Confused idiot is confused

She/her, 24, still a dumbass

[beasbrain]

My Game

description: your plan was simple: learn how to play pool from steve, beat eddie, collect your hundred bucks. you forgot to account for eddie's ego, or what happens when you make him jealous.

pairing: jealous!eddie x you (fem!reader)

tags: jealous!eddie, bestfriend!reader, friends to lovers, possessive!eddie, smut with plot, competitive flirting, jealousy as foreplay, reader actually beats him and he takes it serious, he takes you out back to pay, pool game to back-alley sex pipeline, voyeurism (ish), public smut, condescending praise, dom!eddie, sorry i'm ovulating

TW: NSFW (18+) minors do NOT interact!!!!, PiV, unprotected

WC: 3.6k

A/N: requested by @eddiemunsonspantschain HOPE YOU LOOOOOVE IT :D here's a quick smutty bedtime story for all of my lovely freaks. i have something super exciting cooking up after this one...so stay tuned ;) reblogs are always appreciated <33 as always, love you all! muah muah

You relied on Eddie in many ways. Guy problems? He was the first one you'd call if a date went sour. Work drama? The second you got off, you'd pace around his trailer, explaining the usual bullshit as he sat on the couch, chiming in when necessary.

Somewhere along the way, the line between "best friends" and... whatever this was had gotten a little blurry. You couldn't remember exactly when it happened. Maybe it was the fact that you had a drawer at Eddie's trailer for spare clothes, or that he never knocked before walking into your apartment. 

Hell, even the rest of your friends had long since given up trying to figure it out. Robin had stopped correcting strangers when they assumed you two were dating, Dustin had started referring to you as "Eddie's girl" just to watch the two of you sputter, and Steve swore you were both "the dumbest almost-couple" he'd ever met.

The funny part was, neither of you ever denied liking the other. You just... never actually admitted it, either.

So life carried on in that weird in-between, where lingering touches lasted a little too long, late-night drives felt suspiciously like dates, and neither of you was brave enough to ask what any of it meant.

In many ways, Eddie was the best friend you could ask for. But the one thing you hated? He was a cocky bastard when it came to anything competitive. 

Any game night, whether that's something as simple as Uno or arcade games, he thought he was the best. Though, to be fair, he was. Which is why, after one fateful 1v1 of pool at the Hideout, when he conned your ass like a fool and beat you out of a hundred bucks, you needed revenge.

So, naturally, your pride wouldn't let him teach you how to play, oh no. Instead, you decided to ask Steve. Steve wasn't someone in the group you were particularly close to.

But, beyond him, your options to teach you how to win at stupid bar games were Robin, who was as agile as a baby deer, or Nancy, who could care less about you and Eddie's billiard feud.

Steve looked up from where he was wiping down the windshield of his BMW in his driveway, rag slung over one shoulder. "You want me to do what?"

"Teach me pool."

He blinked. "...Pool."

"Yes, Steve. The game. With the sticks."

"I know what pool is."

"Good. Then we're making progress."

He laughed, tossing the rag over the hood. "Since when have you been interested in pool?"

You crossed your arms. "I'm interested in beating Eddie."

"Oh."

"Exactly."

A grin slowly spread across his face. "...I'm in."

The Hideout wasn't open yet, save for a handful of regulars nursing beers before the evening crowd rolled in.

Music crackled quietly through the speakers while Eddie hauled cases of liquor behind the bar, already halfway through complaining to Gareth about a distributor screwing up another order.

"You know what they gave us?" Eddie scoffed. "Light beer. We don't even sell the shit."

Gareth shrugged. "People drink it."

"No, they most certainly do not."

Then the front door opened, so Eddie glanced over automatically. You walked in first with Steve following close behind.

His eyebrows pinched together. "...What the hell?"

Steve waved toward the bar. "Yo."

Eddie nodded slowly. "Harrington."

Then his eyes landed back on you. "What're you doing here? Thought you worked today."

"I did."

"And now?"

You smiled sweetly. "I'm learning."

"...Learning what?"

Steve answered before you could. "Pool."

Eddie glanced between the two of you, raising one finger accusingly. "...From you?"

Steve looked genuinely confused by the question. "...Yeah?"

"You know how to play?"

Steve frowned. "Dude."

"What?"

"I've been playing forever."

Eddie stared for another second before scoffing to himself.

"...Whatever." Then, he disappeared into the back, huffing something under his breath.

For the next forty-five minutes, Steve proved to be a surprisingly patient teacher.

"No, loosen your grip."

"I'm trying."

"I know, but you're choking the cue."

"I'm not choking it."

"You absolutely are."

He stepped behind you. "Here."

His hands lightly adjusted yours on the cue. "Relax your shoulders."

You exhaled.

"There."

You lined up another shot and missed. "Oh, come on!"

"You looked better."

"I looked better?"

"That's half the battle."

Across the room, Eddie slammed a rack of glasses onto the shelf harder than necessary, causing Gareth to look over.

"...Everything alright?"

"Fantastic."

"You sure?"

"Mhm."

He dared another glance; Steve had crouched beside you now, pointing toward one of the corner pockets.

"If you bank it off this rail—"

Eddie shook his head and continued polishing the same glass he'd already finished.

"He's practically climbing inside her personal bubble."

Gareth followed his gaze to Steve's arm, which reached across yours to point toward the angle.

"...Looks like he's just showing her."

"Mhm."

"You jealous?"

Eddie barked out a laugh. "Of Steve? ...No."

"Exactly."

Gareth watched him continue scrubbing the spotless glass.

"...You're polishing air."

"I know."

"...You wanna go interrupt them?"

"No."

"...Looks like she's laughing."

"I can see."

Steve said something that made you laugh again, a little louder than the last time.

Eddie's jaw ticked. "He's not even that funny."

Gareth snorted. "You realize you've been watching them for like twenty minutes?"

"I have not."

"You absolutely have."

"I've been working."

"Eddie."

"What?"

"...You've poured the same guy three refills without him asking."

Eddie froze and slowly looked toward the older regular sitting at the bar. The man raised his fourth full beer.

"Thanks, Munson!"

"...Shit."

By the end of the lesson, you actually sank three balls in a row.

Steve pointed at the table dramatically. "There it is!"

"I did that."

"You did."

"I actually did that."

"Told you."

You grinned. "You are officially my favorite Harrington."

"There aren't exactly many of us."

Still smiling, you turned toward the bar. "Eddie!"

He looked up immediately. "What?"

Your grin somehow got even bigger. "Rematch."

The entire bar seemed to perk up. Eddie leaned against the counter, folding his arms.

"...You sure?"

"Oh, I'm positive."

"You just spent an hour getting coached."

"So?"

"I don't know..." A slow smirk tugged at his mouth. "Sounds a little desperate."

"It sounds like I got tired of losing to someone whose entire personality revolves around a pool table."

A chorus of quiet "oohs" erupted from the regulars. Eddie placed a hand dramatically over his chest.

"That's hurtful."

"You'll survive."

He pushed off the bar, grabbing a cue from behind the counter. "Same bet?"

You scoffed. "I'm not giving you another hundred dollars."

"Coward."

"I'm being financially responsible."

"Chicken."

"I'm smarter than you."

"Doubtful."

Steve quietly stepped backward. "Yeah…I'm gonna head out."

"You probably should," Gareth agreed.

"You created this monster."

"I absolutely did."

Eddie twirled the cue once in his hand before pointing it at you. "You've got one shot, sweetheart."

You stepped closer until only the pool table separated the two of you. "I only need one."

His grin faltered for just a second. Not because of the challenge, lord knows he loves a challenging woman. But because you'd wandered close enough that he could smell your perfume.

You caught the slight pause in his usual bravado, eyes quickly darting across his face. Then Eddie recovered first, spinning the cue between his fingers with that infuriatingly cocky grin.

"Ladies first."

"Oh," you smiled, taking the cue from his hand just slowly enough for your fingers to brush against his, "I'm gonna enjoy wiping that smug look off your face."

His eyebrow quirked up then. "...We'll see."

The first break went to you.

You leaned over the table, tongue poking against the inside of your cheek the way Steve had told you not to do because it apparently made you overthink your shot. The cue cracked against the rack, sending the balls scattering across the felt.

One dropped, then another, causing a grin to spread across your face.

"Oh, that's gotta sting."

Eddie clicked his tongue. "Beginner's luck."

"You've been saying that for the last three games."

"And eventually I'll be right."

"I've won one."

"You've won almost one."

"I was one ball away."

"You still lost."

You rolled your eyes, circling the table as you looked for your next shot. "God, you're insufferable."

"And yet, here you are."

"Only because watching you lose is going to heal something in me."

Eddie laughed under his breath, leaning his hip against the edge of the table while you lined up your cue.

"Careful," he mused. "Harrington tell you to keep your elbow up?"

You didn't look at him. "He did, actually."

"Hm."

"And to follow through."

"Mhm."

"And to stop gripping the cue like I was trying to strangle it."

Eddie made a face. "...That sounds like something he'd say."

"It worked."

"So did cheating."

You looked up. "I wasn't aware lessons counted as cheating."

"They do when they're from the enemy."

"The enemy?" You snorted. "Steve?"

"He knows what he is."

"Oh, does he?"

"Mhm."

You laughed quietly, taking your shot. The cue ball kissed the side of yours just enough to send it into the corner pocket, causing it to disappear with a satisfying clack.

Your jaw dropped. "I meant to do that."

"No, you didn't."

"I absolutely did."

"You looked surprised."

"I was surprised by how well I did it."

"Sure."

You pointed the cue at him. "Don't ruin this for me."

"I wouldn't dream of it."

The game continued like that, each shot somehow accompanied by another jab, another smug remark, another excuse for the two of you to drift closer as you circled opposite ends of the table.

"You scratched."

"I was distracted."

"By what?"

"You talking."

"I wasn't talking."

"You exist loudly."

"I do not."

"You absolutely do."

You nudged him lightly with your shoulder as you squeezed past him. He didn't move, not even an inch.

"You know," you muttered, looking up at him, "most people would step out of the way."

"I'm not most people."

"So I've noticed."

Instead, he leaned down just enough that his shoulder bumped yours back.

"Figure it out."

"Oh, you're the worst."

"Sure I am.”

You huffed dramatically before ducking around him, though not without your arm brushing against his on the way by.

A few turns later, you found yourself stuck behind him as he leaned over the table, studying an angle that frankly looked impossible.

You waited, but he simply didn't move. "Eddie."

"Mhm?"

"I can't see."

"I'm thinking."

"You've been thinking for like two minutes."

"It's called strategy."

"It's called stalling."

He looked over his shoulder. "I don't stall."

"You absolutely stall."

"I am visualizing."

"You are making shit up."

Finally, he straightened, only to find you standing much closer than he'd expected. For a second, neither of you stepped back.

Then you smiled. "My turn."

He cleared his throat and took a step aside. "Be my guest."

You bent over the table, carefully lining up your shot. The cue slid forward, clack, and another ball dropped.

Behind you, Eddie let out an exaggerated sigh. "I knew Harrington was a bad influence."

You glanced over your shoulder. "Oh my God."

"What?"

"You are unbelievable."

"I'm serious."

"No, you're not."

"He spent one afternoon with you and suddenly you're running tables."

"I'm hardly running the table."

"You're certainly trying."

You rested both hands on the cue, smiling to yourself. "You know..."

"What?"

"...If I didn't know any better..."

Eddie lifted an eyebrow.

"...I'd say you're jealous of Steve."

Eddie's smile stayed exactly where it was. Only this time, it didn't quite reach his eyes.

"Jealous?"

"Mhm."

"Of Steve."

"You've mentioned him..." You pretended to think for a moment. "...What? Eight times since we started?"

"I have not."

"You've called him the enemy."

"He is."

"You accused him of cheating."

"He was."

"You've insulted his teaching."

"It wasn't that good."

"I've made more shots tonight than I have in the last six months."

He clicked his tongue. "Coincidence."

You laughed. "You're jealous."

He held your gaze for a long moment, twirling the cue lazily between his fingers before shrugging one shoulder. "...Maybe I was."

Eddie looked almost as surprised by his own answer as you were. He scratched the back of his neck, looking away with a quiet scoff.

"I mean..." he muttered, trying and failing to sound casual, "guy's got his hands all over you. Kinda weird."

Your heart did a slow, traitorous little flip. "So that's what this is about?"

He looked back at you. "I don't like people assuming they can get all cozy with you."

"Steve was teaching me."

"I know."

"You've practically climbed all over me trying to fix my stance before."

"That's different."

"How?"

"'Cause..." He gestured vaguely between the two of you. "...It's me."

You couldn't help it when a grin spread across your face. "Oh, wow."

"What?"

"You really don't hear yourself, do you?"

"Oh, shut up."

You laughed outright this time, and Eddie couldn't stop himself from smiling back, shaking his head as he pointed the cue toward the table.

"Take your shot before I remember why I like beating you so much."

You stepped up beside him, your shoulder brushing his as you passed.

"I'm starting to think you don't like beating me nearly as much as you pretend you do."

For the first time all night, Eddie didn't have a smartass comeback. He just watched you lean over the table, trying very hard not to notice how unfairly pretty you looked when you were concentrating.

The game stretched on longer than it should have, every shot laced with your growing confidence and Eddie's sharpening edges.

But in the end, you sank the eight-ball clean, right into the corner pocket with a decisive thunk that echoed through the bar like a victory bell.

The regulars let out a low chorus of approval. Eddie stared at the table for a moment too long, cue still gripped tight in one hand, before his gaze lifted to yours.

That cocky smirk was still plastered on his face, but it had gone tight at the corners.

You leaned on your cue, flushed with triumph and just enough adrenaline to push. "Hmph. Steve must be a good teacher after all," you said sweetly, tilting your head. 

Something dark flickered in Eddie's eyes. He set the cue down with deliberate calm, then crossed the space between you in two strides. His fingers wrapped around your wrist, lifting it with a gentle yet firm grip. 

"Alright," he said, voice low, "that's enough."

He tugged you toward the back hallway, past the storage room and out the rear door into the narrow alley behind the Hideout. The door slammed shut behind you, cutting off the muffled sounds of the bar. 

"Eddie—" you started, but he spun you around, pressing your back to the rough brick before you could finish. His body crowded yours instantly, one thigh slotting between your legs as his free hand braced beside your head.

"You think this is funny?" he growled, mouth hovering inches from yours. His breath was ragged. "Parading Harrington in here, letting him put his hands all over you while I watch?"

"He was teaching me," you breathed, even as heat pooled low in your belly. God, he was jealous. Really jealous. It shouldn't turn you on this much, but the way his grip tightened on your wrist sent a shiver straight through you.

"Sure, doll. Teaching." Eddie's other hand slid down your side, bunching your shirt up roughly until his palm met bare skin. "Laughed at his shitty jokes. Let him stand that close." He leaned in, lips brushing your ear. "You know exactly what you're doing to me, sweetheart."

You arched into him. "Maybe I do."

That was all it took. His mouth crashed into yours, all teeth and tongue and pent-up frustration. You kissed him back just as fiercely, fingers threading into his curls and tugging hard enough to make him groan against your lips. 

He tasted like cheap beer and that stupid cinnamon gum he always chewed, and underneath it all, that unmistakable Eddie scent that always made your head spin.

His hand shoved under your waistband without preamble, fingers dipping between your thighs to find you already slick. A low, satisfied rumble vibrated in his chest.

"Fuck. This wet for me, or were you thinking about his hands the whole time?"

"Yours," you gasped as he circled your clit with two rough fingertips, pressing just right. "Always yours, you idiot."

"Good answer." He nipped at your bottom lip, then spun you again; face toward the wall this time.

Your palms braced against the cool brick as he yanked your jeans and underwear down in one impatient motion, just enough to bare you to the night air. The sound of his belt buckle and zipper was obscenely loud in the quiet alley.

He pressed against your back, hard and hot, one hand sliding up to wrap loosely around your throat.

"You don't get to tease me like that and walk away," he murmured, lips against the shell of your ear. His cock nudged at your entrance, thick and insistent. "Gonna fuck the thought of him right out of you."

