#platypan

[platypanthewriter]

Finally updated!

New chapter!  4/who knows really

[writingwithcolor]

I'm writing an AU of a movie that takes place in the 1880s USA, where a travelling white character and a Jewish character are waylaid by Native Americans, who they befriend. Probably because it was written by and about PoC (Jews) the scene actually avoids the stuff on your Native American Masterpost, but I'd still like to do better than a movie made in the 1980's, and I feel weird cutting them from the plot entirely. I have a Jewish woman reading it for that, but are there any things you (1/1)

2/2 1880s western movie ask--are there things you'd LIKE to see in a movie where a white man and a Jewish man run into Native Americans in the 1880s? I do plan to base them on a real tribe (Ute, probably) and have proper housing/clothes and so forth, but right now I'm just trying to avoid or subvert awful cowboy movie tropes. Any ideas?

White and Jewish Men, Native American interactions in 1880s

I am vaguely concerned with how you only cite one of our posts about Native Americans, that was not written by a Native person, and do not cite any of the posts relating to this time period, or any posts relating to representation in media. 

Sidenote: if you want us to give accurate reflections of the media you’re discussing, please tell us the NAME. I cannot go look up this movie based off this description to give you an idea of what my issues are with this scene, and must instead trust that the representation is good based off your judgement. I cannot make my own judgement. This is a problem. Especially since your whole question boils down to “this scene is good but not great and I want it to be great. How can I do that?”

Your baseline for “good” could very well be my baseline for “terrible hack job”. I can’t give you the proper education required for you to be able to accurately evaluate the media you’re watching for racist stereotypes if you don’t tell me what you’re even working with.

When you’re writing fanfic where the media is directly relevant to the question, please tell us the name of the media. We will not judge your tastes. We need this information in order to properly help you.

Moving on.

I bring up my concern for you citing that one—exceptionally old—post because it is lacking in many of the tropes that don’t exist in the media critique field but exist in the real world. This is an issue I have run into countless times on WWC (hence further concern you did not cite any other posts) and have spoken about at length. 

People look at the media critique world exclusively, assume it is a complete evaluation of how Native Americans are seen in society, and as a result end up ignoring some really toxic stereotypes and then come to the inbox with “these characters aren’t abc trope, so they’re fine, but I want to rubber stamp them anyway. Anything wrong here?”. The answer is pretty much always yes. 

Issue one: “Waylaid” by Native Americans

This wording is extremely loaded for one reason: Native American people are seen as tricksters, liars, and predators. This is the #1 trope that shows up in the real world that does not show up in media critique. It’s also the trope I have talked about the most when it comes to media representation, so you not knowing the trope is a sign you haven’t read the entirety of the Native tag—which is in the FAQ as something we would really prefer you did before coming at us to answer questions. It avoids us having to re-explain ourselves.

Now, hostility is honestly to be expected for the time period the movie is set in. This is in the beginnings (or ramping up) of residential schools in America* and Canada, we have generations upon generations of stolen or killed children, reserves being allocated perhaps hundreds of miles from sacred sites, and various wars with Plains and Southwest peoples are in full force (Wounded Knee would have happened in 1890, in December, and the Dakoa’s mass execution would have been in 1862. Those are just the big-name wars. There absolutely were others). 

*America covers up its residential schools abuse extremely thoroughly, so if you try to research them in the American context you will come up empty. Please research Canada’s schools and apply the same abuse to America, as Canada has had a Truth and Reconciliation Commission about residential schools and therefore is more (but not completely) transparent about the abuse that happened. Please note that America’s history with residential schools is longer than Canada’s history. There is an extremely large trigger warning for mass child death when you do this research.

But just because the hostility is expected does not mean that this hostility would be treated well in the movie. Especially when you consider the sheer amount of tension between any Native actors and white actors, for how Sacheen Littlefeather had just been nearly beaten up by white actors at the 1973 Academy Awards for mentioning Wounded Knee, and the American Indian Religious Freedom Act had only been passed two years prior in 1978. 

