11 for the soft sentence starter for hellcheer, if you’re so inclined. 😘
I got multiple asks for this one, so I hope it's good!
11. "You make me want things I didn't think I deserved."
Ten years ago, grinning as best as she could at her high school graduation, there were about a million things Chrissy never would have thought she'd have to do by twenty-eight years old.
The biggest thing, of course, was picking up the pieces of her shattered life and starting over from scratch. Yet, at twenty-five, she had to do just that.
The haphazard marriage she'd jumped into with her high school boyfriend had been fractured for some time. Two people who were barely compatible as teenagers couldn't, unfortunately, continue faking their way through the rest of their lives. But it all came crumbling down when Chrissy found him in bed with his assistant.
She had said nothing. Done nothing in the moment, even as Jason cried and begged and the girl scrambled to shield herself. She'd just left, gone back to their house the next day while he was at work, packed up her car with everything that would fit, and had the divorce papers sent to him from the guest bedroom of her friend Abby's house across town.
Jason, at least, didn't throw a fit or attempt to fight, which honestly surprised her. Instead, he gave her everything she asked for in the divorce decree, bought her out of her half of the house, and only attempted to reach her a half-dozen times through their lawyers before letting it lie.
With the slight monetary cushion from the house, plus Chrissy's savings account, she picked a destination at random and drove.
From Indianapolis all the way to Philadelphia. Her tears dotting the pavement beneath her tires in drips of dark gray that left her feeling hollowed-out and exhausted. Like her skin was too small for her bones, let alone the organs tucked beneath.
Once there, she rented the smallest one-bedroom apartment she could find and found a lovely job at a little used bookstore working morning shifts. Slowly, carefully picking up all those broken pieces of herself and reaffixing them to the stained-glass puzzle of her soul, mindful of the sharp edges.
It took work, but slowly, ever so slowly, she started to find joy in small mundanity again.
The next thing she never considered as a possibility at eighteen years old just happened to walk through the front door of that same bookstore about six months after she started working there.
She was shelving a cart of books in the science-fiction section, double-checking the names of each author, when the check-out clerk at the front gave an enthusiastic, "Well hey! Don't normally see you in this time of day!"
"Yeah," the voice answered, deep and obviously smiling. It made Chrissy stop, her ears straining, though she had absolutely no idea why. "Got a late one tonight, so I figured I'd stop in before the studio and see if you got any new King."
The check-out clerk, the wife of the owner of the store, hummed thoughtfully.
"Not sure about any new King," she answered. "But, oh, we did get a few copies from Tanith Lee over in sci-fi. Rare finds."
"Sweet. Thanks, Madge. Hey, Stan still treating you right? You let me know, yeah? I would love to steal you away."
"Gosh, Eddie, don't make an old woman blush!"
Chrissy, staring down at the book in her hands without comprehending the title or author, suddenly had the strangest thought.
It can't be---?
"Oh, shit, sorry, didn't mean to scare---" The voice, that had just rounded the corner and made her jump, suddenly broke off as Chrissy's gaze whipped up. Brown eyes, widened with shock and framed in thick lashes, looked back at her.
Familiar brown eyes.
"Chrissy Cunningham?" Eddie Munson asked, his voice seventeen different layers of disbelief. Calling her by a name she hardly recognized anymore. Mouth parting with her own surprise, Chrissy just stared. Uncomprehending. Impossible.
What is he doing here, of all places?
"Uh---"
"Sorry," she said, tossing the books back onto the cart and turning around.
"Hey---"
She was already gone. Shoving her way through the doorway into the back room and slamming it behind her. Taking a few slow, deep breaths to quell the rapid pounding of her heart.
She knew - because everyone back in Hawkins knew - that Eddie had left Hawkins the night of graduation. As she cheesed her way through a thousand photos with Jason and friends she, by and large, no longer spoke to, Eddie took maybe three pictures for the benefit of his uncle and strung his graduation gown, spray painted with the words 'Fuck You, Higgins', up on the flagpole before taking off.
Chrissy, out of her own curiosity, had asked around where Eddie was heading, but no one knew.
Now, apparently, she did. He'd been in Pennsylvania all this time.
And, worse than that, he looked good. Comfortable. Happy. Like he'd never known how it felt to have skin too small for his bones. For whatever insane reason, this only made her feel more wrung out. A prime example of graceless aging. Every time she looked in the mirror, all she saw were dark circles and fine lines.
It took indeterminable strength to get up that following morning and go to work.
As the first hours of her shift passed quietly, Chrissy thought maybe she was in the clear. From what, exactly, she couldn't say, but her shoulders gradually began to fall as the repetitive tasks of her job kept her hands busy.