Then he thrusted in deep, one smooth stroke that punched the air from your lungs. You moaned, the sound echoing off the bricks as he filled you completely. He didn't give you time to adjust. Just pulled back and drove in again, setting a punishing rhythm that had your toes curling in your shoes.

" Eddie—fuck—"

"Yeah, say my name." His grip on your hip tightened, rings digging in as he angled deeper, hitting that spot that made sparks explode behind your eyes. "Louder. Let the whole damn alley hear who you belong to."

You did. Gasping it out between thrusts, voice breaking as pleasure coiled tighter and tighter. He reached around, fingers finding your clit again, rubbing in tight, relentless circles while his hips snapped against your ass.

"Such a brat," he panted, teeth grazing your shoulder through your shirt. "You were so cocky before. What happened, huh baby?" He punctuated each word with a thrust, grinding deep on the last one until you were trembling.

The orgasm hit you like a freight train. You clenched around him, crying out as waves of heat crashed through you. Eddie followed right behind with a choked groan, burying himself to the hilt and spilling hot inside you, hips stuttering as he rode it out.

For a long moment, the only sounds were your ragged breathing and the distant hum of traffic. Then he eased out slowly, careful despite the raw edge still humming between you. He tucked himself away, then turned you gently, pulling your clothes back into place with surprisingly tender hands.

Eddie rested his forehead against yours, thumbs brushing your flushed cheeks. "You okay?" he asked. 

You smiled, still catching your breath, and tugged lightly at one of his curls. "I'm okay."

"You sure?"

"Mhm."

He searched your face for another second anyway, like he wasn't entirely convinced until he saw the smile tugging at the corners of your mouth. Only then did his shoulders finally loosen.

"There you are," he murmured.

"There I am?"

"You disappeared for a minute."

"I think I had a good reason."

He snorted, ducking his head with an embarrassed grin. It was strange seeing him like this.

Five minutes ago, he'd been all confidence and smart remarks, and now he suddenly looked like the same guy who got flustered whenever Wayne asked if the two of you were dating.

You brushed an imaginary speck of dust from the shoulder of his jacket. "So..."

"So?"

"...Does this mean I finally get to stop pretending we're just friends?"

His eyes met yours again. "I'd really appreciate that."

You laughed quietly. "I've gotta admit, Munson. I was starting to think you were hopeless."

"Oh, I was."

"You were."

"I mean it." He leaned back against the brick wall, slipping one hand into yours.

"I don't think I realized just how bad I had it until today."

"The pool lessons pissed you off that bad?"

He nodded. "When I saw Harrington behind you..." He let out a quiet laugh, shaking his head at himself. "God, I was so irrationally pissed."

You raised an eyebrow. "Really? I couldn’t tell."

“Shut up.”

"He was just teaching me pool so I could beat you and get on your nerves." You bumped his shoulder. "Which, by the way, worked beautifully."

"Yeah, yeah."

"You were glaring at him like he keyed your van."

"He was standing way too close."

"He was showing me how to bank a shot."

"Didn't need to be all..." Eddie gestured vaguely with his free hand. "...Harrington about it."

You laughed. "What does that even mean?"

"You know."

"No, I actually don't."

"All..." He sighed dramatically. "Perfect hair. Nice smile. Hands everywhere."

"His hands were on the cue."

Eddie gave you a look. "Mostly."

You couldn't help laughing. "You're unbelievable."

"I know that now."

"You knew it then."

"...I did."

"So why were you so grumpy?"

He was quiet for a second, rubbing the back of your hand with his thumb.

"Because I kept thinking..." He shrugged, almost embarrassed by himself. "'What if she realizes she likes him better?'"

You blinked. "...Steve?"

"Sounds stupid out loud, doesn't it?"

"A little."

"Thanks."

"Eddie." You laughed, giving his hand a squeeze. "You really thought I was gonna fall for Steve Harrington because he showed me how to hold a pool cue?"

"I wasn't exactly thinking rationally."

"Clearly."

He groaned, dropping his head against your shoulder. "Can we pretend I never admitted any of this?"

"Absolutely not."

"Figured."

love me a good dom!eddie what can i say

also, the taglist is being really funky. i'm sorry if it's not tagging everyone pasted, i've been messing with the tags every time but tumblr likes to play games sooooooo

if you wanna be notified when i post, don't be shy and turn those post notis on ;))

taglist:

@a-villain-vying-for-attention  @fapqueen @sadgirl-bee @bowie-frommars @milescrypt  @bitterestwillow @lnnn1n @youngbrokefab @ludachrissy @sisteramycatherine @izzycstairs @britttzy267 @eddiemunsonsimpp @powerpuffedbjtch @sariahs-stuff @cciessuzi @lilyquinnmunson @julxsxx @kozume-ko @obsessed-eddie @doomdabss @leelei1980 @hexqueensupreme @ches-86 @plaidamoosette @bobiverses @meadows-of-asphodel @whitakerstorm @brrrainst3w @serendipdipity01 @hypersexytoptobottom @m-art000 @walleloveseve @camsmunson101 @flavorfullsteve @peachpuffs25 @micheledawn1975 @whitakerstorm @cciessuzi @blackqueenie-18 @ggdawgg @velvetdimond @enne02  @ludachrissy @izzycstairs @abbysleftbicepp @britttzy267 @ssculker @eddiemunsonsimpp @powerpuffedbjtch @kylorensbaby @raeyas-ghost @gunnersaurusrex @mortalselfprojected @lilyquinnmunson @this-issam @acrloved @foxygrll @ghoulishjewels @sespe08 @emily-robert @revesephemeres @laraabarett @kylorensbaby @fanficrebloggy @roxypixiechic @munsonsvixen

@fapqueen

@djoshairychest

@pussfart

[yeehawpim]

a comic about fix-it fanfics

[raccoonmilf]

Hello? TikTok????

[the-muppet-joker]

Hey I'm sure there's a perfectly innocent reason someone could be desperately searching for muppet hole. Muppet hole is a normal thing to want

[biggest-gaudiest-poltergeist]

so strange when people assume 'waking up early' means increased productivity bc no??? im awake so i can read fanfic in bed before breakdown

[biggest-gaudiest-poltergeist]

BREAKFAST

[mattsleftball]

Reader getting super high n sleeping falling asleep on Steve getting all cozy and Eddie getting all jelly🤭

ooh i love this

Warm - Steve Harrington x Reader x Eddie Munson

The high doesn't hit all at once.

It creeps in slowly - like warmth spreading through your chest, like your thoughts sinking into something softer. Steve's living room feels quieter. The couch feels bigger. Steve's shoulder beneath your cheek feels...really, really nice.

You don't even remember leaning into him.

One minute you're sitting there, legs tucked under you, listening to Eddie argue with Steve over how cool D&D is. The next, your head is on Steve's shoulder, your body curled instinctively to his heat.

Steve freezes.

He looks down at you like you've just handed him a loaded gun and a puppy at the same time.

"You good?" he murmurs.

You hum in response, eyes half-lidded, words slipping away before they fully form.

"M'comfy," you mumble, nuzzling closer without thinking.

Eddie stops talking mid-sentence. "...Oh."

Steve shoots him a warning look. "They're just tired."

Eddie's jaw tightens. He watches as you sigh contentedly and curl further into Steve's side, fingers fisting the fabric of his sweater like it's the most natural thing in the world.

"Yeah," Eddie says, voice light but eyes sharp. "Real tired. Funny how that works."

Steve carefully adjusts, draping an arm around your shoulders so you don't move. It's gentle and protective.

Eddie hates it.

You shift again, cheek pressed to Steve's chest now, breath evening out as sleep finally takes over you.

Eddie scoffs. "Unbelievable."

"What?" Steve whispers.

"They didn't even ask," Eddie mutters. "Just stole you."

Steve huffs a quiet laugh. "They fell asleep, man."

Eddie crosses his arms, pouting like a kicked puppy. "Yeah, well. When they wake up, they're sitting next to me."

Steve grins. "Sure."

Eddie glares at him. "I'm serious."

From where you're half-asleep, you murmur, "Eddie's warm too..."

Both boys freeze.

Steve bites back a laugh.

Eddie brightens instantly. "See? They know."

You smile faintly in your sleep, completely unaware you nearly started a war between the boys.

Masterlist

xoxo,

infinity-quill

[lvrsnt]

AND YOU

eddie munson x reader x steve harrington (aka poly!steddie x reader)

steve really likes eddie. eddie really likes steve. steve and eddie really like the strange girl they met at the hideout, and they think she likes them too ( 5.5 k words ) a/n: FINALLY THE MENACE READER FIC IS HERE! this took me way too long and tons of rewriting for something so small i literally removed so much of the smut because it was taking too much time to write and it was a whole thing bleghh . also i realised that menace reader kinda falls under ditzy reader, but i kinda fw menace reader name so im just keeping her like that :) and yes she is also kinda a self insert fucking sue me tags: fluff fluff fluff!!! eddie and reader piss off steve (aka menace reader) universe, swearing, kisses and making out but no explicit nsfw content, eddie and steve r in love before meeting r, nancy wheeler is awesome, eddie and r are down bad for steve, alcohol mention and minor weed mention but nothing explicit, takes place in summer, implied metalhead reader, NOT PROOFREAD, steve implied prev internal homophobia

Eddie spots you first, because of course he does. The Black Sabbath leather jacket on your back catching his eye as he strolls into the warm bar. It’s too small to be an item borrowed from a boyfriend, and Eddie drinks in the form fitting material hugging your curves as he and Steve escape the summer heat in to the Hideout. He’s still staring hard when Steve Harrington snaps him out of it.

“-anways that last bartender said I looked like shot guy, which is like, what the fuck does that mean?” Steve bloviates, the taller boy walking in step with his best friend, pausing when he realises he’s lost Eddie’s attention, “Munson, are you fucking listening to me?”

His brown eyes follow Eddie’s to find the prettiest girl he’s ever seen at the bar. You’ve got on crazy cool clothes, shit he’d see in a fashion magazine (or Eddie’s closet), and a small crowd of people around you, friends or fans, Steve’s not so sure. He watches as you recount whatever story you’re telling, hands flying to articulate your points as the patrons laugh. Your lilting voice finds its way in his ears, sending a warm feeling in his stomach and when he blinks, you’re staring back at the pair, a grin slowly melting across your features.

“Whoa,” Steve murmurs.

Eddie’s just as stunned, blinking away the possibility of  hallucinating in unison with the brunette. “Was she looking at me?”

Based on looks alone, Steve is certain you’re more Eddie’s type (he’s not known many girls as cool as you talking to archetypal ex-jocks like Steve) but a little friendly banter never hurt anyone. 

He shrugs, arms crossed over his chest in a practiced aloofness he knows Eddie hates. “Don’t think so,” he tsks.

Eddie knows what he’s playing at, and he slaps the handsome boy square in the chest. The lazy grin Steve wears is enough to have his skin crawling, and he tries his best to push the warm feeling rising in his chest down. “Why not?” he scrunches his raven curls faux self-consciously and sniffs, “I’m pretty.”

Yes, yes, you are, Steve thinks lightly. He gestures at himself with a light scoff, sucking air through his teeth with a sorry expression, “Sure, but have you seen me?”

“Have you seen yourself?” Eddie teases back, “‘Sides, she’s coming over anyways, and I think she’s looking at me more than you.”

“What?”

Eddie’s right. You’re strolling towards them, having ditched your fanclub to approach the two men with your head held high. All of Steve’s faux bravado evaporates as you step closer.

 “Hello,” you say, confident like he’d expect you to.

“Hey,” they both reply, Steve eager, albeit shyer than usual and Eddie in his usual jaunty tone, this time with a little more coolness to it.

The leather jacket crinkles as you fold your arms over your chest, a little pinch in your eyebrows as you scan over the two. There’s no bite behind it, no real scrutiny, and Eddie finds himself leaning closer to provide you with a better look. A small smile spreads on your face.

“Pretty.” you murmur finally. Eddie gives a knowing look to Steve that reads, just like I said. Steve rolls his eyes.

“Me or him?” Eddie enquires. He’s not sure what would sting more, if you pointed to Steve and left Eddie void of his best friend and you or if you nodded to him and left Steve all on his lonesome. Fortunately, he’s presented with the best case scenario.

There’s no hesitation when you say, “Both.”

You don’t laugh, and Steve realises you’re serious. 

Oh.

He’s not sure how to navigate this, his gorgeous best friend he’s sure he’s in love with and the prettiest girl he’s ever laid his eyes on staring back at him with expressions doused in expectancy. Eddie’s eyebrows raise at what he interprets as hesitation, though it’s the exact opposite. 

Steve swallows down an eagerness that’s sure to scare you off thickly and says cooly, “Well, can we both buy you a drink?”

You grin, big and wide and Eddie’s expression matches yours as he guides the two of you back over to the bar. Steve’s in deep shit now.

-

Eddie’s not so sure what to call this arrangement.

You’re sprawled out on his bed, your head resting on Steve’s thigh to create a halo of hair on his lap, your chin tucked into your chest as you flick through Eddie’s stack of tapes, throwing the ones that don’t interest you unceremoniously into a pile on the sheets.

“Boring,” you huff, “also boring. This looks good!” Friday the 13th joins the smaller second pile composed of solely horror movies and Steve grimaces. He’s not so sure he’s mentally prepared to watch Jason on Camp Crystal Lake at this time of night. 

“Aliens…Critters…Oh, I like the cover on this one-” you muse to yourself before giggling, “-hey, this one’s a porno!”

“What?” Eddie calls horrified from the kitchen, almost dropping the cold cans of beer on his bedroom floor as his padded feet sprint to the bedroom. Steve’s already peering down to inspect the cover as Eddie snatches the tape from your fingers.

Eddie loves Steve and you.

Steve and you, Steve and you. He repeats the and like it’s his own fucking matra. Steve and you. He’s already in love with Steve, albeit any real boyfriend action Eddie would be more than happy to enact, and Eddie’s more than certain that he’s falling in love with you. The single month after him and Steve watched you down two cosmopolitans has already begun to bleed into Eddie’s favourite memories like the world’s most beautiful stain, and Eddie knows he wants to keep you around much longer.

You’re giggling as he frowns down at the tape cover. Al Pacino glares back at him on the cover of Scarface. You’re fucking around with him, clearly, and Steve’s laughing too.

“Assholes.” he murmurs, going for a tone with real bite and instead landing on something with a little more amused affection. “No beers for either of you.”

“Oh c’mon, man.” Steve pouts, twirling your hair around his finger absentmindedly. 

“Yeah, man,” you parrot Steve, shoulders still shaking with mirth as your socked feet push at Eddie’s thighs instead of dangling off his bed.

Eddie catches your feet, hands wrapped around your ankles as he makes an action of pulling you off the bed. “Especially not for you.” Your heels land back on the floor with a thump as Eddie retreats back into the kitchen.

He’d usually entertain your antics if Steve was on the other end of them, but it’s Eddie instead and he feels a sudden sympathy for the brunette. Eddie returns and drops an apology can in Steve’s lap as you shuffle over to allow him more space.

“What’re we watching?”

Your eyebrows pinch together. “Where’s my beer?”

“In the kitchen where it belongs instead of in your evil hands.” he sniffs, almost as dramatic as Steve with the flu as you sputter, rising into a seated position to stare at him incredulously. 

“Please?”

“Just get her the beer or we’ll never hear the end of it.” Steve chimes, more familiar with your antics than Eddie. Steve prefers to call himself Y/N Educated, but it’s just a nicer way to say that he’s an easy target for you.

Like the fucking minx you are, you stack your hands on Eddie’s shoulder and hook your chin over them to look up at him through your lashes. Eddie tries his best to ignore the feeling of your chest pressed against his bicep. You’re definitely not wearing a bra.

You try again this time. Eddie knows you’re not going for sultry or sexy, but it all has the same effect when you’re murmuring in his ear.

“Can I please get my beer?” you ask sweetly, “Please?”

He caves, because he’s an idiot, but he doesn’t look at the puppy-dog eyes he’s sure you’re giving him, because he’s not that stupid. You hum happily when he relents. 

“‘Kay.” he huffs, “Fine, asshole, I’ll get you your damn beer.”

