(Steve Harrington x Dustin's older sister, fem!reader)
Summary: When you get hurt during a secret Crawl into the Upside Down meant to stop Vecna, everything falls apart as your friends rush to get you out alive—and Steve, terrified of losing you, is forced to confront just how deeply it affects him.
word count: 6,597 (oops...)
Warnings: Angst, mentions of death, hospital scene, bad injury, mentions of blood, panic, mild violence, fluff ending though. The details are not accurate to season 5 because lowkey kinda forgot what happened.
A/N: This is for whoever requested it, thanks for the idea and I'm so sorry it took me forever I've just been in a writing slump. Also, if you are the person who sent me a request in my inbox about the marriage and you're reading this, I will be doing that 100% so stay tuned.
*.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.*
The rules of the Crawls are simple.
Stay focused. Stay quiet. And more importantly, above everything else, don’t die.
Of course, nothing about your life in Hawkins has ever been simple, not for a long time. You can thank your genius little brother for that, the one who first dragged you into this mess with demogorgons and Vecna and every nightmare that followed since.
Even now, a few years later, you’re still here—still stuck in it like it never learned how to let you go. And yet… you wouldn’t undo it because somewhere in the chaos, it led you to Steve. It carved out space for friendships you never would’ve had, for people who became something like family when everything else fell apart. It gave you something worth holding onto, even when everything around you was falling apart.
Right now, things still suck. That part hasn’t changed but you are all so close to the finish line. Closer than you’ve ever been. Vecna, the source of all of it, the thing that’s been lurking behind every wrong turn and every broken piece of Hawkins, is finally within reach.
And these crawls? It’s the answer to how you will figure out the rest. Step by step. Dark tunnel by dark tunnel. You’ll do whatever it takes to end him for good.
By now, everyone in Hawkins knows the military owns the town.
Curfews. Checkpoints. Armed patrols rolling through neighborhoods at all hours. Helicopters overhead so often nobody even looks up anymore. Entire streets blocked off behind fences and floodlights while government officials lie through their teeth on the news about “environmental contamination.”
Which means every Crawl has to happen in secret. They have to be quick. Quiet. Precise. That’s what Hopper calls it, like if he keeps repeating the words, the fear will stop leaking in around the edges.
“Controlled,” is how he phrases it.
Like anything about this has ever been controlled. You almost want to laugh when he says it because your hands don’t feel controlled. Your thoughts don’t feel controlled. And that quiet, irrational fear sitting under your ribs—the one that whispers you could die down there—definitely isn’t controlled.
But then you think about why you’re still doing it. Your little brother, who got dragged into this mess long before he understood what it meant, to think he was just a little boy when it all started… and Steve, who somehow ended up in the middle of all of it like he was always meant to be there. The others too, all tangled up in something none of you ever asked for, none of you ever deserved. Sometimes you didn’t understand why the responsibility of saving the world had fallen on you and your friends. You weren’t a hero by any means. So was it selfish to wish this burden belonged to someone else instead?
When your mind dwells on it too much something in you hardens. It doesn’t matter what you feel. It doesn’t matter how fear sits in your chest like a weight. It doesn’t matter if you want to play hero or not, you have to. Because god forbid if something happens—It has to be you. Not them. Never them. You.
You can’t let anything happen to them. You won’t. That part of you isn’t negotiable anymore. It is an instinct, sharper than fear, louder than reason. If something goes wrong down there, it should be you taking the hit, not them. That’s just how it is, you’ve made that up in your mind a long time ago.
So you nod when Hopper talks about “controlled.” You follow the plan. You step into the Crawls anyway, even when everything in you is screaming not to. Hawkins is already too close to breaking, and they’re already too important to lose.
- -
Rain pours hard enough to blur the windshield as the van idles beside the abandoned access road outside Hawkins. The woods beyond the barricades are black and endless, lit only by the occasional sweep of military floodlights in the distance.
Inside the van, nobody talks before the Crawl. Maybe they did at the beginning—back when everything still felt uncertain in a different way, when the first few missions were more fear than experience and silence wasn’t something anyone had learned to rely on yet. But after too many close calls, too many mistakes that almost cost everything, staying quiet started to feel like the safest option, like saying less might somehow mean risking less.
Still, it doesn’t make anything easier. Not when things are getting more serious, more real, and every time you get closer to Vecna it only gets more dangerous, like the Upside Down is learning you just as much as you’re trying to survive it.
The fear stopped being loud weeks ago. Now it sits there, quiet and heavy. It’s left exhaustion that settles deep into everyone’s bones.
“You remember the route?” Hopper asks from the driver’s seat for what feels like the third time, his grip tight on the wheel even though he’s trying to sound steady. He’s the adult, the one supposed to have this under control—but even he can feel it now, the weight of what they’re about to do settling in the van like a second body.
“Jesus, Hopper,” Steve mutters beside you, checking the shells in the shotgun across his lap. “We’ve done this one before.” Steve sounds rather angry in his tone, because that was his nerves talking, too. He’s not actually angry—he’s scared. For whatever reason, emotions tend to get the better of us in situations that put us on edge. Some people lash out in anger, while others fall into sadness. It’s just human nature.
Suddenly, everyone goes quiet again, no one arguing after that. The weight of Hopper’s words cloud your mind like toxic gas you can’t escape. Rain taps steadily against the roof of the van, soft and endless, like it doesn’t care what’s waiting for you out there.
In the dim dashboard light you catch a glimpse of your younger brother. Dustin somehow looks younger and older at the same time. You can’t help but think about how he’s too young for all of this, for the shaking hands and the radio packs he’s forcing himself to focus on. And all you can think about is how you still see him as that little kid with the missing teeth and the big, pearly, gummy smile that used to show up like nothing in the world could touch him, like everything was still simple enough to figure out, and all those innocent times when his only worry was about D&D and nerdy comics.
You nudge his shoulder gently, careful, like you’re trying not to break whatever’s holding him together, and ask, “You okay?”
Dustin Henderson snorts. “Fantastic. Love risking my life in nightmare hell dimensions.”
“That's enough Dustin,” Steve says automatically as if Dustin’s sarcasm triggers him.
You’d noticed that Steve and Dustin had been on edge with each other lately. The two people you cared about most in the world were too busy fighting to see how much it was tearing you apart. Under any other circumstances, you would’ve fought harder to make them stop, but with the possible end of the world hanging over all of you, nothing felt that simple anymore and it felt hopeless, exhausting even to waste your energy on something so stupid.
Dustin stares at him.
Steve pauses.
“…Never mind.”
The truth is, nobody’s doing okay anymore. You know you’re not. Not after three months of Crawls. Three months of sneaking beneath military blockades and slipping into the Upside Down looking for Vecna while Hawkins rots from the inside out.
And Steve—
Steve’s gotten worse too.
Not in an obvious way. He still joked around sometimes, still tried to keep everyone moving like he could talk the fear out of the room. You knew he thought that was his job too—keeping everyone else together, keeping them happy. God, how you wished you could make him understand that he was allowed to fall apart sometimes too.
But even now, he still threw himself between danger and the rest of you without a second thought, like protecting everyone was just another burden he’d silently decided to carry alone.
But it’s also in the way he watches you now. Every Crawl, every hallway, every breathless pause where something could go wrong. He’s always looking at you.
And the worst part is… you know why. Steve knows you. Knows you’d do anything to save your little brother. Knows you’d do the same for him, too, even if you don’t always say it out loud. He’s the same way, has been for a long time now—throwing himself into danger like it’s just part of the job.
But that doesn’t make it okay. It doesn’t make it less terrifying. Because understanding it doesn’t stop the fear from sitting heavy in his chest every time you step into the dark. He’s not just worried anymore.
He’s scared shitless of losing you.
And you could see it in the way he looked at you when he thought you weren’t paying attention—like he was already grieving you before anything had even happened. Like some part of him was trying to memorize every expression, every laugh, every little thing about you in case it was the last time he ever got to see it.
He couldn’t survive losing you. Not now. Not when the two of you were finally so close to having something beyond all of this horror, a future, a life, something normal. He wouldn’t admit it but Steve had never really been afraid of dying for himself. He was afraid of living in a world that no longer had you in it.
Robin even pulled you aside once after a mission and said, “I’m serious, he looks like he’s five seconds from a nervous breakdown every time you get hurt.”
At the time, it had only been a twisted ankle.
But tonight feels different. You can tell the second Hopper kills the engine.
The air changes.
You know how people in murder mysteries always say they felt it coming? Like it was some sort of gut feeling that chose not to trust anyways. Yeah, well, you felt something too. You just didn’t know what it was yet.
“Alright,” Hopper says quietly. “We move fast. Military patrol passes in eleven minutes. We miss that window, we’re screwed.”
Screwed was putting it lightly. If any of you missed this mark, you’d be dead but no one admits that to themselves.
Everyone grabs their gear.
Steve catches your wrist before you can climb out. “Stay close to me tonight.”
You raise an eyebrow. “I always do.”
“No.” His voice drops lower. More serious. “I mean it.”
There’s something in his face that makes your stomach twist. It's fear. Real fear.
Before you can respond, Hopper opens the van doors. “Move.”
The woods are freezing, cold crawling straight into your bones. Rain soaks through your jacket almost instantly as the group cuts through the trees toward the restricted zone. Somewhere in the distance, a generator hums beneath the crackle of military radios.
Floodlights sweep across the forest every few seconds, cutting through the trees in sharp, blinding arcs. Everyone ducks automatically. By now, the routine is muscle memory. And when you think about that too much, it hits in a way you don’t really let yourself sit with since it shouldn’t be like this. None of you should be here at all. Maybe in another life you’re just normal kids, worried about normal things, not carrying the weight of saving a world that keeps almost ending.
Hopper leads.
Nancy checks the rear.
Robin keeps track of timing.
Steve stays near you. Always near you.
“Same plan,” Nancy whispers. “In and out. We check the western sector for movement and regroup in forty minutes.”
Everyone nods. Then they descend—and you’re just left watching for a second longer than you should, hoping it won’t be the last time you see any of them come back up. Maybe it was wrong to think so negatively all the time, but who could really blame you? You’d all seen things no one was ever supposed to see, lived through horrors that went far beyond normal. After everything that had happened, “okay” didn’t even feel like a real thing anymore.
Crossing into the Upside Down never gets easier, no matter how many times you do it. The cold hits first, sharp and immediate, like the air itself is rejecting you. Then the smell follows. Rot. Blood. Wet decay that clings to everything the moment you breathe it in. If the “walls” could talk, you didn’t think you’d want to hear what they had to say.
And underneath it all, something worse—you can feel it before you even name it. The air doesn’t feel alive here. It feels wrong. Dead in a way that doesn’t stop moving.
You land hard beside Steve at the bottom of the tunnel and immediately hear the distant echoing groans somewhere deep underground. The Upside Down version of Hawkins stretches endlessly ahead in darkness and ash.
Steve instinctively reaches for your hand for half a second before catching himself. Still, his fingers brush yours. “You good?” he asks quietly.
“Yeah.”
He studies your face like he’s checking whether you’re lying. Obviously he can see that a part of you isn’t fine but… who is right now? So he reluctantly nods.
The group moves carefully through the ruined underground corridors beneath Hawkins High, flashlights dimmed low while spores drift through the air like snow.
No monsters.
No attacks.
No sign of Vecna.
Just silence.
That should’ve been fine. But nothing ever really was. Not when that evil son of a bitch Vecna always seemed to have another trick up his sleeve.
Robin notices first. “Do you guys hear that?”
Everyone stops.
Nothing happens.
“That’s the problem,” she whispers.
Steve immediately lifts the shotgun.
The walls twitch, a sick ripple runs through the vines coating the ceiling. Then Nancy sees it first. Her whole expression changes. “Move. Now.”
But it’s too late.
The tunnel behind you seals with a wet, snapping snap of flesh and root and something alive deciding you don’t get to leave. Vines burst across the walls like they’ve been waiting for permission.
Dustin stumbles back. “Oh, you’ve gotta be kidding me!”
The lights overhead pop one after another, glass bursting into sparks before the tunnel is swallowed in darkness. Then the screaming starts. It’s a demogorgon. And it’s close. It’s coming straight for you all.
It doesn’t just echo through the tunnel—it fills it. That wet, guttural screech tearing straight through the air as something massive drops from the ceiling in a sudden, violent impact.
“RUN!” Hopper roars.
Everything snaps into motion at once. Gunfire flashes through the dark in sharp bursts. Nancy fires blindly, hitting nothing fast enough. Robin swings her crowbar hard, metal striking something solid—but it barely slows it. The demogorgon moves wrong-fast, snapping forward and missing you by inches, claws raking sparks off the wall beside you.
Steve grabs your arm and yanks you forward. “GO!”
You run.
And it follows. Not rushing. Hunting. Deliberate. It drives all of you deeper into the tunnels instead of toward the exit.
And that’s when it clicks to you. Vecna knows. He’s not just waiting. He set this.
“This is a trap!” Dustin shouts, voice cracking as he runs, barely keeping up as the darkness closes in behind you. The realization hits too late. A demogorgon drops from the ceiling.
“DUSTIN!” you scream.
It lands directly in front of him with a yell so loud the tunnel shakes. Dustin barely gets his hands up before it slams into him, throwing him sideways into the wall hard enough to make the sound echo.
His flashlight skids across the ground, spinning uselessly through the dark. The demogorgon turns immediately. Straight toward him. Focused and ready to kill.
You don’t think for even a second you just act. You move quickly in front of him. “HEY!” while shouting you throw yourself between them just as it lunges.
Pain explodes through your side. Its claws rip across you so violently it feels like being torn open with burning metal. Your breath vanishes instantly. A scream rips out of you before you can stop it. You hit the ground hard.
Somewhere behind you, Steve goes completely silent as he is currently processing what the fuck just happened.
Then—
“No. NO!”
The terror in his voice is instant. Raw. Unrecognizable. The shotgun blast detonates through the tunnel. The demogorgon jerks back with a screech, but it doesn’t go down. It barely even slows. It twists toward Steve for half a second before its attention snaps right back to you.
Like it chose you. Like that was always the plan.
“Get her up!” Nancy shouts.
You try. You really do but the second you push against the ground, agony tears through your ribs so sharply your arms collapse underneath you. The demogorgon lunges again.
Steve gets there first.
He throws himself between you and the creature with the nail bat raised, slamming it across the monster’s face with a roar that sounds more desperate than angry. “GET AWAY FROM HER!”
The creature shrieks.
Steve hits it again. And again.
He’s furious now. Reckless. Swinging hard enough to stagger himself.
“Steve!” Robin screams.
The demogorgon catches the bat mid-swing. Everyone freezes. For one horrible second, neither of them move. Then the creature hurls Steve across the tunnel. He crashes into the wall and drops hard.
“STEVE!” Your voice breaks on his name.
The demogorgon turns back toward you slowly. Its flowered face opens wider, revealing rows of teeth slick with blood. You try to move but the pain immediately tears through your side so violently you nearly black out.
The creature steps closer.
Steve gets between you and it instantly, torn nail bat raised with shaking hands. “Come on,” he breathes, voice cracking. “Come on, you want somebody? Take me.”
The demogorgon pauses. The vines twitch violently beneath its feet, and then, suddenly, the creature backs away. Not defeated. Not afraid. Called off.
At first, the retreat barely makes sense. Demogorgons don’t stop. They don’t hesitate. And then the realization crashes over the group all at once. Vecna never intended to kill anyone here. He wanted panic. Distraction. Chaos. A reminder, carved deep into your all your mind, of exactly how much power he still had and how easily he could unleash it whenever he wanted.