These Native actors would not have had the ability to truly consent to how they were shown, and this power dynamic has to be in your mind when you watch this scene over. I don’t care that the writers were from a discriminated-against background. This does not always result in being respectful, and I’ve also spoken about this power imbalance at length (primarily in the cowboy tag).

Documentaries and history specials made in the 2010s (with some degree of academic muster) will still fall into wording that harkens Indigenous people to wolves and settlers as frightened prey animals getting picked off by the mean animalistic Natives. This is not neutral, or good. This is perpetuating the myth that the settlers were helpless, just doing their own thing completely unobtrusively, and then the evil territorial Native Americans didn’t want to share.

To paraphrase Batman: if I had a week I couldn’t explain all the reasons that’s wrong.

How were these characters waylaid by the Native population? Because that answer—which I cannot get because you did not name the media—will determine how good the framing is. But based on the time period this movie was made alone, I do not trust it was done respectfully.

Issue 2: “Befriending”

I mentioned this was in an intense period of residential schools and land wars all in that area. The Ute themselves had just been massacred by Mormons in the Grass Valley Massacre in 1865, with ten men and an unknown number of women and children killed thanks to a case of assumed association with a war chief (Antonga Black Hawk) currently at war with Utah. The Paiute had been massacred in 1866. Over 100 Timpanogo men had been killed, with an unknown number of women and children enslaved by Brigham Young in Salt Lake City in 1850, with many of the enslaved people dying in captivity (those numbers were not tracked, but I would assume at least two hundred were enslaved— that’s simply assuming one woman/wife and one child for every man, and the numbers could have very well been higher if any war-widows and their children were in the group, not to mention families with multiple children). This is after an unknown group of Indigenous people had been killed by Governor Brigham Young the year prior, to “permanently stop cattle theft” from settlers. 

The number of Native Americans killed in Utah in the 1800s—just the number of dead counted (since women and children weren’t counted)—in massacres not tied to war (because there was at least one war) is over 130. The actual number of random murders is much higher; between the uncounted deaths and how the Governor had issued orders to “deal with” the problem of cattle theft permanently. I doubt you would have been tried or convicted if you murdered Indigenous peoples on “your” land. This is why it’s called state sanctioned genocide.

This is not counting the Black Hawk War in Utah (1865-1872), which the Ute were absolutely a part of (the wiki articles I read were contradictory if Antonga Black Hawk was Ute or Timpanogo, but the Ute were part of it). The first official massacre tied to the war—the Bear River Massacre, ordered by the US Military—places the death count of just that singular massacre at over five hundred Shoshone, including elders, women, and children. It would not be unreasonable to assume that the number of Indigenous people killed in Utah from 1850, onward, is over a thousand, perhaps two or three.

Pardon me for not reading beyond that point to list more massacres and simply ballparking a number; the source will be linked for you to get an accurate number of dead.

So how did they befriend the Native population? Let alone see them as fully human considering the racism of the time period? Natives were absolutely not seen as fully human so long as they were tied to their culture, and assimilation equalling some sliver of respect was already a stick being waved around as a threat. This lack of humanity continues to the present day.

I’m not saying friendship is impossible. I am saying the sheer levels of mistrust that would exist between random wandering groups of white/pale men and Indigenous communities wouldn’t exactly make that friendship easy. Having the scene end be a genuine friendship feels ignorant and hollow and flattening of ongoing genocide, because settlers lied about their intentions and then lined you up for slauther (that’s how the Timpanogo were killed and enslaved).

Utah had already done most of its mass killing by this point. The era of trusting them was over. There was an active open hunting season, and the acceptable targets were the Indigenous populations of Utah.

(sources for the numbers: 

List of Indian Massacres in North America Black Hawk War (1865-1872))

Issue 3: “Proper housing/clothes and so forth”

Do you mean Western style settlements and jeans? If yes, congratulations you have written a reservation which means the land-ripped-away wounds are going to be fresh, painful, and sore.

You do not codify what you mean by “proper”, and proper is another one of those deeply loaded colonial words that can mean “like a white man” or “appropriate for their tribe.” For the time period, it would be the former. Without specifying which direction you’re going for, I have no idea what you’re imagining. And without the name of the media, I don’t know what the basis of this is.

