so much we wanted to get you another one, do you like it?"
She starts wiggling, jumping without her feet leaving the floor. She looks at Eddie, at Wayne, at you, at the pool, and a noise starts to brew like the whistle of a saucepan boiling water, the lid skewiff. Eddie grins and waves her hand.
"It's for you, babe, do you want to get in?" he encourages.
"With you?" she asks, still wiggling.
"Maybe later. Do you need help?"
Junie runs to the edge of the pool, looking over the side that's almost as tall as her and into the water. You already gave him a strict talk about water safety as though for a moment you might not be supervising, loving but resolute that she can't for one single second be unattended or without eyes on her.
He hadn't been offended, though he did kiss the top of your head and say sarcastically, "Thanks, major, I didn't know that."
"Jerk," you'd said, earning another kiss.
Eddie puts his hands under her arms and lifts her up carefully. Her legs curl in toward her stomach like a pill bug. "It might be cold, June, but it's in the sun, so it won't stay cold. Ready?"
"Yes!" she says.
Eddie eases her down into the water. She shrieks happily as water covers her toes, her legs, up past her belly button.
Eddie lets her go and she sits in the water rather than stands. The water reaches her shoulders. She lifts her hands and does a little splash. "It's so big!" she cheers.
You ease down into a kneel poolside and reach your hand into the water. "And so cold!" you say, looking up at the sky for a moment. "It'll be warmer in no time. Oh, wow, June, there's so much water, you're up to your chin!"
Junie stands up and runs to the palm tree, giggling. Her attention snags on the slide, and Eddie knows everyone present smiles when she gasps and spins on her heel to you, almost slipping onto her butt. She scrambles up again. "Mommy, it's a slide!"
"I know! Are you gonna go down? Come here, you have to let me help you up over the side and you can climb up the slide."
Just when Eddie's starting to think he couldn't like you more, you pull her up against your chest and out of the pool. You don't care that she's soaked.
"Let's go down the slide!" you say, sounding genuinely excited.
"Starting to think you should've got a bigger one, kid," Wayne says.
Eddie snorts and peels off his shirt. "Maybe," he says, shooting Wayne a secret, pleased smile, before rounding the pool. "Babe, you're getting wet, let me have her," he says to you. The daycare kids and their parents should be coming soon. He knows you'll want to look your best.
"Woah, put your shirt on, Munson, what do you think this is? A GQ shoot?"
"Like I'm some piece of meat," he murmurs with a smile, failing to help Junie navigate the inflatable steps of the slide.
You whistle playfully. Wayne howls with laughter. Eddie turns three shades of pink. He blames the sun.
Your teasing ends as soon as it's started. When Junie gets the hang of the slide he dries off and puts his shirt back on, and soon the daycare parents arrive with their tiny charges. They're quick to climb into the pool. Junie is ecstatic beyond words, laughing and giving out dripping hugs to her very favourite friends Adrien and Lucy. Adrien is a sweet, smart toddler. He manages to say, "Happy birthday, Junie!" with a small reminder.
Junie smiles until her eyes close. "Thanks," she says gleefully.
You shuffle over to Eddie. "Can you please watch all the babies so I can go get the drinks, please? And say thanks for the gifts?"
"Please please," he says, squeezing your wrist. "I think there's about seven pairs of eyes on them, but yeah, absolutely. They don't call me Eddie Water Safety Munson for nothing."
You elbow him mildly.
The only danger Eddie can see is that the kids look like they might have a fight over who gets to use the slide first. There's an impatient four year old called John who feels desperately that he should get to go first, and Lucy, Junie's favourite, does not agree. The birthday girl doesn't seem super interested in the conflict and instead plays with Adrien and a little girl named Matildhe with her rubber duckies, away from the slide.
"You don't have to stay," Eddie says to Wayne, eyes on Junie's excited chattering.
"And leave you to entertain the parents? I'm not that cruel."
Eddie doesn't know most of the parents, having only met Adrien's mom when Junie was having her hugging phase and Eddie went in for emotional support, and John's dad outside of the mechanic where Wayne works, you in the car, Junie on his hip as he dipped in to bring Wayne his forgotten lunch for a late night doing overtime. Junie had recognised John, and so Eddie had been forced to introduce himself. It had been fine, but Eddie would prefer you with him for any future clumsy introductions.