It was a warning not to mess with him anymore—or whatever it is that he’s planning.
And judging by the blood soaking through your clothes, he got exactly what he wanted.
“Shit—shit, she’s bleeding bad,” Dustin says, voice thin with panic.
Steve drops to his knees beside you so fast he nearly slips. His hands hover over your body helplessly, terrified to touch you and terrified not to.
Your breathing comes out uneven and sharp. Everything hurts.
“Hey, hey, look at me.” Steve’s voice is trembling now. “Look at me, sweetheart.”
You try.
His face is pale underneath the grime and blood splattered across his cheek. His eyes look wrecked already.
Nancy kneels beside him immediately, ripping open the medical bag.
“We need pressure on it now.”
Steve presses his hand over your side carefully. The second he does, you cry out. His entire face crumples. “I know. I know, I’m sorry.” He sounds close to panicking himself. “I’m sorry.”
The vines around the tunnel pulse faintly again. Like Vecna’s still watching. Still listening. Steve notices too. And something angry flashes across his face. “Get us out of here,” he says sharply without looking away from you. “Right now,”
“We need to move.”
“She can’t walk,” Dustin says instantly.
“Then I’ll carry her!” Without hesitation, Steve slides one arm beneath your back carefully. The second he lifts you, you cry out. He looks devastated.
“I know,” he whispers frantically. “I know, sweetheart, I’m sorry.”
Sweetheart. In another circumstance it would make your heart melt but you were currently on the verge of what felt like, and probably was, death.
The retreat is a nightmare. Everything hurts. Steve carries you through the tunnels while Hopper and Nancy clear the path ahead. Robin keeps checking behind them for movement while Dustin stays glued to Steve’s side, panic written all over his face.
“You can’t fall asleep,” Steve says for maybe the hundredth time.
“I’m tired,” you mumble against his shoulder.
“Hey, no— no, look at me. You can’t fall asleep yet.” His voice shakes. He’s pleading with you more than commanding, desperation bleeding through every word. “You stay awake. Okay? Stay awake for me, please.”
Blood keeps soaking through his jacket. You can feel it.
So can he.
And the more blood there is, the more frightened he becomes. By the time they reach the outside world again, Steve is breathing hard and it’s not from exhaustion but from panic. Real panic.
He nearly stumbles climbing back through the tunnel into Hawkins.
The rain hits all of you instantly. Cold and sharp.
Robin yanks open the van doors while Hopper starts the engine.
“Go go GO!”
Steve climbs into the backseat with you still in his arms. Dustin scrambles in beside him.
The second the van starts moving, Steve pulls you against his chest and presses both hands harder against your wound.
The drive to Hawkins Memorial feels endless. Rain pounds against the windshield while military sirens echo somewhere nearby.
Nancy keeps looking back from the passenger seat.
“Steve,” you mumble, desperate for relief from something you can’t quite name—the pain, the fear, the awful feeling that everything is slipping away from you all at once.
He doesn’t answer.
“Steve.” you plead again, you’re not sure how much longer you can stay awake.
His eyes are locked on you. Terrified. “You stay with me,” he whispers again. “Please.”
Dustin suddenly starts crying quietly beside him. Which somehow makes it worse.
“I should’ve seen it,” he chokes out. “I should’ve known it was a trap.”
“This isn’t your fault,” you whisper weakly. The last thing you wanted was to ever make your baby brother feel at fault. This was nobody's fault besides that evil son of bitch.
“Yes it is!”
“No,” Steve says sharply.
Dustin looks up.
Steve’s face is streaked with blood and rain and tears. “This is not on you. You hear me?” His voice breaks harder. “None of this is on you.”
Then he looks back at you and completely falls apart again, because your eyes are slipping closed.
“No no no—hey.” He cups your face carefully. “Stay awake, you have to. We’re almost there.”
You try.
You really try.
But everything’s fading.
“I’m begging you. Just stay awake for a little longer, baby.” Steve whispers.
That word nearly destroys you, but somehow you force yourself to stay awake a little longer. One look at everyone’s faces tells you everything you need to know—this isn’t good. The fear in their eyes is impossible to miss and now you’re not sure you’re ready to die yet.
The hospital is in chaos. The military presence in Hawkins means every emergency room is overloaded already. Soldiers crowd the entrance. Backup lights flicker overhead. Nurses rush through the halls carrying supplies while distant shouting echoes from somewhere deeper inside the building.
The second Steve carries you through the doors, people start moving.
“Severe abdominal laceration—”
“She’s losing too much blood—”
“We need a room NOW.”
Hands pull you away from him.
Steve physically resists. “Wait—”
“Sir, let them work.”
“I’m coming with her.”
“You can’t.”
“She hates hospitals—”
“Steve.” Robin grabs his arm before he can actually fight somebody.
He looks wrecked. Completely wrecked. Your blood covers half his clothes, smeared across his hands and soaked into his jacket, and now that the doctors pulled you away from him, he looks utterly lost. Like he doesn’t know what to do with himself if he can’t follow.
Dustin stands frozen nearby, looking completely numb. His sister had just thrown herself in front of a demogorgon to save him. That could’ve been him being rushed away by the doctors right now, bloodied and barely conscious, but instead it was you. That realization seems to hit him harder now that his brain is preoccupied. He can’t even bring himself to move, just stares after you with wide, terrified eyes like if he looks away for even a moment, something even worse will happen.
And for the first time since any of this started, Steve looks genuinely helpless. There’s nothing left for him to fight, nothing he can fix, nothing he can throw himself in front of anymore.
He can’t lose you. Not like this. Not after everything. And yet all he can do is stand there and watch as they take you farther away, like that possibility is happening anyway.
- -
Hours pass.
Nobody leaves—how could they? Not when their friend, girlfriend, sister is currently fighting for her life right here. Everyone stays rooted in place, because moving would somehow make it worse, stepping away would mean accepting something none of them are ready to accept.
Hopper eventually forces everyone into chairs while doctors move in and out of surgery doors down the hall.
Steve doesn’t sit. Not once. He paces endlessly through the waiting room, hands tangled in his hair. Every few minutes he asks for updates. Every few minutes he gets nothing.
Dustin eventually breaks around three in the morning. “I can’t do this anymore.”
Steve immediately crouches in front of him. “Hey.”
Dustin wipes angrily at his face. “What if she dies?”
Steve stops breathing for a second.
Just a second.
But it’s enough.
Enough for it to hit him all at once—because he hasn’t let himself say it out loud, hasn’t even let himself think it properly. Not you. Not after everything. Not after you just got dragged away from him with blood on his hands and your name still stuck in his throat.
Dustin notices first. His expression shifts like he already regrets saying it.
So does Robin. Her eyes flick to Steve immediately, like she’s bracing for whatever comes next.
“She’s not gonna die,” Steve says finally.
Too fast.
Too desperate.
Dustin starts crying again anyway.
Steve pulls him into a hug immediately because it’s all he knows how to do right now.
It hits Robin suddenly then, watching the two of them sitting there together in the middle of the hospital at four in the morning.
This is Steve’s family.
Not just friends.
Family.
And losing you would destroy him.
The doctor finally appears just before sunrise.
Everyone stands instantly.
Steve’s face has gone completely pale.
“How is she?”
The doctor pulls off his mask with a tired sigh but he reveals probably the best news of Steve’s life.
“She made it.”
Silence follows. Nobody moves at first, like the words don’t fully register, like if they stay still enough they can keep reality from changing again.
Then Dustin breaks first, the relief hitting him so hard he starts crying. His worst fear— losing his sister—is pushed back a little farther into the distance. Not today. Fate doesn’t get to take you today. Vecna doesn’t win this time.
Robin lets out a sharp, disbelieving swear, half laugh, half shock, like she can’t decide whether to collapse or yell at someone for letting it get that far.
Steve doesn’t say anything. He just closes his eyes. And for a second, it looks like his whole body finally gives out on holding itself together.
“You can see her soon,” the doctor continues. “She’s stable, but recovery’s going to take time.”
Stable. Alive.
That’s all he’s ever wanted to hear. Steve has to lean against the wall suddenly.
Robin grabs his shoulder before he falls.
“You okay?”
“No,” he laughs shakily.
Then quieter:
“But she is.”
—
When Steve finally enters your hospital room, the sun is barely beginning to rise outside. Pale orange light spills through the blinds in thin stripes across the floor. It’s only been a few hours since the demogorgon attack, but to him it feels like days. Days since he last saw your face without blood on it. Days since he knew for sure you were still alive.
For a moment, he just stands there in the doorway staring at you.
You look exhausted. Pale. There are bandages wrapped tightly around your abdomen, machines humming quietly beside you, bruises scattered across your skin. But your chest is rising and falling steadily.
You’re alive.
Steve lets out a breath that sounds almost painful.
“Hey,” you whisper weakly.
That nearly destroys him again.
He crosses the room immediately, grabbing your hand so fast it’s almost desperate. His fingers are cold, trembling slightly against yours.
“I thought I lost you,” he admits, voice cracking completely on the words.
And suddenly you understand.
Not just fear.
Not just panic.
Weeks of it. Months.
Every Crawl. Every fight. Every time the two of you stepped into the Upside Down together, Steve had been waiting for the moment something finally went wrong. Waiting for the second he wouldn’t be fast enough to protect you.
“You’re shaking,” you murmur softly.
He laughs once under his breath, completely wrecked. “Yeah, no kidding.”
Your thumb brushes weakly against his hand. “Steve…”
“No, because I need you to understand something,” he says quickly, eyes glassy. “When they took you away from me, I genuinely thought that was it. I thought the last thing I was ever gonna hear from you was you apologizing to me while you were bleeding out.”
Your chest tightens painfully. “I’m still here.”
Steve bows his head for a second like he physically can’t handle hearing that. He presses your hand against his forehead, breathing shakily.
“You scared the absolute hell out of me.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t apologize.” He looks at you immediately. “Seriously, don’t ever apologize for that.”
The room falls quiet for a moment except for the steady beeping of the monitor beside you. Steve keeps staring at you like if he looks away too long, you’ll disappear again.
Then the door opens quietly behind him.
Dustin steps in looking exhausted beyond belief, hair a mess, eyes red and swollen from crying. Robin follows right behind him carrying terrible vending machine coffee.
The second Dustin sees you awake, his whole face crumples.
“You idiot,” he says tearfully. “Do you have any idea how traumatic you are?”
You laugh softly despite the pain. “Hi, Dusty.”
He points at you angrily while already crying harder. “No, absolutely not. You do not get to ‘Hi, Dusty’ me after that.”
Robin snorts loudly from the doorway. “Thank God. One more hour with sad Steve and I was gonna lose my mind.”
Steve rolls his eyes without looking away from you. “Robin.”
“No, seriously,” she continues, setting the coffees down. “This man stared at a wall for like forty minutes. At one point I thought he died too.”
“I was thinking, Robin.”
“You were having a breakdown.”
Dustin carefully hugs you a second later anyway, trying not to hurt you. The second he does, you feel him shaking.
“That could’ve been me,” he says quietly against your shoulder.
Your expression softens immediately. “But it wasn’t.”
“You shouldn’t have had to do that.”
“I’d do it again in a heartbeat."
“Don’t say that.” His voice cracks instantly. “Please don’t say that.”
Steve looks away for a second, jaw tightening hard enough you can see it. Because he knows you mean it. That’s the problem. You would do it again if it meant protecting the people you loved.
Robin gently nudges Dustin after a minute. “C’mon, Henderson. She needs rest before you emotionally flood the entire hospital.”
Dustin wipes angrily at his face. “I hate everyone here.”
“You love us.”
“Unfortunately.”
Eventually, the room settles. Robin and Dustin fall asleep in uncomfortable chairs after hours of refusing to leave. Steve stays beside your bed the entire time. Even when exhaustion is visibly dragging at him, he refuses to let go of your hand.
At some point after dawn, you wake again to find the room quieter. The sky outside has turned soft gold with early morning light. Dustin is snoring against Robin’s shoulder across the room.
Steve is still beside you.
His head rests near your hand on the mattress, eyes closed for the first time in hours, fingers still loosely wrapped around yours even in sleep. Like some part of him is afraid you’ll vanish the second he lets go.
You gently brush your fingers through his hair.
Steve stirs immediately, blinking awake in confusion before his eyes find yours. The panic there disappears almost instantly.
“Hey,” he says softly.
“Hey.”
For the first time since all of this started, you see something different settle across his face. Not fear. Not panic. Relief. Real relief. And when he smiles at you this time, small and exhausted and unbelievably emotional, it feels like maybe—despite everything—you all survived this one.
Steve leans his forehead to rest against yours for a moment longer than he probably realizes. Like he’s afraid that if he moves too fast, reality will snap back and take you away again.
“You’re really here,” he says quietly, like he still needs confirmation.
“I’m really here,” you answer, just as soft.
His breath shakes a little. “Okay. Good. Because I swear, if I had to go through that again—”
He stops himself, jaw tightening, like he can’t even finish the thought.
Your thumb brushes his hand again. “Hey. It’s over. I’m okay.”
Steve huffs a short, disbelieving laugh. “You’re literally stitched back together and calling that ‘okay.’”
“You can’t classify anything as just ‘okay’ right now, but I'm alive and that counts.”
That earns a real laugh out of him this time, small, but real, and it breaks something tight in his expression. Just a little.
Across the room, Dustin stirs in his chair and groans. “If you two are gonna do emotional trauma bonding, can you do it quieter? Some of us are trying to recover from almost losing a sibling.”
Robin, still half-asleep, immediately throws a pillow in his direction without looking. “Go back to sleep, Henderson.”
“It hit my face.”
“Good.”
Steve doesn’t even look over. He’s still watching you like he’s afraid blinking will cost him something. Then his voice drops again, softer. “When they took you away… I couldn’t think. I just—” He shakes his head, frustrated with himself. “I kept replaying it. Like if I had moved faster, if I had grabbed you sooner, if I—”
“Steve.” You interrupt gently.
He stops.
You tighten your grip on his hand. “You didn’t fail me.”
His eyes flicker, like he wants to argue, like that thought has been sitting in him too long to just disappear.
But you don’t let him spiral.
“I did what I had to do,” you continue. “And I’m here because it worked. Because you all were there. Because we didn’t give up.”
Steve looks down for a second, breathing unsteady. “Still felt like I lost you.”
“I know.”
That quiet answer lands heavier than anything else. The room stays still for a moment after that, the kind of silence that isn’t empty—just full.
Eventually, you shift a little in bed, wincing at the ache in your side. Steve notices immediately, sitting up straighter.
“Do you need anything? Water? I can get a doctor. Or—wait—should I get a doctor?”
“I’m okay,” you reassure him quickly. “Just sore.”
“You’re allowed to be not okay,” he says immediately. “Like, medically speaking, I think you’re supposed to be not okay right now.”
“That’s not very comforting.”
“It’s honest.”
That makes you smile a little, tired but real. Steve notices it like it’s something he’s been waiting to see.
“There it is,” he murmurs.
“What?”
“That.” He squeezes your hand. “Your face doing that thing where you’re actually you again.”
You roll your eyes faintly. “My face has always been me.”
“No,” he says, shaking his head. “I mean… before. Before I thought I lost you.”
The weight of that hangs for a second.
Then you shift your hand slightly, turning it so you can hold his properly, fingers interlacing more firmly.
“Steve,” you say carefully.
He looks up instantly.
You hesitate, because you can feel how much this matters to him. How much everything hinges on the next few words.
So you choose them slowly.
“I need you to listen to me.”
“I am listening.”
“No more blaming yourself,” you say. “For any of it. For what I did. For what happened. For any of this.”
His jaw tightens again. “That’s not how it works.”
