An Archive of Our Own, a project of the
Organization for Transformative Works
Steve Harrington doesn't have time to date. In fact, between working multiple part-time jobs and raising two rambunctious and poorly-behaved preteens, he doesn't have time for much of anything. And it's fine. He's fine. He's having an absolutely awesome time slinging ice cream, sorting DVDs, and dodging questions from his friends and family about his love life.
That is, of course, until the twins come to him with a simple request: go to Parents Night and sign them up for Mr. Munson's Dungeons and Dragons club.
Or, the one where Steve is a tired and overworked DILF who may or may not be smitten with his kids' seventh grade English teacher. Featuring: busted old Hondas, milkshakes as an intricate mating ritual, twelve year-old wingmen, and the worst flirting you've ever seen in your life.
featuring incredible cover art by the talented @enfreakment | prettydizzeed !
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the
Organization for Transformative Works
Steve Harrington doesn't have time to date. In fact, between working multiple part-time jobs and raising two rambunctious and poorly-behaved preteens, he doesn't have time for much of anything. And it's fine. He's fine. He's having an absolutely awesome time slinging ice cream, sorting DVDs, and dodging questions from his friends and family about his love life.
That is, of course, until the twins come to him with a simple request: go to Parents Night and sign them up for Mr. Munson's Dungeons and Dragons club.
Or, the one where Steve is a tired and overworked DILF who may or may not be smitten with his kids' eccentric and bizarre English teacher. Featuring Robin as the world's worst wingman, Dustin and Max as Steve's meddling twins, and DnD and coffee milkshakes as intricate mating rituals.
Man okay I love love love your writing and if I may send a prompt either Steddie helping Dustin after he falls off Max’s skateboard and breaks his arm or the three of them talking about their absent fathers >.<
thank you so much!! 🥺 i can absolutely do the first one, especially bc i had a similar idea going for some cupids! he would totally try to use his sister's board and wipe tf out. this takes place about 2 years before the story starts! i was originally going to make it a missing scene but i'm still getting the timeline figured out.
Steve would've thought that at the age of ten, his kids would be responsible enough to exist outside without adult supervision. If they were smart enough for fifth grade math and to make snide comments about his casserole at the dinner table last night--which still stung, by the way--surely they could be unleashed upon the neighborhood without doing anything outrageously stupid.
Steve also thought it was safe to open a condom wrapper with his teeth once upon a time, and Dustin and Max had definitely fallen from his tree. Which made them genetically predisposed to having really bad ideas.
The crack came first. A loud, wet snap, like someone grabbed a stalk of freshly washed celery and broke it over their knee. It was the kind of sound that flipped a primal switch in his brain stem--like a caveman hearing something rustle in the bushes. He dropped the remote and booked it to the driveway, leaving the Indiana Pacers to get their asses kicked without an audience.
The scream came shortly after.
Steve scanned the yard with frantic eyes, searching for the source of the sickening cry and soft whimpers that had his skin erupting into goosebumps and raised hackles. The twins sat huddled at the edge of the driveway, Dustin's bike and Max's skateboard laying abandoned on the asphalt.
Dustin was holding his arm at a weird angle.
He was crying.
Shit, fuck, shit-fuck, shitting-fucking motherfucker. Steve jogged down the front steps, nearly tangling his feet and falling head over New Balances.
"What the Hell happened?!" The hard pavement sent an ache echoing through his knees as he dropped down a little faster than planned. He took one of Dustin's chubby little cheeks in hand, rubbing away a trail of hot tears with his thumb. "Hey, hey," he shushed, "What happened, huh?"
The other hand patted frantically around Dustin's head--over his crown, his temples. Steve could practically trace the places where his skull plates fused together by memory. By the grace of God, Dustin's perfect, fragile little melon seemed to have made it through unscathed.
"It was an accident!" Dustin blubbered, panting through the onslaught of tears, snot, and pained whines. Yeah, no shit it was an accident. Nobody wiped out and fucked their arm three ways to Hell on purpose.
Max sat behind him, brow furrowed and jaw clenched, rubbing her brother's shoulder softly. The color had drained from her face completely, and even her hair looked a little pale. "I told you it was stupid." Steve followed her eyes as they flickered to the fallen bike. There was a weathered jump rope tied just below the handlebars--and yeah, that was pretty stupid.
Dustin shot her a weak, watery glare. "It was your idea too!"
Steve held up a hand between them, cutting off the argument before it could start. "I don't care whose idea it was," he said, knowing it was probably both of them anyway, "I'm not mad--just..." He shifted on his knees and looked down at Dustin's cradled arm. "Show me."
Dustin squeezed his eyes shut and gingerly moved his good hand away. Even Max gasped. "Is it bad?" he whined, "Son of a bitch, Max--is it bad?!" And normally Steve would try to correct him, but the kid had just turned his arm into a crazy straw. He could use a swear word or two, as a treat.
