Being a dad is something he's always wanted. Call it a cliche, right, the all-American, golden boy who's caught up in the idea of four to six snot-nosed brats looking up to him as they try to make sense of all the big and small things because they have no other choice. You only get one dad, right?
He images them, crawling and then walking and then sprinting through the same ancient, brand-new stages of life. Six months, learning the kitchen-magic of how their fingers and toes bend on command. A year, stumbling Jello-legged down a hallway. Fifteen, slamming their bedroom door only to rush, crying, into Steve's arms when he works up the courage to rap his knuckles on the wood like the dad from Full House.
Maybe. It's all Steve's ever wanted. More than that signed Nicks basketball his own dad sent for him when he was twelve. More than Nancy Wheeler. More than his need for mountains, and oceans, and something else.
But then he meets Billy, and it's like all that other shit goes away for a while. None of it disappears, really, but he's got something to focus on, now. Something to work toward, with someone, and that makes it worse, in a way.
Billy finally lets him fuck, and Steve lays in bed that night with an irritatingly awful douchebag drooling a spot onto his chest, and Steve thinks. Knows--
Look, he won't admit it on the first fuck, but this is it for him. He wants to buy this dude house, and he wants wedding rings around the fat and bone of both their fingers, and. He wants babies, with Billy.
Aches Billy to love him.
He wants a life with this asshole. The whole nine. Steve runs his hand through Billy's hair and falls asleep imagining family Christmases, and vacations, and the fragile, shining hope that Billy will wake up tomorrow and swear that he's in love. That Steve is who he's waited 19 years for. That to each other, they'll always belong.
Obviously, that doesn't happen. Maybe.
If it does Steve wouldn't know, because Billy's not a lunatic. He's gone before the sky's fully blue. Leaves his phone number scrawled on the corner of Steve's mirror in Sharpie.
Steve's in love.
So. Immediately, he wants the impossible, but mostly, he just wants Billy. And by some giant, invisible, choking miracle he gets Billy. His body first, and then his thoughts. His laugh, genuine and biting and whole. Billy shares his memories, like pieces of bread dropped in water for hungry birds, for Steve. Achingly slow, he tells his hopes, his dreams, and.
Eventually, one night with his head on Steve's chest he says, "You terrify me. I never want it to end."
So. It's basically love.
Steve's a loose canon when it comes to this feeling. Pedal to the medal, he shoots through walls with bright red booming firepower until everything is cracked and bleeding and open around them. Until there's room enough to say, "I love you, move in with me."
So, Billy does. Impossible.
Wonderful and joking, even though it's not a joke when Steve's parents meet him on move in day and Steve's dad is thrilled that Billy knows shit about cars, and Steve's mom likes that Billy has a weathered recipe book that was, "passed down from my grandma, back in California," for her to find a place for in their tiny, warm kitchen while she unpacks.
"He's very nice," Steve's mother says, "Respectful. Handsome." In that same wistful, sleepy tone that she used when she first called Nancy wheeler sweet. Beautiful.
"He's a fine young man, son," Steve's dad tells him. "Try not to run him off."
Steve watches them reverse from the ratty, rocky, untamed driveway, with his heart in his throat. Imagines the day he and Billy will leave their kids, supported and loved fiercely, to make that wobbly step toward the brush-fire shore of their lives.
--
Steve's plan for the future lives and breathes in a small, tucked-away corner in his mind for months. He nearly chokes to death on it, several times a day, watching Billy relax into his routine.
Billy cooks dinner every night. They eat on the couch in their boxers, dishes left on the coffee table until Billy kisses him awake in the blue light of the television, "Let's go to bed, baby," he says. Steve always notices that the plates and cups are cleared away, the living room tidy for the dawn.
Billy buys a shovel and digs two holes in their patchy backyard. Steve watches him from the kitchen window, wondering what the cavities will grow with the start of spring.