“It is when I’m telling you it is.” That gets a small, almost stunned pause out of him. You continue anyway, quieter but firmer. “I’m not mad at you. I’m not blaming you. And I’m not going anywhere because of what you didn’t do fast enough.”
Steve swallows hard. “You don’t get it. I— I keep thinking if I lost you—”
“But you didn’t.”
Silence again.
Then Dustin, still half-asleep, mutters from his chair, “Can you two stop saying ‘lost you’ every five seconds? We get it, you almost died.”
Robin, without opening her eyes: “He’s right.”
Steve exhales something between a laugh and a sigh. “Okay, yeah. Sorry.”
But his grip on your hand doesn’t loosen. Not even a little.
The morning light shifts slightly in the room, brighter now, softer. The hospital sounds outside begin to pick up—distant footsteps, quiet voices, the normal rhythm of a world that feels way too ordinary after everything you’ve been through.
Steve glances toward the window, then back at you.
“You scared me,” he says again, but this time it’s not as broken. More honest. Grounded.
“I know.”
“And I meant it,” he adds. “You don’t do that again.”
You raise an eyebrow slightly. “That sounds like an order.”
“It is.”
A beat. Then you sigh lightly. “Fine.”
Steve blinks. “Wait. Really?”
“I said fine,” you repeat. “No more reckless hero moments. I would risk my life again like that.”
He looks suspicious immediately. “You’re saying that way too easily.”
“Because I mean it.”
He studies you like he’s trying to decide if he believes you.
Then you squeeze his hand again, softer this time. “I don’t want to scare you like that again either.”
That finally gets him. His shoulders drop a fraction, tension easing just slightly out of him for the first time since you woke up. “Good,” he says quietly. “Because I don’t think I can handle it twice.”
“I’m not planning on it, trust me.” you whisper.
Across the room, Dustin has fully given up and is now asleep again, slumped awkwardly in his chair. Robin is half-leaning against him, also out cold.
Steve notices and huffs a quiet laugh.
“They’re unbelievable.”
“You love them.”
“I do,” he admits. Then looks back at you. “But I was really focused on you for a while there.”
Your smile softens again. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.” His voice drops. “Kind of still am.”
And for a moment, neither of you say anything else.
Because it’s not needed.
He just stays there, holding your hand like he’s decided that as long as he can feel you there, he can start believing in tomorrow again.
♡ Steve touches you as if he can press the truth directly into your skin.
Warnings : 18+ / MDNI! • Enemies to lovers, hurt/comfort, angst (blood/injuries, fear of losing someone), smoking (cigarette), smut (unprotected sex, fingering, semi-public ie outside), emotional vulnerability, protective Steve Harrington, praise kink(?) with themes of trauma, self-worth, and comfort throughout
Pairing : Steve Harrington x impossible girl!Henderson!reader
Word count: 7.3k
Summary: After yet another failed crawl leaves you trapped beneath collapsing concrete, Steve Harrington finally snaps. Forcing you to confront what you really mean to him.
Chef’s Note: yes, the glasses stay on. Send any tips to this customer @roseswebcorner (Order in comments) ♡
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Rain spits against the windows of the station, turning the parking lot outside into a smear of neon reflections and black asphalt. The ‘WSQK’ sign buzzes red against the storm, flickering ominously over puddles and the van which Steve had abandoned at an angle near the curb, one wheel half up on the pavement.
Wind rattles the broken gutter overhead, and through the rain-streaked glass you can just about make him out, standing beneath the awning. Barely sheltered.
Head tipped back against the brick. White t-shirt damp beneath his cord jacket where the rain had soaked through. Hair curling at the edges, pushed back off his forehead evidently from running his hands through it. His wire-framed glasses catch the red every few seconds, briefly obscuring the exhausted look underneath them before the light flickers away.
Steve.
Steve with blood drying across his knuckles.
Steve with a cigarette between his fingers despite the fact he told the others he’d quit months ago.
You push open the station door and step out into the damp night air, the storm immediately swallowing you whole. Instinctively wrapping your jacket tighter around yourself.
He spares you the briefest of glances when you step out, closing the door behind you. His eyes catch yours; sharp for half a second before he drops his gaze back to the cigarette between his fingers, jaw tight behind the slow curl of smoke.
You cross the narrow space between you and lean against the wall opposite him, back against damp brick. Rainwater drips steadily from the edge of the awning between you, hitting the pavement in uneven taps.
Neither of you speak. Steve just takes another drag; choosing to focus on that and not the fact that you followed him out here.
“You know those things kill you, right?” you say eventually, voice so uneven you're not sure you sound like yourself.
He lets out a humorless huff through his nose. “Think I’m aware.”
The stick glows orange between his fingers. You just watch his hand.
Swollen knuckles.
Split skin.
A faint smear of blood slowly drying near his wrist.
Without really thinking about it, only really to distract yourself from the way your stomach twists, you reach forward and pluck the cigarette from between his fingers.
Steve’s eyes flick to you, but he doesn’t move to stop you.
You take a drag before you can think it through, the smoke burning harsh down your throat. For a while no words pass between you. Just the cigarette.
Until eventually you realise you haven’t stopped staring at his hand.
The way his fingers keep clenching and unclenching at his side. The almost imperceptible wince every now and then that he doesn’t even realise he’s doing it.
“You should probably clean that up.”
His jaw flexes.
“Yeah?” he says flatly. “You think?” The way he looks at you when he says it—tired, angry, something rawer underneath —makes you swallow harshly.
Steve takes the cigarette back from you, shoulders tenser than you’ve ever seen them. Then, quieter but just as sharp, he adds, “Maybe you should stop giving me reasons to punch things.”
“There it is.” You knew that was coming. The blame. Is it warranted? Probably. Do you want to hear it? No.
You tilt your head back against the brick, forcing your voice to be lighter than you feel, forcing yourself to say your next words. “That wasn’t my fault.”
His head lifts slowly, eyes finding yours before skirting over you just as slowly. Rain-dark hair plastered messily around your face. Mud streaked across the knees of your jeans from where you hit the ground. The tiny cut near your cheekbone you hadn’t bothered cleaning.
Something sharp flashes across his face so quickly it looks physical.
He grits his next words out. “You ran in there alone.”
Your jaw tightens instantly. “I had it handled.”
Steve actually laughs out that. Cutting. Slightly mocking. “You did, did you?”
A flashlight beam disappearing around the corner before he could grab your hand. Your voice crackling through the radio—I’ll be fine, just cover the other side—
Then static.
You flinch. You don’t need reminding.
The floor giving out beneath your feet. Rust and concrete collapsing inward. Your shoulder slamming hard enough into the wall to make your vision spark white.
You force yourself to shrug anyway. “But I got out.”
“Because of me.” Steve steps forward as he says it, the words sharper and louder than everything else he’s said tonight before he visibly catches himself.
His voice lowers again, words scrapped raw. “You got out because I got to you in time.”
His eyes lock onto yours and don’t move. Don’t even blink.
And for a second neither do you. Like you're in a trance.
Rain continues to hammer down around you. Neon red flickers across the sharp line of his jaw, catches against the lenses of his glasses, turns his soaked white t-shirt pink for half a heartbeat before fading again.
You look away first.
Your jaw aches from how hard you’re clenching it. Steve’s breathing hard now, not from exertion but from whatever ugly thing he’s been trying to hold down since you all came back up.
“You know what I heard?” he asks.
You don’t answer. He doesn’t give you time to.
“You telling me to shut up, a loud crash—” His voice catches suddenly, wavering around the next part like he physically hates saying it out loud. “You scream.”
His eyes lock back onto yours, he swallows, hard, before continuing. “And then nothing.”
The words hit harder than they should.
Because, yes, you remember it too.
The static swallowing your voice mid-sentence. The sick drop in your stomach when the tunnel floor gave out beneath you. The impact. Dust choking the air so thick you could barely breathe around it.
And then silence.
Deafening. All-consuming. Terrifying.
Steve drags a hand through his hair, frustration bleeding through every little move he makes. “Do you have any idea what that was like?”
You hate this.
Hate the way he’s looking at you. Hate remembering the panic clawing up your throat beneath all that concrete. Hate remembering how helpless you felt down there. Hate the fact he saw you like that.
So you default to the only thing you know how to do in a moment like this: deflection.
“I’m standing here, aren’t I?”
Steve’s expression hardens instantly. “That’s not the fucking point, Henderson.”
You cross your arms tighter over your chest like a shield; voice raising to match his. “Then what is?”
For a second he just stares at you like he can’t actually believe you’re asking. As if he genuinely cannot comprehend how you don’t get this. And in your rational brain, maybe you do. A little. But understanding something and letting yourself feel it are two very different things.
He just laughs, again. This time it’s softer. Not quite so mocking anymore.
In fact it sounds a little wrecked.
Actually, it sounds completely and utterly wrecked.
“I found you trapped under concrete,” he says, rough and low, every word a struggle for him to say. “And you were still trying to joke with me.”
Your stomach twists, you feel your hands grow clammy and shake by your side because suddenly you’re back there.
Steve dropping to his knees beside you so hard the impact echoed through the building. Blood already running over his knuckles from the door he’d punched and kicked through to reach you. His hands shaking while he shoved broken debris away from your leg.
And you, dizzy and hurting and terrified in a way you didn’t want to name, still forcing out:
“Took you long enough, Harrington.”
Steve had looked at you like the joke physically hurt him.
And now, eyes glassy behind rain-speckled lenses, cheeks flushed, his jaw flexes the exact same way.
“You looked at me like-like it was no big deal—“
You swallow harshly, cutting him off. “It wasn’t—”
“How can you say that?” His voice cracks this time. Barely, but you hear it.
“Jesus Christ, do you think I wanted to not be able to fucking answer Dustin when he’s screaming down the radio that you’re not answering? Cause I didn’t know why you weren’t. Cause you had decided to go off alone. Again.”
Rain rattles violently against the metal awning overhead. Steve looks away suddenly, dragging a hand over his mouth before shaking his head once.
“Do you think I wanted to be the one to tell him that you—” His voice catches hard enough that he has to stop. “That you…”
He can’t say it.
You realise with a horrible twisting ache that he physically cannot force the words out. Like saying them aloud might make them real. Might drag you right back beneath the rubble where he found you.
The storm presses in around you both, so loud now that it almost feels intrusive. Like the night itself is listening.
Steve stares out into the rain, chest rising hard beneath the damp white t-shirt, cigarette long forgotten.
You don’t know what to do with this version of him.
Steve annoyed? Easy.
Steve sarcastic? Easy. Typical.
Steve looking at you like losing you would’ve broken him? That hurts.
In a way you don't understand. In a way that makes your chest actually ache.
“He would’ve been okay,” you say quietly, and you almost believe yourself.
But Steve’s head snaps toward you so fast you instantly regret it. “What?”
You shrug even though the motion feels stiff. Defensive. False. “Dustin. He would’ve been okay.” You nod as you say it; like that will make it true.
For a second Steve just stares at you.
Then something furious flashes across his face.
“No,” he says immediately. “No, he wouldn’t have.”
You open your mouth to say-to say—you don’t know. You don’t know what to say, what to do, where to look.
“No.” Steve shakes his head once, sharp and disbelieving. “No.”
You look away on instinct—the look in his eyes, the rawness of his voice suddenly all too much. You try to make yourself smaller somehow. Fold inward. Retreat back behind the walls that usually keep people out before he can force his way through them.
But he won't let you. Not anymore. Not after today.
He’s moving before you can.
One second there’s space between you. And then the next there isn’t.
Rain clings to his lashes. His glasses sit crooked from where he shoved a hand through his hair moments earlier. His chest rises hard beneath his soaked t-shirt as he steps into your space like he physically cannot stand this distance anymore..
And then before you can even blink his hand is grasping your jaw. Firm. Unwavering. His fingers curl against your skin and drag your face back up until your eyes are on him. Only on him.
No chance to run. No chance to hide from this. From him.
“Harringto—”
Your voice doesn’t sound like your own. Too thin. Too breathless. Like you’re begging for something you can’t even name. For him to stop. For him not to stop. For him not to make you stand here and let him see you like this.
“No. You’re not listening to me.” His thumb presses sharply against your jaw as frustration bleeds through every word. “You keep saying this shit like people would just get over it. Like losing you wouldn't-wouldn't mean anything.”
Your pulse stumbles hard against your ribs.
“You think Dustin would’ve been okay?” he says incredulously.
“You think your brother wouldn’t spend the rest of his life wondering if he could’ve stopped you from running in there alone? That if he had done even the slightest thing differently that you would still be here. Going over and over and over it in his head wondering where he fucked up?”
“You keep acting like you’re expendable,” he says, voice cracking around the last word. “As if it wouldn’t matter if you didn’t come back.”
You try to pull away instinctively, discomfort clawing up your throat too fast, but Steve’s grip tightens slightly before immediately softening again when he realises it.
Not letting you go. Not letting you disappear.
“And me?” It’s not only his voice that has broken but his expression, as he struggles to speak. “You think I would’ve been fucking okay?”
He’s staring at you like he needs you to understand this. Like it matters more than his pride. More than winning any argument. More than whatever this thing between you has become.
It's almost like he’s trying to show you something in his words, in his face, in the desperation in his voice. Something he’s been trying to show you for a long time now and you just keep refusing to see.
If he can just make you see it—really see it—maybe he can stop you from slipping through his fingers next time.
Your breath catches painfully in your throat. Because the worst part is—
Some part of you thinks you do see it.
That maybe you always have.
And that is infinitely more terrifying than pretending you don’t.
“Why?” you croak out before coughing lightly and trying again. “Why?”
The question seems to knock the air out of him for a second. His brows pull together hard as he almost spits out “What?”
“Why would you care?” You mean for it to sound sharp. Defensive. Detached.
Instead it comes out small. Confused.
Steve, for all his frustration and anger, just stares at you.
It’s still raining heavily, wind now pushing cold mist beneath the awning, but all you can feel is the warmth of his body standing so close to yours.
Then he laughs once under his breath. But it's devoid of any humour.
“Jesus Christ,” he mutters, swiping the hand not cupping your jaw down his face and through his hair, shaking his head. “You really don’t know.”
Immediately your defenses slam back into place. “Know what?” you say quickly, trying for sarcasm mixed with anger and missing completely. “All I do is annoy you.”
“We fight constantly,” you cut in, words tumbling out faster now because if you stop talking you might actually have to hear what he’s trying to say—what he’s been trying to say for years now. “I drag you into insane bullshit, I nearly got myself killed tonight, I got you injured, I make your life harder basically every time I—”
Suddenly you’re cut off.
Not by more words.
But by a forceful pressure.
Specifically, Steve's mouth on yours.
He crashes into you. Moving like he's been holding this in for years—like if he doesn’t do it now, he’ll drown in the weight of it. Like he cannot stand hearing one more terrible thing leave your mouth.
It's not soft. Not careful.
It’s desperate and angry and messy, his lips pressing hard enough to bruise, his fingers digging into your jaw to keep you there.
You gasp against him, and he takes full advantage, slanting his mouth over yours again, teeth scraping, breaths mingling sharp with the almost addictive combination of nicotine and rain.
You stumble back a step, shoulders hitting the wall, but he doesn’t let you retreat. He uses his body instead of his words to cage you in, one hand still gripping your jaw, the other braced against the wall beside your head. His glasses dig into your cheekbone, the frames cold where they press against your skin, but you don’t pull away. You are not sure you could.
You finally snap out of the shock of it, and in that moment all you want is him closer than humanly possible. Your hands fist in the damp cotton of his shirt, dragging him closer with a desperation that surprises even you. .
