kept thinking about Eddie & Steve deliberately making jokes to ensure that Dustin and co don’t get into the boat on Lover’s Lake.
“Nicely done,” Steve says when they’re far enough away from the bank—when they’ve left a disgruntled Dustin behind rather than a worried one.
“Hmm? Oh, yeah,” Eddie says—glances back to where the kids are, although they’ve already got swallowed up by the darkness. “‘Course, man.” He gives a weak smile as he drags the oar through the water. “Those little shrimps would probably try and, like, cannonball right in, and honestly? I, uh, really don’t think my heart could handle that.”
“Yeah, they… really throw themselves into things.”
Steve decides that he’s never gonna bring up Operation Child Endangerment if Eddie’s in the vicinity—the dude already looks at them all like they’ve got a few screws loose, he doesn’t wanna make it worse.
Although, on second thought, him and Dustin probably let that particular cat out the bag with their persistent optimism way back in the boathouse: “There’s nothing to worry about.”
Eddie’s wide-eyed look painted a thousand words.
Oh, he thinks you’re crazy, sing-songed the perpetual high schooler hiding in Steve’s brain. Eddie ‘The Freak’ Munson thinks you’re crazy. Time to seriously re-evaluate your life choices.
“Did you think Eddie was a bit, uh, weird back there?” Dustin asked him later. “Like, he’ll be okay, right?”
Dustin was prone to using ‘weird’ as a catch-all term, where it could mean anything from someone being genuinely weird to them experiencing severe emotional distress.
Steve clapped him on the shoulder reassuringly. “Henderson, I’m pretty sure he thinks we’re weird.”
He almost wants to make a joke about that now, get Eddie to laugh, maybe. To tell the truth, Steve had almost cracked and laughed himself once he’d gotten into the boat, when he turned and saw Dustin’s comically outraged expression.
It was only as Nancy and Eddie began to row that he registered the laugh would’ve secretly been one of relief—heartened by the sight of the kids left on the shore.
He stays quiet; Eddie’s shoulders are slowly tensing more and more the further across the lake they go.
It’s not noticeable at first—Robin’s providing a running commentary on the movements of Dustin’s compass, while Nancy determinedly pulls her oar in and out of the water—but Steve soon realises that Eddie’s kind of stopped rowing, instead just making ripples as his grip goes slack.
It’s damn hard to see, but Steve just barely makes out Eddie’s eyes glittering in the dark, staring down at the lake.
“Hey,” Steve says quietly. “You don’t have to—we’re not too far out, we can take you back, man.” He tries for levity. “This thing holds three people tops, remember?”
Eddie’s smile is more of a grimace. “Nah, man. Had enough of being chickenshit.”
“Dude, you’re not…”
Steve trails off, biting back his frustration—it doesn’t look like Eddie’s listening to him anyway; he’s still not taken his eyes off the water. Steve briefly wonders if he’s got that thing Robin says she gets sometimes, something about an imp—it’s why she never gets on Ferris wheels or whatever, convinced that she’s somehow gonna fall.
Eddie gives himself a shake and resumes rowing.
“Sorry. S’just… pitch black down there. He—” Eddie clears his throat. “He wouldn’t have seen—”
His voice cracks, fades into the night. His grip on the oar slips—he snatches it back before it can fall.
“Eddie,” Steve begins, but Eddie speaks right over the top of him.
“I—I hoped he was just drowning instead.” Eddie scoffs, and there’s a bitterness to it, an edge of self-loathing that Steve wishes he couldn’t hear. “And then maybe—” A sigh, another grimace disguised as a smile. “That’s a pretty fucked up thing to think, huh?”
He’s got that tone, Steve thinks, like when he kept repeating that he ran away from Chrissy—like he thought that if he said it enough, someone would snap, condemn him. Like he’s looking for proof that he’s monstrous.
Robin’s still talking, tactfully giving Eddie a semblance of privacy. Underneath her chatter, Steve hears Nancy’s rowing falter for just a moment, and he feels a pang in his chest.
He thinks of Barb and drowning. Wonders again if an ordinary tragedy would’ve been better compared to…
Then he lets it all sink back down.
“That’s not fucked up,” he says firmly. “Trust me, dude, that’s… that’s normal.”
Eddie chuckles shortly—it sounds like he’s doing something similar, pushing everything down, down…
“Normal, huh? No-one’s called me that before.”
“First time for everything.”
There’s a flicker of amusement across Eddie’s face when he replies, “Guess compared to you freaks, I’m pretty normal.”
“Ooh, did that feel good?” Steve says, appealing again to his mental high schooler. “Bit of role reversal?”
Eddie laughs more genuinely. “Sure did. Community theatre’s done wonders.”
A silence falls, and Steve encourages himself to get all relaxed by the boat bobbing up and down. Yeah, nothing’s strictly been confirmed yet, but he already knew what he was getting into when he stepped off the shore, water leaking into his shoes.
It’s gotta be him.
“I know what you’re doing, Harrington,” Eddie murmurs.
Steve gives him a questioning look.
Eddie pulls in some long breaths in exaggerated imitation. “You’re not subtle, Mister Swim Captain.”
“Co-captain,” Steve corrects, hiding his surprise. He can’t really imagine Eddie paying attention to the swim team, least of all a former swim team.
“Oh, forgive me for my inaccuracy.”
Hmm, he’s getting borderline poetic, Steve thinks. Like he was with Mordor and stuff.
So. He’s afraid.
“I’ll be fine,” Steve says lightly.
Eddie lets out a short groan, mutters something that sounds like famous last words. Then, quieter still—Steve can’t quite make it out.
Something about the dark.
Steve could repeat that he’ll be fine, but he knows that’s a shit reassurance. He settles for continuing to breathe in and out, long and slow; Eddie’s beginning to look like he’s unconsciously mimicking the pattern, his shoulders lowering.
“Just come back up, Harrington,” he says, so softly that Steve might’ve imagined it.
“Co-captain’s promise,” he says.
Eddie’s lips twitch. But he’s still fixed on the lake’s depths, like he’s waiting for something—dreading it.
And you wonder whether it's not unusual for Peter Potamus' Magic Divers to share a decent pot of coffee in the mornings prior to a day's diving sessions ...
Thus doth Peter Potamus explain a uniquely spiritual side of Polynesia Uncharted to his nephew, Pat Potamus, ahead of a dive
"Patrick, what we're about to dive to may be a little unusual to you, but to the natives of such an interesting paradise, such amounts to the spiritual.
"I'm talking about an underwater tiki shrine ... and on occasion, the natives, in their sheer and natural nakedness, will dive down and offer what amounts to silent prayers to its spirits. And try not to be surprised if the statue happens to ejaculate oh so suddenly into the water...."
"Now here we are, another voice from the afterlife.
Who are we now? We know we’re alive,
We call you out, discover why we were left behind.
The sun creates a different escape while we’re still alive.
Now we’ll go, and know the answers are with us now.
Console yourself, we already cried.
Do we know too much? Are these pieces meant to be side by side?
I held my breath, you close your eyes, before the dive."
Now we’ll go
And know the answers are with us now
Console yourself, we already cried
Do we know too much?
Are these pieces meant to be side by side?
I held my breath
You close your eyes
Before the dive
wow, it took shuffle player this long to draw a st. lucia song for this blog? sinful. st. lucia’s a synth guy, through and through. you’re not gonna find him trying anything ubelievably experimental or heavy, but god damn is he ever fun. this track is one of his best. just close your eyes right before the last drop, at 3:01. definitely a song to listen to with headphones rather than not