Your head tilts up to press a loud, smacking kiss onto his cheek, nothing like the gentle greetings he gives the crown of your head. A real spit and lip gloss slick thing that has him cringing. Steve clears his throat. Eddie knows he’s fighting the urge to ask for one of your kisses too.

“Mwah,” you finish off the assault on his cheek happily, stretching out into the space he leaves as he stands up, “Thanks, honey!”

Eddie’s cheeks fucking burn. He gets you two beers and another for Steve because he doesn’t want to miss a second of staring at your faces collecting seconds.

-

“So,” Robin starts, twirling a fly-away string from her bikini bottoms tight around her finger until the tip turns a dark red, “what’s the deal with you and Y/N?”

Nancy turns around on to her stomach, letting the sun hit her back to turn it a light golden as she looks at Steve from the sun bed, cheek smushed against the damp fabric. “And Eddie,” she corrects, “don’t forget about Eddie.”

Steve’s in too deep to even consider lying, instead huffing as he slinks down in his seat, arms crossed around his bare chest. You’re on Jonathan’s shoulders in Steve’s pool, wrestling Dustin as he sits atop Eddie’s, head thrown back as you shove your way to victory. The melting sun doesn’t fare so well with his heated cheeks.

“I don’t know,” he groans, palms pressed into his eyes, “I don’t even know at this point.

“You don’t-” Robin says shrilly, before toning down her voice, “you don’t know?”

“Robin, what am I supposed to say?” Steve hisses, “‘Oh hey, Eddie, I’m actually in love with you, but in a ‘I want to kiss your face’ way, and you too Y/N, actually.” he laughs now, dry and bitter, “‘Yeah, I’m fucking whipped for you too, and so is Eddie and I think you want us both but I don’t even know anymore because-” he breathes in shakily, voice a whisper, “‘because i’m in love with both of you.’”

Steve shoulders heave with the effort of letting out his frustrations, and the silence that falls between him and the two girls has him cringing. He’s open to spout out an apology he doesn’t really mean when Nancy speaks up.

“Steve,” she says, pushing up her sunglasses against her head of curls to get a good look at the boy, “have you ever thought about just dating both?”

Steve blinks. “What?”

“Dating both of them,” Nancy repeats, “Y/N and Eddie.”

He hadn’t thought it was a possibility. Steve had just wrapped his mind around wanting to date Eddie when you came into the picture.

“No,” he responds truthfully, hopefully, “I can do that?”

“Is anyone saying you can’t?”

Steve thinks for a second, though he’s not sure why he does. He’s in love with both of you, he thinks it must be one of the most obvious things in the world.

“No,” he tells himself, “nobody is.”

-

The backyard is eerily quiet when everyone goes home, the only sounds being the soft splashing of the water and Steve crushing empty cans in his hand, shoving them into a big black trash bag behind him. Your eyes follow the moving veins in his hands and the curve of his bicep, revelling in your first instance of ogling a shirtless Steve Harrington. He looks up, smiles at you, and sends a swarm of butterflies flying around your stomach.

Eddie splashes water at you to get your attention. “What’cha looking at?”

You splash him back, laughing at the way he blinks the water out of his long lashes, the droplets falling down over his tatted chest. It looks like the black widow on his chest is weeping, and you giggle. “Nothin’”

Eddie pulls you forward by your bicep, spinning you around to pin you to his chest, his bicep coming around your cheek to curl into your neck in a perfect headlock. His knuckles muss your chlorine soaked hair, forcing a squeal as you kick your feet. He smells strongly of Nancy’s tanning lotion, slathered on thick over his arms to try rid him of his Hellfire t-shirt tan lines.

“You little perv!” he teases, voice thick with affection, “You didn’t strike me as a peeping tom.”

“I’m hardly a peeping tom if he knows I'm staring.” 

“If I were any smarter, I'd guess you had a crush on our boy here.”

You’re not one to deny the obvious as you claw at Eddie’s arm to get him to release you. “I do, stupid-”

The commotion in the previously peaceful backyard must’ve spooked Steve as he stands before you now, hands on his hips as he looks down at the both of you in the pool. “I turn around for three seconds and you two are already trying to kill each other?”

“She’s trying,” Eddie muses, dropping your head with two defensive palms up, "I'm all for love, not war.”

“You guys are stupid.”

Now free from your restraints, you swim up to where Steve’s standing, arms resting on the hot concrete and your chin hooked over them as you stare up at him. It hurts your neck, but he’s handsome at every angle. “You coming back in?”

He shakes the black trash bag and you can hear the clang of aluminum inside. “Let me throw these out first.”

“Throw them later,” you tell him, “come back in, please.”

Steve pretends to think about it, and you already know what his answer will be, but you still smile wide regardless when he relents. “Alright. Back up.”

Before you can move back, Steve’s making a running jump into the pool, tucking his legs into his chest in his perfect swimmer form and sending Eddie diving away with a yelp. You react similarly, hands coming up to shield your face from the spray.

Steve’s brown head of hair breaks the surface, revealing his handsome face when he pushes the locks back to slick down, curling in slightly at the nape of his neck. A little grossly, you think about licking the spot of pool water running down his plump bottom lip. A chemical kiss, Eddie would’ve called it.

“C’mere,” Steve tells you.

You let him pull you in, his big hands coming down to wipe off your streaking mascara from your sunkissed cheeks, his tongue in between his teeth in concentration.

Eddie paddles over, peering over Steve’s shoulder. “A little more to the left, honey.” You flush a little. Eddie calls him honey like it’s second nature.

If Steve notices the petname, he doesn’t show it, following Eddie’s instructions to brush off the sticky black stuff. Breaths mingle, kissing each other. Your lips don’t.

“Scootch over,” Eddie huffs, his hands replacing Steve’s. His ring sat snug around his middle finger is tarnishing slightly. You make a mental note to tell him. After you stop staring at his mouth.

Eddie makes quick work of your face, rubbing in harder but removing all of your smudge make up efficiently. You’re not sure you’ve ever felt as nervous as this before, both of them peering down at you as you try your best to stay still.

“Hi,” you whisper.

“Hey,” they murmur back.

If you really wanted to, which you do, you could tilt your head ever so slightly to press your lips against either of them.

They both share your same sentiment, moving in together in tandem, their heads almost colliding. You wait for the fuse to burn and set off all the fireworks in your stomach, but it dies right before the fire can mix with gunpowder.

“Hey!” Dustin calls, oblivious to your little moment. He’s bent at the waist, rummaging through a pile of you and Eddie’s belongings on one of the lounge chairs. 

Steve and Eddie both curse. You’re grateful that it means you didn’t dream up your almost-kiss.

“Have you seen my house keys?” he calls again, letting Eddie’s black backpack fall to the ground with a clink as he peeks under your tote bag. Eddie pales.

“Henderson, if you broke my pipe I swear I’ll-”

Dustin groans, loud and obnoxious like Steve would and you laugh at the clear similarity. “Oh my God, can you just help me look, please?”

“Alright, Jesus, we’re coming.” Steve yells back, dragging himself up the pool stairs to help the younger boy search. Eddie follows close behind, a hand around your wrist as your bare feet slap against the ground to join the two.

They crowd the seat, peeling open pizza boxes and Eddie’s backpack to find the lost house keys. You watch Dustin rise to his full height, swallowing thickly as he pats down his board shorts, his sunkissed cheeks paling.

“Guys, wait.”

Steve understands it as quickly as you do, gritting his teeth as he drops your bag back down. “Are you serious?”

Eddie, oblivious, keeps searching, even pulling apart the bushes to see if they hold Dustin’s keys. You shuffle from one foot to another.

Steve repeats it again, and Dustin cringes at the rise in his voice. “Are you serious? You had them the whole time?”

That gets Eddie’s attention as he rises slowly to peer down at Dustin, arms crossed over his bare chest. “What’d I just hear?”

Steve scoffs. “He had them the whole damn time.”

“The whole time?”

You watch what you’d describe as two dads scolding their young son. The scrunched up look on Steve’s face is worth your missed kiss.

“I’m sorry, okay?”

“Get out, Henderson.”

“Jeez!” Dustin yelps as Steve guides him towards the door, still clutching his keys in his hand. One of Eddie’s DND figures catches on the light through the gaps in his fingers.

“Out, please.” 

“Can you still bring me to Robin’s tomorrow?”

A beat.

“Okay.” you hear Steve tell him, “can you go now?”

-

You’re pulling out a small collection of guitar picks from in between worn down leather when Eddie returns from the gas station, twirling a small plastic bag around his index finger as he climbs into the driver's seat.

“Hey!” he says happily as you drop the picks into the cupholder, a cigarette stuck to his plump bottom lip as he speaks, “I was looking for those!”

You don’t doubt that. Eddie is notorious for losing his things anywhere and everywhere. Steve’s bedroom is practically Eddie’s personal lost and found. You’re already feeling around for another one when he starts the car.

The cool summer air floods your lungs when he rolls the windows down, pulling out of the gas station parking lot and down the main road. Sweltering heat has forced Eddie out of his usual leather jacket and Hellfire shirt and into soft band tees with the arms cut off.

“Can you light?” he mumbles around the cigarette, leaning in with his eyes focused on the road to allow you to flick open the zippo lighter in his centre console, pressing the cool metal to your hands as the spark illuminates his face.

He settles back against his seat, one hand lazily turning the steering wheel as he drives down the main road to your house. The wind whips his hair into something fierce and beautiful and you’re overcome with the sudden urge to kiss him like you felt in the pool two weeks ago.

You pass Steve’s house, void of Steve himself. He was picking up an extra late night shift at the Family Video and had to bail on your plans to go to the cinema tonight. Eddie rests his wrist on the window to flick the butt onto the street and wave a small, “Bye, Harrington,” as you drive past.

“Bye, Harrington,” you repeat, “You know he’s going to see that and know it’s you, right?”

Eddie grins at you, no sheepishness as he says, “I know. Means he’ll call me later to bitch me out when he gets home.”

It’s mostly silent as Eddie pulls into your driveway, switching off the radio to quieten Led Zeppelin as he puts the van in park. You’re unbuckling your seatbelt when Eddie puts his hand over yours gently. He’s looking at your lips when you turn, you notice.

“You okay?”

“Peachy.” Eddie murmurs, quieter than you’ve ever heard him. His chest is tense with a breath he doesn’t even realise he’s holding in. 

You’re already closing the distance between the two of you when he exhales, pressing your lips to his to breathe in cigarette smoke and vanilla. The bridge of his nose knocks into yours as his eyes shudder closed, almost two months of want building up into the small, satisfied sound Eddie pushes into your mouth. He’s sweet when you kiss, though you expect nothing less from the boy who adjusts the van seat just to your liking before you sit inside. 

Eddie’s greedy and needy as his hand comes to anchor in your hair, his fingers pushing the strands back as he pecks the length of your cupid's bow. You’re certain you’re both thoroughly kiss bitten when Eddie pulls back with a gasp, eyes wide. Your saliva leaves a sheen over his gaping mouth.

“Fuck!” he exclaims, paling further than you thought he could, “We’re so stupid!”

Well. Not exactly the first thing you’d like to hear after you make out with someone. Or the second.

“What?” you ask, slightly embarrassed, though you’re not sure what for, “Eddie?”

His forehead rests on the steering wheel, dark hair forming a curtain around his pretty face. You’re already itching for another kiss, but it’ll have to wait. Eddie’s eerily quiet, meaning that whatever little internal breakdown he’s having is none of his practiced bravado. You shake his half-bare shoulder gently.

“Are you okay?”

Eddie rises like a corpse from the dead, turning to you with a groan. “Harrington’s going to be so mad we kissed without him.”

You laugh a sweet sound as you throw your head back, shoulders shaking as Eddie leans over to you, a hand behind your headrest. “I’m serious! Dead serious. He’s going to get all whiny and mopey when we tell him.” He blinks like he’s just realised what’s transpired and inspects your face with more clarity. “Hey. You kissed me!”

“No, Captain Obvious, I just wanted to put my face real close to yours,” You use your pointer and thumb to emphasise the space between the two of you, “and see what the air in your vicinity tasted like.”

Eddie grins, fat and wide as he closes the space again, his hand coming around to the soft leather of the cushion to cage you to your seat. He pecks an apology kiss to your cheek, and then something more intense to your lips. “Oh, baby,” he laughs, “kissed me so dumb I started worrying about Harrington for a sec.”

You both know Eddie always worries about Steve, but you let the baby ease you out of a teasing remark. There’s a fuzzy feeling lighting up your body and if Eddie kissed you any more, you’re certain you would glow with it, lighting up the dimly lit van. You kiss him again to test it out. No glow, but the smile on Eddie’s face is close enough to it.

“You’re really fucking pretty, you know that?”

Your nose wrinkles in a faux disgust. “Ew,” you tell him, “you got a crush on me or something?”

He kisses you again, this time by the corner of your eye in the free space between your eye and your eyebrow. “Big, fat, juicy, cootie-transferring, disgusting crush. World ending crush. Universe destroying crush.” he murmurs into your cheek.

“Maybe I should stop kissing you, if it means it’ll destroy the world.”

“You don’t want to be stars floating together in the vast galaxy?”

“Not yet.” you reply truthfully. “What’s the plan for Steve?”

“I’ll tell him, and then you go left and I’ll go right and then we’ll kiss him so stupid he forgets about it.” Eddie jokes, though you’ve seen the way Steve short circuits when he sees the soft fat of your thigh revealed by your mini skirt or when Eddie’s play fighting ends up with the two of them a little too close and personal (even if nothing’s too close and personal for Eddie) on your bedroom floor.  There’s a very real and possible chance that you’d send Steve Harrington into shock if you pressed your lips against his.

“Okay,” you murmur, “Kiss me again?”

Eddie obliges. Fireworks spark again. You kiss him again to test if there’s still novelty to it after your 20th one: there is.

-

You almost feel bad the next time you see Steve, your head hung a little lower than it should be when he kisses your cheek, dangerously close to the side of your mouth. You wonder if he can smell Eddie on your lips. 

With all of his Dungeon master bravado, you would’ve thought Eddie could play the part of the innocent best friend a little easier, but he looks just as frowny as you are. He rubs at his shoulder, pale skin a little more tan from days at Steve’s pool as he rummages through the fridge.

Steve’s saying something - an anecdote about work or what his mom told him that morning - but it falls on your deaf ears. His voice swings in and out like a focusing camera, your eyes trailing the curve of his cupid's bow as he speaks. Eddie explained it to you perfectly on the drive to Steve’s house, his big hand on your thigh: once you’ve broken the ice with him, it makes the idea of breaking the ice between platonic and practically a married couple with Steve more plausible. Instead of a wave in the moonlight, it’s something palpable - something to hold in your hands.

Eddie jumps over the back of the couch, sodas tucked into the crook of his arm as you try your best to be interested in the new record Robin played at the WSQK. Eddie gives you a funny look that reads, “cut it out,” but his tongue pokes out to wet his bottom lip when Steve leans in closer to him and you bite back a laugh.

“How was the movie last week?” Steve asks innocently, sucking at the liquid pooled around the top of his can.

Eddie swallows harshly, “Good.”

Now that’s fucking rich coming from Eddie “I have to explain every single plot line in deep detail until you physically stop me” Munson. You want to bite the bullet yourself and just break the ice, but it has to be fair on Eddie to say what he wants too. “Steve,” you say, eerily serious, “we have to tell you something.”

His nose scrunches, eyebrows gathered in the middle of his forehead. “What? No, man, you said you two would watch it with me with no spoilers.”

“It’s not that, Steve.”

“Please. I don’t trust either of you.” he frowns, “‘Cause then I’ll think I'm safe and then Eddie’s going to whisper it in my ear or something.”

“Steve-”

“Seriously, Eds, I know you will.”

Loving Steve Harrington is easy. Telling him that you love him is not.

“Steve!”

Eddie takes a leap of faith, hands damp and cold from condensation cradling Steve’s sunkissed cheeks to pull him close, their chests flushed together. You watch as Steve lets out a surprised yelp, before relaxing, his body melting against Eddie’s. You find yourself craning your neck to get a look.