Steve lets out a ragged moan against your mouth, the sound muffled by the sharp press of teeth and lips—half frustration, half surrender—before he mutters a broken, "Fuck," against your skin.
It’s all hands and teeth and the dizzying press of bodies.
His hand slides from your jaw into your hair, gripping just tight enough to tilt your head back, exposing your throat to the scrape of his stubble.
You gasp at the feeling, and he fully takes the opportunity given to him to deepen the kiss, tongue hot and insistent, like he’s trying to rewrite every argument, every sharp word, every moment you’ve spent at each other’s throats.
All in this one kiss.
“You think I don’t care?” he murmurs against your mouth before kissing you again immediately. “Jesus Christ.”
Another kiss.
Another sharp inhale.
His lips drag against yours slower this time, but no less desperate.
“I punched through a fucking door for you,” he says hoarsely, words breaking apart between kisses. “When I heard you scream—” His voice catches roughly. “When I saw you trapped down there alone I-I couldn't breathe.”
Your chest aches so hard it feels unbearable.
“Not till I knew you were okay.” His hands are still shaking even as they hold onto you.
Steve kisses you again before you can speak, like he already knows you’ll try to argue your way out of this too.
He’s not wrong.
“No,” he mutters against your lips, thumb trembling where it rests beneath your jaw. “No, you don’t get to do that anymore.”
Steve touches you like he can press the truth directly into your skin; then you might finally believe him. “You matter to me,” he breathes against your mouth.
And then, quieter. Rougher. “So fucking much.”
Another kiss, slower now, but somehow just as devastating.
“More than you’ll ever know,” he says hoarsely against your lips. “More than you ever could.”
Your throat tightens dangerously. And for the first time all night, maybe ever, you don’t call him Harrington.
.“Steve…”
The name leaves you like something fragile, like it physically hurts you to let him hear it.
Hearing his name said by you, like that—soft, fractured, stripped bare—destroys whatever last shred of restraint he’d been clinging to.
Steve’s breath stutters against your lips, his grip tightening in your hair reflexively. The sound of his name in your voice—not Harrington, not king Steve, not something thrown at him in anger or challenge–does something violent to his chest.
He doesn’t just kiss you this time—he devours you.
He drags you impossibly closer, his teeth catching your lower lip hard, his tongue sweeping in long before you can recover. There’s absolutely nothing gentle about it—this is Steve memorising your mouth like it's proof you’re real.
That he didn't lose you before he ever got the chance to have you.
“Been trying not to do this for so long,” he admits roughly against your mouth
Surprisingly, that brings a smile to your face—a real one, small and disbelieving but there—and you feel the tension in your chest loosen just enough to breathe. Maybe it’s the adrenaline still humming in your veins, or the way Steve’s hands are trembling where they’re tangled in your hair, but suddenly you can’t help it.
You tilt your head back to break the kiss, lips brushing his as you murmur, “You’re telling me Steve Harrington, King Steve, has been pining after Henderson’s big sister? All this time?”
Steve freezes.
For a second, he just stares at you, rain dripping from his lashes, mouth slightly parted like he can’t decide whether to strangle you or kiss you again. Then his grip tightens in your hair, tugging just enough to make you gasp.
“You’re fucking impossible,” he grits out, but there’s no anger left in it—just exasperation, fondness, something raw and aching beneath the words.
The grin tugging at your mouth only widens. “You need to work on your moves.”
Steve blinks at you, mouth not even an inch away from yours.. “Excuse you?”
“You heard me,” you murmur, lips still brushing his. “That’s a little bit embarrassing, don’t ya think? And not for days, or weeks—years.”
Steve lets out a disbelieving laugh.
“You made me your enemy when really you just wanted to have me.”
Steve goes absolutely, completely, still.
For one glorious second Steve Harrington actually looks completely and utterly, beautifully speechless.
The wind changes direction causing the rain to hit the both of you. Rainwater slides down the side of his face as he stares at you, jaw flexing hard—actively trying not to react to that sentence the way he wants to.
You can practically feel the moment his patience snaps—his fingers twitch, his jaw sets, and his gaze narrows. “You,” he grits out, thumb tapping your chin, voice rough, “are pushing your luck.”
You grin up at him, tilting your head to make his grip shift. “Am I?”
His thumb presses into the hinge of your jaw, tilting your face up further. “Yeah. You are.”
There’s a beat of silence—then you hum, deliberately slow, eyes flicking down to his mouth and back up. “I don’t think I am.”
Steve exhales sharply against your lips, the heat of his breath mingling with the chill of the rain still dripping down his face. His fingers twitch where they’re tangled in your hair, grip tightening just enough to make it hurt. “We shouldn’t be doing this,” he mutters, voice rough—half protest, half plea.
You meet his gaze, eyes innocent—unaffected—rainwater catching on your lashes. “Then stop.”
His jaw flexes. He doesn’t move. Doesn’t blink.
His thumb drags slowly along your jawline, pressing just shy of painful when it catches on the curve of your chin. Then it traces your jawline, slow and deliberate, before his fingers drop lower. Curling into the damp fabric of your shirt, then dragging downward until they catch on the waistband of your jeans.
His gaze locks onto yours, challenge burning behind rain-speckled lenses. "You wouldn't care?" he murmurs, voice rougher than the storm overhead.
You tilt your head, feigning indifference even as your pulse kicks violently against your ribs. "Mm?"
He flicks the button open, fingers hovering over the zip. "So if I just—"
His gaze is locked onto yours, daring you to stop this. Daring you to stop him.
The zipper rasps open under his touch, cold air biting at exposed skin as his hand slides in. His fingers trace the dip of your hipbone, rough and warm against the bite of the wind.
"You wouldn’t care if I went back inside?" he murmurs, voice scraping low.
Your breath hitches. You should push him away. Should say something sharp, something defensive but all you can manage is a shaky exhale as his fingers dip lower, skimming the edge of your underwear.
Steve watches you with a focus that borders on predatory. His fingers pause, testing, waiting for you to bolt or shove him back. When you don’t, his lips twitch—not quite a smirk, but something darker. Something hungrier.
"Guess that answers that," he mutters, and then his hand is sliding fully into your pants, palm hot against your stomach.
Steve’s fingers slide beneath your underwear with a precision that shouldn’t be possible given how badly his hands were shaking moments ago. His fingers dip lower, finding you already wet—impossibly so—despite the cold, despite the argument, despite everything.
His breath hitches against your throat. “Fuck,” he mutters, half to himself, half to you.
You gasp, sharp and involuntary, your hands scrambling for purchase against his rain-damp jacket as your legs threaten to give out entirely.
Steve doesn’t give you the chance to collapse.
His free hand slides around your hip, fingers digging into the curve of your ass, hauling you up against him like you weigh nothing. Your thigh instinctively hooks around his waist as he pins you against the brick wall.
All the while he doesn’t stop, his fingers working you with a rhythm that borders on punishing, his palm grinding against your clit with every upward stroke.
You bite down on a moan, forehead dropping against his shoulder, nails raking down the front of his jacket, his neck—really anywhere you can reach. .
The angle is awkward: the wall digging into you, his glasses still digging into your cheekbone, but none of it matters. Not when his thumb circles once—hard—and your vision whites out for a second, hips jerking against his hand.
“Fuck—Steve—” The name tears out of you, ragged and broken, as his fingers curl just right, pressing deep.
Your gaze catches briefly on the split skin across his knuckles where his hand grips your hip. “Careful,” you breathe instinctively. “Your hand—”
Steve lets out a rough, disbelieving laugh against your throat, forehead dropping briefly to your shoulder like the concern physically hurts him. “Don’t care,” he mutters.
Before sinking his teeth into the curve of your neck hard; claiming the space between your pulse and your collarbone. Then his tongue follows, slow and hot, soothing the sting in a way that makes your knees threaten to buckle again.
All the while, his fingers don’t stop moving inside you; dragging a choked, alien noise from your lips.
“Still think I don’t care?” he mutters against your skin. His thumb circles your clit again, deliberate, relentless, and you choke on absolutely nothing.
You don’t get a chance to answer—not that you could even form words right now—because Steve’s mouth is back on yours. Fingers working you faster, rougher, until your breath comes in sharp, uneven gasps against his mouth.
He continues, this time his breath fans your ear, “Still think I hate you?” he repeats.
You whine–it’s high, desperate and pathetic—in the back of your throat. His palm grinds against your clit; everything is too much and not enough all at once.
“Honey—” Steve’s voice cracks around the word, rough with something that isn’t just frustration anymore. “I could never hate you.” His fingers curl inside you, pressing deep enough to punch out another pathetic whine.
“You annoy the absolute shit out of me,” he admits hoarsely. “You drive me insane. You never listen to me, you throw yourself into danger without a single thought about yourself, and every time you do I just wanna grab you and shake some sense into you.”
His thumb strokes your cheek almost unconsciously as he says it. The softest he has ever touched you–by far.
“But hate you?” Steve lets out a breathless laugh, the idea utterly ridiculous to him. “Jesus Christ.” He cuts himself off with a ragged exhale, forehead dropping against yours as his thumb circles your clit in slow, deliberate strokes.
“You walk into a room and suddenly I can’t think properly.”
Your stomach flips violently.
“You argue with me about everything.”
“I do not—”
“You’re literally about to,” he says immediately, kissing the corner of your mouth when you glare at him.
It pulls the smallest unwilling laugh from you but you still can’t help but roll your eyes.
Steve’s expression softens at the sound instantly. And then more seriously, even more sincerely:
“I know what kind of mood you’re in by how hard you slam a door. I know when you’re lying by the scrunch of your nose.” His jaw tightens slightly.
“I knew you were in trouble tonight before anyone else even realised something was wrong.”
Your chest aches.
Steve swallows hard, eyes flicking over your face like he’s trying to make you understand something impossible. “You’re not forgettable,” he says quietly.
The words hit harder than they should.
His thumb brushes your cheek almost absently, tenderness bleeding through every movement now.
“You walk into a room and people look for you when you leave it.” His voice roughens slightly. “You’re loud and difficult and stubborn as hell and somehow you still make everything feel…” He breaks off with a frustrated breathless laugh, shaking his head once. “Fuck.”
Your pulse stumbles beneath his hand.
Steve presses his forehead against yours again before finishing quietly:
“You’re everything.”
Your breath catches to the point where you think you might stop breathing.
He closes his eyes briefly as if he didn’t mean to say that part out loud. But when he looks at you again, he doesn’t take it back. He doubles down.
“And I need- I need you to believe that.”
“I tried not to—” He cuts himself off with another rough laugh. “I really fucking tried not to do this.”
“But then you smile at me,” he says softly, almost accusingly. “Or you say my name and suddenly I’m done for.”
You stare at him speechless.
Steve brushes his nose against yours gently before kissing you again, nowhere near as frantic this time but somehow all the more intimate for it.
“So no,” he murmurs against your lips. “I don’t hate you.”
A pause.
Then, quieter:
“I think-” he pauses, taking a deep breath, his fingers slowing, “I think-I’ve been in love with you for a really, really long time.”
You whine—high-pitched and completely broken—as Steve’s fingers thrust just right, pressing deep, and suddenly the world fractures.
Your back arches off the wall, thighs clamping tight around him, nails biting into the damp fabric of his jacket as pleasure crashes over you in waves so sharp you actually can’t breathe.
And Steve? Steve doesn’t let you ride it out in peace. His mouth finds yours again, kissing you through the aftershocks. His tongue licks into your mouth just as his thumb circles your oversensitive clit, dragging a sob from you that he swallows greedily.
"That's it," Steve murmurs against your temple, lips brushing damp skin as your hands scramble clumsily over his shoulders. "Good girl."
The praise sends yet another shudder through you, legs still trembling from the aftershocks. You're barely lucid, fingers twisting in his soaked shirt as you press impossibly closer with a whine—high and needy, the sound muffled against his collarbone where your mouth rests.
"Steve—" Your voice cracks around his name, raw from earlier shouts now reduced to breathless pleading. "Please—"
"What, baby?" His fingers stroke gently through slick heat, coaxing another weak jerk of your hips. Rainwater drips from his hair onto your flushed cheeks when he leans down. "What do you need?"
You can't answer—not coherently at least—just rut against his hand with a broken noise, oversensitive but desperate for more after he just gave you the best orgasm of your life.
His chuckle is dark, warm against your ear as his free hand slides up to your jaw, cradling it. “Gonna need you to say it baby.”
The words shouldn’t wreck you the way they do. They absolutely shouldn’t send heat coiling low in your stomach all over again—but they do.
They absolutely do, and Steve absolutely knows it. You can see it in the way his eyes darken behind his glasses, in the way his thumb presses just under your chin, tilting your face up slowly.
“Say it,” he murmurs, lips brushing yours, the ghost of a smirk playing at the corner of his mouth. “Tell me what you want.”
You swallow hard, your throat working around nothing, because god, this is torture.
The way his fingers are still inside you, curled just enough to tease but not enough to give you what you need. The way his breath fans over your lips, warm and uneven, like he’s barely holding himself together. The way his glasses are fogged beyond repair, rainwater clinging to his lashes, his hair a mess from where you’ve dragged your hands through it god knows how many times.
You hate the way you sound—whining, desperate, voice cracking around his name like some lovesick idiot—but god, you don’t care. Not now. Maybe later.
"Steve," you murmur again, hands fisting desperately in the soaked fabric of his shirt, vying to drag him closer even though there’s not an ounce of space left between you.
He hums, considering, like he’s weighing whether to give in—and for one stupid, hopeful second, you think he will. But then he pulls his fingers out of you with a slow, deliberate drag that makes your hips jerk forward instinctively— chasing the loss, the sudden emptiness—only for his free hand to press flat against your stomach, holding you firmly against the wall.
He lifts his fingers to his mouth, tongue curling around them in a slow, obscene lick that elicits a moan from your throat before you can stop it.
You could kill him. You will kill him. Later. After.
His gaze locks onto yours, dark and unreadable behind rain-speckled lenses, as he cleans every last trace of you off his fingers with agonising precision.
Your face burns, your thighs twitch, and somewhere in the back of your mind you know you should be embarrassed—should really shove him away or snap something sarcastic—but all you manage is a weak, "Fuck."
Annoyingly causing Steve’s mouth to lift into a smug little smile.
“Want you,” you whisper helplessly, forehead knocking lightly against his shoulder. “Idiot.”
"That’s not very nice, now is it, baby?" Steve murmurs, lips brushing the shell of your ear.
You huff, fucking hell–what more does he want for you?
His thumb presses into the delicate skin beneath your jaw, tilting your head back until you have no choice but to meet his gaze. ”Calling me an idiot," he continues, voice dropping lower, "after I just let you come?"
His other hand slides up your side, slow and deliberate, until his palm rests over your hammering heartbeat. "You’re such a brat," he mutters against your lips, breath uneven. "Always have been."
Steve exhales sharply before he relents. His hands dropping to his belt in rough, jerky movements. The buckle clinks too loud, his fingers fumbling slightly with the button of his jeans before he finally shoves them down just far enough to free himself.
He doesn’t give you what you want, though, not quite yet. Instead, he presses the hot, heavy length of himself against your thigh, rocking forward just enough to make you gasp at the contact, the friction maddeningly light.
"Say it," he murmurs, lips brushing yours as his fingers tighten on your hip—not guiding, not forcing, just there, holding you in place while his cock twitches against your skin. "Say you believe me."
You bite your lip hard enough to taste blood, hips jerking involuntarily against nothing, desperate for more. For him.
Steve doesn’t let you. His forehead knocks clumsily against yours, his breath coming in ragged bursts between kisses that are more teeth than anything else..
