I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the first time that Billy shows up at Steve’s house in the middle of the night after a fight with Neil.
It’s after they’ve started fucking, but there are still “no feelings” involved. Billy never stays to cuddle, Steve still isn’t reconciled to the idea that he’s anything other than straight– maybe they’ve never even properly kissed. It’s just clashes of teeth and lips, a quick roll in the sheets, doggy style so they don’t have to look in each other’s eyes.
There’re “no feelings” involved, so Steve is a little more than confused when he answers the pebbles being thrown at his window and it’s not Dustin with some Upside Down business or something. It’s Billy fucking Hargrove, and at first he seems like his usual asshole self. But then, Steve– irritable and ignoring the pull in his gut that’s somehow still happy to see the other boy at ass o clock on a school night– goes downstairs and pulls the sliding back door open to say “What the fuck?” And the words die on his lips.
Billy’s been crying. His eyes are red rimmed and glazed over in the bad lighting of the porch lamp. His knuckles are raw and busted open.
“What the Hell happened?” comes out of his mouth before he can think about it. Billy shrugs.
“It’s fucking freezing out here, Harrington.” He mumbles instead of an answer, and he’s definitely trembling from something other than the cold.
Steve steps to the side like his feet are made of lead, gobsmacked by the sight of Billy Hargrove with his tail between his legs. He shuffles in, rubbing warmth back into his hands, clenching his jaw against the pain.
“Sit down before you fall down– coffee?” Steve collects his thoughts, trying to formulate some type of plan of attack with his sleepy, sluggish brain. Billy doesn’t reply, just grunts, but Steve needs some caffeine to deal with this strange, subdued version of the cocky blonde boy sitting under his kitchen lamp. He makes the coffee and waits for it to percolate, neither of them speaking.
It should be awkward. Really, it should. But, the calm isn’t tense– it’s almost peaceful. Billy is relieved about something, Steve realizes after his first sip of too-hot coffee, and his chest tightens with some emotion he can’t place.
Coffee is consumed in silence. Both of them pretend Billy’s hands aren’t shaking until their mugs are empty and Steve is a little more awake.
“Are we not gonna talk about this then?” he breaks the quiet, sick of listening to the tick of the clock and Billy’s slowly calming breaths.
The blonde shook his head slowly, and Steve was starting to fidget with nerves just watching the glazed over expression on Billy’s face.
“Nope.” he popped the p, not meeting Steve’s eyes.
Asking nicely wasn’t going to work here– Steve didn’t know why he ever thought that that would work, and bit the inside of his cheek as he pondered his options here.
In the end, it wasn’t that hard.
He stood without ceremony, grabbing the blonde with a hand around his bicep and pulled him out of his kitchen chair. Billy snapped at him and tugged back from his hold, but Steve just gripped him tighter and pulled him up the stairs. If Billy really wanted out, they both knew he was strong enough to get away. But instead he was letting Steve do this, which made his heart clench with some twisted sort of pride. Honored that Billy would trust him to take the reins.
“What the fuck, Harrington?” Billy hissed when they came up to the bathroom, glaring daggers as the brunette sat him down on the rim of the tub. Steve busied himself with the small first aid kit under the sink in lieu of answering “Hey Asshole, I said– Ow fuck, Steve…”
He pressed the antiseptic doused cotton more gently against Billy’s knuckles, even though he was glaring at him, jaw set and fucking pissed off.
It wasn’t even at Billy, though. It was at whoever decided to scare him to the point of tears, ripped up his hands. He’d seen the bruises before. At first, Steve had written them off as some stupid fight he’d gotten himself into, God knows that’s something Billy’s good at. But, then something shifted and Steve had thought to ask.
After that, Billy refused to even talk to him for longer than it took to push him to the ground in basketball. It took a week or two before he showed up back at Steve’s door. Steve didn’t ask again– but it wasn’t because he had missed that douchebag. He hadn’t missed him.
Steve wasn’t letting go without an answer this time– rage built up and bubbled up his throat as he listened to Billy’s choked off noises of pain. He cleaned every cut and wrapped his knuckles with sure hands before demanding that the blonde take off his shirt and let him see the damage.
If he had had the presence of mind to think about it, he would have been floored by the fact that Billy actually did it. No bitching or refusing, just a lost look in his teary blue eyes as he gingerly tugged his shirt over his head.
He was bruised to all Hell, and looked so small and young and afraid as he sat on the edge of Steve’s bathtub at 3 in the morning.
Steve could hardly stand it. He never wanted to let Billy out of his sight again. He was protective.
He let out a long, measured exhale through his nose and fidgeted with his lip. Billy wasn’t meeting his eyes, and Steve stepped into the other boy’s space without a thought, kneeling between his knees to force his gaze to lock on his.
“Who did this, Billy?” he didn’t even recognize his own voice, all rough and low.
He just shook his head, sneering in a half assed way that only made Steve pity him. His eyes were brimmed with tears and he was trembling again.
“You don’t fucking care, Harrington.”
“You know I do– why’d you come here if you thought I didn’t?” Steve bit out the words, coming up to cradle the blonde’s face in his hands on instinct. He surprised himself with the words– he did care. Somewhere along the way he’d actually started to fucking care about Billy Hargrove and the bruises and the blood and the fucking tears were just too much to take.
Billy didn’t move his hands away and he didn’t say a damn thing. He just looked at Steve with these big, tired eyes. Like he was exhausted by all the secrets that he kept. Maybe Steve could understand that.
The air was thick and neither of them knew what to say without sounding sappy or queer. Steve didn’t need to think, though, to know he had to do it. He pressed his lips softly to the other boy’s, so gentle and chaste, not looking to do anything more than comfort. It wasn’t some clash of teeth and tongue on their way to tearing up Steve’s sheets, it was just… love. Something neither of them were even willing to think about, let alone name.
But Billy kissed him back, matching Steve’s softness but pressing in closer, needing to be close so desperately that he whined behind his teeth.
Steve shushed him as they separated, but didn’t dare make eye contact when it was through. They rested their foreheads together like a real couple and Steve let his fingers sink into Billy’s curly hair.
“Um… you should stay tonight.” he finally risked breaking the silence.
“’Kay.” Billy whispered, sounding hoarse. There were wet tracks down his cheeks, then, and Steve was swept back up in the protective need from before.
It simmered under his skin until they were lying back under the covers of his bed, Billy awkwardly beside him but unwilling to touch.
“From now on, you always come here when you need me. Okay? D’you hear me?”
Billy just took his hand and squeezed with one of his bandaged ones.
Steve pulled him close, and felt the blonde relax into his chest with a tiny, broken noise. He pressed his lips over and over again to the soft skin at the nape of Billy’s neck and let the boy tremble with the force of his tears in the relative privacy of his back to Steve.
That was okay with him. At least he was safe. The rest could come later.
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