Steve’s long lashes kiss his cheekbones, his nose rubbing against Eddie;s, his hands raked through his heat-frizzy curls. You pout when Eddie doesn’t let go to let you have a turn but you give him some grief; your kiss with Eddie was 2 months in the making, for Steve it’s been much longer.

You prod the chub at Steve’s waist. “Hello?”

He pulls back, flushed from head to toe, kissed all over with Eddie’s fierce love and not even mad that you’ve poked him. “Hi, honey,” he grins, “You want one too?”

“I guess,” you shrug and Eddie laughs.

Steve kisses you first, to your delight, sweetly at the corner of your mouth and then hot and heavier over your lips. He tastes like Eddie, who tastes like you, who now tastes like Steve. It’s a good kind of taste.

He rubs the pad of his thumb over your cheek, another hand holding the nape of your neck tight and secure, like he’s unsure if he ever wants to let go. You tingle all over with the excitement of being able to pull pretty sounds out of Steve, experimentally biting down on his plump bottom lip to test all your greedy theories. He lets out a groan that curls around you like smoke, and you try the other side for research purposes. 

“You’re a mean kiss,” he smiles against your lips.

“You wanna see mean?” you tease back.

Eddie hooks his chin over Steve’s shoulder, giving it an affectionate scrape with his teeth and then a kiss to sooth the tingle. “What’re we discussing, ladies?” he chimes in.

“Evil, nasty things about you.”

Eddie curls an arm around Steve’s stomach. “Yeah?” You’re the evil, nasty one, baby. Where’s my kiss?”

Steve’s physical affection has made you kind today, and you oblige, kissing Eddie with all the sweetness he deserves. Too sweet that Steve confirms his own suspicions.

“Oh my god,” he murmurs, then louder this time, “Oh my god!”

Why does this always happen when you kiss Eddie?

“What?” Eddie asks, leaving one last peck on your lips to look up Steve, who stares down at you incredulously and then to Eddie.

“You guys kissed before!” he points out, eyebrows raised and hair bobbing as he exclaims, “No fucking way you two kissed before I kissed Eddie, oh my god!”

You give Eddie a grimace to say, “you were right,”

“Are you mad?” you ask cautiously. You’ve done everything under the sun to annoy Steve, and he never makes it past slightly agitated - that’s Eddie’s doing.

“No,” Steve replies, then a little more truthfully, “Maybe.” He purses his lips, “Just a little ‘cause I didn’t get to see it.”

“You saw it just now!”

“I didn’t see it see it. Do it again.”

“You perv!”

“Eddie, you don’t wanna kiss me?”

“I do-”

You lean over Steve to place a sticky kiss on Eddie’s cheek, loud and smacking. The sound makes him recoil and Steve laugh. “You’re a freak,” Eddie yelps, “Get off’a me!”

Steve wrestles you back onto your side of the couch to let Eddie go, peering down at you through his long lashes. Your mouth finds his again, tongue prodding past his pink lips to lick at his own. Eddie finds the column of his neck, pressing kisses into the neglected skin, his hand snaking up to cup your face.

“You thought you were going to kiss me first?” Eddie murmurs, packing extra mirth into his kisses.

Steve sighs. “I thought Y/N was going to kiss me first too,” he tilts his head back, hitting the back of the couch, “I gotta go thank Nancy. And call Robin.” he pauses, “Maybe not Dustin.”

[burgundysnow]

Torment

Words: 1.3k Warnings: public sex, sub/dom dynamics, edging, overstimulation, punishment, blowjob, nsfw, reader is nicknamed princess.

Thinking about Eddie being a sub for a moment. stay with me. 

He didn’t even do anything that bad. But teasing Steve on his already frustrating day off in public, was the breaking point. 

Eddie coming up behind him, saying shit like “there’s a bathroom right over there. I’ll be 5 minutes tops. Princess has the kids.”

The Arcade was bustling, Steve had already promised to do 3 different things with max and Dustin. So the answer was no. 

The constant nagging isn’t what got him though. It’s that after Steve said no, Eddie went to tease you. 

It’s not that you were a second choice or anything. Eddie was probably just being horny again. Maybe it’s because he’s craving Steve’s attention and when he doesn’t get what he wants. He went to you, to make him jealous. 

But that didn’t sit right with Steve. He had already shot him down and said no. Steve was the final authority when it came to sexual things like this, so Eddie went to you hoping the answer would vary?

That’s when Steve came up behind him, whispering in Eddie’s ear. “No cumming for two weeks.” With a slight jab into Eddie’s abdomen. 

Sadly, that only made Eddie get half hard in his jeans in the middle of the arcade. 

If you would have asked anyone other than Eddie how that first week went, they would have said “fine.” 

But if you asked Eddie how the first week went, he would have responded with “absolute torture.” 

He lasted about ten days before Steve came back from work and saw you laying down next to Eddie and tugging at his painfully hard dick.

“No.” Steve groaned. Rubbing at his eyes in frustration. “Do not tell me you caved.” 

“I didn’t cave!” Your movements slowed, making Eddie groan. Ten whole days. 240 hours he’s gone without busting his load. 

Not to mention, you still used him. 

Late into the night when Steve was gone, Eddie was the one who licked up that mess between your legs happily. Only to receive nothing afterwards, save for a kiss on the forehead. 

“I’m just teasing, Stevie. Do you really have that little faith in me?” 

“No. I just have that much faith in Eddie.” 

Steve’s usual routine from getting back from work would be to press a kiss to both your heads before getting in the shower. But right now, he’s taking off his shirt and climbing onto the bed. Positioning himself right in front of Eddie’s dick.

“Come on.” Steve swats your hand away so that he can press kitten kisses to Eddie’s tip. “It’s my turn.” 

“Be my guest.” 

Eddie’s head was in a whirl wind. You and Steve are talking like he’s not even there, while his dick feels like it’s going to burst.

He’s all sweaty and sprawled out. His bangs are damp, but at least you’ve done Eddie the decency to pull his hair back into a low bun. 

He’s holding onto your thigh tightly. Though, whenever he gets a little too close, he has to let go of you. Hovering, his fingers flex like he’s tensing them just to give him something else to think about— other than his impending orgasm. To him, touching you is getting him that much closer to the edge.

And Eddie, being the good boy he is. Hasn’t said a word. He usually runs his tongue. That’s how he got into this mess before. Right now though, other than his whines and moans, he’s not mumbled a single word. 

“Stevie— he’s been pretty good….” 

If you guys were teasing him right now, he would be so mad. Because the thought of cumming has him so much closer. 

“You’re going soft, Princess.” When Steve comes up to respond, he’s drooling around Eddie’s dick. Plump, glossy lips that you want to kiss right off. He probably tastes like Eddie. 

Eddie wants to move away. Shift. Say his safeword. Be done. Because right now, he can’t take much more teasing. It hurts. 

“Don’t you remember Friday? When he was acting so innocent sucking us both off just so we would give him some pity. ‘Just because I wanted too’ my ass, he’s trying to butter us up to get him to cum. Does that sound like a good boy to you?” 

That was a moment of ‘desperation and weakness,’ as Eddie would respond. And apparently, Steve doesn’t do weakness with the way his hand is rapidly going up and down Eddie’s cock making disgustingly slick noises. 

“He was just being sweet…” 

He tilts his head to look at you. Pressing a sweet kiss to his lips that has Eddie whining. Feeling dizzy with love. 

“My sweet boy…” your voice is sickeningly sweet, it makes Eddie tap rapidly at Steve’s arm. The silent way of saying i'm gonna fucking cum, edging him once again. 

Steve only rolls his eyes at your persuasion. He lets go of Eddie’s cock, as if he’s annoyed that he was about to fall over the edge. 

“I don’t think he deserves it yet.” 

“Steve, you’re so mean. Look at him!” 

Eddie looked like he came out of a porno. His chest was wet and glistening with his precum, his cheeks were flushed with his eyes almost rolled back, and his balls so heavy and full. 

“What about when he did the laundry yesterday? You know he hates doing laundry.” 

And while Steve was mean, he wasn’t cruel. 

“Ed’s? What do you think, lesson learned?” You asked softly. 

And while Eddie wasn’t talking out of his own volition. When there was finally an opening for him to speak, he spew out words in haste. 

“Please. Please. Please. M’so close. I won’t tease again please!” 

Eddie’s voice broke, just like his humility at the moment. His words seemed convincing for the time being, but you know by next week he will be teasing you in public again. 

But you can’t seem to care when he looks so pretty and fucked out. This is medieval torture for Eddie. He’s sure the women in the Middle Ages did this to their husbands if they didn’t come home with an actual cow. 

“Steve.” Now you’re pleading on his behalf. He’s never been more in love with you— or horny. 

“Damn— alright! Don’t come running to me though when he shoves his hand down your pants in public. Thought we were trying to teach him decency.”  

Steve’s hand is rough. So tight as he squeezes it around Eddie’s cock, going at a brutally fast pace. Hearing the wet noises that echo across the walls. 

“Oh— fuck yes, thank you. Thank you—”

Eddie’s head is spinning. Steve lets the coil in Eddie’s stomach steam to the surface. Your hand is touching Eddie so gently. Tracing the outline of his face, down to his chest like he’s precious. Now your hand is on his thigh, your touch making him shiver. He doesn’t last long after that.

“I’m cumin’ please—”

One, two seconds before cum shoots out of his dick. Steve is nice enough to lick it up when it lands on his abdomen. Eddie’s chest is heaving and his eyes roll back. His head hitting against the headboard of the bed, voice changing between guttering groans and high pitched whimpers.   

It feels so good. Riding out the waves of his orgasm, until it doesn’t stop, the ending pleasure becomes building pleasure once more, more prominent this time, more sensitive. Then suddenly Eddie is being forced into overstimulation. 

“No— no no no Steve I can’t-“ he whines so perfectly. Squirming just right. 

“Come on Ed’s, you’ve been whining about how you wanted to cum so bad this week, gimme another.” 

“Steve.” Oh there it is. Your voice, you’ll save him from this overbearing pleasure. Let this torture finally end, and maybe bathe him in the shower. 

“You’ve already pulled one from him. It’s my turn, I want a go.” 

Eddie watches in horror as your switch places with Steve. Your figure sitting in front of him, getting your grabby hands on his aching cock. While Steve— so much stronger now that he’s working out at the gym twice a week— practically holds him down. 

That’s when Eddie realized, you’re not his savior. You’re a pretty fairy in disguise, just to give him more pleasurous torture.

And Eddie can’t help but to love it. 

[burgundysnow]

Little steddie blurb about how you just can’t do quickies with Steve. Word count: 1.3k

Eddie wasn’t necessarily a cheapskate— but if you see half price written on a music store going out of business, you better believe he’s popping in. Whether he’s on a date or not. 

Both you and Steve have already checked it out. There was one or two records that you bought but Eddie kept going. You see through the window of Steve’s truck that Eddie’s has a little pile set aside of stuff he’s bound to buy on the counter. 

If he buys anymore, you’re pretty sure he’s going to come out asking Harrington for extra cash. 

“What the hell is he even doing?” 

Steve’s annoyed. He’s in a pretty pristine shirt because you were all supposed to be on your way to a fancy restaurant. His hair is slicked back, and he’s looking out the window of the truck. 

“He’s having fun. Let him be.” 

There’s soft music that keeps you mostly entertained. But it is boring. Just sitting and waiting in the car till Eddie comes out with fluffy bangs and sweaty pits. 

Steve turns to you. No doubt looking over your frilly hair and light makeup for tonight. His head hits against the back of his seat while grabbing your hand. Very bored indeed.

“Do you wanna have sex?” 

“What?” A laugh bubbles out of you. 

“A quickie right there, in the back seat. Or I can turn the corner for more privacy. Munson won’t even know we’re gone.” 

That might be true because Eddie looks pretty absorbed in picking different choices of records and guitar strings. 

“Steve, we can’t.” 

“We totally can.” 

It’s not just about Eddie though, or the thrill of getting caught. There are other factors of Steve that can be enjoyable under the right circumstances. And just terrible in others. 

“But I mean— we can have sex later right? That was the whole plan for tonight. The fancy dinner thing?” Steve asks, his hand is rubbing over your thigh through the little slit in your dress making you feel warm and aroused. He’s joking. Steve wants to take you out for overpriced dinner portions any day of the week, it doesn’t have to end in sex. But you play along. 

“Yeah. That’s like the whole plan for tonight.” You nod. 

“Then why can’t we do it now?” 

Steve wasn’t whiny when he asked. He’s genuinely curious, because Steve has a sneaking suspicion that you chose to have more quickies with Eddie than him for some reason and he wants to know why. 

“Because Steve— now isn’t the right time.” 

“Do I do it wrong?” 

You look over at Steve, despite the heat you feel flowing to your cheeks with his blunt words. You can hear the slight insecurity when Steve speaks and you guess you’re not as good at hiding all your sex secrets as you thought you were. 

“No— you don’t do quickies wrong. It’s just—”

Because you can’t come up with an excuse fast enough, Eddie’s knocking on Steve’s window as your savior. He sees Steve’s hand on your thigh and an amused smile plays on his face as the window gets rolled down. 

“Starting without me?” Eddie’s shirt is thoroughly ruined and his cheeks are pink by how hot it is in the store. Only a broken AC to cool him down.

Steve would like to proudly tell Eddie, “yeah so fuck off.” But he can’t. Because he doesn’t understand why you don’t like quickies with him. So instead Steve answers with a sigh. “What do you want.” 

“Can I bum twenty dollars?” 

“Twenty?! Ed’s—” 

Eddie has this sheepish smile. Totally waiting to have to explain his reasoning. But Steve pulled out his wallet from his back pocket. 

Right as Eddie’s about to grab the crisp twenty, Steve pulls back. “Can you can tell me why she doesn’t like quickies with me?” Steve nods his head towards you. You almost scoff, wanting to punch or pout at Steve for the rest of your life. 

Steve only asks Eddie because sometimes you both speak behind his back. He knows because you tell Steve all of Eddie’s bad sex habits. So he has a hunch you do it about him too. 

Eddie looks a little taken a back. But when he meets your gaze he smiles. Despite your constant shake of head telling him to say no.

Eddie yanks the money out of Steve’s hands, pocketing it before mumbling. “She doesn’t like quickies with you because you too big, Harrington. Not much time for prep.” And then while you’re closing your eyes, embarrassment over-taking your whole body, Eddie taps Steve’s truck a few times before he goes back inside. 

Steve’s gaze returns to you. He puts his hand back on your thigh— more of a comfort this time— before touching at your chin and making you look up at him. 

His eyes tell you that he’s not upset at least. They’re more worried if anything with the way they sparkle and his eyebrows draw close. 

“Is that true?” 

You nod pathetically.

Steve runs an exasperated hand through his hair. He smiles all amused and puffs out his chest. Now he’s taking this too literally and it’s getting to his ego. 

“You could have told me. I wouldn’t want to make you uncomfortable.” 

“Yeah but—” you shake your head. Making sure the AC of the truck is directly on you with how hot you suddenly feel. Not thinking it was this muggy. “You like quickies. I know you do.” 

Steve huffs a laugh. He is a bit of an exhibitionist. With the way he railed you at the lake house when you all went camping while Robin was in the next room over. Or when you’re in a little hiding place with Steve like a Photo Booth and he kisses for a little too long. You can just tell he likes the thrill of being caught. 

“Yes. But I like you more.” 

His hand on your knee is rubbing full circles. It does make you feel a little better even if it was a suggestive gesture a few seconds ago. And the way Steve’s eyes look at you, you can tell he’s a little guilty. 

“Fuck— I feel like an ass. It hurts doesn’t it?” 

“No! It doesn’t hurt. But you know…. When we fuck it’s nice to be a little stretched out first.”

Steve looks at you amused, your cheeks are hot and after a moment of staring too long in each others eyes, you both laugh. Fuck— your words are so crude. 

“Guess this means I can gloat to Eddie about how you like quickies with him more because of his small dick?”

“You do that and I’ll tell him you hate when you both fuck in front of the tv.” 

“I’m watching my show and he just comes and drops to his knees every time. It’s like I’m cursed or something.” 

You don’t tell Steve that Eddie does it on purpose. Not because you want to keep that a secret. It is amusing when Steve still hasn’t learned just to record it, and then he has to go and pause the tv while Eddie’s mouth is full of his dick.