Then, around two o'clock in the afternoon, another customer rang the bell when they entered the front door. Chrissy, posted at the counter, turned to greet them.
And stopped.
Because of course. Of course it was Eddie. Cool, casual, easy Eddie, strutting around like he'd never known even a moment of social discomfort.
"Hey, Cunningham," he said, not even attempting to pretend he hadn't returned explicitly for her. Using the name she'd shed almost four years prior. "What, uh. What's up?"
Chrissy blinked. Tried to force a smile that felt like she was stretching her cheeks around drying concrete, lips firmly sealed to prevent it from dripping inside her mouth.
"Oh, not much," she replied, ash and debris slipping past her teeth with every word. "Just, um. Working. H-How are you, Eddie?"
"Y'know, I figured you remembered me by the way you, uh, bolted, like I'd killed your cat or something. Nice to hear you say my name, though. I didn't, right?"
"Didn't what?"
"Kill your cat?" He shrugged, leaning against the counter. "Like, I'm a fan of animals, but Jesus. You ran so fast. Or I thought maybe I'd died and you saw my ghost or something."
Chrissy snorted. And, just like that, the awkwardness in the air cleared. Becoming something tangible, something honest between them.
They talked through most of the rest of her shift. He asked how long she'd been in Philly, how she was liking it, how she'd ended up there. Which. Yeah. She'd expected Eddie to apologize for her broken heart, but instead, he had laughed.
Loudly. Openly. Easily. Dramatically rolling his eyes so hard it made his head whip back, hair becoming a crazy halo around his head, Eddie groaned.
"I knew Carver was a dumbass, but holy shit. Cannot believe he'd do that to you, of all people. Motherfucker doesn't know what he had, clearly."
Chrissy blushed.
After work, they wandered through a nearby park together. Eddie literally kicking stones off the sidewalk as they continued their conversation, where Chrissy got to ask the questions that plagued her mind.
He'd been in Philly since graduation. The band thing hadn't worked out, he admitted, but he had a great job at a recording studio playing guitar in a booth and helping bands write their albums. On the side, he writes. Just for magazines right now, he said, but he was working on his first novel.
"And you actually enjoy that?" she asked, disbelief coloring her tone in strange hues. Eddie looked at her, brow furrowed, as she elaborated. "I just mean, like. You were, um. You were so intent on being a big star, right? That was your dream?"
"I mean, yeah, it was," he stressed. "But, y'know, we're older now. Or, well, I am. You, uh, look exactly the same. If we weren't walking around during the day I'd accuse you of vampirism. But, no, it was my dream. And then things changed. And now this is my dream."
Clearly, Chrissy didn't seem convinced, because Eddie galloped a few steps ahead of her and stopped her trek with his body.
"Dreams are allowed to change, y'know? I mean, you don't have the same dreams now you did when you were eighteen, do you?"
That pulled her up short. Making her blink down at the cracked pavement beneath the soles of her tennis shoes as she racked her brain.
"I, um. I'm not sure. I can't--- I can barely even remember what my dreams were. I was so wrapped up in Jason's for so long, I just..."
"Well," Eddie began in the wake of Chrissy trailing off. Smacking his lips together, he shrugged and bowed at the waist. "What if that's your dream? Figuring out what your dreams are?"
"Sounds a little silly."
"Well c'mon, Chrissy, you gotta embrace silliness if you're gonna survive this life! Everything's fucked up." He winked at her, and Chrissy felt an entire swarm of butterflies suddenly spring to life in her stomach. "What's this world without a little fuckin' whimsy, y'know?"
He came by during her shifts every day that week. When he finally, finally asked her to dinner, entirely unafraid of her edges, Chrissy couldn't help but smile when she said yes.
Eddie was incredible. Kind and funny and handsome and talented. All those little things she'd sort of assumed, way back when he was the mean-and-scary metalhead in school that she was warned to stay away from. Now, she was able to traverse all the alleyways of his personality without fear of being judged or ridiculed for her interest. Unapologetically, she took Eddie's hand and marveled over the fact that her bones and his seemed to fit so well together. That skin and skin could touch without feeling hollow or stretched thin. That she no longer looked in the mirror and saw all of her flaws, but instead all the beautiful things Eddie traced with soft, careful fingertips at all hours of the night.
She loved him. She loved him so much, she couldn't even lament over the time they'd wasted not being together. Because dreams change, as Eddie had said, and Chrissy wasn't sure she could have appreciated him as she did now back in high school.
What if you're my dream?
The last thing Chrissy ever expected herself to be doing at twenty-eight years old was getting ready to walk back into Hawkins High for a ten-year reunion she hadn't actually planned to attend. Not until Eddie picked up the invitation off her pile of mail and laughed so hard he had tears streaming down his cheeks.