"Say you’ll think twice next time," he growls, dragging his mouth down your jaw to nip at your pulse point. His hips roll forward again, the head of his cock catching against your clit for one devastating second before he pulls back, leaving you gasping. "Say it."
You whine, nails scraping down the skin of his neck as you try to pull him closer, but Steve resists, his grip ironclad.
His laugh is dark, uneven, his lips curling against your throat while you buck against him fruitlessly. "Nuh-uh, sweetheart. Not until you—fuck—"
His words cut off abruptly when your teeth sink into his shoulder, his hips stuttering forward instinctively before he wrenches himself back with a muttered curse.
His grip tightens in your hair, tilting your head back until you have no choice but to meet his gaze. "You think this is a joke?" he murmurs, thumb brushing your swollen lower lip.
"You think I don’t fucking mean it when I say I can’t lose you?"
You arch toward him instinctively, but Steve doesn’t budge. Just watches you with that same unreadable expression.
"Tell me you believe me," he whispers, voice rough with something that isn’t just want anymore. "Tell me you know how much I—" He cuts himself off abruptly, fingers flexing against your hip like he’s physically restraining himself from finishing that sentence.
But it’s the look in his eyes that finally undoes you.
Not the way his hands shake where they grip your hips, not the ragged edge of his voice when he says your name—no, it’s the raw, unfiltered fear behind those rain-speckled glasses. .
Steve Harrington, who’s spent years pretending he doesn’t care about anything, looks at you like you’re the only thing left in the world that matters.
And something inside you finally breaks.
Your hands move before you can stop them.
You grab his face hard enough to push his crooked glasses further up his nose, fingers cold and shaking against rain-damp skin as you drag him down toward you.
“Hey,” you whisper, voice cracking badly enough that Steve immediately stills. “Hey.”
Your forehead presses against his.
And for the first time tonight, you stop trying to pull away from what he’s giving you.
You let yourself feel it.
The fear.
The relief.
Him.
Your eyes burn suddenly, embarrassingly, and you let out one sharp, frustrated breath that sounds dangerously close to a laugh.
“I’m here,” you whisper brokenly, trying to convince the both of you.
Steve makes a wrecked sound at that. His hands tighten on your hips almost painfully. “Yeah,” he breathes instantly, nodding quickly. “Yeah, you’re here.”
Your throat tightens so hard it hurts.
And suddenly, the words are there before you can stop them.
“I do.”
The confession slips out in a whisper, barely audible over the storm, but Steve goes utterly still.
His breath catches audibly, fingers twitching against your skin like he’s been shocked. For one terrifying second, you think he might pull away—might bolt like a spooked animal—but then his forehead drops against yours with a shuddering exhale.
“Say it again,” he rasps, voice cracking. His thumb traces your lower lip, smearing rainwater. “Please.”
“I do,” you whisper again, voice cracking. His breath stutters against your temple, his fingers trembling where they grip your thighs—like he’s afraid you’ll take it back.
Then he moves.
There’s no finesse to it, just raw emotion.
Just Steve’s hands gripping your thighs hard enough to bruise as he presses into you with a ragged groan that gets lost in the rain. The stretch burns briefly before giving way to a fullness that steals your breath.
The sound punched from your throat is half-sob, half-laugh, the words spilling again without thought: “I do.”
Steve’s hips jerk uncontrollably at that, his breath hitching like the confession is a physical blow, and then he’s moving in earnest. No rhythm, no ounce of control, just raw, shuddering need.
Every snap of his hips drives the words from you again, fractured and breathless: “I do—Steve—I do—” His name cracks on a moan as he angles deeper, one hand sliding up to fist in your hair, tilting your head back to expose your throat. His teeth finding your pulse point, biting down just shy of pain as his pace turns punishing, the wet slap of skin lost beneath the storm’s roar.
You’re babbling now, nonsensical; repeating it like a mantra between gasps, each thrust wringing the words out like he’s starving for them.
Steve’s grip tightens, his other hand splaying over your ribs like he’s counting each ragged inhale, each stuttered “I do” that spills from your lips.
The world fractures as pleasure crashes over you in waves so violent they steal your breath.
Your back arches off the wall, thighs clamping around Steve’s hips, nails biting into his shoulders as you shatter with a sob he swallows greedily.
Steve follows with a groan so broken it barely sounds human, his forehead dropping against yours as his hips jerk erratically, his fingers tightening in your hair.
For one suspended moment, there’s nothing but the ragged sound of your breathing, the rain still hammering against the awning above you, Steve’s pulse thundering beneath your lips where they rest against his throat.
Then reality rushes back in all too quickly—the cold brick against your back, the damp fabric of your clothes clinging uncomfortably to your skin, Steve’s glasses digging into your cheekbone where they’ve been knocked askew.
He doesn’t pull away.
Neither do you.
Instead, his hands slide up your back, slow and unsteady, smoothing over the rumpled fabric of your jacket. “You’re okay,” he murmurs, lips brushing your temple. Whispered so quiet you know he doesn't mean for you to hear it.
One hand rises to card through your tangled hair, fingers gentle where they work through the knots. “You’re okay.”
The words are less a statement than a plea, repeated like a prayer as his breathing gradually slows.
When you tilt your head back to look at him, his glasses are fogged beyond recognition, rainwater and sweat streaking down his flushed cheeks. He looks wrecked. Beautiful.
Your fingers rise to push his glasses up his nose, clumsy with exhaustion, and Steve catches your wrist before you can.
His thumb brushes over your racing pulse, his gaze dropping to your swollen lips, then lower—to the mark blooming on your collarbone, the rumpled state of your clothes. Something dark flickers in his eyes before he exhales sharply, forehead dropping to rest against yours again.
“‘M okay,” you murmur softly, fingers brushing back his rain-damp hair where it’s plastered to his forehead.
Steve exhales sharply—half laugh, half sob—his breath warm against your lips as his hands slide up to cradle your face. His thumbs trace the hollows beneath your eyes with a reverence that makes your chest ache.
“You’re not,” he counters, voice cracking, glasses still crooked, but you can still see the raw fear lingering in his gaze.
His fingers tighten fractionally, like he’s physically willing you to understand. “You were under a building, you idiot.” The words crack on the last syllable, his forehead dropping to rest against yours as his breathing stutters.
You can feel him shaking—fine tremors running through his arms where they cage you against the wall, the rapid flutter of his pulse beneath your fingertips when you touch his throat. It’s unnerving. Steve Harrington doesn’t tremble. Steve Harrington doesn’t falter.
But he is now.
Under your fingertips.
His glasses slip further down his nose when he tilts his head to press a kiss to your temple—clumsy, unpracticed, achingly tender. “Christ,” he mutters against your skin, voice thick. “You scared the shit out of me.”
Your chest aches at the honesty of it.
Steve Harrington—loud, stubborn, impossible Steve Harrington—standing here shaking in your arms because of you.
Your sworn enemy.
The bane of your existence.
The boy who could rile you up with nothing more than the arch of an eyebrow and one stupid smug look.
And yet here he is, holding you like losing you would’ve destroyed him.
Slowly, carefully, you reach up and straighten his glasses for him. It’s the smallest thing. Basic decency, really.
But it hits him anyway.
You see it happen in real time—the way his breath catches softly, the way his eyes lose some of that frantic edge as they search your face. As if he can’t quite believe you’re touching him so gently.
Steve’s gaze drops briefly to your mouth before lifting back to your eyes again, softer now than you think you’ve ever seen it.
“C’mere,” he murmurs quietly.
This time when he kisses you, it isn’t desperate.
No teeth.
No frantic grasping.
No fear.
Just warmth.
His hands cradle your face carefully, thumbs brushing your cheeks while your fingers curl into the damp collar of his jacket. The kiss is slow enough that you can actually feel it this time—every soft press of his lips, every shaky exhale against your mouth, every lingering second of him choosing you.
Like coming home after being lost for a very long time.
And for once—
you don’t fight it.
You let yourself be held.
P.S. I do not recommend engaging in this type of behaviour after having a building collapse on you. Please seek medical attention first. Lots of love, the chef ♡
😔 oh Liz, I’m so sorry your sister is going through this and that you’re having to deal with the pain that it brings. 💔
You’re truly such an amazing person and I may not know your sister but if she’s important to you then that’s enough to know she’s a wonderful woman too. And I will absolutely be sending you both positive energy, love and hope that she can fight this and come out on top and even stronger than she was before.
I love you and I’m praying hard for her to beat this and quickly.
new rules: sugar + vice vol. 2 (ch. 3) [mob!tasm!peter x fem!reader]
summary: how Peter spent his spring break from Honey, and how the summer vacation is going... 😬
words: 10.4 k
tags: fluff and angst (my otp), also: Peter being insatiable, Peter having PTSD, non-graphic smut scenes, voyeurism, Hawaii, TW: flashback to SA in Vol. 1, child abuse, domestic violence, being spied on, being creeped on by a drunk guy, please take care of yourselves if this isn't your cup of tea).
This took me a ridiculously long time to write. Thank you, everybody, for your patience and your support!
back to sugar and vice masterlist.
3 - New Rules
For a crime boss, Peter Parker was surprisingly good at following rules.
Rules were good. Rules were safe. Rules created order out of chaos. Peter always made the rules. For the Spiders, following the rules meant life or death.
1. Don’t use real names.
2. Never walk into a place without an exit strategy.
3. Always bring a weapon.
4. Remember that someone is watching—always.
5. Respect appointments.
6. Respect partners.
7. Respect the Boss.
Respecting the rules meant respecting the Boss. No one would dare question that. Even if his rules didn’t make sense.
8. No killing.
“Say what again?”
“I said ‘no killing,’” Peter repeated, firm. His voice carried more authority than it had in weeks. Not since he’d left the city.
The Penthouse in Queens was in escrow, sold in record time after John Walker’s disappearance. Leaving the city was against Counsil’s advice. (Matt even took the Lord’s name in vain!) But Peter didn’t care how it looked to anyone else.
So, it was an early spring afternoon at the Catskills cabin when he announced the latest rule to his crew. Their reactions varied.
Peter distinctly remembered Miguel’s mouth forming a tight line before an explosive coughing fit. He choked, it seemed, on nothing—nothing other than the utter nonsense he’d just heard.
Johnny leaned back in his chair, literally scratching his head. He let out a long, whistling exhale.
Jess adjusted in her seat with a wince, not-so-subtle in her discomfort.
Peni and Noir stared at Peter with deadpan expressions. In Noir’s case, he was as “deadpan” as capable before he stood up to pour himself five or six fingers of bourbon.
The only one who appeared unfazed was Felicia.
She lounged in the back, a diamond nail file swiping against her manicure, watching Peter beneath the fringe of her false lashes. Her coral lips, painted in Chanel Rouge Matte First Light, remained perfectly still, though the nail file never stopped moving.
Peter could deal with everyone else’s grumbling.
Matter of fact—Fuck ’em, he thought.
Peter was the Boss.
But Felicia Hardy was scary.
It wasn’t the 4-inch stilettos she wore on Casual Fridays, or the sharp, carbon steel hairpin she sometimes used to twist back her frosted-platinum hair. It was all in her eyes: dark blue as the Atlantic, which held secrets just as deep. Her eyes were on him, unreadable as ever.
It drove Peter nuts.
He hated that he could never tell what she was thinking, only that she was thinking. Or maybe her eyes were smiling, a self-satisfied smirk that she could withhold from the rest of her face. She could’ve been thinking about leading the group into a slow clap. Or poisoning his water bottle. She gave up nothing.
Neither did Peter. He announced the Spiders’ new law, uninterested in giving anyone any explanations. Peter reminded them that he didn’t owe them one. If they didn’t like it, they could leave the organization whenever they wanted. No one was his prisoner.
Not anymore.
He knew they wouldn’t quit. They were loyal, but that wasn’t the reason. (Although, lately, he had reason to question everyone’s loyalty.)
The truth was they couldn’t leave. Not until it was over.
‘Over’ was the variable; the finish line was different for everyone. Everyone had a list of wrongs to right, and they were all prisoners to it.
Just like Peter.
Peter was released the same afternoon he was arrested. He learned the cops had no real case. There was nothing Commissioner Alexander Pierce could pin on him. Nothing that District Attorney Frank Castle could charge him with. Not yet.
Peter had won. But the moment he came home, all he felt was loss.
The emptiness was so loud it made his eardrums throb. The quiet of his lavish, twentieth-story penthouse felt like a black hole, tearing him apart the farther he ventured inside. Soon, he was alone in the dark, swallowed by memories.
He saw the image of Eddie Brock rummaging for snacks in his pantry. A day later, Eddie would be dead.
Peter’s eyes drifted to the large terrarium in the great room. From his illuminated basking rock, Rex locked eyes with him. The bearded dragon was motionless under his heat lamp, glowing red with piercing black eyes that suggested pure contempt.
Those judgmental little eyes triggered another memory: this time of Honey referring to the reptile as ‘the angry guy’ from a Pixar film that Peter hadn’t heard of. She’d laugh about it as she fed him blueberries, grinning wide as he’d eagerly snatch it from her fingers and gnash like he was starving. The dragon perched on her shoulder like he belonged there, his spiny tail spread down the length of her arm like armor.
Honey’s scaly guardian glared at Peter now, live crickets bouncing around his terrarium unfettered. He looked angrier than ever. Why wouldn’t he be? Peter sent away his best friend.
Me too, buddy. Me too.
That was nothing compared to Peter’s nausea when he glanced into his office. What used to be his office.
He surveyed the damage from the threshold. The giant floor-to-ceiling window had been boarded up with plywood. The blood that previously coated the hardwood floor and walls had been cleaned up, but its scent lingered in Peter’s nose. All the destroyed furniture had been removed from the room, leaving it empty.
Empty. Empty. Empty.
Within seconds, Peter’s skin felt clammy. His lungs shrank to a walnut’s size. The tightness in his chest nearly brought him to his knees as he was ambushed by the memory of—
Peter was on his knees. He had been fighting to no avail. Unable to intervene, unable to stand, he was bleeding out from a gunshot wound and multiple broken bones. Never mind the guns that his treacherous guards held on him. Peter was watching helplessly.
Uselessly.
John Walker was assaulting the woman he loved.
The woman he’d die for was rigid beneath Walker’s grip, her breath strangled in her throat. Walker was digging his claws into her flesh, bruising her while he salivated and rutted against her like a rabid dog.
Honey’s eyes were vacant in a way that scared the shit out of Peter. Her mind was elsewhere—retreating to a state of dissociation—while her ex-husband violated her. She was quiet, but Peter could hear her heart pounding.
He was trapped and panicking. He could hear it in his own voice as he screamed profanities at Walker. In his heart, he screamed that he was absolutely gonna kill that motherfucker with his bare hands. His screams were ignored.
The whole attack felt... performative. Walker was taking his time, drawing the assault out, all while his guards howled with laughter.
He was putting on a show of torturing them.
Honey had mentioned before that her abuser used to enjoy subjugating her in front of people. That’s why Honey suggested this—enduring this nightmare from which she had worked so hard to escape. She had apparently hoped to appeal to John’s barbarity and obsession, maybe as a diversion. She was offering herself as a ‘trade,’ buying time for Peter to rescue them.
“It’s not a fair trade” is the only thing that comes to his mind.
Peter is worthless.
When Peter returned to reality, he clutched the doorframe so tight that the wood cracked. Sweat beaded down his neck. His breaths came short, and he could taste bile in each one.
He shot out of the room like a bullet. He left the penthouse just as quickly. That was it. Peter could never sleep another night there. Not while every thread in his bedsheets and every fiber of his being still smelled like her.
The Cabin was the only place he had left to go. Even if different ghosts haunted him.