You come back down with drinks and make parental rounds, thanking each one for the small gifts they've brought. You ask about allergies and nod seriously when one parent says their boy is sensitive to aspartame, before sneaking back to Eddie's side.
"What's aspartame, handsome? Do you know? I might poison that poor baby from stupidity."
"It's a sweetener,” he says, "they put it in Jolt Cola. I think they're saying he's hyperactive."
"Oh, right… is there aspartame in the strawberry juice?"
"I'd have to check. Want me to take a look?"
"No, it's okay… I'll just… hold off on it for a minute," you say. You let your weight rest against his side. "This looks amazing. It's amazing. Thank you, Eddie."
He turns to you and pouts for a kiss. You lean up and give it to him immediately. Eddie doesn't care that there's a crowd of people to watch, he can't not give you a hug. His head locks over your shoulder, and he squeezes you tightly.
"Don't worry, I'm still watching her," he says before you can wriggle out of his arms.
"Okay," you say, your face flopped into the juncture of his neck. "Thank you double. I don't deserve you."
"Yes you do. You deserve a whole lot more," Eddie says, thinking about the houses by the elementary school, and how lonely you can get, and the feeling of your hands as you wash soap suds out of his hair. He hugs you hard and pulls you toward him, your heels lifting off of the ground just slightly. "But this is a start, right?"
"I wouldn't call this a start," you say, pulling away from him. Your face is lined with affection. “This is better.”
You turn around, sliding firmly under his arm, and scan the pool for your girl. Junie's standing now, offering handfuls of water to Lucy, who takes them and tips them over her head. Every time water runs down her face she laughs, and Junie hurries to get her another handful.
"I think Steve said he was gonna come by," Eddie says. "That cool?"
"Sure, the more the merrier. What about Robin?"
"She can't, she's training the new video store recruit. She said Steve has her gift, though."
You shake your head and click your tongue, "Tsk, they didn't have to get her anything."
"They wanted to. Steve actually enjoyed it, I think. He's kind of desperate to be a dad, you know? He's dating this girl from Anderson but she's in college and they're not settling down yet. You know, I never thought that I'd– that I would end up settling down before him."
"Are you?" you ask softly.
He's quiet for longer than he means to be, watching as Junie gets her go on the slide. She barrels down into the water and screeches, overjoyed.
"I'm not asking you to," you say, "I wouldn't ever ask you to, I mean, you don't–"
"Hey, hey, wait. Wait a second." He tears his gaze from the pool to meet your eyes. "I'm settling down. I am. I want to. I want to be with you, and I want to look after you. I love doing it. This," —he gestures around your backyard— "is what I want. I want a ton of other things and I'm not giving up on them, I wanna make music, and get a job that pays better, but I want to do those things with you. You and Juniper."
"I'll look after you, too," you say.
He kisses the skin before your ear. "You already do," he says quietly.
There's a small gap in your conversation. Eddie takes a sweep of the yard. Wayne looks content if a little bored in the sun, arms crossed across his chest and Teddy bear sat beside him. Junie's talking animatedly from inside of the pool to one of the parents as they rub sun cream into their own child's arms. The stray cat who sometimes sleeps under the porch noses at a half sandwich on the picnic blanket. Eddie's sweating in the heat, and it is so, so loud, but he reckons it's a damn good party.
You stroke a big wad of curls behind his shoulder, a smaller strand behind his ear.
"I love you," you say tentatively.
Eddie laughs but closes his mouth, the sound more of a hum, and leans back so you can cup his cheek. "I love you, too," he says, "you know that." He confessed it plainly enough only a week ago, lying in the grass with you, your cheek over his heart.
"Good," you say, looking like you might keel over. "I was really scared to tell you."
"I was scared to tell you too. That's the fun part, for sure. This is terrifying."
"Terrifying," you second.
"And awesome."
"So awesome," you murmur.
Eddie peels your hand from his cheek and spins you around. You move slowly but let him do as he pleases. Your lashes kiss in the corners as you smile, as you pause in your spin to squeeze his fingers tenderly.
"Munson!" Steve calls, though he blinks when he sees the crowd of people he technically works for amassed poolside. He's only been with Cork Kids for a few days. "Oh, hello."