"It's not"--Max swallowed hard-- "Bad...?"
It was fucking gnarly.
"Okay." Steve let out a long breath, hoping it would expel the heavy, twisted queasiness growing like wet vines in his stomach. "Okay...Max, just go inside and grab the keys." She didn't need to be told twice. Steve rubbed Dustin's back softly. "Let's get you up, come on."
After some trial and error, he finally managed to get Dustin on his feet and eventually in the car. It wasn't his scariest drive to Hawkins General, but it definitely wasn't a good one. The twins sat in guilty silence in the back seat, unable to even make eye contact. But as Dustin pressed his teary face to the cool window, Max put her hand on his knee.
The break wasn't as bad as it looked. Obviously it was still bad, Steve's kid broke his fucking arm--but it was what the ER called a simple fracture. One clean, easy-to-fix snap of the radius. No torn skin or muscle, no floating bone fragments. They wrapped Dustin's arm in a neon orange cast, and pretty much made his fucking year when they wrote a note excusing him from gym class for the next six to eight weeks.
Steve took them to Benny's for burgers, and even let Dustin order a chocolate milkshake because he felt so damn bad for him. ("It's good," he said after a few seconds of careful thought and exaggerated lip-smacking, "But your milkshakes are better.") Max picked at her dinner, uninterested in eating or talking. Steve half-expected her to check out the second Dustin hit the ground; the loud roar of a passing bus was enough to get her glassy-eyed and absent. But she'd managed to stay present and engaged. This wasn't about her, but Steve was still damn happy to see it.
He got Dustin situated in bed, all propped up with his cast covered in ice packs.
"This feels familiar," he said, picking up Dustin's Chewbacca and tucking it under his good arm, "Did we just do this? I feel like we just did this. Oh, yeah." He stuck out his finger and poked Dustin's chin. "These." He'd gotten his baby teeth yanked out in June, and spent a month and a half eating chocolate pudding and mashed potatoes. "Jesus, kid. You think you can go six months without needing urgent medical attention?"
Dustin grinned, and then leaned forward and bit down on Steve's finger with his gums.
curious....do you think the duffers are clever/strategic enough to earn credit for half of the theories this fandom has about the show? i keep thinking we're reading too much into stuff and they're kind of going with the flow more than they are elaborate geniuses but i feel like i'm the only one
the thing about the duffers is that they're fucking crazy. they put SO MUCH DETAIL into this show. prepare yourselves for an info dump because when it comes to this show i go full x-files. the fox mulder kinnie clown shoes are ON.
for example they use a lot of number symbolism. hopper comes home at 5:15 and 5 + 1 + 5 = 11. el takes the 422 bus down to meet kali. 4 + 2 +2 = 8.
they also use music as symbolism and will go as far as to be historically inaccurate in order to accomplish that. moby's "when it's cold i'd like to die", which plays both during eddie's death and when joyce and hopper find will in s1, didn't come out until 1995. and hmmm after that happened in s1, will became a SPY for vecna/henry/001 so like. hmmmmmmmmmm. what does it all mean.
another favorite music symbolism moment of mine is the use of duran duran's "girls on film" during the s2 halloween party. it's the night that steve and nancy fall apart, and johnathan swoops in; the first time stancy slept together, jonathan took a picture of her. SHE WAS HIS GIRL ON FILM.
there's even little details in the setting. like in eddie's room, he has a poster for iron maiden's somewhere in time and there's graffiti in the far right corner that says EDDIE LIVES.
there's also some pretty heavy kas symbolism in season 4? erica is painting a tiny figure of him. hopper uses a sword that looks almost identical to the sword of kas, and eddie uses a similar shield. also a few of eddie's tattoos all circle back to 001: the spider on his chest and the puppet master on his arm in particular. (ALSO important to note that the six bats on his arm were explicitly chosen to represent STEVE and his NUGGETS which makes me feel sick to my stomach.) he also has a vampire skull ring.
what i'm trying to get at is that I Want To Believe that the duffers are smart. i could wax poetic about every teeny tiny detail in this show for the rest of my life, and i want to believe that they're all very intentional. i totally understand thinking that they're just rolling with stuff, and that very well could be the case! i just really hope that it's not, bc otherwise WHY did they sprinkle in so many of these details? idk i feel crazy i'm foaming at the mouth.
divorced T4T stancy is actually something that can be so personal. to find someone who sees you, who really understands you. someone who you can exist around without worrying. someone you can unwind the too-tight bandages around, swim shirtless with at night when your parents aren't home, and know she thinks you're handsome. to be able to untuck, to breathe again, and to be in your vulnerable entirety and know that he loves every inch of you. even after they fall apart, steve clings to the idea of her, because he loves her, and because he's terrified of never finding someone else who gets it, someone who could actually see all of him and want to stay, and give him an RV full of six giggling children. he not only still loves her but sees her as the only person he can have a future with.