Peter’s thoughts shifted to the present meeting with his crew, hearing how the gang was reacting to his new rule:
“—we might as well call ourselves The Sugarhill Gang and organize ourselves a flashmob—”
“—seriously, man, what decade are you even from?”
“—fucking insanity, ya tryin’ to get us all killed—?”
“—whatchu think our allies are gonna say when we can’t back them up?—”
“—gonna need a whole lotta well-placed banana peels—”
Well. That went well.
Peter smirked as he mused. Sarcasm was his only friend.
Honey had rules, too.
Never serve espresso in a cold cup.
Don’t trust anyone who won’t sing along to their favorite song. (Run if they tell you they don’t have a favorite song.)
Always look someone in the eye when you clink glasses in a toast, lest you be cursed with seven years of bad sex.
Then there was their most sacred rule, established early in their “situationship”:
“I promise,” he said. “No touching. Until you ask me to.”
It was the night Peter begged her to sleep with him—or next to him. Beside him, in his bed.
It wasn’t that weird, right? Maybe it was a little inappropriate, but it didn’t cross any lines...
Who was he kidding? It was an episode of “Dateline.” Creepy as hell. It’s a wonder Honey trusted him at all.
How was he supposed to explain (to the woman he’d essentially kidnapped) that he needed her nearby to sleep? He couldn’t close his eyes if it meant losing sight of her. He couldn’t rest without feeling her warmth, knowing he wouldn’t be abandoned.
Maybe Peter was just scared to be left by himself.
See? That’s what I’m talkin’ about, man. Creepy. A.F.
Or left with himself.
Peter had spent twenty-seven days alone in a cabin. He had nothing but his own thoughts.
On Day 28, he had a plan. He just needed to break it down into its most simple rules.
TWO WEEKS AFTER THE REUNION
“I think we should establish some ground rules,” Honey whispered to him, seated beside him. Almost.
There was a short distance across the aisle of the twin-engine jet where they sat apart. If it were up to Peter, he’d have her draped across his lap, safety be damned. She declined the seat next to him, where he could easily wrap his arm around her. Or at least lace his fingers through hers.
He couldn’t remember when he wanted to hold someone’s hand so badly.
They were halfway to Honolulu; once again, she was barely outside his reach. Peter worried they were going back to ‘no touching.’ He would respect it if that was the case. Even if every second of not touching her felt like he was on fire.
“Yeah?” Peter croaked, a little too enthusiastic. He was trying to sound supportive yet subdued. Not too excited—but not dismissive. The result was some kind of “delighted grimace” as he nodded along like a bobblehead. “Ya, ah-uh, ye-yeah, that’s great, I love rules.”
If his nervousness was apparent, she didn’t call it out.
“For the trip?” she added, providing some context.
“Oh, right. Right.”
The trip to Hawaii. The one they were just beginning.
Peter began preparing almost immediately after their reunion. He would’ve gone the following day, but Honey argued that she couldn’t bail on her co-workers. So, they waited until she was granted a week off at her request.
He called in a few favors (friends of friends) and secured a private jet. Later, he learned what the owner meant when he said it was “built for a romantic getaway.” He found a cozy, king-sized bed in the back draped in luxurious silk sheets, and he was eager to spend most of the 11-hour flight from JFK making use of it with Honey.
But it was clear to Peter that wasn’t going to happen.
The loud pop of a champagne bottle reinforced this. Felicia’s voice echoed through the Cabin with an enthusiastic “yowww!” He glanced behind his seat toward the sound.
The silver-haired vixen stood in the galley behind the seats with a bend in her slender waist and her lithe arm extended outward. She poured a generous amount of liquid gold into a crystal coupe, gripping a champagne bottle from beneath its base. It was a tantalizing display of isometric strength, poise, and raw muscle, showcasing her experience as a gymnast and ballerina (and occasional alcoholic).
At the receiving end, Rebecca’s sparkling eyes scanned the toned arm of her server as champagne filled her glass. With bright, flushed cheeks, she quickly darted her tongue out to taste the foam overflowing from the rim. Felicia nodded in approval.
Rebecca Jimenez. Honey’s adult sister. Honey invited her on their romantic getaway. Along with her other sisters. And niece. And far too many of Peter’s crew for him to be comfortable with.
It wasn’t so much a request as it was a condition. Honey reasoned with something thoughtful about memories and sharing moments. Peter worried that it was more about avoiding time alone with him.
Becca fluttered her thick lashes and shimmied her shoulders flirtatiously to Chappel Roan’s synth-pop melody. Music blared from the in-cabin speaker system while hidden LED light strips flashed in sync with the music. Cat and Becca were in sync with each other.
Peter couldn’t help but roll his eyes. At this point, Felicia had a better shot at getting laid.
Across the aisle from Rebecca, their mother Ana audibly ‘harumphed’ at the fun being had. The matriarch’s baggy eyes were full of judgment, trying to ignore the middle sister’s scandalous behavior. Anxiously, she glanced out the plane’s windows while unconsciously clenching her fists, a glass of wine in one hand and a rosary in the other.
Further back, Bella and Miles sat side-by-side, battling each other on their handheld Switches. They were wired on the excitement of travel and Sour Gummy Worms.
Gabriella Jimenez occupied the row behind Miles and Bella, buried in a black Billie Eilish hoodie. The youngest of Honey’s sisters kept her head down and her phone within four inches from her face. Peter had never seen her any other way.
By contrast, Selena Jimenez looked elated. She sat across from Rebecca, delighting in the makeshift celebration between the adults. The teen had the giddiness of a child being allowed to stay awake to watch the ball drop. It contrasted with the “cool girl” vibe she tried to feign.
At the airport, Peter saw Honey and Selena off to the side, engaged in a heated whisper. He could hear Honey grilling her to explain her clothing choice. Specifically, why was her little sister wearing a mini dress, heels, and a full face of makeup on such a long flight? Peter didn’t quite understand the problem, but he figured it was a sister thing and said nothing.
As they taxied on the runway, Honey vented about it to Peter, mentioning her regret that she invited Johnny Storm on the trip. Only then could Peter connect that and the cartoon hearts shooting from Selena’s eye sockets.
Johnny was in the galley with Felicia, dancing like a fool while holding a whiskey bottle in the crux of his tattooed bicep. The brash, charismatic show-off was ‘just being himself.’ That included wearing a muscle shirt that was two sizes too small.
To his credit, he wasn’t trying to draw the attention of a 17-year-old. For someone best described as ‘only sorta occasionally vain,’ Johnny talked a lot of shit about himself. He even admitted that he was dyeing his grays, to Peter’s shock. I mean, he knew about the hair dye, but would never have imagined Johnny being honest about it.
Johnny avoided Selena’s longing gazes like the plague. Peter was pretty sure he heard him fart and belch—simultaneously—just to solidify his unattractiveness. He worked diligently to squash any suggestion that he would reciprocate the girl’s affection.
Honey flashed a look at Johnny that suggested murder, which likely encouraged his efforts.
“So, first, I think we should split up the days we’re going to the Polynesian Cultural Center and the Zoo,” Honey explained, with her well-worn planner in her lap. “I hate going to museums and not being able to read all the stuff.”
Peter brought his attention back to Honey, nodding along. “Yeah, me too. But––”
“And I already know Bella’s gonna want to spend half her time in the peacock enclosure—did you know they bite?”
“Oh.” He didn’t. “I, uh…?”
“And I already know Becca’ll blow her entire paycheck at the mall, but if she maxes out her credit card, that’s on her. She’s a big girl. Do not offer to buy anything, please. It’s like bringing an alcoholic to a bar.”
“Okay, well, maybe—”
“While Bella, Miles, and Selena are staying the extra day at Aulani,” Honey rattled on, “we can hit up Kualoa—Oooh, we need to do the group photo at the log! You know, the—”
“The one from Jurassic Park,” Peter finished, proving that he had been paying attention.
It had been a topic in Honey’s fascinating presentation of facts about Hawaii. Along with the fact that the Hawaiian alphabet only had 16 letters. And that in the 1990s, a Category 5 hurricane blew all the chicken coops away, so now, chickens roam free on some islands like pigeons in New York.
“We gotta force Gabby to get up for Diamond Head, but I think she’ll really enjoy it.”
“Yeah, about that,” he jumped in, attempting to shift the conversation. “I was thinkin’ we might get some time, y’know?” She blinked at him. Peter’s gaze darkened, voice low and dripping with seduction. “Just you and me? Have a little fun? Y’know... alo—”
“Chaperones!” Honey yelped as if just remembering forgotten keys. Her train of thought jumped the tracks. “We should split up to chaperone the kids! We’re gonna be spread out across the island, sometimes across multiple islands. I want to make sure that no one gets lost, everyone has fun, and no one gets bitten by a shark... or a peacock—should we start making lists? I’ll make a list!”
Without waiting for a response, she pulled out a pen attached to the cover of her notebook and dutifully started jotting down names. Peter let out a soundless huff. She was definitely avoiding him.
He calmly stewed in frustration but simultaneously reminded himself that the trip was about her. Only two weeks had passed since their reunion, and emotions were still inflamed.
9. Stay the hell away from her.
That was Peter’s rule throughout their separation. Ending his relationship with Honey wasn’t an easy decision to make. He struggled with it, especially in the weeks after he returned to New York City.
One morning, he resolved to let her go; by that afternoon, his longing for love chipped away at his stubborn instinct to stay alone. The cycle repeated endlessly.
Gwen used to hate that, too.
Stay away from her.
Peter had spent more time than he’d like to admit watching Honey from afar. Not stalking her or anything, just... watching.
Out of sight, usually concealed on the rooftops, he’d watch her leave her apartment building in the early morning and follow her until she reached the greasy spoon diner where she worked as a waitress.
She was safe there. She was fine. Peter just needed to know she was okay, and then he could simply—
Stay away from her.
Except for when he thought he had her schedule figured out, she would then stray from the routine. She would visit a coffee shop, linger for a bit, and then go to another coffee shop. Like she was ranking every latte in Manhattan.
Who drinks that much coffee? (Besides him.)
Then, she would switch to a string of night shifts, which were the worst. Once, she got home after midnight and was headed back to work less than 4 hours later.
That can’t be legal, right?
Sometimes, it seemed like she was covering every available shift. It was exhausting to keep up with, and he knew she had to be even more worn out. He couldn’t understand it.
It wasn’t a financial issue; Peter had loaded her bank account with enough to cover her expenses for at least two years (in the event he needed to disappear for any reason). There was no way she needed the money. So why on Earth was she taking on so many extra shifts? At this rate, the coffee or the excessive overtime would drive them to an early grave.
Stay away from her.
He nearly broke his own rule one night when she took another detour after work. Instead of going home, she hurried down the stairs of a southbound subway station. It was after 11 pm, and the image of her alone on the train made his stomach twist.
He didn’t think. He just ran.
When he found her again, she was just stepping off the platform onto the train, with the doors closing behind her.
Again, he just ran. Like an idiot.
At least I’m staying away! He argued while clinging precariously to the top side of a subway car.
Miraculously, he made it to her stop without being noticed. He trailed behind her until she reached this mysterious, new destination. He was relieved. Then, he was incredibly irritated to see she had traveled to... yet another coffee shop.
Fortunately, his phone buzzed. When he answered, Felicia was already in the middle of a straightforward greeting:
“Where the FUCK ARE YOU right now, Spidey? We said MIDNIGHT! Whadda I look like, a stilted prom date?”
It was enough to pull his focus.
The ridiculousness of the situation wasn’t lost on him. He reflected on the absurdity of his frustration—hypocrisy. Honey had spent nearly her whole life in New York; it’s not like she’d never taken the subway before.
She wasn’t with ME before.
Honey never had to worry about a target on her back. Or Fisk’s goons going after her. But Peter did worry. All the time. He was caught between two fears: one, that his enemies would follow him to her, or the other, that she might never make it home.
It wasn’t her home, he’d reason. That shitty, rundown apartment with the lazy Super who couldn’t just fixthefuckin’ A/C wasn’t her home. He couldn’t fathom why Honey decided to stay. It wasn’t where she belonged.
But it’s where I left her.
Peter was very familiar with her ‘living situation.’ Her apartment had become a part of his regular commute, no matter where he was headed. He hung out on the building across the street, where he would monitor the windows from the roof. Hiding—Staking out (like a coward) waiting in anticipation for her to close the curtains.
Stay far, far away from her.
Honey was as skilled a marksman as anyone he’d ever met. Even from across the street, seeing her made Peter feel like a bullet had pierced his lung. It took his breath away and stung like hell.
Across the street felt more forgivable than watching her like a pervert from the fire escape outside her window. The idea of being caught like that was mortifying.
If he needed to be closer, he would stick to the walls. Literally. It was risky—crawling up the buildings near Times Square and its thousands of tourists. He hoped they were too distracted by lights, selfies, and Sesame Street characters to notice him in the shadows.
Peter clung to the stonework by his fingertips, stopping inches from her windowsill. Not close enough to see inside. He didn’t intend to spy on her. Not a lot.
All he needed was to hear her. He would close his eyes and just... listen.
Despite the chaotic symphony of the streets, he learned to distinguish the beeping of her microwave. He also knew her favorite radio station and which local news channel she preferred. He learned the sounds that marked her good days and her bad days.
The bad ones are on me.
There were days when she couldn’t hold it in. Her muffled sobs and shuddering breaths devolved into heartbroken wails, and Peter forced himself to listen.
I did that.
Maybe the best thing he could do was leave her in peace and hope that one day... maybe... she’d—
She’s not alone.
The realization turned his blood cold. Peter climbed the wall on this particular night and stopped just beneath her open bedroom window. He heard sounds coming from inside, but not the ones he had been expecting.
These were intimate noises that he’d recognized almost immediately. He had caused those sounds before.
They were branded into his brain, echoing in the empty cavern of his dreams at night until he would awaken and realize he was still alone. He lay in bed with tears burning in his eyes while the rest of him felt harder than petrified wood.
It was almost embarrassing how quickly her breathless sighs, needy groans, and moans of pleasure brought his obnoxiously painful erection back to life. Hearing them now, with one palm flat against the exterior wall, he knew he couldn’t be the cause... So, the logical conclusion was one that he did not like.
There’s someone else. Fuck, fuck, fahhhck she’s found someone else!
Of course, she’s found someone else! Because she’s fucking gorgeous, you idiot! What did you think was gonna happen?
One-half of Peter wanted to punch his fist through the wall and rip whoever was touching his girl right out of the room.
The other half wanted to throw up.
Beneath those emotions, his brain was scrambled by heartbreak, grief, and a ridiculous sense of betrayal. Rage drove his pulse, but shock kept his thoughts empty.
“Ohh, Pee-ter...”
He froze. Wait, did she just—his name is... also Peter?
That was definitely Honey’s voice. She sounded almost... pained? Her voice was strained tighter than a wire about to snap.
Nooo. The odds of—
“Pleeease, Peter, please, just like that...”
Peter’s breath caught in his throat as his jaw hung open. He could have been dreaming again, but the whine that came out of her mouth was unmistakably erotic. Outside of the unlikely event that she’d taken some other guy named Peter into her bed, she was moaning his name.
Why did that make him so proud? Why did her inability to move on make him happy? What kind of monster wants that? How fucked up was he?
He was fucked up enough to not move.
Peter stayed still, regardless of how his conscience criticized him. The shame wasn’t enough to overcome his greed. Not this time. And what he did next—savoring her lewd sounds, hanging off her wall with one hand while the other deftly unbuckled his belt—was monstrous enough to prove his point.