"Steve!" Junie cries, throwing herself at the wall of the pool. "Hello! Good morning!"
"Hiya, Junie," he says.
"Good to see you, son," Wayne says, extremely amused.
"Come swim, Mr. Steve!" one of the kids calls.
"Gonna save him?" you ask Eddie.
"Not a chance."
"Steve!" Junie yells again, "Hello!"
Steve understands that he's not going to get out of it, clearly, because he crosses the yard and kneels down in the wet grass by the pool. "Hi guys. Are you having fun?"
The kids all cheer. Steve gets splashed in the process.
—
Children's birthday parties are much shorter than you thought they'd be. The children, in different states of tiredness, are wrangled into towel ponchos and shepherded into cars, each with a slice of cake wrapped in a paper towel and a heartfelt, "Thank you so much for coming."
Steve, exhausted, is slumped on the couch in your trailer with a cold can of coke pressed to his forehead and a borrowed pair of Eddie's sweatpants as well as a black and red Metallica shirt that wildy changes the young man's appearance. Junie giggles, sitting with Mr. Munson —call me Wayne, kid, I'm begging you— at the kitchen table.
"Not like that, Way!" Junie says, trying to coach him through eating a powdered sugar donut.
"I don't know how else I'm supposed to be eating it." He sounds as adoring of her as you often feel, forgiving her mispronunciation.
"Babe, where do you want these?"
You finish the cup you'd been washing and sidle to the back door. Eddie's holding the towels you'd brought out for the parents to sit on. Most are wet from the kids climbing in and out of the pool, and all of them are plastered in grass.
"Leave them there, I'll put them straight in the washing machine."
Eddie climbs up the steps, arms full to bursting. "Open the door for me."
You open the washing machine and Eddie tucks them all inside. Every clean towel you had has been muddied and you wouldn't care, but Eddie looks like he needs a shower, and you probably look similar. You stop him before he can go back outside.
"What?" he asks.
You twist your hand into his shirt and pull him in. "Two seconds, you have–" You tilt his head to the side and rub at a funny splotch on his cheek. It spreads but doesn't budge.
"If you lick your thumb, we're breaking up."
You go on tiptoes. "We can't break up, 'cos you love me," you whisper, not even smug. "And I love you."
"That's pretty good logic," he says, smirking, "but it won't stop me."
"Ew," Steve sing-songs, pulling out a chair next to Junie as he cracks open his coke. "That's super gross. And in front of your family. Yuck."
"We didn't so much as kiss," Eddie says.
"No, you're just in love. Much worse."
Eddie rolls his eyes and pulls out the last chair. You assume he'll sit, but he backtracks, grabbing you by the shoulders and sitting you down. "Sit," he commands.
"I don't think I have much choice."
Junie smiles at you from across the table, changed into dry fleece pyjamas to fight any possible chill. You smile back, propping your chin on your hand.
Powdered sugar coats her cheeks. "Donut, mommy?"
"Oh, yes please," you say, holding out your hand.
She gives you a donut like she's worried you're about to collapse from hunger, nearly catapulting it across the table. You pick it up and take an indulgent bite.
"Did you want one?" you ask Steve, hand in front of your mouth.
"I think I've had enough," he says, queasy.
Junie must have force fed him half the cupcake platter. Her viewing him as a nemesis was short-lived.
"Eddie?" Junie asks. "Donuts." She babbles something indistinguishable.
"No thanks, junebug."
Junie hugs the bag of donuts close to her chest, then, seemingly glad that everyone is done sharing.
"Did you cover the pool?" Wayne asks.
"Yes sir, no cat claws will be getting at that one."
"You'd be surprised what you can fix with duct tape," Steve says.
"Does that really work?" Eddie asks.
It's sweet seeing Eddie around his friend. You resolve to ask if it can happen more often —even if you're not there to see it, knowing he's having a good time would make you happy. You've been selfish with him since you met him, and you can't say you're too sorry because of how it ended up, but you can try to make up for it now.
He and Steve get along in a very specific way, wherein Eddie says suggestive things and Steve pretends to hate his guts, and then one or both of them forgets the facade and they talk like normal friends.
"I got from St. Louis to Evansville with duct tape over a puncture."
"That sounds amazingly dangerous."
"I survived, didn't I?" Steve asks.