But The Man of the Hour comes out with a box full of stuff and plants it in the back of the truck. Only for Eddie to wave Steve over, a silent way of saying there’s more. 

“What the fuck Munson.” 

Steve unbuckles and shakes his head. Annoyed look on his face. But right as he’s about to close the door he stops, looking up at you. 

“When we get home I’ll make sure that little hole is stretched wide for me alright? No pain, I’ll take my time.” 

Your lip is caught in between your teeth as you smile. Now who’s being crude. 

“Can’t wait.” 

You’ll be lucky to even make it to dinner at this point. 

[moonstruckme]

Mae, have you ever done a whimsical reader with Steddie? I don’t really have an idea exactly but I love reading whimsical reader. I think whimsical reader would both confuse and make Steddie swoon

I have not! And I agree, I think she would :)

poly!Steddie x whimsical!reader ♡ 668 words

You’ve been missing for a whole afternoon before your boyfriends set out to find you. They know better than to be worried—you have a tendency to set out with purpose and then get diverted along the way—but they also know better than to think you’ll notice it’s getting dark out with enough time to make it home. 

Steve and Eddie split up with intent to meet back at Skull Rock by sunset, and of course that’s where Eddie finds you, sitting pretzel-style on the ground laying down pieces of bread while Steve slaps the back of his neck agitatedly. 

“Hey, beautiful,” Eddie says, loving how you and Steve both look up. He was talking to both of you, really. 

“Hi.” Your voice floats towards him like dandelion seeds on a summer breeze. For someone who’s made no effort to come home all day, you look genuinely pleased to see him. “Your hair looks nice.” 

Eddie grins. He’s tied it up in a bun because it’s so fucking hot out, and it’s probably damp and frizzy, but of course you would find something to like. “Thanks. Where’d you run off to today?” 

You hum. “I wanted to go sit in the stream.”

“It’s dried up,” Steve informs Eddie. 

“It was dried up,” you echo wistfully. “So then I came here to lie in the sun, and when I woke up—” 

“She fell asleep,” Steve fills in, his voice heavy with a signature mix of dryness and affection. His mouth twists as he smacks a spot on his arm. 

“—I saw these ants taking apart an old apple to carry it away. I find their organization very impressive, don’t you?”

Eddie raises his eyebrows at you. “Super impressive, yeah. Sweetheart, did you nap here for the whole afternoon?” 

You take your attention off the ants by your knees for a moment to blink up at him. “I don’t know. Is the afternoon over?” 

Steve huffs an appalled laugh. “Yeah, it’s over. You know it’s over because the fucking mosquitos are out. Are you two not being eaten alive?”

“Nope,” says Eddie, at the same time as you say, “I don’t mind them taking what they need.” 

Steve’s brows sew together concernedly at that, but he only snaps, “Can we go, please?” 

“Okay, you big baby.” Eddie slings an arm around Steve’s neck, hauling him in for a kiss. “Jesus. Can’t even take a couple of mosquito bites, huh?” 

“I think it’s sweet,” you say. You ensure the last few pieces of your bread are broken up and dispersed before standing. “It means they like your blood the best. I bet they really appreciate you.” 

Steve scoffs as he threads his fingers through yours. “Oh, great. They appreciate me.” He bumps Eddie’s hip. “Are we sure they’re not all just going to me because he’s anemic?”

“Your contribution does a lot to help the forest ecosystem, Steve.” 

“I think he’d like it better if they asked,” Eddie tells you, shooting your boyfriend a teasing look. “Isn’t that right, pretty boy?”  

You frown at this, as though a bit distraught on behalf of the mosquitos. “I’m sure they would if they could.” 

Steve mumbles something like okay, pressing a pacifying kiss to your head. 

“It’s a good thing the bugs have you to look out for them,” Eddie tells you. “I mean, standing up for mosquitos, giving your lunch to ants…” 

“I still ate most of it,” you say. Steve’s kiss seems to have lifted your mood considerably (Eddie can also testify to this effect). You’re now gently swinging your joined hands between you as you walk. “I didn’t think they needed much. It’s just that sometimes one of the ants would go out of the line, and I didn’t want them to feel silly coming back with nothing.” 

So you laid down tiny pieces of your bread in their path. Fucking adorable. 

Steve and Eddie share a look, and this time it’s Steve who says, “They’re lucky to have you, babe.” 

[beainabottle2]

Okay a thot after listening to Lubalin’s dear diary over and over while ill. Didn’t proof or anything just thought I’d throw this into the ether. 💛💛💛

Eddie had found your diary while you were packing up your things from your parents house. You had just rented a trailer in Forest Hills and needed help packing but he was giggling while reading aloud, not helping in the slightest.

“Dear diary,

Steve Harrington in love with me. So is eddie, I like stevie not Eddie. Eddie picks his nose and eats his boogers. And is annoying. I hate it when he gives me the love look?!”

He laughed rolling onto his side on your bed to look at you “really sweetheart? You hate it when I give you the ‘love look’?” He asked raising his eyebrows teasing you.

“Ed’s come on I was like six years old when I wrote that. I didn’t know what would happen” you tried to suppress the smile trying to break on your face by turning back to your chest of draws but it was impossible. Especially when your other boyfriend walked in to collect another box

“what happened?” Steve asked eyes narrowing in confusion seeing Eddie laughing “oh just our girl has been in love with you since we were in kindergarten, but apparently I’m just annoying” he bust into a fit of chuckles again handing the diary to Steve. He took the diary and read the paragraph, a slow smile forming.

“Awe honey, you loved me even then?” His grin as wide as you’d ever seen it while he pulled you into an embrace. You rolled your eyes and tried to ignore them. “Uh what about me? I never ate my boogers!” Eddie exclaimed jumping off the mattress and joining the hug as he felt left out.

“Yes you did!” you and Steve replied in tandem cackling with laughter “but I still love you, both of you.” Your laughter died out. You pulled Steve’s hair tugging him into a kiss followed by Eddie.

“We love you too baby” Steve muttered with his nose in your hair. “Yeah, even if I am annoying” Eddie add. You tap his arm giving him a stern look as he starts to laugh again.

“I’m kidding, baby. I’m sorry. I love you.” Eddie kissed the top of your head, his grin wide in your hair while holding you.

[batshit-auspol]

Please enjoy the infectious laughter of the Australian senate struggling to keep its composure while grilling a man about bee semen

[batshit-auspol]

Regularly forget we posted this and then are hit like a brick with notifications like this one

[literallymechanical]

"Reviewer 2 wants better citations" moodboard

[levanswrites]

can you help me occupy my brain?

pairing: eddie munson x reader

summary: You don’t know how deep this runs. How badly he wants to ruin you, in the kind of way that feels so natural it scares the shit out of him.   

Because if you gave him that part of yourself, let him guide you, teach you, take care of you the way he aches to—

He doesn’t know if he’d be able to stop.

warnings: 18+ mdni, softdom!eddie, experienced!eddie, virgin!reader, mutual masturbation, thigh riding, dirty talk, praise kink, guilt/shame around intimacy, eddie's pov, self-loathing, yearning, angst, comfort, dom/sub undertones, established relationship, love confessions, fluff

word count: 6k

prev pt here | series masterlist | series playlist

It’s been two months.

Two months since Eddie Munson fell into your life like a comet, all noise and heat and unexpected gravity, and somehow decided to stay.

Two glorious, heart-thumping months of falling for the boy who laughs too loud, talks with his whole body, and kisses you like it’s the last thing he’ll ever get to do.

Two months of Eddie. Your Eddie.

Two months of car rides with the windows down, limbs hanging out the passenger side while Eddie passionately explains why this wailing seven-minute track is a “fucking masterpiece.” Sometimes you’d stop for gummy worms and neon-red Slurpees. Sometimes you’d wind up somewhere off Route 6, parked under a bowl of stars while he spins stories about cosmic gods who could shatter galaxies with epic guitar solos. Half nonsense, half magic—all Eddie.

Two months of burned dinners, of dancing in his kitchen to scratchy cassettes, letting the garlic catch on fire because he’d rather spin you under his arm than stir the sauce. A dozen ruined meals, but who cares when there’s takeout in the fridge and the air smells like home?

Two months of late nights on his couch, your book open in your lap, his sketchpad filled with dragons and dungeons and ink-smudged dreams. He’d doodle monsters while you turned pages, but you were always watching him more than reading. The way his brow furrowed when he was focused. The curve of his mouth when inspiration struck. The absent way he’d reach out, blindly tangling his fingers with yours. Sometimes he’d fall asleep there, head in your lap, curls splayed across your thighs. You’d stroke his hair, trace circles into his scalp, and wonder how someone so loud, so vivid, could make you feel this quiet. This safe. This wanted.

Two months of tiny rituals. Of new traditions. Of learning him and letting him learn you.

You were stitching a life together in fragments. Moments strung like beads on a thread. Little pieces of him, slowly becoming yours.

Sewing the tear on his Hellfire shirt. Painting tiny dragons for his campaign. Burning your thumb on a birthday cupcake you baked two weeks too early because you couldn’t wait to surprise him.

Two months of this soft, slow thing.

And then—there was the kissing.

God, the kissing.

Soft ones. Sleepy ones. Clumsy, breathless, giddy ones. Kisses that taste like cherry ice and cinnamon gum and Eddie, through and through.  

Your boyfriend was a good kisser. You didn’t have much to compare him to, but some things you just know.

You kissed him everywhere. On porches, in movie theaters. In the back of his van. In the hush of his living room. In the rush between class bells, sneaking out behind the gym, the thrill of it bubbling up up up like Pepsi Cola.      

Sometimes they were silly, all teeth and laughter. Sometimes they were syrupy-slow, honey-sweet, affection melting you like sugar on his tongue. Sometimes they were nothing more than punctuation—a press to your temple, a kiss to your knuckles.

A soft I’m here, I see you.

And sometimes, they weren’t soft at all.

Sometimes, they burned.

Like that night on his couch.

His thigh between yours, his mouth dragging heat down your neck. The roll of his hips, slow and deep, a rhythm that made your whole body light up like a struck match.

And just as something wild and dizzying began to bloom in your belly, just as you whispered his name—

He pulled away.

He always, always pulls away.

Sometimes with a joke. Sometimes with a nervous laugh and a mumbled, “You want water?” or “We’ll miss the movie.”

And sometimes, worst of all, with his forehead pressed to yours, voice frayed to a whisper:

“Sorry.”

You never asked why. Never pushed.

Because he’d always looked so… scared.

Like there was a fire in the room only he could see.

And you didn’t want to shatter something delicate by asking for too much.

But two months is a long time to wonder, and the weight of not-knowing was starting to bruise. 

Lately, in those quiet moments after he pulled away—after he kissed your forehead and stared up at the ceiling like he’s trying not to drown—you’d lie beside him and wonder:

Was it you?  

It all comes to a head on one beautiful, opportune Monday. 

Monday, in Eddie Munson’s opinion, can go fuck itself.

It starts with the death of his alarm clock. He must’ve knocked it off the nightstand in a half-conscious flail sometime around 4 a.m. It hit the floor, cracked open like a bad egg, and promptly gave up the ghost.

So yeah, he’s late. No coffee. No time to fix his hair. He yanks on a crumpled Slayer tee and the same jeans he thinks he spilled soup on last week. No time to care.

The van, by some miracle, starts. Then dies a mile and a half into the drive, coughing out one final, wheezing breath before sputtering into silence.

“Cool. Awesome. Fucking incredible.” 

He hoofs it the rest of the way to school, two miles of gravel shoulder with the sun in his eyes. Grit in his shoes. Sweat down his back.

And the day just keeps giving.

Late to class, again. His backpack’s unzipped and leaking a crumpled D- from last week’s quiz. Then, before third period, a rogue water fountain nails him dead in the crotch and he ends up giving a presentation on post-industrial America looking like he pissed himself.

At lunch, the gods laugh harder: a freshman trips, launching a carton of chocolate milk across the table. It drowns Eddie’s beloved D&D binder—maps, character sheets, weeks of world-building, soaked beyond saving.

He doesn’t scream. Doesn’t flip the table.  

Just mutters a tight, “It’s fine, man,” and locks himself in the bathroom to splash cold water on his face.

By final bell, he’s got a stress headache, a ruined campaign, and exactly six stolen minutes with you.

Just long enough to hug you. Long enough to hear you say, "I’ll come by after tutoring, okay?”

Long enough to see you smile. The only thing that doesn’t suck about his day.

That smile almost saves him.

Until he trudges back to where his van died, still rotting on the roadside, and remembers Wayne’s pulling a double shift and they’re too poor for a tow.

So he walks home.    

And by the time he stumbles into the trailer, something inside him is fraying at the edges.

His skin feels too tight. His thoughts snarling inside his skull like static.  

He drops his bag. Stands rigid in the doorway, shoulders tight, spine wound into knots. The late afternoon light bleeds through the slatted blinds, painting the living room in that soft, decaying gold that makes everything feel like it’s fading.

It’s too quiet. Too still.

He lets his forehead thump against the door. Closes his eyes. Tries to breathe.

It doesn’t help.   

Something inside him thrums. Itches. Crawls.

Not just arousal. Not just loneliness.

Need.

Need for control. For release. For something inside him to shut the fuck up.

And he hates this part of himself. Hates how fast it turns from wanting into craving into obsession. The way it gnaws at his spine, coils around his throat and chokes.

So he does what he always does when the ache becomes unbearable:

Drags himself to his room. Cranks Sabbath until his ribs rattle. Collapses onto the mattress and throws an arm over his eyes.

And with the other—he spits into his palm. Shoves it down his jeans.

No lotion. No comfort. Just this: dry and rough and angry. A punishment more than anything else.  

A desperate effort to scrape it all out of him. To burn it off. Kill it.

His jaw clenches as he works himself hard and fast, staring at the ceiling like it might offer forgiveness. Like it could soak up the guilt bleeding through his skin.

He tries to keep his mind blank.

It doesn’t work.

It never works.

Because his mind always, always finds its way back to you.

To your laugh. Your breath on his skin. Your fingers in his hair. The way you said his name that night on the couch—

Eddie.

God. He could’ve come from that alone.

It lit something up inside him, and it broke something else. 

Because all he wanted, all he fucking wanted, was to slide his hand between your thighs.

To guide you. Teach you. Worship you until you were shaking, until you were gasping his name again. Only louder this time, needy.

He wanted to take you apart. To coax you open. To say: There you go. Just like that. Good girl.

He jerks harder now, chasing the edge like it might erase him. Like it might exorcise whatever’s wrong with his head.

Tries not to think of your voice, your face. Tries not to imagine you whispering please in the dark. Asking for more, asking for him.

He does, of course, but fuck it, it's fine, he’s right there, teetering on the edge, so close he can taste it—

And then it drops.

The wave collapses before it crests.

His hand falls still. His breath stutters. His cock aches, flushed and untouched, angry with the unfinished heat of it all.

Shame clamps around his ribs like a vice.

It’s become a routine, at this point. Heat, guilt, silence, disgust.

He wipes his hand on his shirt, though there’s nothing left but spit and shame, and prays the ceiling would crack open and swallow him whole.

It never feels good. Not when it’s like this.

Because whenever he looks at you, he sees everything.

Everything soft and warm and golden.

Everything he doesn’t deserve.

You’re too good.

Too kind. Too full of light.

And he’s—

He’s this.

Tangled up in guilt and fear, warped and wired all wrong. Buried under the constant, gnawing certainty that if you ever gave him that part of yourself, he’d ruin it. Take too much. Break something sacred.

Hurt you.    

Because no matter how many times he tells himself not her, not like this, his body doesn’t care. The part of him that craves control—quiet, aching, patient control—still wants to see you pliant beneath him.   

Wants you flushed and panting and pleading for more. Wants to draw out every gasp, every moan, every broken, holy sound as he takes you to the edge.

Wants to believe you’d trust him enough to let him see you like that, vulnerable and open.

To touch. To take.   

And that’s when the guilt sinks in deepest. Sharper than fangs digging into his sides.

Because you do trust him. You already trust him.

You trust him without knowing what he’s capable of wanting.

