Steve and Robin end up with some (comparatively) pretty long-lasting jobs as bartenders and for every drink, no matter how old the party gets, no matter how many times he's served them that night, Steve asks to see the party's IDs every time they get a drink.
Sometimes (especially in the beginning), just to annoy them, he'll scrutinize those IDs reallllll close, or sometimes he'll take one look and pretend its fake, promting a tired groan (payback for every tired groan Steve had over the years) before Steve 'checks' again and realizes oh! silly Steve, guess that birthday is right, crazy huh, you just look really young for your age. Anyway, you wanted that alcoholic beverage virgin right?
barista!eddie drawing a pentagram or whatever with the table cleaner while closing and accidentally summoning demon!steve, who's absolutely stoked to see a cozy little coffee shop for the first time
the song is "Chantilly Boy" by Starbenders, one of my favorite indie rock bands that my sibling introduced me to! i stayed up hella late one night to finish this in time for a contest on insta, only to find i apparently don't know how to tag properly so i didn't actually enter in time 😅 regardless, im so super happy with how it turned out!!
unfortunate theory, but i think season 5 stumbled into Steddie not because the duffers liked steddie but because they didn't have plans for steve outside of the love triangle (in part bc yknow he was never meant to survive)
like i remember an interview or something about s2 when steve and dustin are paired up for the first time, they mention its bc those characters kinda are left out of the other main plots. steves babysitter role was kinda born out of situation: they didn't kill him and thankfully weren't going to have him just disappear (rip argyle you deserved SO MUCH BETTER) so he got paired with dustin.
(and as a steve and dustin superfan i need to stress this isn't a dis at them, it was an accident so happy bob ross would weep tears of joy, im just talking about how it wasn't a plan for steves character before then)
and in season 5 we have not the same exact situation, but something similar, mostly in that robin has been drafted into the gay mentor role and while they do a little love triangle stuff, they can't make it all season long (or at least they didn't, thankfully). so that leaves his relationship with dustin, which has a lot to chew on with Eddie's death and dustins grief and that kinda sorta rivals thing they wanted to go for in s4.
getting hella speculative in a way i might not even agree with later, i just wonder if steve this season metatextually kinda duplicates dustins internal struggles because they weren't sure what else to do for him, mostly because at least with the canon-addressed cheating/jealousy vibes from season 1, steve doesn't handle it well. but they couldn't break up steve and dustin, Dustin is steves epilogue and it'd just really suck, so steve ends up in the same place as dustin: lashing out because he doesn't know how to handle the grief.
and im not saying it doesn't work, i LOVE it! immostly trying to figure out how they got here because steve hasn't really done this before and most notably, wasn't shown with nearly any negative emotion in the s4 epilogue. and i think this like meta theory makes sense. steve doesn't often get arcs *about* him, and the duffers don't seem to be trying to tell any story through him.
but thankfully, the unintended consequence of that is that they dumped a bakery's worth of crumbs onto one of the most popular ships in the fandom, one that had some of the lowest odds of being anything close to canon.
after NINE. HOURS. (NOT including meals and sleep) ITS FUCKING DONE.
A complete floorplan of the entire Harrington house. Including too much thought about random, throw-away lines from characters and squint-to-see-it background glimpses inside.
plently of stuff in the actual house is altered or straight up ignored in favor of following the fiction logic and because I Wanted To. A lot of this is motivated by my headcanons for the Harringtons and how I'm writing them in my fic, but I'm also certainly not an architect so it's by no means perfect. It is, however, unreasonably canon compliant in the few bits we do see.