"By the skin of your teeth."
"You weren't even there!"
You finish your sugary donut and try to earn Junie's attention. She's pulling apart a donut of her own in her hands and licking the jelly off of her fingers, looking confused and delighted at once. She's going to be thrilled when she realises there are chocolate filled ones after that.
"Is that nice, my love?" you ask.
"Mom, it's strawby jelly," she says. "Strawby strawby strawby."
She's been chatty today. "Strawberry, huh? Do you like that? It looks yummy."
Junie offers you a squashed square. Some people would be disgusted at the mauled goods. You take it and eat it, 'cos her hands should be clean, you washed them yourself a half hour ago before she started on the treats. The strawberry jam is as fake as they can make it, which is probably great for Junie but sucks for you.
You're starting to stand when a big cup of water gets placed in front of you, held by a familiar hand. You love his stupid hands, his knuckles and his short nails and the tiny white hairs, everything about them. More now as they deliver your saving grace.
"How'd you know?" you ask Eddie, turning in your seat as you pick up the glass.
"I tried one earlier, I knew you wouldn't like it."
"How could you possibly know that?"
He taps the tip of his nose.
"I should be heading home," Wayne says.
"You don't want to stay for dinner?" you ask, sitting up properly.
"No, kid, I'm alright."
"He's meeting his friends at the bar," Eddie says, "don't let him fool you."
"We haven't kept you, have we? I'm sorry," you say.
"No, you didn't keep me. I had a great time, best kids party ever," Wayne says, standing up. He leans down to meet Junie's eyes. "Happy birthday, little miss. Make sure you plant one on your mom, huh? It's been a long day."
You don't think she gets his drift but she nods at his solid eye contact, and that's good enough for him. Wayne claps Eddie on the shoulder and they walk off to the front door. Eddie follows him down the steps as they trade goodbyes.
"I should get going too," Steve says.
"Are you sure?" you ask, frowning. "If you want to stay for dinner, that's no problem. I don't know what Eddie's told you but I'm a good cook, I promise. We're gonna have Junie's favourite, it's fresh chicken noodle with stelline, the little stars."
Steve wavers, "I-"
"If you don't have anywhere to be tonight, it's really no trouble. I'd love to have you, I'm sure Eddie would too."
"Yeah, okay. If you're sure," he says, scratching a hand through his hair.
Junie jumps down off of her chair with impressive gusto and crawls under the table to your thighs. She leaves sugary fingerprints behind as she emerges, patting your legs until you're forced to help her up. She's mumbling something. Junie talks all the time, but what counts for actual words is another story.
"What are you saying?" you ask, pulling her legs out from under her so she doesn't hurt her knees.
She babbles. Her face has all the intent of someone speaking understandable language, to the point where you feel bad for not getting it.
"Baby talk doesn't get easier?" Steve asks.
"I mean… she's mine. I understand her a lot more than Eddie does, but half the time she might as well be speaking Sindarin."
You pause, mouth open. Steve licks his lips.
"Is that–"
"From Lord of the Rings, yeah. We've been reading it together."
"It's worse than I thought. You should really come out with us sometime, have conversations with people who aren't trying to brainwash you," Steve jokes.
Junie hums, pleased at something invisible, and starts pulling your sleeve down over your hand. You nod toward her. "I can't, really. I always have her."
"You could bring her with you. I wouldn't care, and Robin wouldn't either. We have a couple other friends who'd love you; Jonathan, he's a photograph developer for the post, and he's kind of quiet but he's one of those undercover nerds, like you."
"Stop flirting with my girl," Eddie says, closing the door behind him.
"She's actually talking like you and the idiots." Steve looks at you from the corner of his eyes. "No offence."
"Full offence," you say sweetly, leaning down to give Junie a kiss. "We're offended, aren't we? Mister Steve's name-calling."
Junie looks up, smiles at Steve like a traitor, and then spots Eddie's return. "Up," she says, "up, please."
Eddie takes her. She gives him a gross sticky kiss on the cheek and he eats it up. "What do you want, then, birthday girl?"
She pops her lips but doesn't say. Eddie carries her to the fridge and opens the freezer, sorting through the amassed collection of frozen treats. There's a range of popsicles and ice cream sandwiches hiding between mini pizzas and a bunch of ready-made pasta you got on sale.