And you don’t know what that means to someone like him. Someone who’s spent most of his life being too much. Too loud, too intense, too hungry.

You’re such a freak, Munson.

You don’t know how deep this runs. How badly he wants to ruin you, in the kind of way that feels so natural it scares the shit out of him.   

Because if you gave him that part of yourself, let him guide you, teach you, take care of you the way he aches to—

He doesn’t know if he’d be able to stop.

Doesn’t know if he’d be gentle enough. Doesn’t know if he’d be good enough.

So he pulls away.

He always pulls away.

Sorry. Sorry. Sorry.

Devotion and hunger. Reverence and ruin. All the fucked-up wires in Eddie Munson’s brain are twisted beyond salvaging. Lines so blurred he can’t walk them anymore. Isn’t sure he ever can.

And that part of him, the part that wants—it should never be in the same room as your first time. Shit, maybe not any time.

You deserve soft. You deserve space. You deserve to stumble through this at your own pace, with someone who doesn't come pre-loaded with instincts that sound like care and feel like safety but might just be another kind of selfishness.

You deserve better than a burnout metalhead with a hand down his pants and a head full of self-loathing. Better than someone who wants things from you he has no right to even imagine.

But his body won’t let it go.

His fingers twitch again, needy and insistent.

One more time. Just enough to dull the edge. Reset. Rewind. Pretend this day never happened.

Then he’ll take you out. Somewhere safe, somewhere easy.

Maybe the record store on Elm. Or that diner you like, the one with the vanilla milkshakes and the broken jukebox.

He’ll make you laugh, he promises to himself. That’s the plan. 

He closes his eyes. Spits into his hand.

Just one more—  

He doesn’t hear the door creak open.

“Eddie?”

Your voice cuts through the static like a blade.

His whole body locks, heart stuttering like a misfiring engine.

Fuck.

For a split second, he hopes maybe, just maybe, he imagined it. That you aren’t really standing there in the doorway, eyes wide and searching, backpack still slung over your shoulder. Like you didn’t just walk in on him like this—flushed, half-naked, drowning in his own shame.

Then you blink, and reality slams into him like a truck.  

“Shit—fuck—fuck—sorry—” He scrambles upright, yanking his hand from his jeans, fumbling for the button. Hisses when his still-hard cock catches on the zipper. “Didn’t hear you—thought I closed the door—fuck—”

The music is still howling behind him. He stumbles toward the stereo, half-zipped and red in the face, and slams it off. Sabbath cuts off mid-wail. Silence crashes down like a guillotine.

He turns back around, breaths coming sharp and uneven.

You’re still there.

Staring. Not leaving. Not saying a word.

His heart kicks hard against his ribs. Fight-or-flight with nowhere to go.

And then your gaze dips.

Lower.

To the flush on his neck. The strain in his jeans. The guilty distance in his body, like he’s bracing for you to flinch.

But you don’t.

And when your eyes meet his again, there’s no disgust, or regret.

Just this strange, near curious sort of calm.

You break the silence first, voice soft but impossibly steady. “Hi.”

His throat feels like sandpaper. “…Hi.”

The air between you stretches, tight as guitar string wire, thrumming with tension neither of you dares to cut.

“Sorry. You were just… saying my name.”

The words land like a sucker punch.

His stomach flips. His face burns hotter, and his useless, traitorous hands hover awkwardly in midair, unsure if they should reach out or retreat. 

You step forward, careful and patient, like he’s a wild thing caught in a snare.

“Eddie,” you say again, and god, it’s soft. Too soft. It cuts. “Were you thinking about me?”

Fuck.

He can’t hide. Not when you’re looking at him like that.

His eyes dart to the floor, shame burning like acid up his neck, but they flicker back up just as fast. Because he still wants to see you, even if it hurts. Even if it damns him.

He opens his mouth. Shuts it. Tries again.

He could lie. Could joke, like always. Toss out something lewd to make it less… intimate. But when your eyes catch his, he forgets how to do anything but feel.

Eddie Munson has never been good at pretending with you.

“Yeah,” he says. His gaze doesn’t waver this time.

Always.

You breathe in slow. Something shifts in your face, then. Relief, maybe. Understanding. Softer in the undercurrent, like a kind of quiet courage.

Like maybe you were hoping he’d say it out loud.

You nod. And then, steady, brave, beautiful, you say:

“Tell me.”

He blinks. Takes the better half of a minute to process two simple words. “…What?”

“I want to know what you imagine,” you say, still calm. “When you’re alone, thinking about me."

His whole body jolts like a live wire.  “I…” He laughs, startled, breathless. Shaking. “I don’t think you want to know.”  

“I think I do.”

And then you step even closer. Close enough that he could just reach out, if he were brave enough. If he didn’t feel so damn wrong.

Your hand brushes his, tentative, tender. And when he doesn’t flinch away, you take it fully. Wrap your fingers around his like he’s worth holding.

Like he’s not the kind of monster that could ruin someone like you.

“Sorry,” he whispers, voice rough, cracked open by guilt.

“You weren't supposed to…” he trails off, head dropping, curls falling like a curtain across his face. He can’t meet your eyes. Can’t let you see all of him like this: bare, aching, twisted up in hunger and self-loathing.

You weren't supposed to see me like this.

Wanting. Weak. Caught in the mess of everything he’s trying to bury.

You squeeze his hand. “Eddie.”

Just that. Just his name. Soft. Sure. Certain.

And he hears something crackle inside him: a hairline fracture he’s been pretending wasn’t there, splintering like glass beneath pressure. Behind it, the floodwater churns—cold, relentless, impossible to contain. Because he knows what he sees in your eyes now. That same thing he’s spent countless nights trying to crush inside himself. What he’s been trying to kill every time he wakes up with his hand between his legs and your name in his mouth. Want tangled with fear. So tightly fused at the root he can’t tell where one ends and the other begins.

That unbearable, unspeakable, beautiful truth.

The guilt claws its way back up like it’s got teeth.

It’s not something he can explain. Not in clean lines. Not without cutting you on the jagged edges of it.

Because what he wants to say is:

I didn’t pull back all those time because I didn’t want you.

I pulled back because I want you too much.

In ways that scare the hell out of him. In ways that don’t feel safe, not for you.

I want to ruin you in the most reverent way. I want to hear you beg. I want to be the one who teaches you what it means to need someone like that.

To need me.

Because he’s only ever known people who came into the world already knowing the rules. Who could play the game with sharp smiles and empty hands.

But with you…  

With you, it feels like trespassing. Because wanting you the way I do could hurt you.

And he’d sooner die than let that happen.

Because he breaks things. That’s what he does. That’s who he is.

Takes too much. Ruins them.  

I’ll turn something beautiful into something I can’t come back from.

He swallows hard, jaw locking. Shoulders tensing like he’s waiting for a blow.

And all he manages, small and hoarse and hopelessly inadequate, is:

“I didn’t want to rush you. I just… I want it to be good.”

A coward’s version of the truth.

But you nod, eyes soft.

“I want it to be good too,” you whisper. “With you.”

Then, without even flinching:

“I trust you.”

His breath stutters, chest tight. Eyes squeezing shut like he can block the word from settling into him.

The fracture in the glass grows, spiderwebbing across everything. The water rises higher, pressing harder against the fragile barrier.

He wants to believe you. God, he wants to earn that word. Wrap it around himself like armor—but it cuts. It draws blood on the way in.

“You can’t…” His voice trembles. Breaks. “You can’t say that.”

“Why not?”

“Because I—” He chokes on it. Shakes his head like he can shake it off his skin. “Because even I don’t know what that means.”

The words taste like rust in his mouth.

But then he feels your hand on his cheek. Gentle. Certain. He leans into the touch before he even knows what he’s doing.

“I do,” you say softly. “I know what it means.”

You brush the curls from his forehead like he’s something worth holding.

“It means you make me feel safe.”

Your thumb comes to rest on the curve of his cheek, stroking gently.

“You make me feel seen.” Another stroke.

“Held.” Another.

“Loved.”

He flinches.

That last one lands like a blow. A rib-shattering strike that leaves him breathless.

“It means,” you continue, voice barely above a whisper, “that I didn’t know what it was supposed to feel like… until you.”

Your smile—radiant, wondrous—burns through him like sunlight through stained glass. Too beautiful to touch.

“Eds, I’m ready,” you murmur. “But if you’re not… that’s okay. I mean it.”

He stops breathing. Eyes snapping open, wide, stunned.

Because he knows. He knows what it costs you to say that.

To offer softness like that after all the times it’s been taken from you.

After everything.

After assholes who used your trust like a weapon. People who made you feel wrong for saying no, like you were the problem for wanting to feel safe.  

It’s how he stumbled into your life in the first place, isn’t it?

That night in his trailer, your voice shaking when you asked him for something to make you feel brave. For something that should never require courage.

Then the night on your back porch, that party, your tears bleeding into his shirt.  

Both nights carved something permanent inside him.

Etched in lines under the skin. Sunk in deep. Stayed.

And he’d sworn, sworn, that he would never be one of them.

That he would never make you feel that way again.

And now, after all that—

You’re looking at him like you're doing the same thing to him.

Like you're becoming the same kind of person who hurt you.

The thought guts him.

It strikes him like lightning then. Like cut glass, something he’s always known, but becoming crystalline clear in this moment, sharp and sudden and slicing clean through his walls—

He loves you.

No questions. No caveats.

He loves you.

Eddie stares for a long, aching moment.

His chest heaves. His eyes shine, glassy and wide.

“It’s not… it’s not that I don’t want to.”

You nod. “I know.”

“It’s never—I never—” His gaze drops, throat working.  

But you don’t let him fall.

You reach down, slowly, tenderly, fingers sliding along his wrist, tangling with his.

A soft I’m here, I see you.

He breathes, shaky. His hand tightens in yours. And—as another crack splinters down the glass, as everything he's been holding back threatens to break loose—

He kisses you.

It’s everything.

Hot. Urgent. Breathless. Like the weight of all this emotion was just waiting to catch a spark.

Your hands slide down his neck, his chest, his stomach, down to the waistband of his jeans—but they hover there. Waiting. Letting him decide.

“I think about that night,” you whisper between kisses. “When you were on top of me. Between my legs. I couldn’t—can’t stop thinking about it.”

He groans, breathing hard through his nose. “Me too. Baby, god—”

He kisses you like he’s drowning. Because he is. Drowning in want, shame, every dark thought he’s tried to smother beneath bright colors.

Step by step, he backs you toward the bed until your legs brush the edge.

Then, without breaking the kiss, he lowers himself down first, shifts the center of gravity so that you're placed above him.

Because that’s what he needs.

Show me it’s okay to want you like this. Show me it doesn’t make me like them.

His hands are careful. His breath shallow. His eyes scan your face, reading for hesitation. But you don’t flinch. You don’t pull away.

You settle into his lap like you belong there, like this is exactly where you want to be.

And that’s what he needs right now.

Because when you’re in control… then wanting you feels safe.

When you set the pace, it means he doesn’t have to question every breath, every touch, every tremor under his palms.

If you’re the one moving, deciding—then maybe it’s not selfish. Maybe it’s not too much. Maybe it’s not wrong to feel this way about you.

“Do you still want to…?” You glance down, smile soft and teasing. “I could just… help.”

He nods before he can find his voice. Hands trembling, rings clinking.

“Yeah. Yeah, sweetheart. Please.”

And when you start to move—hips slow, purposeful, grinding against the growing ache in his jeans—the room begins to tilt.  

“I think about you too, you know,” you whisper, low and lethal. “When I’m… touching myself.”

His eyes slam shut. “Fuck.”

“It’s true. I think about you all the time.”

“You can’t just—say shit like that—” he groans but you laugh, soft and dangerous, hips still rolling.

You kiss him again, slower now. Deeper. No pressure to go further. Just want. Trust. Presence.

He fists the linens on his mattress, kisses you back hard.

And this close to you, this close to unraveling, he starts getting greedy.

“What do you—ah, fuck—what do you think about?”  

“Mm, your hands,” you murmur, right into his ear. “Your voice. What you’d say to me while you’re inside me.”

He chokes on nothing but air, eyes squeezed shut. You hold down the rhythm, soft and steady.

It’s like every dumb adolescent fantasy he’s ever had collapses in on itself. Every dog-eared porn mag, every secret late-night movie—all of it fades away.

“Fuck, baby,” he gasps, watching the way your face is screwed up in concentration. “I’m—"

“It’s okay, Eddie. Let go.”

Then, softly, like a spark to gasoline:

“Please.”

That’s all it takes.

He’s done.

He comes with a hoarse groan, hips twitching as warmth blooms through his jeans. It slams into him like a Mack truck, too hard, too fast, fierce and unforgiving. His legs are trembling by the end of it, chasing a release he can’t contain. Fingers curled tight in the soft, worn cotton of your shorts to try and anchor himself.   

And when he looks up, vision blurred, you’re watching him.

Eyes locked on his face, pupils blown wide, lips parted in something like desire and awe and maybe even something else.

Your expression is so open, so unguarded.   

Like he’s beautiful. Like what just happened was beautiful.

You blink slow, lashes heavy, then smile.

It’s blinding.

One trembling hand reaches up and pulls you down for another kiss—warm, messy, soft around the edges, the high still settling. He feels your arm shift against his chest, a quiet inhale catching in your throat. Eddie watches, utterly entranced, as your hand slips out from beneath your waistband.

You were touching yourself.

But you waited. Just to see him. Just to be with him through it.

And you haven’t finished. You’re still aching.

“You didn’t…?” he starts.

You shake your head, cheeks flushed.

“Didn’t want to miss it.”

He groans, hands moving before he can stop them. Thumb brushing your waist, voice thick with awe.

“You wanna…” he breathes, barely believing, “… use my leg?”

Your nod is small. Lips caught between your teeth, eyes shimmering. All soft certainty. All permission.

And it floors him. Because no one’s ever looked at him like that, like he’s safe. Like he’s something you can trust with your body, your needs.

You shift, lifting your hips, and he braces you, helping you find the right angle. Steady hands on your sides, guiding you as you straddle his thigh. He plants his feet against the floor, lifting just enough to offer the resistance you need.

The seam of your shorts drags against him. You suck in a sharp, stuttering breath.

Eddie feels it like a punch to the sternum—that tiny, wrecked sound zipping through his bloodstream like the first hit of nicotine. His hands tighten on your hips.

And then you move.

Grinding slow at first, testing pressure, rhythm. Every drag of denim and cotton drawing out soft whimpers that catch in his skin.

“Yeah?” he breathes, lips brushing your jaw. “Feels good like this?”

“So good,” you breathe. “You always feel good, Eddie.”

He groans; it wrecks him every time you say something like that. Like it isn’t just praise. Like it’s the truth, pure and uncomplicated.

Your breath hitches against his mouth.

“Wanna… wanna make a mess on you.”

His whole body locks up, muscles going rigid like he’s been jolted by a live current. The part he’s been trying so hard to keep silent comes throbbing to life.

He shifts underneath you, near frantic, pressing his thigh up against your heat, adjusting the pressure until you gasp, sharp and sweet in his ear.

And he watches you like he’s starved.

Watches the way your jaw goes slack when the angle hits just right. The way your lashes flutter, the tiniest crease between your brows. The way your nipples go stiff under your shirt. The little tremor in your fingers as they slip back under your shorts, gliding through your arousal.

And he can feel it, too. Damp heat seeping through denim. Hear the slick, rhythmic drag of your knuckles. Sticky sounds of plush skin, matched by the soft, broken moans spilling from your throat.

He feels it, hears it, smells it. Drenched in it, drowning in it, he never wants to come up for air. Never wants to break the surface. Won’t ever come up unless you tell him to.

His mouth starts running, unbidden. No amount of shame could stop him from giving this to you now.

“That’s it, baby. Use me. Whatever you want. Fuck, look at you, so beautiful like this. Gorgeous. Yeah? Right there? There you go, don’t hold back.”

You shiver like each word hits something deeper inside you, hips rolling fast, hard, rough. Bearing your weight down, hand clenched tight around his shoulder.   

That’s what he wants most. For you to have this. To take it. To feel safe claiming it.