Thought Process (for context):
the darker shaded floor areas are lower than the rest, some bits like the garages having stairs and some areas like the sun and dining rooms list being like a step lower. Windows are marked with dashes along the outside, sliding doors are two thin lines slightly overlapping, stairs change color as they diverge from the level we're looking at, and furniture is eyeballed so don't look to closely a the scale.
not all closets are labeled, just the ones i figured could be confusing. Steve and the guest rooms have closets i promise.
the laundry room and pantry are not the same size but by the time i noticed i was exhausted. so pretend they're both more reasonably sized.
i don't know what the floorplan symbol for garage door is and then i forgot to look so the headlights point to where the doors are and you can see them clearly in photos so yeah.
The general layout is based on the idea that the Harringtons are or were into hosting dinner parties and business meetings in their home, especially as a young rich couple looking for respect in their circles (Mr. Harrington taking on his father's business and reinforcing that power, Mrs. Harrington climbing her own social ladder and building an image).
So the house is laid out with hosting areas towards the right with the office big and near the dining room because it's more than just a workplace, it represents him as a businessman. In canon the entryway and living room both have very high ceilings and no second-floor above them, so I'd imagine they're also aware of how the top floor looks from below, hence the fancy double/french doors to the master bedroom which is in plain view from below. Steve's room and the guest room are's nearly as visible.
As for the kitchen and sun/pool rooms, I see them more as secondary hosting areas that aren't used as the main location most of the time and are more this background setting to these events that still feel rich. The kitchen is massive and mostly for dinner-parties and Mrs. Harrington's social events.
The kitchen and main bathroom's placement is based on a line Steve said to Barb giving her directions to the bathroom: "down past the kitchen, to the left". With the massive living room on the left and wanting to keep the dining and office close by, i interpreted the "to the left" part being like "find the kitchen, then turn left". And with the rest of the area being open-concept, the bathroom would be the only normal door over there and easy to find. it's a bit of a stretch with just that line, but it makes sense to me with the rest of the context for the layout.
the basement is similar to this, though not as openly displayed so I imagine its for slightly closer friends. Theres a garage door down there so I figured Mr. Harrington might have a cool car he shows off, like he's letting people in on a personal detail about himself. There's also a guest room down there (the only one still considered 100% for guests, more on that later) for those people.
beside the basement garage, there was originally one main garage that holds two cars, obvious Mr. and Mrs. Harrington's cars. I imagine they bought the house before having kids, so a third one wasn't on the mind but after having Steve they added the front one (either turning the carport into a closed garage or they never had a carport and added a whole new addition, up to you)
Both garages lead to the same part of the house, and that area is the only one besides the water heater room that is purely function over effect. It still looks good like the rest of the house but it's not made to be fancy because guests would rarely need to be over there if at all and it's not noteworthy from other parts of the house.
In my headcanon, Steve's room used to be a guest room, staying his room from nursery to present with Mrs. Harrington renovating every now and then. Its one of those places in the house that doesn't have to look perfect for all to see, so she gets creative and has fun with it.
The upstairs guest room is also unofficially Mrs. Harrington's room, based on a line where Tommy mentions a fireplace in "his mom's room" instead of "guest room" or "parent's room" or "master bedroom". I belatedly realized this could be a solidarity thing with Steve hating his dad and calling the master bedroom his mom's room, but that was after 9 hours of this and im not changing it but there you go. In this version, I imagine she leaves the master some nights because her marriage with Mr. Harrington is failing (cheating and all, I wouldn't want to be in the same bed with someone who cheated either)
the master bathroom was an executive decision, just looking at the house in canon and not having enough space in my first attempts, i decided the triangle roof part above the dining and office could fit a master bathroom.