She accepts a popsicle and then insists on a second. Eddie glances at you.
"It's her birthday," you say.
"What happens tomorrow? When she expects another round of treats?" Steve asks.
"I pop a double dose of Tylenol–"
"She won't be doing that," Eddie says.
"I take two Tylenol," you amend, "and we try to explain. It's worth it even if she is a demon tomorrow. You've had a good day, right?" You smile at June and her two popsicles, one fist cherry pink and the other lime green.
"She's had the best day ever," Eddie says, and then, a reflection of yourself if you've ever seen it, he kisses her forehead five times in a row.
"Oh, god save her," Steve says.
You stand up to make dinner. Steve helps, and Eddie promises to join you in a moment but never gets around to it, preoccupied by Junie's turbulent popsicle eating and the subsequent rainbow stains on your couch cushions. He scrubs at them with a washcloth and Steve, helpful but unnecessary, stands at your side having chopped all there was to be chopped.
"You can come around whenever," you say, wondering if that's too far.
"That's generous. You don't really want me here that often," he says, chuckling.
You dip your pinky finger in the saucepan to gauge the heat. It's not hot enough to add the pasta stars yet
"Steve, this might shock you, but I actually like having company. It was just me and Junie for so, so long, and I love her, but–" You stir the soup with a wooden spoon rather than continue whatever embarrassing thing your heart had compelled you to verbalise. "I missed having real conversations." You laugh. "I've never been as lucky as when Eddie decided he didn't mind being around me."
"It's worse than that. He minds not being around you. We had him over for dinner, yeah? Two weeks ago? He started rubbing it in my face that he met you first." Steve crosses his arms. "You're pretty, but I have a girlfriend, and he knows that."
"What's she like?" you ask.
"She's amazing. I keep worrying she'll realise that I'm a total loser." He clears his throat. "I mean, I'm a catch, obviously. But no, you'd like her. She'd like you."
"Think so?"
"One hundred percent."
"Maybe we should go on a double date like in the movies."
"Stevie'd like that," Eddie calls. "He's been trying to get me on a date with him for years."
"You wish, Munson."
"Yes I do," he sing-songs.
Junie throws a teddy at him and he drops to the floor like he's passed out. She giggles and climbs on top of him. He oofs but doesn't throw her off, maintaining his act until she sits on top of his chest and starts poking his cheeks. His tongue lolls out of his mouth.
"Well, you can't have my boyfriend, but you can have the best chicken soup ever if you pass me the stelline from the cabinet."
You think Steve might be a great friend. He's funny, he's quick-witted, and he's bitchy but not mean. He and Eddie get physically aggressive with each other when he asks for a second serving, because She's not your servant, Harrington and I was asking permission, you idiot, but it's definitely more friendly than nasty.
When Steve does get going it's later than any of you realised. He says goodbye with varying levels of niceness. You get a heartfelt thank you for the meal and compliments on the party, Eddie gets a hug with a shoulder pat and then an insult that actually worries you until you hear him laughing, and Junie gets a hesitant hug. Junie wants the hug desperately, and Steve isn't used to her yet, but when she gets her arms around his neck he rubs her little shoulders like a pro.
"How did you ever land him?" you ask after his car has pulled away.
Eddie giggles like a kid, "That's so offensive."
"He's a sweetheart…" You turn to him. "You're a sweetheart, what am I saying?"
"What are you saying?"
You lean against his chest. Eddie looks at you warmly enough that it makes you feel you're gorgeous —something in his smile, maybe, that says he's thinking a nice thought. When you lean on him it grows more obvious. His lips part, his eyes on yours.
"You're so fucking pretty.” Your smile is too much like a smirk and yet it doesn't put him off. "I'm serious," he says, hands clasped at the small of your back.
"Thank you."
"You're welcome." He steals a soft kiss. "Very welcome." He steals another.
You're putty, melting, and you'd care but his hands are loving. He slides one hand under the hem of your shirt and presses his rough palm to your back. You rub your cheek against his chest and feel it like a siren in your head: I'm lucky. How'd I get so lucky?
"Yeah!" Junie shouts, jumping on the couch and almost falling flat on her face. "Kiss kiss," she says, "Mommy!"
"Demanding, insatiable pest," Eddie says.