“Still good?” he breathes, kissing your shoulder.  

“So good,” you nod, voice shaking. “So close. Don’t stop—please—”

“Won’t. I’ve got you,” he promises. “Just like that. That’s my girl.”

“Oh my god, Eds—"

And then you fall.

Soft, like everything between you.

A sharp little gasp. A tremble through your thighs. A whispered, broken:

Eddie.

He feels the exact moment you let go.

Feels it in the way your breath catches, in the way your hands scramble for something to hold—fisting his shirt, his hair, pressing your face into his neck like you’re trying to sink into him.

Your hips stutter, grinding down one last time, chasing every ounce of feeling left in you. Your body collapses forward, breath shaking against his neck, arms curling around him like you might disappear without the anchor.

And he holds you through it. Holds you like he’s holding his entire fucking world.

Arms locking around your back, hands clenched in the back of your shirt, mouth moving against your temple.

“I got you,” he breathes, over and over. “You’re okay. I got you, baby. I’ve got you.”

I love you. I love you. I love you.

You collapse fully against him, hips jerking through the aftershocks, thighs twitching. Still trembling.

He feels every aftershock, every breath that shudders against his skin, and holds you tighter. Like he can absorb it. Soak the overwhelm right out of your body.

He kisses your temple, your cheek, your jaw—whispering breathless praises into your skin. Make it stick. Keep you safe.

“So good. You did so good, baby. So fucking beautiful.”  

You breathe against his shoulder, shaky and dazed. Your chest heaves against his as you float back down.

“You okay?” he whispers.

You nod, laughing softly as you nuzzle into his hair. “That was… holy shit.”

He huffs a stunned, stupid breath, eyes to the ceiling. “Yeah. Holy shit.”

Eventually, you lift your head, just enough to see him. Eyes glassy, lips kiss-swollen and parted.

And you smile.

Not embarrassed. Not awkward.

Just soft. Glowing.

Radiant in a way that makes his throat ache, pressing hot behind his eyes like too much light after too much darkness.

“You make me feel so good, Eddie,” you whisper. “So fucking safe.”

And just like that, the glass shatters.

The dam breaks.

The flood rushes through, relentless and inevitable.

It fills every chamber of his chest, crashing in like cold, clear water that cuts deep beneath the skin, scouring away years of doubt and fear.

Your voice, your gaze. The way you touch him like he’s something worth holding. The way you speak to him like there’s nothing wrong with how much he feels, like his hunger isn’t monstrous. Like love isn’t a thing he has to earn through pain.

It rushes into all the hollow places. Fills him full of things he’s spent so long trying to seal up, starve out.

Hope. Tenderness. Acceptance.

He’s soaked in it. Drowning in it. Dripping with your scent, your heat, your hands sliding up his arms, around his neck. You’re pressed so close he can’t tell where he ends and you begin.

There’s no stopping it now. No holding back.

It pulses through him, cell by cell. Can feel it everywhere, down to the marrow. Just how deep this runs. How thoroughly it’s woven into him.

How much he loves you.  

It’s always been you.

You, in every look that steadies him, in every gentle touch that tells him he’s not too much, not too broken. You, in every breathless laugh, every whispered Eddie that sounds more like a prayer than a name.

You, with softness that doesn’t flinch. Kindness that doesn't demand. Strength that chooses him, even when he can't choose himself.

And now that he sees it, truly sees it, it’s all he can feel.

The tide has finally taken him under. And he’s grateful for it.

Grateful to drown in this.

In you.

Because this love—your love—it’s been patient. Quiet.

Steady in ways he’s never quite known.

It’s been waiting. You’ve been waiting.

And he can’t stand to keep you waiting a second longer.

His voice cracks as he says it:

“I love you.”  

You go still for half a breath. Then your smile blooms, slow and stunning, like sunrise breaking over still water.

You lean in. Press a kiss to his lips. Another to his cheek. One more at his temple.

Your rest there, forehead pressed to his, and whisper it back:

“I love you, too.”

Your words land soft. Gentle.

His breath catches all the same.

Too.

A word has never sounded quite so holy to Eddie Munson.

It drops like a stone in water, ripples, reverberates, rings out through every nerve ending.

Because he’s been wanted before, but only in pieces. Only for what he could give. Only until he became inconvenient.

Used. Tolerated.

But loved?

Not like this.

Not freely. Not gently.  

That voice in his head, the one that whispers that he ruins everything he touches, it’s still there. But your voice—your love—is louder.

And for the first time in his life, he believes it might stay that way.

His heart’s still catching up, staggering under the weight of something he’d convinced himself he’d never get to feel.

And then—your soft little sigh.

Happy. Content.

It tugs him gently back to earth.

You curl into him again, arms wrapping tight around his neck, warm and buzzing and real. And Eddie’s arms won’t stop moving—can’t. His hands drift across your back in slow, reverent sweeps, tracing your spine, your waist, the curve of your shoulder blades.

Trying to memorize this. Press it into his bloodstream. Etch it into bone so it can’t ever leave.

So even on the days when the ache creeps in, he’ll still have this.

Your smile deepens against his neck, the silence draping like a warm blanket.

And then, light and teasing:

“So… what do you wanna do now?”

Eddie laughs.

Really laughs.  

It bursts out of him before he can stop it—a bright, breathless sound, a lungful of clean air after being underground for so long. Light spilling out through all the little cracks, in a way it hasn’t in years.

It feels new. It feels free.

It feels like you.

God, he loves you.

Loves you like it’s easy. Like it was always going to happen.   

He wraps you tighter in his arms, lets the moment settle like starlight. Then, with a spark of mischief creeping into his grin, he shifts, hands sliding toward your ribs.

Digs his fingers in just enough to make you squeal, twisting in his hold as laughter bursts out of you, squirming to get away.

“Eddie!”

“What?” he grins, catching your hips before you can slip off. “You asked me what I wanted.”

You smack his chest without any real force, still breathless with laughter as he pulls you back into him, tucking you under his chin.

There, he closes his eyes, breathes you in.

Hears the ripple of your laughs soften against his chest and smiles. Knows he’s made good on at least one promise he made to himself today.

Then—with his eyes wet, heart full, voice thick with everything he knows he’ll never be able to fit into words—Eddie Munson vows:

“Anything. We can do anything you want.”

a/n: sorry it's been a while gang! wanted to get this one right. can't believe we've breached 40k words and we're just now getting to dry humping. anyway. much to look forward to. we're barely getting started here...🙊

thank you for following this story and sending me so many kind words about it! it means everything to me 💙💙

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[charnel-doll]

this pride month we need to start being kinder to trans people who don’t pass. no matter what the reason is.

[charnel-doll]

sometimes someone is only out online. sometimes someone is newly out. sometimes someone can’t access medical transition. sometimes medical transition isn’t a magical perfect transformation. sometimes the ambiguity of someone’s presentation is the point. many many other reasons why someone might not perfectly pass. respect is deserved regardless

[levanswrites]

mine's a tale that can't be told

pairing: eddie munson x reader

summary: Eddie leans back in his throne, slow and deliberate, and the grin that spreads across his face isn’t playful. Isn’t silly.

It’s feral. Claiming.

And something inside you twists—sharp, hot, and utterly wrong.

warnings: heavy mutual pining, fluff, light angst, slow burn, dnd, eddie's dungeon master voice™, soft soft eddie, dom/sub dynamics (if you squint)

word count: 4.4k

a/n: this one mixes the classic religious symbolism with some... dnd metaphors? is that even a thing? anyways, the pining is intense in this one. title by led zeppelin. this can be read as a standalone piece. read prev chapters here: pt. 1 / pt. 2 / pt. 3 / series masterlist

It’s laughter you hear first.

A quiet echo, then a gasp. Whispered shouts. 

It drifts through the dim hallway of the school basement, long after hours, where labs, old art rooms, and storage closets sleep behind locked doors. Your steps slow when you spot the only source of light.

A door. 

Warm light spills through a cracked pane, splintered and golden, like the cut of a stage spotlight. It’s open just enough for sound to escape.

Then, you hear it:

A voice.

His.

Low, steady. 

If you hold your breath, you can just make out the words.  

“…seven. And what’s your AC?” 

Another voice responds, muffled.

You swallow, eyes flicking to the clock at the far end of the hallway. 

You’re not sure if the door was left open by accident, if you're meant to be hearing any of this at all.

You glance down at the binder in your hand, and consider leaving it outside.

But then he starts speaking again, and something in your chest pulls.

You drift forward without thinking, feet ghosting across the tile.

You stop just short of the door, close enough to slot yourself behind the tiny sliver of open space.

Inside, Eddie is a different creature entirely.

The room is bathed in flickering candlelight, stage props and old lighting rigs stretching tall, wavering shadows. Most of his torso is obscured behind a dark screen, yet the glow catches the sharp outlines of his shoulders, the wild edge of his hair. 

Behind him, the intricate carvings of a wooden chair rise, ancient and regal.

Clearly something pulled from the drama department’s dusty closet. But here, in the dim light, it feels foreboding. Commanding.

And from his throne, Eddie grins like a king.

“…takes another step toward you,” He intones, voice curling low through the air.

There’s a thread of something familiar in his voice, but it runs deeper now, darker. A growl curled beneath silk.

It’s his voice, but not a version you’ve ever known.

The room stills, like prey before a predator.

Then—THUD. 

A fist slams against the table, thundercrack against wood.

The whole table jumps. Candles flicker. Sheets of paper flutter like startled birds.  

Your breath catches.

“He grips you by the throat.” 

Eddie’s hand shoots up, rings catching candlelight. Fingers curl midair, claw-like, closing in a tight fist.

You see it in their faces, the players. 

Frozen mid-breath. Eyes wide. Clinging to every word. 

Not just caught in the game. Devoured by it.

By him. 

There’s a reverence in the room.

Something sacred. Like church.

And Eddie Munson’s giving the best damn sermon anyone’s ever heard.

“When the creature speaks… his lips don’t move.”

His voice drops low, eyes gleaming over the edge of the screen. 

“You don’t hear it,” He murmurs, quieter still. “You feel it. In your head. In your spine.”

The silence that follows is deafening.

Even the candlelight holds its breath.

Then:

A tilt of his head. A slow roll of his shoulder.

A shift behind the screen.

And when he speaks again, the voice that comes out isn’t his.

Deep. Fractured. Raw.

“You dare challenge a god?”

It shouldn’t make your stomach flip like that. But it does.

From down the table, someone curses under their breath. You don’t see who.

You’re too busy watching him.

The shift in his gaze—slit-eyed and serpentine.

“I’ve waited centuries to wear this face again.”

The deliberate rhythm of his breathing—slow and measured. Inhuman.

“Smoke spills from his mouth,” He murmurs, slipping back into a narrator’s cadence. “The air burns cold. The runes at your feet begin to glow.”

He lifts a hand. Points down the table, straight at Dustin. 

“When your eyes meet his… you recognize him.”

The room goes silent again.

Eddie leans forward, barely, and the other voice takes hold again.

“Long time no see... brother.”   

Even from the doorway, you see Dustin’s jaw drop. 

Nobody at the table moves. Not even to breathe.

Eddie leans back in his throne, slow and deliberate, and the grin that spreads across his face isn’t playful. Isn’t silly.

It's feral. Claiming.

And something inside you flares again—sharp, hot, and utterly wrong.

Then, just like that—his voice shifts back. Light and familiar. 

And his eyes, what just a moment ago had been pitch, something cold and ancient and not-quite-human—softens.

“All right, freaks.” He claps once, breaking the silence. “We’ll pick up right here next week.”

Like a director yelling cut, the spell breaks.

Dustin lets out a choked swear, slapping a hand to the table. Sheets fly. Someone beside him throws himself backward in his chair with a groan—C’mon, Eddie!—while another hauls an eraser down the table. 

You blink, blood rushing back to your legs all at once. You hadn’t noticed you’d stopped breathing. Or how close you’d leaned in.

“Make sure to grab all your shit,” Eddie rises from his throne, palms pressed to the table like a king dismissing court.

“If I have to clean up one more time after you animals, Daddy’s gonna be very disappointed.”

The table erupts in shrieks. Dustin groans in disgust. Someone wails, No, not the Daddy voice, please—

A pretzel flies down the table. Eddie ducks with a grin, unbothered, reaching for his notes.

He moves with practiced ease, sweeping up scraps of paper behind the screen. The flick of his fingers, the scrape of his chair, the low electric hum of the room still thick with imaginary blood.

It’s all still his. That energy. Tension. The afterglow of story spun like silk around his hands.

And you’re still watching, heart doing something weird and heavy, thinking about the way he commands a room without raising his voice.

Your foot moves forward, before you even mean to.

But then: the voices swell again. More laughter. Chairs dragging. Backpacks unzipping. Someone loudly demanding to know where their Mountain Dew went.

You flinch, retreating fast. Backpedaling to the bend in the hallway, tucking yourself behind the corner near the bathroom door, just out of sight.

You clutch your binder to your chest like it might shield you from the heat still flickering beneath your skin.

From the way his voice is still echoing in your bones.

At first, Eddie thinks its a hallucination. 

A vision. 

Some sugar-drunk mirage conjured by the questionably expired sodas Doug found in his garage.

Because there’s no way.

No way it’s you, standing in the doorway.

While he was busy conjuring demons and scribbling madly behind the DM screen, monologuing like a satanic Shakespeare.

He blinks. Rubs his eyes for good measure.

And you’re still there.

You step forward slightly, through the crack in the door, like maybe you might come in—then just as quickly, step back. 

Gone.

The doorframe is empty as the group filters out, rowdier than ever.

Thanks Eddie, see ya tomorrow!

Bye, Daddy! Shrieking laughter.

Eddie barely reacts.

Gareth claps him on the shoulder, making him jump. 

“Mikey’s for pizza. You coming?”

“Uh, raincheck. Gotta clean up.” 

“You sure? Jeff said he’s going for the garlic knot record.”

He huffs a laugh. “Tempting. Go ahead, I’m good.”

“All right man. Jam sesh at Doug’s later, if you feel like it.” Gareth hesitates a second, then leaves with a wave. 

Eddie barely nods, slow and distracted as he rolls a d20 between his fingers, eyes still locked on the door.

Maybe he’d imagined it.

A trick of the light. Wishful thinking.

Outside, voices ring down the hall, something about Dustin’s fate after the cliffhanger from today’s session.

The door clicks shut, and silence settles. Warm, buzzing at the edges.

He stays there for a moment, still behind the screen, half in the world he made.

Then, slowly, starts to gather.

Dice. Sheets. His lucky pencil, worn to a nub. 

His fingers linger at the edge of the DM screen. Worn soft at the folds, a few smudges of ink on the inside panel where he’d scrawled a last-minute monster stat block.

He exhales. Low, slow. The kind that makes your ribs shift.

Rakes both hands through his hair and lets his head drop back for a second.

It’s always like this after a good session. The ache. That hollow crash. The feeling like he was somewhere else entirely, and now he’s been dropped back into his own skin.

A different kind of comedown, he thinks.

The sudden quiet of being alone again.

And then—

A knock.

Soft. Once.

Then again.

“Uh, come in?”  

And you’re there.  

Poking your head through a tiny crack in the door.

Cautious. Curious. 

Lit from behind like some kind of angel, haloed in the faded hallway fluorescents.

He grins, helpless and immediate.

“Thought I was going crazy.”

You tilt your head, smiling faintly. 

“Sorry?”

“No, it’s…” He shakes his head, still grinning. “Come in.” 

You step inside with a soft ‘thanks’ on your breath.

“So this is… Dungeons and Dragons, huh?”

There’s curiosity in your tone. A little wonder, a little hesitation.

As if something might break lose if you say the words any louder.  

You linger near the wall, eyeing the table in the middle like it could swallow you whole. 

Eddie’s grin blooms. Can’t help it. 

Soft candlelight dances across your face, catching the flicker of unease in your eyes.

He knows exactly what you must be thinking: devils sketched in red sharpie, candles set like some kind of ritual, winged and horned miniatures caught mid-snarl on the table.

You’re trying not to look alarmed. He appreciates the effort.

“First time?” he asks, voice light.

You nod, eyes roaming across the chaotic spread.