10. Never break a secret you can’t control.
Peter didn’t tell her about that night. He avoided discussing his stalking dutiful watching altogether. The times she avoided his eyes had him convinced she already knew.
No touching.
Respect the Boss.
Now, Honey was the Boss. And if Peter wanted to win back her trust, that’s how it had to be. That’s what Gwen would say. He needed to be brave. He needed to trust her.
And that’s how Peter Parker ended up at a karaoke bar: Scared shitless.
It was Honey’s idea (of course, it was). It came off more like a challenge. They were at the end of their trip, and Peter had all but totally failed to woo her. Honey dodged every romantic display of devotion, every attempt to charm her, and his every effort to make her happy.
No romantic private dinner cruise on a yacht. No couples-only spa day being lavishly pampered in a secluded lanai. No honeymoon villa, either—not for anyone but Peter, who spent the last six nights sleeping alone.
Honey’s excuse was that she had to keep watch over her sisters. “Can’t have Gabby up all night on TikTok and Selena sneaking out to creep on Johnny...”
Honey made the rules.
How Peter ended up at the hole-in-the-wall bar with Honey’s family and his crew—the baddest, most feared mob in the Tri-State Area—was a blur.
He watched Felicia climb onto a dinky stage covered with a musty, stained carpet. She approached a mic stand in front of a cheap backdrop lit by old Christmas lights, topped by a tiny disco ball swaying overhead.
She was fueled by a bottle of champagne and three healthy pours of Clase Azul.
“It’s not for shots! You don’t shoot it, you South Shore meathead; ya savor it! Didn’they teach ya anything about culture at the country club back in Long Island?”
Concealing herself behind a shield of boldness that had always served her well, Felicia belted out “Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend.” She practically writhed with the mic stand. The song's lyrics scrolled down a small LCD screen next to the stage, but she didn’t spare it a glance.
The Black Cat was as theatrical as a diva, fearless in her delivery. She milked whistles from the crowd while she passed suggestive glances at Rebecca.
Honey ate it up, relishing how Becca’s face flushed at the attention. It triggered a cackle that Peter had never heard from her before. She teased her younger sibling gleefully as she danced around the dive bar with Miles and her other sisters.
Not being of legal drinking age, the teens were sober, but nobody else could tell. They all let loose, chasing a different kind of high.
Honey’s aura was as intoxicating as it was contagious. The woman radiated childlike energy, bright rays of sunlight burning through clouds. She was effervescent and enchanting, even as she fist-pumped through an improvised 80s training montage. She really was a maniac. And a sorceress.
When the DJ called Johnny’s name, she wildly applauded, hooting and hollering like they were in a saloon.
Johnny wasn’t even at “their table” anymore. He’d abandoned his party a half hour ago, instead preoccupied with charming the pressed linen pants off a group of elderly Japanese women. Each of them was adorned with pearl earrings, flowy pastel blouses, and a variety of sun hats perched atop carefully styled hair.
That whole exchange began when Johnny Storm swaggered up to their table, his shirt unbuttoned just enough to be suggestive, flashing them a grin that had probably left a trail of broken hearts across multiple continents.
The tallest of the four women, the one with the silk scarf tied under her chin, exchanged a glance with her friends before giving Johnny a slow, assessing look. The one in the strawberry-patterned cardigan hid a giggle behind her hand, while the others sat up a little straighter, eyes twinkling with mischief.
Johnny, undeterred by their age or their unimpressed expressions, leaned in slightly. “Ladies,” he said in a velvet voice, “I have a feeling you’re the real stars of this place. Tell me—do any of you sing?”
The one with the visor, who had been stirring her drink with a tiny umbrella, let out a dramatic sigh. Like she had been waiting all night for this question.
“Young man,” she said, adjusting her pearls, “do you think we came here not to sing?”
Now, he was squeezed between his adoring fans. He’d bought the round of neon-colored cocktails they were sipping on through dainty straws. The women cheered for him with their perfectly manicured hands.
He tipped back his head and put a shot glass to his lips. In a second, the spicy cinnamon amber liquid was gone. He extinguished the fire in his throat with a growl, clanked the empty glass down on the tabletop, then pressed a quick kiss with an exaggerated ‘mwah’ to Strawberry-Patterned Cartigan’s cheek before pulling away.
The woman instantly flushed with shock, almond-shaped eyes going wide. Her friends burst into laughter, which had them shaking their delicate, birdlike shoulders. She brought a hand to her cheek as if to verify the audacious gesture was real.
Then, with the grace of a woman who had raised children and scolded many men in her time, she delivered a light but decisive smack to Johnny’s bicep—not in true anger, but in a way that sent the entire room into a fit of delighted laughter.
“You little scoundrel,” she huffed, though her lips twitched upward despite herself.
“I regret nothing!” he shrugged, taking the stage.
Speaking of “no regrets,” Johnny Storm nailed Shania Twain’s “That Don’t Impress Me Much.” And Peter was very much impressed.
The room transported to another dimension of reality, one where troubles were far away, and the only thing left behind was good cheer. Honey was the star at its center, Peter observed, an absolutely mesmerizing sight to behold. Her delight burned through everyone’s inhibitions and fear. Peter felt lightheaded and giddy witnessing her joy.
It was almost enough to distract him from the fact that Honey mandated everyone, including Peter, sing a song by themselves.
Peter wasn’t scared. He wasn’t.
He just wanted to die. His complexion turned a pale green. He gripped his bourbon so tightly it was a surprise the glass didn’t shatter.
It was like flipping a switch on a time machine. Honey’s request—no, Honey’s sadistic act of torture—reverted the most ruthless Mob Boss in New York back into an awkward, insecure teenager.
Singing in front of Honey that night at his old Baby Grand piano (the one he eventually, to his great embarrassment, tossed into a wall) was a rare display of vulnerability.
Peter remembered that night vividly. It was back in a time when Peter had wanted her so badly that he was willing to do anything. He would have sung her the entirety of Dear Evan Hansen if it brought them closer. If he could just touch—
Goddamnit, we’re really doing this all over again?
Honey’s given name was announced over the loudspeakers. Peter blinked in her direction, watching as she took another sip of her mojito, set down the glass, then bounced up to the microphone.
“This one goes out to someone special,” she purred. The slight slur in her voice from her buzz was almost undetectable.
She placed both hands on the microphone as a few bright, metallic guitar strums rang out through the giant speakers. Peter gulped, staring like a spaceship had landed in the middle of Central Park.
Honey’s eyes didn’t meet his directly. Instead, they scanned the room, seeing only her friends and several unimpressed (and frankly annoyed) patrons. “You know who you are.”
The lead electric guitar strummed the Major chords in an unhurried, lazy rhythm—
D-major, A-major, E-major, F-sharp minor...
Honey closed her eyes and crooned, “You make me come...”
Peter choked on his drink. Full-body short-circuited.
“Owww!” someone catcalled from the audience.
Peter had actually died, he was pretty sure.
But the melody repeated—
D, A, E, F-sharp major...
Now her eyes were fixed on Peter, the kind of mischief in her gaze that only meant trouble. “You make me com-ple-eete...”
The melody repeated. Honey failed to match the higher D-major note on the last syllable, falling a little flat. It wasn’t totally tone-deaf, but it was the kind of sound that triggered an eye twitch in those who were sensitive to off-key singing. Honey didn’t notice or didn’t care.
Peter didn’t criticize. He was still dead. Or speechless, his brain stalling during its system reboot.
At the next chord of F-sharp major, she found the right key again, heartachingly passionate as she laid out the next grenade of a lyric:
“You make me com-plete-ly miserable...”
The music died down momentarily, a dramatic pause in the song. A second later, the whole band—bass, drums, and guitar—roared back to life. The A-major chord thrashed in staccato jabs beneath Honey’s voice as she began the next part of the song.
Peter was still jarred from the force of the blast. The whole thing was a stunt, capped off with a not-so-subtle jab at his persistent demand for her attention. Or at least that’s how she saw it.
It was a stunt, right? That means I don’t have to actually sing now—?
A vibration in his pocket jolted him out of his daze.
Quickly, he grabbed his iPhone clad in a spider-adorned case. Miguel’s name lit up on the screen. Saved by the buzz. He hopped up from the table, phone to his ear, and shuffled out the front door.
A few minutes later, he was wrapping up the call. It was a straightforward status report. Enough to distract Peter from the karaoke bar but caused its own kind of stress.
Honey had invited Miguel and the others to Hawaii, but they all were suddenly busy—or so they said.
Peter knew Miguel wouldn’t be caught dead in a karaoke bar.
When the call was over, Peter tipped his head back and exhaled slowly. Fatigue weighed on his shoulders. He needed a vacation from the vacation. He pocketed his phone into his khaki trousers, brought his free fingers to his forehead, and rubbed at the worry lines there.
When he reopened his eyes, he stood beneath a canopy of stars. The moon hung low over the black ocean horizon, and the tide glistened in its light. Staring at the stars above felt like a mirror image of his experience staring at the streets beneath the Empire State Building. Peter stood on the edge of both worlds, belonging to neither.
No touching.
The thought was accompanied by the sensation of his body hairs standing on end. Lightning erupted beneath his skin, setting his nerves on fire. His hickory eyes blackened, pulling focus like an owl in the night until they found their target.
Honey stood alone outside the bar’s entrance, shifting her weight between her wedge sandals. Peter observed her, raising an eyebrow at how she wrapped her arms firmly around her middle. The curve of her spine and shoulders made her appear to be cocooning herself. Peter could feel waves of anxiety radiating from her.
That’s when he noticed the strange man lurking closer to her. He stood just over six feet, and with his silver hair and fake teeth, he looked old enough to be her father.
The tourist sported a crooked grin as if he had shared a joke, but Honey didn’t find it funny. Instead, she stepped back while he swaggered closer. Clearly drunk, his gait resembled a stumble. He wobbled just a foot away from her, which was eleven feet too close for Peter’s comfort.
“I’m jusss’ sayin’—” the creep slurred with a deep, gravelly voice. “I can getcha a drink.”
To anyone else, Honey remained calm and composed. No surprise there. For years, she fought for her life while hiding in plain sight.
But Peter knew her signs. Each time her eyes darted to the side, her alarm was as noticeable as sirens and flashing red lights. Her whole body signaled a fight-or-flight-or-fawn response. He didn’t rule out the possibility that feral was just as likely an outcome.
Stay away.
Peter waited, feet glued to the Earth. Not hesitating, but not moving. Not intervening. Not breaking the rules. Not crossing any lines. Not touching.
The glassy-eyed man reached for her. “You ain’t gotta be alone—”
“She’s not.”
They heard Peter’s voice before they noticed his presence. It was calm, but foreboding—like the stillness of a cemetery. The Earth seemed to quake from the quiet intensity radiating off of him.
Conversation stopped cold. He had their attention.
There was no urgency in Peter’s tone or movements. Just the slow, deliberate precision of someone who had already decided how this would end. He stood as a monolith, radiating darkness and authority. Like Anubis, ready to guide the dead to the underworld.
Honey blinked at him… several times. Peter loomed large over the drunk man with a sovereign sparkle in his eye. It was a serenely vicious display of what could only be described as reverent malice. The proud way the Devil gazes upon his own Kingdom in Hell.
No killing.
No blinking.
No touching.
Peter’s mouth made no sound, but his eyes spoke volumes.
11 - Don’t pick a fight you can’t win.
Her drunken predator scoffed dismissively as if he could read Peter’s mind. Simultaneously, he took a big step back and abruptly stumbled off. A heavy odor of sweat, sunscreen, alcohol, and piss-your-pants terror trailed behind him, while he muttered something that sounded like “whore” beneath his breath.
Peter didn’t bother watching the man leave. But when the threat was clear, he finally met her eyes.
Honey’s shoulders slowly relaxed, releasing the tension in her body. Despite her apparent calm, she seemed frustrated with herself for becoming flustered at all.
Peter’s gaze held no victory or smugness. Instead, he looked endearingly patient, like waiting for a signal of some kind.
11.5 - Never lose a fight that picks you.
Honey crossed her arms over her chest, feigning disinterest. “I had it handled,” she declared.
Amusement sparkled in his brown eyes. “Yeah?” he murmured with a slight head tilt.
Now, she was the one to huff. Honey sighed with irritation, shaking her head as she briskly walked back inside. “Go fuck yourself,” she grumbled, but without any actual malice to it.
By that time, the party was over.
Honey gave hasty goodbyes, explaining her drop in enthusiasm as exhaustion from an eventful week of travel. Her only desire was to go back to the hotel and crash. She didn’t object when Peter insisted on walking her. He was unsure if she was finally accepting his help or if she was too tired to argue.
They walked side-by-side down a main road in unhurried silence.
Peter stole a few anxious glances at her, observing with concern the way her brows drew together pensively. Unexpressed feelings tugged at the edges of Honey’s smile like an argument was on the tip of her tongue. She didn’t seem like she had enough energy to fight.
Peter didn’t know which scenario was worse.
The uncomfortable silence ended with a whack.
Both of them froze mid-step, halted by the familiar sound. Like a baseball hitting a leather mitt. It was the unmistakable sound of a fist to flesh. The next noise was all wrong. It was a strangled, breathless shriek. It was like shattering glass, a foreign wail that was too high-pitched for any man or woman.
The cry of a terrified child in pain.
Wide-eyed, Peter and Honey snapped their gazes over to the source. Shadows played beneath the fronds of a palm tree on the street corner, the canopy illuminated by a golden streetlamp. They concealed the figures of a man, a woman, and a smaller person between them.
A boy, they noted—a baby. No older than three. The family likeness was unmistakable. The boy’s father had his tiny forearm twisted up behind his back. The child was screaming like his arm was broken, his face soaked with hot tears that glistened in the streetlights. He shrieked and wailed—like a toddler should.
Standing a few feet away from the boy and his father, the woman watched the scene in silence. She hugged herself while swaying slightly, her eyes drifting in and out of focus.
That look, both Peter and Honey knew very well. Judging by the scene, it wasn’t the first time this had happened.
Peter jumped to action, rushing from Honey’s side. He caught the grown man’s arm just as he was about to strike his son a second time. By the time the father looked back to see who interrupted him, Peter had already crushed the bones in his wrist.
The boy tumbled to the ground, still sobbing with an added level of panic. But his cries were overshadowed by the howl that tore from his father’s throat.
Honey watched in horror as the man’s entire arm seized in Peter’s grip, his useless fingers twitching helplessly. The father was on his knees, staring up at Peter with sudden desperation. His breath came in ragged gasps, the pain suffocating him.
Peter appeared to wait a few moments, not for the screaming to stop, but for his victim to come to terms with what just happened.
The crime boss had no remorse in his eyes. No shame to be found, not even for the pleasure he took in splintering the man’s bones. He exacted justice. He righted a wrong. It was as simple as that.
Panicked screams persisted, with the boy’s mother now shrieking. Terrified, she clung her sobbing child tightly to her chest and fled the scene.
Peter appeared unaffected, leaning down close to the whimpering man’s ear. He placed a calming hand on the shuddering man’s back.
“Next time,” he whispered, sharing a secret that was cast down like a curse, “I take the whole thing.”
Once Peter let go, the father flattened on the ground, crumbling faster than his carpal bones. The situation ended as Peter stepped backward, leaving the man to writhe on the pavement alone.
An eerie calm fell over them, contrasting the pounding of their hearts.
Then, Peter directed his attention on Honey, studying her with worry. She blinked at him, wide-eyed and shaken, as he closed the gap between them. His hands surrounded her shoulders, his fingers gripping her tight. The action seemed as if he was reassuring himself.
An unspoken exchange between them set them off towards the hotel.