"Don't you dare talk about my love like that," you scold.
"I meant you," he says, grinning at a well-landed joke. "C'mere, let's have a good birthday cuddle before mommy's shower."
"You're showering first," you say.
"I thought you liked it when I smell gross?"
"You smell like wet grass, but that's not why. You should go first 'cos the water won't be hot by the second one."
Eddie gets gooey. "I'm weird about you. Keep being like this and I'll get weirder. You couldn't cope with that and neither could I."
"Not even," you say.
"Kiss please," Junie insists, still jumping.
You and Eddie turn to her at the same time. Her eyes widen as though she knows what's about to happen, but she doesn't care. She's had the best day ever. Woke up with tickles, praised and petted and cuddled, she's bounced from a birthday breakfast of waffles and more syrup than her baby teeth should be able to withstand to TV with stovetop popcorn and her favourite movie. She sang, she preened under your fingers in her hair, and played in the pool until her legs turned to jelly. She blew out all her candles in one breath (aided, secretly, by Eddie behind her as you held the cake). She ate enough donuts to down a horse. And now, to end it all, she's gonna get the world's best hug.
"Ready?" Eddie asks dramatically. "Three, two…"
You reach for her at the same time, laughing before you've so much as set a hand on her fleece-covered shoulders.
𓆩❤︎𓆪
Thank you soooo much for reading! I hope that you enjoyed. Writing is a labour of love but sharing it is terrifying so if you enjoyed this, please let me know, or consider reblogging. It makes a big difference! ♡ I really missed writing for them! Please forgive sometimes the formatting of my paragraphs being odd, I had to cut this down to fit it all into one post!
Eddie: just goes even harder and manhandles her *fuck me*
nsfw 18+ wc: 753 tiny breeding kink implied
especially when eddie's lap is flush against your ass, chest pressed to your back in a sticky union of sweat building with each growing hum of the vibrator buried between your legs dialed higher by his greedy thumb.
it's not the first time he's stretched you this full, but it is your first experience taking him until he was seated to his base, bringing you to the cusp of a pleasant moan and bulling it out of you as a sudden grunt at his final push inside, trapping your pleasure between the device in his rough hand and the heaviness of his sack resting against the drips of your sopping heat spilling from where he fills you.
his humid breath coasts past your ear in huffs skating across the backs of your damp fists drawing deep into the sheet beneath you. he has you prone beneath his weight, keeping you lifted with his forearm and the toy alone. enveloping you completely, caging you with his shoulders curved over yours and his arm hooked beside your head, bicep shaking the longer he holds himself above you. your cheek becomes smashed to soft cotton and tacky skin alike, panting, panting hot and shallow with your back arching to his command, thoughts melting to the place where his besotted praise consumes you.
unutterable words fall from your kiss-bitten lips, losing them to the crook of his elbow. flipping to where your other cheek met the damp hollow, you sought fresh air for your lungs, moans gasping with desperation to tell him what your fat tongue and lust-laden eyelashes could not, fluttering shut from the burden of focusing on anything but the tension clenching around his thick cock.
"keep," you tried, "like that." the heavy purr of the toy being stroked in circles over your clit steals the rest.
he's eager, voice slipping from genuine awe to cuts of coy, "gonna—already, baby?" he asks, but he knows. he knows what your pretty whine cut short sounds like when you begin squirming, rocking your hips in the unforgiving space between your bodies—but to have it so soon?
he'd yet to move since the initial slide of his weeping tip past your point of pleasure, and now you were begging for it in the neediest way, causing him to twitch inside you at the excitement.
"please—" the softest ask "need you to fill me."
the newness of your relationship was no match for the dirtiness of your request. "fuck, baby." his praise mixes with yearn for your tight cunt creaming around him. "gonna make me cum like that. you want it? you want all of it? wanna make you full?"
cresting to the peak of your climax with his lips, teeth, tongue, and ragged breath at your jaw coinciding with the heavy drag of his cock learning which spot unravels you fastest, he channels the brink of his own undoing into keeping you still.
his hand is a force to be reckoned with on your hip. digging fingertips around the cup of bone, flesh bruising beneath his flustered grip; he had let go of the vibrator, and you took over, grinding onto him from the overstimulation, fucking up onto his cock with deviousness, eyes glinting in the same low lamplight which struck love in his.