“Yeah. It’s…” Your eyes flit to the snarling archdevil on his DM screen. “…not what I pictured.”

“Yeah, you missed the one night we didn’t summon anything. We save the virgin blood for Tuesdays.” He crosses his arms, winking. “Gotta keep up appearances, right?”

A smile tugs at your lips, crooked and apologetic somehow.  

You step a little closer, gaze wandering. It snags on the throne that looms behind him, regal and proud.

“So you’re like… really in charge here, huh?”

It’s half-teasing, but not cruel. There’s warmth in it. Curiosity.

Eddie’s fingers twitch at his side.  

He scratches at his jaw, eyes flicking down before he smiles again.

“Well, they don’t call it Dungeon Master for nothing.”

Your eyebrows shoot up. Mouth parts a little. 

“Dungeon,” You echo, careful, like you’re committing heresy. 

“…Master?”

Eddie nearly chokes on his spit. 

“It’s just a title,” he clears his throat, “Means I run the game, build the world. Mostly I’m the guy who gets blamed when everybody dies.”

You squint at him, then back at the table. “Huh.”

“I mean, you were really good at it,” you muse, gaze drifting over the sprawl of painted figurines and battle maps like they’re ancient relics.

He wants to show you everything.

“You know, with all the voices and stuff.” Your tone softens, trailing off, eyes still fixed on the table. 

Eddie grins, slipping into his worst fake Scottish accent—shrill as all hell and offensive to both Scotland and sound itself.

“Oh, you mean Sir Bartholomew MacGee? Master of the Mystic Bagpipes, Conqueror of the Flaming Cabbage!”

You laugh, nose crinkling.

“No, I mean the, uh…” You clear your throat, biting your lip.

“The other one. The, uh… kind of… devil? Or demon?”

Oh.

Oh.

He eyes the embarrassment flickering on your face, and a slow smile curls at the corners of his mouth—giddy, edged with something molten.

A thrill bubbles up in his chest, that flicker of something he’s always been better at playing than feeling.  

He leans forward, hands planted on the table, shoulders curling.

His gaze rises from beneath the curtain of his hair.

“Ah, you mean Kaelrath the Forsaken,” he purrs, voice dropping into that slow, dark register—the one meant to chill a room. “Warden of the Shadowed Keep.”

You nod, face just a touch too serious.

He watches you, amused and a little fascinated.

“Oh, you don’t wanna mess with him.” 

“Why not?” Your eyes widen, voice barely above a whisper.  

His heart nearly stops. 

“Well,” he leans back, crossing his arms, “He made a pact with the Obsidian Wyrm, got exiled from the Celestial Plane, yadda yadda. Bit of a dick, honestly.” 

He flashes you a grin. “Real mean bastard.”

You blink, a smile stalling on your lips. 

“Well, I kinda thought you were mean and scary too. Before I knew you.”

He laughs, sharp and startled, like you knocked the air out of him.  

Looks away fast, suddenly not sure where to land his eyes.

His hand taps jittery on the back of his throne.

Then: 

“You wanna try it?” He quirks a smile, brows lifting.

You blink. “What? Oh, no, I don’t—”

“Oh c’mon,” He steps aside, gesturing with a little flourish to the chair behind him.  

“It’s simple mechanics. All you need’s a little imagination.”

You hesitate, then step slowly toward the seat he’d been occupying all night.  

Carefully, like it might collapse under your weight, you lower yourself into it.

And for a moment, Eddie can’t move.

He just watches you.

The way your fingers hover over the edge of the table.

The way your eyes flicker over the chaos behind the screen. The campaign notes still wide open: scrawled maps, monster stats, a post-it that says YOU BASTARD in Gareth’s handwriting. 

Stage lights cast a soft glow behind you, catching in your hair.

Eddie swallows.

Hellfire would riot if they saw this.

No one gets to sit there. No one but him.

He tips his head to the side, murmuring softly. 

“That’s the seat of power, y’know.”

You glance up. 

“Hm?”

“See this right here?” He leans in, tapping the DM screen.

“Gotta be careful what you say behind this screen. People start believing you.”

You purse your lips, thoughtful. 

Your eyes trace along the edge of the screen, then flick back to his—curious, cautious.  

“What if I don’t know what to say?” 

Eddie’s smile softens. 

“You make something up,” he says, starting to move. “Here—I’ll show you.”

He drops into a player’s seat beside you, Gareth’s usual spot, his knee brushing yours once.

“Ok, so. It’s the middle of the night. It’s pouring rain. You’re pushing through the trees, branches scraping your arms,” he starts, voice low, almost absentminded as he starts spinning the world around you. “You’ve been walking for days. Mud up to your knees. Maybe blood, too. Hard to tell at this point.”

You blink, caught in the picture he’s painting, and he smiles to himself before continuing.

“Up ahead, you see this crooked old tavern, just off the path. Smoke’s coming from the chimney. There’s soft, amber light flickering through the windows. Looks warm.”

He meets your eyes.

“What do you do?”

You hesitate for a beat, then:

“I… walk inside.”

Eddie makes a small motion with his hand, pushing open an invisible door. 

“You walk inside, and there’s a guy behind the bar. Big. Broad shoulders. Thick arms. Big scar running across one eyebrow—like someone tried to take his eye once and couldn’t finish the job.”

He leans in, resting his forearms on the table. Drops into his gruff, rough-edged voice. 

“Name’s Corwin. I run the place. And you?”

You hesitate, biting your lip to hide the smile curling there. Then:

“Why do you want to know?”

Eddie grins, delighted.

“Ah, mysterious.” he leans back with a soft chuckle, eyes drifting down your frame. “Let me guess. Boots wrecked. Dirt under your nails. You’re a traveler. Been on the road too long, maybe running from something.”

You purse your lips, chin tucked, lashes low.

“Maybe.”

He studies you for a moment. In character or not, he’s not entirely sure anymore.

“And you want something,” he says, gaze flicking to your mouth for half a second too long. “That’s why people come here, y’know. They want warmth. Answers.” A beat. “Or trouble.”

Your smirk grows, just a touch. Enough to knock the air out of him.

“Which one are you offering?”

Christ. He’s a goner.

He grins. “Dealer’s choice.”

The moment stretches—playful, delicate. Too delicate for him to touch. 

Then, your eyes flit to the side, voice low like you’re not sure if you’re allowed to ask:

“Is this guy, like, evil?”  

Eddie blinks, then reaches behind the screen for a die—his lucky d20. 

Smoky black, flecked with silver, numbers etched in jagged runes painted crimson.

“Time for a roll.” He nods, dropping the die into your palm. “It’s called an insight check. Lets you know if someone’s lying. Or hiding something.”

Your eyes flicker down to the die, then back up at him, fingers curling around it.

Then, you let go.

The die spins, tumbling across the table, then settles.

And what stares back, in fiery red, rips the floor out from under him.

A bright, perfect 20.

His breath hitches, quiet and sharp.

Because of course it is.

Of course you’d crit on your first roll. 

Why wouldn’t you? 

Why wouldn’t the universe tilt like that, just for you?

“A 20?” you ask, blinking down at the table. “Is that… is that good?”

His eyes don’t move from the number.

A dry laugh escapes—quiet, breathless, caught somewhere between stunned and amazed.

His mouth opens, words on deck—but nothing. Total blank. 

His brain short-circuits under the weight of it. Of the absurd cosmic perfection that is you. 

Blinks hard, once, eyes dragging up to meet yours. 

“Yeah,” he nods, voice rough. “That… that’ll do it.”

You straighten a little, something like pride lifting your posture. There’s a glint in your eyes now—half teasing, half triumphant.

“So… this tavern guy. Is he evil?”

Eddie presses his tongue to the inside of his cheek, then smiles—wide now, full of teeth.  

He leans in, forearms on the table. Fingers steepled. Thinking.

Licks his bottom lip, sifting through every possible outcome worthy of honoring that nat 20. 

He’s going to make it good.

Something dramatic. Legendary.

Then—

“OH MY GOD.”

Dustin's voice cuts through the air like a slap.

He freezes in the doorway, half-in, half-out, gaping like he just walked in on a crime scene.

Eddie doesn’t even flinch. Just sighs. Deep. Agonized.

He turns slowly, dramatically, with the air of a man who’s just had his Oscar moment ruined by a stage-crasher. 

“Henderson,” he murmurs, voice flat. “What have I told you about knocking?”

“Uhh,” Dustin’s eyes flick between you two, wide with dawning horror. “I thought this room’d be empty?”

Eddie sighs and drops his head into his hand, fingers dragging down his face like he’s trying to erase himself from reality.

“Oh hey, Dustin!” you call brightly, cheerful and unbothered, giving him a little wave from the DM throne like it’s the most normal thing in the world.

Eddie peeks up at you through his fingers, one eye narrowed in disbelief.  

Dustin waves back, awkward, eyes darting like he's trying to solve a math problem he really doesn't want the answer to.

Eddie’s still squinting at you through his hand, wondering how in the hell you know Henderson.

“Oh, I totally forgot!” You exclaim, suddenly rummaging through your bag.

Dustin edges a little closer, still watching Eddie like he might bite.

You pull out a neat binder and hand it over.

“Make sure you get those done by Friday.”

“Oh. Right. Thanks.” Dustin smiles nervously, casting a quick glance toward Eddie, then at the chair closest to him.

“Uhm, I’m just gonna…” He lunges forward, snatching the jacket he’d left draped over the back. 

He retreats a couple steps back, then hesitates. Feet stalling. 

He’s not leaving. Why wasn’t he leaving?

“So, were you guys like…”

Eddie’s head snaps up, eyes like daggers.

“Juust playing DnD!” Dustin blurts, voice cracking. Throws up a frantic double thumbs-up. “Yep, yep, just DnD! Totally normal. Totally chill. Just the greatest tabletop roleplaying game of all time! I mean, why wouldn’t you be playing it, right?”  

He lets out a choked laugh, rubbing the back of his neck.  

Then, quieter, muttering to himself like a man unraveling:

“Yep. Real casual. Totally platonic. Just sitting in the DM chair. Nothing weird about that.”

Eddie cocks his head, pointing to the door. No words now. Just death.

“Yep! Got it.” Dustin nods fiercely, then backpedals like Eddie’s about to detonate.

“Didn’t see anything. Didn’t hear anything. In fact, I was never even here.”

He fumbles blindly for the knob, turns it to the left.

“Other way, you goblin,” Eddie calls, face fully buried in his palm now.

From beside him, he hears you stifle a laugh into your hand.

Dustin bumps into the door. Twice. Then bolts.

In the silence that ensues, you exhale a soft, happy sigh. 

“I love that kid.”

“Uh-huh.” Eddie mutters, staring after the door. 

He’s already planned the exact moment he’ll kill Henderson’s bard next session.

Eddie shifts, finally turning to you. “How do you know him again?”

Your bag zips closed with a soft rasp. “I tutor him in Algebra.” 

Of course. Of course you do.

“Speaking of math…” You reach down beside your seat, slinging the bag over your shoulder with a small sigh.

“I should really get to studying. Big exam tomorrow.”

“Right,” Eddie nods, standing up too. “Uh, good luck.”

Your smile is soft, but it tugs sideways—quiet and tired, like there’s something else still sitting in the back of your throat.  

He has a hunch about what’s coming.

What’s been trying to reach the surface ever since you walked in.

“Hey, um…” you finally say, brows knit tight, “I’m sorry about Tuesday. I think I was…” 

The words falter. You shake your head, teeth pressing into your bottom lip, frustration leaking through a quiet breath.

“Upset?” He offers gently.

You nod. Slow. Brows loosening.

“Yeah,” your lips twitch, pressing in a thin line. “That’s probably it.”

A pause, then you step forward:

“But you’re not… upset? About how I…”

He almost frowns, but doesn’t. Just shakes his head, quiet and sure.

You say nothing for a while, just watching. Studying him with a careful sort of wonder, like you’re turning his words over in your head, testing for weight.

Then:

“Insight check?” You blink softly, raising his die with a sheepish little smile.

He lets out a quiet sound. Almost a laugh.

“You don’t need one. I’m being honest. Promise.”

You nod, lips pressed together. 

“Ok.” 

You hoist your bag higher on your shoulder, fingers tight around the strap.

“Bye, Eddie. Have a good weekend.”

“Yeah, you too.”

You’re halfway out the door before he finds his voice again.

“Hey,” he calls, just loud enough to reach. “That guy, by the way? From the tavern?”

You pause at the threshold, haloed by hallway fluorescents. 

Confusion lingers before it’s softened by something warmer. A quiet, expectant smile plays at your lips as you tilt your head, waiting.

“Not evil.”

A flicker of something tugs at the corner of your mouth. 

Then you huff a quiet laugh, small and amused. 

“Huh. Good to know.”

You wave.

He waves back. 

Then watches you disappear into the hall, golden-hour light framing your silhouette like the end of a dream.

He sinks into the throne—yours, now—and exhales.

Throws the d20 across the table and doesn’t bother to watch where it lands.

Scene setting. Character introductions. Insight rolls.

He thinks about all that he’s shared with you, and all that he keeps tucked away.

Like how DnD’s the only time he ever gets to hold everything in his hands.

The only time people listen when he talks.

He thinks about that a lot. How most people assume he plays to be in charge. To be admired, feared, untouchable. And sure, yeah, it’s fun, playing god for a while. But that’s not why he does it.

It’s not power he wants.

It’s control.

Control like… building a world where people can walk into and understand. Where everything has shape, cause and effect. 

Order. Logic. Consequences you can see coming. 

Not like real life, where your mom dies and your dad leaves and your grades are tanking and everyone hates you for reasons they never bother to explain beyond ‘You’re weird, Munson.’

No. Here, he decides what’s fair. What’s earned. What matters.

And when he says the trapdoor opens?

It fucking opens.

He didn't tell you about the thoughts that crawl in late at night, when sleep won’t come and his skin itches with the static of things he can’t fix.

How he wants to build you a world that holds instead of hurts.

Structure. Edges. A place with rules. Not laws, not like school or curfews or church. 

Not the kind that trap, but protect.

Like a campaign world. 

Thought through. Crafted. Intentional.

A safe place inside the chaos.

And in those hours, when he's lying flat on his back with the ceiling fan clicking overhead like a countdown, he pictures it.

A rhythm.

The way your day could start, if you wanted: with his voice in your ear, soft and certain, before the day gets loud. Coffee in a chipped mug, waiting. Socks warmed by the heater. His hoodie draped over your chair.  

He imagines a world where nothing hurts unless you ask it to.

Where you get to choose what matters. What’s too much, when to stop.

Where he’s the one watching the edge, always two steps ahead, so you don’t have to carry everything all the time.

Because he knows what that looks like—carrying the weight alone. Holding yourself upright, laughing loud enough so no one hears the cracks underneath. 

He’s seen it in you. A reflection, because he’s worn it too.

But in his world, this world he builds in his mind, you don’t have to do that. Not if you don’t want to.

You can hand it over. Let him keep watch.

Ritual, he thinks.  

A sacred kind of repetition. Something you return to when the noise gets too loud and the floor starts to tilt.

He could be that for you. 

But he won’t say that. 

Not yet.

Not unless you ask.

Because in his world, the doors don’t open unless you're ready.

And the weight only leaves your hands when you choose to release it.

If that day comes, he’ll be there.

Waiting at the edge.

Two steps ahead.

Keeping watch.   

a/n: oof eddie, eddie, eddie. I rlly enjoyed diving into his little psyche with this one. lmk ur thoughts! reblogs/comments are always appreciated :)

also would anyone be interested in a taglist? i might start one if there's enough interest!

update: read the next part here!

read prev chapters here: pt. 1 / pt. 2 / pt. 3

series masterlist

[otherwindow]

why is it always a male character going mad avenging his dead wife and never a female character cradling her dying pure of heart husband in her arms then dragging the whole world down with her

[swan2swan]

[charlesoberonn]

First of all, this is a very clever use of this gif. Secondly, fuck you.

[regging]

eating disorders and abortions are two things that are like, spoken about in most mainstream discourse as though they are pretty rare and aberrant, but then when you’re actually friends with a lot of women you come to find out that they are extremely extremely common and kind of banal & mundane