"We gotta go," he'd insisted. "C'mon, sweetness, we gotta."
They'd flown to Indianapolis, rented a car, and driven up into Hawkins the night before. Staying with Eddie's uncle, a lovely man Chrissy had met a few times in their two years together.
Then, hand in hand, they stood outside of the gymnasium doors as Chrissy took deep, intentional breaths. Knowing all those people she hadn't spoken to in years would be past the threshold, dancing along to the top 40 playlist from their graduation year as it pumped through the speakers.
"Ready?"
"As I'll ever be," Chrissy agreed, squeezing Eddie's hand tightly. Unable to keep the grin from her lips when he squeezed back, groaning like she'd hurt him with her strength.
Of course, everyone stared. Everyone started whispering. Chrissy the cheerleader and Eddie the Freak? like they were stuck in this world where they were reduced to who they'd been in high school.
Five years ago, it might've grated on Chrissy. To be reduced to something so elementary.
Now, she just laughed. And maybe that was part of her dream, too.
Eddie didn't let her get caught up in the awkward stares or gossipy whispers. He didn't let her look at her ex-husband across the room, his arm around his new wife as Jason openly gawked at the pair of them. He grabbed her by the waist and practically hauled her onto the dance floor; a place for which he was wholly unequipped. As rhythmic and exponential as his guitar playing was, Eddie couldn't dance for anything.
That made it so much more fun.
A few songs later, after she dragged Eddie around and proudly introduced him as her boyfriend to anyone who attempted to speak to them, Time After Time by Cyndi Lauper slowed down the entire party, and Chrissy once more pulled Eddie onto the dance floor.
He held her close. Leaning over her until he could intentionally make his hair tickle her cheeks. Chrissy wrinkled her nose, shaking his hair out of her face and staring up at him.
"Having a good time, sweetness?" he asked, his voice soft. Something reserved for the two of them.
"More fun than I thought," she admitted. "It's been the silliest day, hasn't it?"
"What did I say? Life ain't shit without a bit of whimsy."
"I just..." Sighing, Chrissy leaned into his chest. Letting him guide her through a slow sway that was still somehow uncoordinated. "After everything that's happened the past few years, I just... You make me want things I didn't think I deserved, Eddie. You, um. You make me so happy."
"Yeah?" She nodded, resting her chin on his sternum and looking up at him. Eddie tilted his face down, resting his forehead against hers as they held each other. "Aw, shucks, baby. You know how to make a guy blush, don't you?"
Giggling, Chrissy shrugged.
"Only the guy that's made himself into my new dream, I think."
"Please. You'd have half the guys in here blushing if you gave 'em the time of day." Stealing a kiss from her lips, Eddie looked at her for a long moment. "Don't, uh, do that, though. I don't, y'know, have much of a jealous streak, but. Let's not test those limits."
Chrissy laughed, letting Eddie guide her off the dance floor.
"You ready to blow this popsicle stand?" he asked as they wandered back toward the table where they'd left her purse and his jacket. Chrissy nodded, taking his hand. They'd hardly been there an hour, but it was just long enough for Chrissy to get her fill of Hawkins for the rest of forever.
They didn't say goodbye to anyone. Even after Jason called her name on their way out.
As they rushed down the steps outside, Chrissy suddenly had a thought. Pulling Eddie to a stop, she gave him a curious look.
"Why did you want to come to this so bad? You hate Hawkins."
"Yeah, but," he said, clicking his tongue. "Maybe I just wanted to say I got to dance with Chrissy Cunningham in the high school gym, finally. Don't knock a guy's dreams, sweetness."
"Cunningham isn't even my name anymore."
"Nah," Eddie said, stepping toward her. "Could, uh, be 'Munson', though. If, y'know, you wanted."
"It--- What?"
"If you were so inclined."
"Eddie---"
"As a possibility."
"Oh, my God, shut up for a second," she laughed, pressing both of her hands over his mouth to quell the incessant chatter that spilled from his lips. Staring at him, at the utter sincerity in his gaze, before slowly pulling her hands away. "Are you, um. A-Are you serious?"
"About you?" Eddie pulled her into him. "Serious as a necromancing lich with unlimited access to the underdark." Before she could answer him, Eddie swept her up in yet another kiss that stole her breath. "You make me want things I never thought I'd deserve, too, y'know. Not alone in all that pining, baby, I swear it."
A slow grin bloomed across her cheeks, like a sunflower waking for those first rays of morning. Eddie mirrored it, highlighting the laugh lines around his eyes that Chrissy traced with her thumbs.
"'Chrissy Munson', huh?" she asked. Eddie's grin brightened, eyes brimming with affection as he looked at her.
"Got a nice ring to it, if you ask me."
"Yeah. I think so, too."
send me a soft sentence starter!