you strain to watch his expression arc prettily from your writhing. the crease between his eyebrows knits tighter—red cheeks going slack from his mouth hung open on a disjointed moan. his messy hair curtains you both, curly ends tickling your skin with every erratic thrust he surrenders to.
he moves his knee up beside your hip, brushing his hairy leg along your thigh, peeling his chest away to drive into you deeper, putting an ache in your spine as you became his one sense, his one purpose, slapping skin on skin in a wet mess of your orgasm painting his lap, pumping his length until its coated and your puffy pussy is ready for him.
his pace stutters to a beautiful collapse, and he chokes out, "makin' you mine." and it's not dirty talk, it's a promise. with the soreness of his hard spank to the side of your ass, his muscles draping about you with animal restraint, and a voice made of primal gold, he reminds you of whats leaking down the backs of your thighs, "let's clean that up, and then we'll go again, yeah? and please, sweetheart, last a little longer this time," he finishes in taunt and pride.
Anyway, putting in the comments I had left on that post, because I absolutely stand by what I said and don’t appreciate someone trying to put words into my mouth
I don’t think the ask about miss mouse was about your collage, the child in it was clearly a child, not an adult lol. Prob this:
https://ww
Most of, if not all, the artwork/moodboards I’ve seen for TYP have miss mouse as white, I think that’s why the other anon ask might have ask
These are the original asks I’m addressing since these seem to be the thing that kicked off this entire convo.
To be completely honest, I think you’re mistaking the forest for the trees.
I didn’t accuse you of anything, other than saying imo you misinterpreted the *original* ask you received linked above. They didn’t accuse any writers of anything. They didn’t accuse you of anything. They said a lot of fan works is white-centric.
Nor did the above asks accuse TYP of white washing fan fictions?? Literally TYP does not do this. There are no descriptions of miss mouse at all. Where in the above asks do they say TYP white washes anyone??
Where did I say in the above comments I have an issue with TYP?? I said pretty clearly that reader was written very neutrally. You seem to be throwing up a lot of straw men here and putting words into my mouth. Is this your version of “having a conversation”?
Ziggy… I’m sorry but you cannot just “block” every single artwork and visual that has a white person, because this is a fandom wide/media-wide trend of centering white people. That is a ludicrous suggestion to a real problem that absolutely should be addressed. I literally cannot even get into what bad advice that is to ANY poc. The problem is not the *individual* artworks, the problem is the WIDER CUMULATIVE TREND OF CENTERING WHITE PEOPLE.
There is literally nothing wrong with a few visuals depicting a white reader. What becomes an issue is when THATS ALL THERE IS or when that’s the majority of what there is. It’s totally possible and viable to point out valid issues that exists, without the interpretation that someone is “trying to blame someone” for those issues. The people who sent in those two original asks were certainly not looking to blame anyone for anything.
I think you need to take a step back, and understand that there is no blame game happening here. I never once blamed you for anything. I said I think you misinterpreting the original two asks. My intent was to clarify what was being said - that much of fan WORKS(not just visual fanart) is white centered and it’s an issue. That’s the whole sentence.
And look, if you disagree that this fandoms fan art/visuals/whatever being very white centric is a problem, then agree to disagree. I see it has an issue that impacts the poc of this fandom, and no amount of blocking individual creators is going to solve that, bc this is not an individual issue. BUT if you agree and your issue was that you saw those two asks as unfairly attacking your friend, I’m here to let you know that I’m positive that’s not what those asks we’re doing.
They even made a point to say no one was to blame. And if you looked at my blog enough I know I’m a black artist, you’d also be aware that I took down my art & deleted my old blog bc my art was misappropriated, w people attempting to sell prints of my art as their own. Additionally, I was also attacked for making any poc artwork and frankly, any poc art I did make never got any traction whatsoever. Because, and I don’t think this is a secret here, the ST fandom has a serious problem with racism both active and passive.
I’m going to state, I don’t appreciate non black people attacking black fandom members for trying to be the voice of reason when someone is clearly misunderstanding something that was said, and non black fandom members standing by and letting that happen and even supporting them. You all wonder why there are hardly any poc in this fandom, in particular black people, this is why.
Eddie Lover @eddiesbestgirl - Tumblr Blog | Tumgag