They walked briskly, his hand on her lower back to guide her and keep her moving. His pulse wasn’t racing—he wasn’t panicked. But he remained on high alert, scanning their surroundings even though the immediate threat seemed to be over.
His main concern was Honey. Her heavy silence left him wondering how she processed everything. The pressure didn’t let up until they stood in front of the gated entryway to Peter’s villa. It wasn’t located near the luxury suites where Honey stayed with her sisters, but she didn’t question it.
The entrance to the private villa was secluded, with lush greenery forming an arbor that nearly enclosed them completely. The shroud of nightfall was almost like a protective bubble around them. It was the closest thing to a haven that Peter had within 5,000 miles.
He was still holding her close, though they didn’t move to go inside. The distant rolling surf and heavy evening air helped to calm them down.
At some point, they both looked down. Peter’s eyes widened in horror to see a bloody handprint on the dress’ waist. It was from where Peter’s hand had been. The blood belonged to the father, obviously, but he snatched his hand away like he’d been burned.
It was Peter who appeared to be struggling now. A storm of emotions raged behind his eyes, an amalgamation of relief, revenge, and regret. Honey kept peering at him, at his hands, and at his face. He could almost see the moment replaying in her mind endlessly. She was either at a loss for words or silenced by her fear of him.
“Honey...” Peter stuttered, trying to find his voice.
He jabbed his fingers into his hair, running them across his scalp. His voice was thick in his throat, making it harder to breathe, and every sound died before it left his mouth.
“I... You... I-I-I—”
“I’m sorry,” she replied abruptly. Melancholy filled her eyes.
He raised an eyebrow at that. “Wh... what?”
“About tonight,” she explained, but her explanation only confused him further. “About the karaoke bar. And about my song.”
It took several moments for Peter’s baffled mind to catch up, during which he’d side-eyed her like she’d grown another head. She was apologizing...? For karaoke? For that 90s song?
He didn’t know the song well or remember the band’s name, but he had a vague recollection of a 50-foot-tall Pamela Anderson-giant in a sporty bikini. He did, however, remember the song’s takeaway: “You make me miserable.”
“It was—it was very rude of me,” Honey admitted remorsefully, a small line forming between her brows.
Peter blinked, still unsure how to respond. “I’m... sorry...? I’m sorry,” he mumbled despite his confusion. She continued to study the flagstone beneath her toes. He tucked his chapped lip between his teeth, pondering quietly as the tension between them faded.
A sheepish half-smile warmed his face. “I’m, uh... sorry I didn’t get to hear the rest of it,” Peter said. He slipped both hands into his pockets, rocking back on his heels.
Honey released her lip and sucked in a courageous breath. “I shouldn’t have made you feel like you were forced to sing,” she confessed. “That was... not cool.”
“Nah,” he chuckled lightly. “You were great. Everybody had fun.”
“Not you,” she frowned, still hardly able to meet his eyes. “You weren’t having fun.”
“That’s just ‘cos I’m a pussy and I had no clue what to sing,” Peter revealed to her conspiratorially, scrunching his nose and bobbing his head from side to side. “It’s- it’s like my mind went blank. Just... ‘Happy Birthday’ and ‘The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air,’ and no way was that gonna happen.”
The conversation fell silent again, but the mood had shifted. The waves seemed calmer in the distance.
“I would’ve liked to hear it,” Honey added as an afterthought. She met his eyes with a genuine spark. “Whatever you would’ve chosen.”
They were quiet again, suspended in time and space, with Peter caught in her endearing gaze. It made him want to melt. It was like staring into the sun, where he could only observe her light in fleeting glances. Meanwhile, his hands in his pockets ached for her warmth.
It felt like they were on the precipice of their journey.
“Are you, um—” she cleared her throat while her fingers twisted the edge of her sleeve. “Are you going to invite me in?”
Peter froze at her modest question as his thoughts came to a standstill. Too many seconds went by with Peter staring at her like a flustered fool, his lashes fluttering.
“Y-you mean... to-to stay?”
He framed it like a question, but he simultaneously nodded his head in unspoken agreement as if there were no doubt. At this point, he was afraid to make any assumptions. Worried that he possibly misunderstood, Peter added, “Or did you want— I-I-I can... get a different room—?”
“Stay,” she whispered, feather-soft.
The simple reply left her lips while her eyes contained volumes of words—entire essays on longing and fear of intimacy that she had memorized and was prepared to defend. Sonnets penned with heartfelt sincerity.
“Stay with me.”
Peter didn’t look away. He stared back, questioning if his eyes and ears were lying to him. Wordlessly, he watched as she reached over, freed his hand from his pocket, and pressed her palm to his.
He studied the action intently, trying to document every moment. Only letting his eyes shut when their fingers wove together. Peter was enraptured, awestruck at the way her touch soothed him, as chaste as it was. He was suddenly lightheaded, heart thrumming in his ears, and he craned his neck forward. With tenderness, he pressed a soft kiss to her hairline, taking a moment to rest his chin against her hair.
Their last night in Hawaii was spent in each other’s arms, adorning one another with tender kisses and comforting caresses. They melted into each other. Every blissful moment Peter spent inside of her felt like a wildfire, setting his soul on fire. The lines between their bodies blurred like smoke billowing and twisting in the wind.
Admittedly, Peter had forgotten what this was like. The signs were familiar; their hair was damp from perspiration. Their sweaty chests heaved as they panted from the exertion. The rhythmic pounding of skin connecting with skin overlaid with the melody of their moans. The pitch ranged from soul-shattering groans to helpless whimpers while they poured filthy words and devoted praise into each other’s ears.
It wasn’t fucking. It wasn’t just sex.
It was something Peter had only experienced a few times in his life. Gwen was the first— the first woman he’d ever made love to. Honey was the second. There was nothing Peter wouldn’t sacrifice to have her be the last.
Two hours after they landed in New York, the couple stood outside of a different entrance. In the hallway outside of Honey’s apartment, stray voices from televisions turned too loud, and shrieking young children competed with the echo of distant sirens. Overhead, a flickering yellow bulb buzzed like it resented the effort.
Peter avoided having his gaze linger too long at the stained carpet beneath his Flower Moon lace-up trainers. The floor stains blended well with the frenetic carpet pattern that reminded him of an old movie theater.
Her building was uncomfortably warm—and so humid for a moment he thought he was still in Hawaii—but he avoided criticism about it. He made a mental note to have one of his associates pay a visit to that useless Super, so they could “discuss his timeline” on getting the A/C fixed.
He had the handle of Honey’s suitcase in his palm, having carried it up the stairs for her. A chartered car waited outside her building.
The two of them stood facing each other in front of her door, a pregnant pause between them.
“So,” Honey timidly began, pointing with her eyes. “This is me.”
“Yeah.” He swallowed. “I wish it wasn’t.” A tinge of blue colored the statement as it sat unanswered.
She cast her glance down at her shoes. “Thanks again… for everything.”
“Oh, yeah…it was— um, it was nothin.’” Sheepishly, he looked everywhere but at her, and when he finally did, he found her studying him. Her gaze was soft and curious.
“It’s not nothing,” she said, resolved. “We never went on any family trips. At least not like that.”
He blinked at her several times, not sure what to say.
“I’ve got an early shift,” Honey sighed, glancing at her door handle expectantly.
“Oh? Oh. Yeah, right. You, uh, gotta—”
“Clean up around here. Tackle some of this laundry—“
“I, uh—yeah, I get it, I gotta, um—“
“You don’t have any laundry to do.”
“Well, no—"
"Someone else does it."
"I, um—”
“I don’t think you know how to do laundry.”
Pink traveled up the back of his neck and painted his cheeks a lovely color. “I remember how to do laundry,” he argued coyly. “It’s-it’s easy—”
“Someone folds it for you, too. Turns your briefs into tiny little squares.”
“One mishap. I had one laundry mishap—”
“Aren’t you, like, a scientist or something?” Her lips curved into a cheeky grin.
“I am perfectly capable of laundry,” Peter gently affirmed. A thousand-watt grin adorned his face. “I have a Ph.D. in laundry from the school of… cleaning.”
“Don’t worry. Your laundry handicap is safe with me,” she teased.
Peter turned his head away, unable to shake the smile off his face. “You seem like you’re an expert in this field.”
Honey pursed her lips, with courage balled up in her throat. “Well, maybe I can teach you.” Her eyes caught his. “If you’re not too busy.”
For the second time in 24 hours, Peter questioned his hearing. Confronted with her fluttering lashes and somewhat suggestive tone, his jaw hung open like it had forgotten its purpose.
“Do you want to come inside?” Honey stated clearly, purposefully—recognizing his distress.
Peter gawked at her like a pot of gold, transfixed by the preciousness of the moment. He felt like swallowing a powerline just to get his tongue to move. “I…uh…”
“C’mon, don’t make me use some dumb, teenage boy metaphor," she rolled her eyes playfully. "I'm not gonna ‘help you with your load—’”
"I can’t," he blurted, with the pain and urgency of ripping off a bandaid.
The smile fell from her lips just as abruptly. For a moment, they were both stunned.
“Oh.” She quickly redirected her gaze.
Peter bit his tongue, his brain screaming at him to recover. He tried to think of some kind of explanation, knowing that a simple ‘no’ wasn’t going to be enough.
“I-I-I have—I’m… I’m sorry, I gotta—” He took a breath. “I just—I-I have this—y’know—”
She nodded stiffly. “Yeah, I get it.”
“It’s not that—I would. I want to—”
“You’re busy. I get it.”
“It’s just this—um, this, uh—thing I have. Johnny and me. And Miguel. And Jess. It’s uh-a-a meeting. Hotel business, y’know. Numbers and boring stuff—”
“You don’t have to lie.”
It was a soft declaration that felt like a stab to Peter’s stomach. Her gaze was razor sharp, while her face retained a tight-lipped smile.
Peter shook his head more aggressively. He looked at her the way a captain watches his ship sink. "No, no, I’m not—"
"I had a really good time, Peter," Honey interrupted, with her hand on the doorknob. “Thanks again.”
Before he knew it, he found himself standing alone in front of her closed door. Almost entirely full circle.
Closing his eyes, he let his head fall backward with a heavy sigh. His fingers twitched at his side, debating whether or not he should knock.
Peter’s phone once again came to the rescue, but he yanked the device out of his pocket with a scowl on his face.
An unread message was waiting for him. He already knew who it was from. The phone unlocked with a scan of his face, then the encrypted app unlocked once he entered a six digit code—041894.
A message was waiting for him, sent from a contact only labeled by two emojis.
Don’t use real names.
🇮🇹🏋️ “Where are you? We had a meeting.”
Peter’s immediate reaction was a wince. Out of an abundance of caution, he glanced over his shoulder, despite him being alone in the hallway.
Somebody’s always watching.
Gritting his teeth, he tapped out a reply.
🕷️ “Late. Got held up.”
Respect appointments.
🇮🇹🏋️ “I’m putting my ass on the line for you. The least you could do is be on time.”
Respect partners.
🕷️ “Don’t go gettin’ your panties too wet. I’m not far.”
🇮🇹🏋️ “If you stab me in the back on this, it’s your funeral.”
The Boss pursed his lips at that. Part of him wanted to snark right back. He’d hate to disappoint.
🕷️ “Threatening again? And I was gonna use 👅”
🇮🇹🏋️ “I don’t need to remind you of what’s at stake.”
Peter bit down on his tongue, feeling his stomach suddenly churn. He glanced back at Honey’s door, recalling the trip he’d finished. The memories he’d made.
Honey never went on any family vacations. Neither had Peter. The difference was that Peter had gone so long without a family, he didn’t know what to do once he’d found one. He still didn’t know.
🇮🇹🏋️ “Don’t forget. You came to me. This was your plan.”
Doubt suddenly filled his mind—not just about his plan, but also this “family” thing.
Peter had never considered his associates as family. The most attachment he had was to Miles. Mostly, he’d felt sorry for the kid and maybe a little protective of him. Considering how he met Miles, that was understandable.
Miles was nearly killed because his uncle was a punk. Couldn’t keep his business separate from his family.
Don’t pick a fight you can’t win.
Business and family are a volatile mix. That’s why Peter wouldn’t get mixed up in ‘families.’
Or... he hadn’t. Not yet.
He hadn’t met Honey. During the short time they were together, she wove a tapestry into his heart, pulling together threads that went unseen. He hadn’t noticed them for years. Knowing her forced the tapestry to take form: the picture of Peter’s family was finally clear.
It was almost worth risking everything. But winning? It was worth losing it all.
He chewed on the rough skin of his lower lip, eyes narrowing on the blinking cursor on his screen. Then brought his thumbs to the keyboard.
🕷️ “Slow down, tiger. You keep ridin’ my ass like that, you’re gonna make me cream my pants right here.”
As soon as he hit ‘send,’ Peter heard the familiar ding of a microwave. His eyes flicked toward the source. Like Pavlov’s Bell, he was conditioned to it. And a split second later, he made a choice.
Fuck it. Frank can wait.
🕷️ “Ttyl, babe. gotta take care of a little problem.”
Peter shoved the phone back in his pocket, throwing himself towards Honey’s door. His fist went wild, knocking erratically. Seconds later, he heard her footsteps approach, alarmed. When the door opened up, she gazed up at him with owlish eyes.
“M’m sorry,” Peter leaned inwards on the doorframe. “I seem to have forgotten something.”
Her brows shot to her hairline. “Oh?” She glanced over her shoulder to where her suitcase was parked—that sweetheart—an apology of some kind was already on her tongue. She looked worried, like she was about to ask him if she accidentally switched toothbrushes.
When she faced him again, Peter’s lips were on hers. His hands cupped her cheeks, fingertips crawling across her scalp. Honey’s body was stiff for a moment, but then she melted like butter with a swipe of his tongue. Her body softened until he scooped her up in his arms, his hands kneading the flesh on the back of her thighs.
Peter pushed her over the threshold. With abandon, he let his tongue brush against hers like he wanted to commit it to memory. Both of her arms went from his shoulders to his nape, hooking herself around his neck as she groaned into his mouth.
The vibration from her groan triggered another one from deep in his belly. He let his fingers wander across the silky fiber of her leggings, greedily squeezing the mounds of her ass while grinding her warmth against his waist.
“I forgot...” he muttered in staccato breaths between kisses, “turns out... you’re the only... thing that I give a shit about.”
Honey hissed as his fingertips prodded at her heat through her tights. Her eyes rolled back at the pleasure, and it took her a moment to regain her focus.
She found Peter staring up at her with a dopey half-smile. His eyes were a different story; full, unbridled passion burned inside their amber hue. Pure admiration glowed in his gaze, with tiny laugh lines that shot out like sun rays from the outside corners of his eyes.
One of his hands traveled beneath her shirt, gliding up the skin of her back. She shuddered at the touch, meeting his lips hungrily for another batch of kisses. He let her control the kiss, relishing in the sublime feeling of her nails across his scalp while her tongue played with his.
It was a crime to pull away. But he was a criminal, after all.
“Jus’so you know, you were right,” Peter interrupted, stealing his lips away from her as much as she would allow. “I gotta huge load that I need you to help me with—”
The laugh that burst from her lips was punctuated by a snort. He basked in the light of her grin, idly kicking his foot backward against the door. The door latch clicked as it slammed closed.
Second, I cannot WAIT to read this 100x’s over! And I may need to bring back my long ass reviews of the chapter so I can scream, cry and laugh about every single little tiny detail! 🥰
But until then, I’m going to thoroughly enjoy consuming every single new thing you’ve added! 🥰😍 as should everyone else cause they’re missing out on novel quality content if they haven’t! ❤️
snowghoul
vaporwave
romaincrisis
baratheonpilled
jacobvanloon