Billy plants a clothesline. "My mom used to dry our clothes this way," He says, when Steve raises an eyebrow. He tacks sheets and sweaters to sway in the sunlight. Talks about laying a patio out there, so they can grill for people when it's warm.
Steve gets hard from the image of himself, in an apron, grilling hot dogs and hamburgers for their friends, first, and kids. Someday. A total dad.
--
Billy makes use of his library card and checks out every book about homesteading he can find. He learns about gardening, and bricklaying, and how to buff gashes out of hardwood floors. For his birthday, Billy hints at a Better Homes and Gardens subscription.
When Steve forks out the cash and the May issue arrives in the mail two months later, Billy presses a hasty kiss to his forehead and disappears onto the porch. He spends his Sunday afternoons with sticky notes and an overused ballpoint pen from that moment on, circling things that have no rhyme or reason, to Steve.
--
They've been living in their house for six months when Billy says, suddenly, "We should see if we can buy it." Like he's been planning his own version of their future.
It's Sunday, and he's just come up for air from Better Homes and Gardens. There's a cheese plate in his hands. He's parked by the front door, on his way out, looking startled as if the words escaped from a caged area buried deep inside of him.
"Huh?" Steve's more of the lay-around-and-rot-in-his-underwear-on-Sunday's type. He's eating ice cream out of the container, distracted by something Barney Fife says. He laughs.
"We should buy the place," Billy tells him.
Steve blinks, "The house?"
"It's our house," Billy says delicately, with all the weight of the world resting on him.
Steve looks up from the television set, shocked that Billy's hair is wet in some places and drying in others. As if he was being groomed by some large, impatient cat. He peers around Billy, out the screen door. "Is it raining?"
"Sprinkling," Billy says, "I have an umbrella."
"Your magazine's gonna get wet."
"I'm reading The Grapes of Wrath," Billy tells him, pulling a weathered copy out from under his cheese plate.
"Sure, but if the rain picks up, your book--"
"--The characters could use a little water," Billy says, "They're trapped in the dust bowl."
"I'm in love with you," Steve says. Like it's the first time he's ever admitted something like this out loud. So it's a surprise. "I like that you read. I like that you talk about everything like it's real."
Billy pads over to the couch and knocks Steve's legs apart. He settles on the arm of the thing, cold, wet toes pressing into Steve's thigh. Steve winces, sputtering when Billy feeds him a slice of American cheese wrapped in bologna.
He chews. Swallows. "I need to make more money, baby."
"Why," Billy asks, feeding himself.
"Because," Steve chokes on the next round Billy feeds him, heart soaring when Billy smiles, "Because if we're gonna lay a patio and grill for our friends I want to make sure you have decent ingredients."
"I don't mind the cheap stuff."
"You deserve better," Than what I can provide, Steve doesn't say.
Billy shrugs, feeding him another round of cheese and meat. "Well, if we're following through with the patio and the grill--"
"--And a porch awning," Steve says, feeding Billy a slice of cheese, "I'm adding that to the list. You can’t read your book and eat snacks while holding a fucking umbrella over your head."
Billy stares at him, swallowing and red cheeked. "I think any sort of permanent installment has to be cleared through the landlord."
Steve thinks about it, humming low when Billy slips off the armrest and settles, heavily, into his lap. "So, we buy the place."
"I need a better job, too."
"We'll look when the paper comes tomorrow."
They lapse into silence, eating cheese and bologna until it's gone, then they move to the ice cream Steve was working his way through, chuckling at The Andy Grifith Show.
It starts pouring rain, little hammers falling on the roof until the power flickers. "I want to make this house nice for you," Billy says.
Steve looks at him. "It's already nice."
"It could be better," Billy says, fiddling with the hair on Steve's chest. "We could have a garden. And I think the beige walls are boring as shit, we need to get some wallpaper. Or paint, or something."
"What else should we do?"
Billy shrugs, "The kitchen needs a rug. I saw this book at the library about how old men in Russia and China and shit learn to weave rugs on giant wooden looms. Some of them have seaters, and others hang them from the ceiling. Your car needs a new power steering pump--"
"--Sounds like you need a shed."