Feel free to use or reference this in your own fics! Feel free to block out my furniture or walls and make your own version. If you share my image please credit with an @ mention!! (again, 9 hours) (thank you fhalsfhd)
(found this bad boy in my drafts and honestly i loved reading it again so we're gonna post it. wahoo)
my personal canon for post-starcourt stobin is that they're actually inseparable for the first month or so
im talking steve taken to the hospital for his injuries and the staff having to force them apart and call security. im talking they have to drag robin kicking and screaming to a different room because last time Steve left her sight he was dragged back lifeless and presumably dead (i firmly believe they intentionally used physical torture for steve and to use his condition for psychological torture for robin)
and steve waking up half-present in a cold plain room alone? might as well be back in the bunker. and if theres doctors trying to run tests and examine his wounds? might as well be Russian soldiers standing over him and touching his injuries. hurting him again. possibly planning to hurt Robin next.
and now hospital staff are trying to deal with two screaming desperate teenagers who keep begging for the other in between rambles of nonsense and they can't run tests or do their jobs or even get answers from them because all these two seem to care about is the other teen
so they don't really have any practical choices other than moving them to a combined room. and they still freak out every now and then but having the other in the room keeps these outbursts much shorter and doctors are able to actually run tests and help these kids as long as they're close together. And when Robins blood tests and everything come back ok and shes able to be discharged, shes given special permission to stay in the room at all times
and the two little kids that came in with them? they're not exactly freaking out quite like the teens but they're certainly not making things easy either. Ericas testing the willpower of any doctor or nurse she can speak to and both kids stay as close as they can at all times and refuse to leave the hospital. visiting hours over? they're in the waiting room, even convinced a couple to move so they can have seats closest to the hall that teens room is in. try to call their parents? good luck getting a full name or number out of them. once their parents do come get them they're showing back up in an hour, bikes lodged in the bike rack and back in their seats. they've been stopped for sneaking in several times and caught hiding under one of the teens beds even more often. eventually staff just gets tired of spending half their shift wrangling two middle schoolers and it becomes an unspoken agreement to just ignore them hiding in the room.
And once Steve is discharged its the same thing all over again. Robins parents were worried about her spending all her time in the hospital with the boy from her summer job, but given the cover story about the fire and the pair getting trapped inside they convinced themselves its reasonable to want to stay by your friends side while they recover
but now that hes out, shes asking if she can spend the night at his house? and his parents won't be there? absolutely not. except robins in no mindset to accept leaving him alone for this long let alone overnight so she tried sneaking out to bike over to his before he can get the dumb idea to drive over in the middle of the night post-concussion. but the buckleys notice shes gone either because she makes too much noise sneaking out or they notice the severe lack of Robin-trying-to-be-quiet noises into the night (robin my tism queen definitely has bump-into-shit syndrome in the middle of the night but she also doesn't make any noise sneaking around the base with scoops troop so i think it's a 50/50 weather she can use the adrenaline to sneak out to see steve quietly)
so they put two and two together and drive over to the Harrington house. steve answers the door and calls robin over, both of them looking sheepish but not exactly guilty. they talk on steves couch (yes Steves there too) and stobin does their best to explain their separation anxiety that gets the severity across without getting them sent to a mental hospital all while making sure not to break any ndas (which ends up being a long conversation with stobin trying to translate their experience in the bunker to fit the cover story well enough, which is very different when the real story is kidnapping and the fake one is a building fire)
eventually they reach an understanding of "we're worried this is kinda unhealthy but its clearly more stressful to try and separate you right now and we're definitely not going to be able to stop you" so they compromise to let steve stay at the buckleys for a little bit so they can at least keep an eye on them. at first they try just letting steve sleep on the couch (which they agree to because steve worried about overstepping as the guest in their house) but one or both of them have nightmares the first night and robin ends up on the couch with him anyway.
after a few nights they get the gist of the stobin dynamic: attached so strongly its concerning but nothing... flirty. anything they do is always completely innocent. hand holding with no heart eyes, banter with no tension, hell even sharing a bed they resemble little kids in a sleepover pile more than lovers. and especially after nightmares they'll find robin holding steve like hes just one of her old teddy bears.
of course theyre still cautious and have their suspicions that theyre secretly dating and just really good at hiding it, they're paranoid parents after all and robins never shown this much attention to a boy ever. but they do relax a bit with it as they're more confident theres no... funny business.. going on. or at the very least nothing thats going to leave robin hurt. they'll have their talks and robin will promise its "nothing like that", but they've grown to like steve so they're sure robin will come to them when shes ready.