"Yeah, I guess so," Billy says. He grins, and then his brows furrow. "But. Steve, I want to build us a life, here. I want to start my life with you, I don't want to wait until we move to something we own, because I like this house, and I feel like when we start to grow our family, we can--"
Steve's heart stops beating.
His vision tunnels, all his focus collapsing on the words Billy says. Phrases that sound wonderful and impossible, all knitting together to equal nurseries built from two-by-four.
Billy stares at him cheeks red. "Sorry, I know we haven't talked about any of this. I get excited."
"I'm in love with you," Steve tells him, breathless.
"I know, dumbass, I'm in love with you."
Steve kisses him. Pulls away. "You really wanna buy a house?"
"Yeah. Not a house, this house."
"You wanna have my babies?"
Billy tugs on his chest hair, grinning when Steve yelps. "Maybe you wanna have my babies, instead."
"Sure," Steve tells him immediately, "Yeah, anything you want."
"I'm going back onto the porch," Billy says, "We'll start with the job listings in the paper."
Steve watches him go. Thinks he could be alright at this, being a husband and a father. Someday.
My first Fursuit Friday in my new condo! I still have a lot of unpacking to do but its starting to feel more and more like my home <3. Im so excited to start this chapter of my life.
"There that's the last box all done!" Steve said placing the last of the dishware away in the cupboard.
"Eds, did you finish unpacking our clothes?" He called down the hallway to the bedroom. Eddie came out the door and wrapped Steve up in a hug. "Even folded them nicely, we, my dear Stevie, are officially moved in."
It had taken months of saving from both their works, cutting down on eating out, being firmer with the kids' arcade limits but finally they'd saved up enough to put a down payment on a small little house on the edge of Hawkins. Far away from any nosy people that wanted to bang on their door about the devil.
"You know what that means right?"
"We can break in that new mattress we splurged on?"
Steve blushed and playfully slapped Eddie's shoulder, "No! Well, yes, but later, now we get to open the fun boxes."
"The fun box under the bed?"
"Edward!"
"What baby, Wayne is already dropping the kids off, we're finally alone in our home."
The way Eddie said our home made Steve's heart flutter but he was on a mission.
"No, first we gotta put up the Christmas decorations. It's only a week away after all, we're basically behind in Christmas cheer."
Eddie smiled and gave Steve a kiss on the cheek, "I'm going to be dreaming of boxes for weeks."
Switching on the Christmas tree lights for the very first time in their new home felt magical. The soft yellow light spilled through the room, bathing the boys in its glow. Eddie wrapped his arms around the back of Steve as they admired their handiwork.
Characters/Pairings: Luka Couffaine, Marinette Dupain-Cheng; Luka Couffaine/Marinette Dupain-Cheng
Rating: Mature
Summary: It’s their first morning in their brand new flat, and Luka’s just trying to be romantic and surprise his girlfriend with breakfast in bed.
Author’s Notes/Warnings: I was watching The Woman in the Yard, and I lost it at the breakfast scene. It just smacked of Luka “Can’t Cook” Couffaine, so of course I told Laurel, who enabled a title and hey. Once you have a title, you have to do it, right? 😂
(The rating is a low M/high T at best; things are alluded to, and Marinette’s not really dressed yet, but nothing actually happens. Still. Boobies.)
“He’s a Good Egg”
Marinette didn’t want to wake up.
She was warm, and comfortable, and still kind of exhausted from the day before.
…and still pleasantly sore from the night before.
Her lips curled into a little smile at that thought, and she pressed her face deeper into her pillow. If she took a deep enough breath, she could still just barely catch the scent of her bedpartner – her new housemate – on the pillowcase.
…which was impossible, she knew, because the pillows and linens were still new and freshly unpacked and smelled more like the plastic they’d been wrapped in than her or Luka yet, but if she closed her eyes and took a deep enough breath and ignored the chemically scent she could pretend…