now if only there was a reasonable explanation for the middle schoolers that keep showing up. apparently they were also trapped in the fire with robin and steve which helps make some sense of it, but they also sat with them in the hospital. surely if they're having nightmares about the fire they'd go to their parents? they hadn't really talked much with the sinclairs but they seemed like very loving parents and robin follows steve to his little dinners with mrs Henderson pretty often so its not likely that they can't go to their parents about nightmares, but they seem to prefer going to steve specifically. like ringing the Buckley's doorbell at 1 in the morning asking if steves there. and of course they'll let them in and show them to robins room (after calling their parents first, do they even know their childs run off?) where steve was sleeping in a pallet on the floor but is now a glorified blanket pile robins hugging. on her bed, of course. because god forbid theres 2 feet of space between them.
and the kid just joins them in their sleepover pile, dustin usually clinging to steves other side like a baby koala and erica usually finding a spot leaning against robin or occasionally making room in between them
and so more often than not the Buckley's have not one, not two, but three extra children in their house that isn't their daughter, all of them sleeping in a pile on robins bed like theres nowhere else they'd rather be
rewatching season 2 very closely and i never realized how Steve's like. always willing to listen to the kids. he's constantly hearing them out and always treats their ideas as worth trying to understand
when mikes going on about bob and the demodog army, steve asks a little 'what do you mean' to get him to elaborate. even as they're running around talking about shadow monsters and referencing a drawing and 'what Mr Clarke taught us' he's actively following along, asking questions when he's confused and keeping up with where they're going. they definitely sound like kids still when talking in s2, and they absolutely still look like kids (Steve's like half a foot taller than most of them still) and yet it doesn't sound like hes talking to kids, he's just talking normal
and i feel like a lot of us forget because that dynamic is so different in season 4, but all the kids and especially dustin have no problem explaining their thoughts. s2 ep8 has a lot of this specifically. Mike and Dustin both elaborate on any questions like its nothing, no groans or exasperation. Hell, Dustin loves using big words and explanations and a running bit is that he keeps over-explaining things to other characters like max and hopper. but steve and the kids are on equal ground, no one's acting like anyone's incapable even while they argue
and he treats all their ideas 100% seriously, even the more out-there dnd talk. and he even looks at Hopper funny when he won't take Dustins mind flayer theory seriously
first: following along with Dustin, looking at him seriously
second: hoppers annoyed, saying it can't help because it's a kids game
third: dustin's rebuttal, a glimpse of Steve's face, mouth open looking at hopper. this screenshot looks like weird looking, but you see the differences. hes notably changed expression looking at hop
and fourth: dustin continuing to talk to hopper while steve looks back down at the book.
he's just so important to the group, both in a genre sense (because how many things go wrong in movies because nobody will listen to the kids) and in a group dynamic (it makes sense that he's popular, he seems to be the kinda person to include everyone in conversations and actually listen to them)
watching steve and dustin clips from season 2 and i never realized how they just take turns being chill vs unhinged. like i think the moments where Dustin's going off and Steve's just sitting there are pretty commonly acknowledged, but there are just as many moments where Steve is just. wack. and Dustin is the straight-man telling him to chill
like waking up in the car obviously is one, but also stuffing the demodog corpse in the Byers' fridge? Steves shoving it in there like "dude help mE OUt" "yea sure.💁 what do i do🧍" "the dOor man tHE DOOR" "yeah ok i got the door😌👍"
also my personal favorite: in the bus Steve figuring out Dustin liked Max and going all wink wink nudge nudge and Dustin's like "why are you winking, Steve? stop."
best dynamic, just listen to the shit Dustin says quietly in response to Steve because its actually gold just hidden in blink-and-you'll-miss-it moments