The reservation history of this time period seems to maybe have some wiggle room; there were two reservations allocated for the Ute at this time, one made in 1861 and another made in 1882 (they were combined into the Uintah and Ouray Indian Reservation in 1886). This is all at the surface level of a google and wikipedia search, so I have no idea how many lived in the bush and how many lived on the reserve. 

There were certainly land defenders trying to tell Utah the land did not belong to them, so holdouts that avoided getting rounded up were certainly possible. But these holdouts would be far, far more hostile to anyone non-Native.

The Ute seemed to be some degree of lucky in that the reserve is on some of their ancestral territory, but any loss of land that large is going to leave huge scars. 

It should be noted that reserves would mean the traditional clothing and housing would likely be forbidden, because assimilation logic was in full force and absolutely vicious at this time. 

It’s a large reserve, so the possibility exists they could have accidentally ended up within the borders of it. I’m not sure how hostile the state government was for rounding up all the Ute, so I don’t know if there would have been pockets of them hiding out. In present day, half of the Ute tribe lives on the reserve, but this wasn’t necessarily true historically—it could have been a much higher percentage in either direction.

It’s up to you if you want to make them be reservation-bound or not. Regardless, the above mentioned genocide would have been pretty fresh, the land theft in negotiations or already having happened, and generally, the Ute would be well on their way to every assimilation attempt made from either residential schools, missionaries, and/or the forced settlement and pre-fab homes.

To Answer Your Question

I don’t want another flattened, sanitized portrayal of genocide.

Look at the number of dead above, the amount of land lost above, the amount of executive orders above. And try to tell me that these people would be anything less than completely and totally devastated. Beyond traumatized. Beyond broken hearted. Absolutely grief stricken with almost no soul left.

Their religion would have been illegal. Their children would have been stolen. Their land was taken away. A saying about post-apocalyptic fiction is how settler-based it is, because Indigenous people have already lived through their own apocalypse.

It would have all just happened at the time period this story is set in. All of the grief you feel now at the environment changing so drastically that you aren’t sure how you’ll survive? Take that, magnify it by an exponential amount because it happened, and you have the mindset of these Native characters.

This is not a topic to tread lightly. This is not a topic to read one masterpost and treat it as a golden rule when there is too much history buried in unmarked, overfull graves of school grounds and cities and battlefields. I doubt the movie you’re using is good representation if it doesn’t even hint at the amount of trauma these Native characters would have been through in thirty years.

A single generation, and the life that they had spent millennia living was gone. Despite massive losses of life trying to fight to preserve their culture and land.

Learn some history. That’s all I can tell you. Learn it, process it, and look outside of checklists. Look outside of media. 

And let us have our grief.

~ Mod Lesya

On Question Framing

Please allow me the opportunity to comment on “are there things you'd LIKE to see in a movie where a white man and a Jewish man run into Native Americans in the 1880s?” That strikes me as the same type of question as asking what color food I’d like for lunch. I don’t see how the cultural backgrounds of characters I have literally no other information about is supposed to make me want anything in particular about them. I don’t know anything about their personalities or if they have anything in common.

Compare the following questions:

“Are there things you’d like to see in a movie where two American women, one from a Nordic background and one Jewish, are interacting?” I struggle to see how our backgrounds are going to yield any further inspiration. It certainly doesn’t tell you that we’re both queer and cling to each other’s support in a scary world; it doesn’t tell you that we uplift each other through mental illness; it doesn’t go into our 30 years of endless bizarre inside jokes related to everything from mustelids to bad subtitles.

Because: “white”, “Jewish”, and “Native American” aren’t personality words. You can ask me what kind of interaction I’d like to see from a high-strung overachieving woman and a happy-go-lucky Manic Pixie Dream Girl, and I’ll tell you I’d want fluffy f/f romance. Someone else might want conflict ultimately resolving in friendship. A third person might want them slowly getting on each other’s nerves more and more until one becomes a supervillain and the other must thwart her. But the same question about a cultural demographic? That told me nothing about the people involved.

Also, the first time I meet a new person from a very different culture, it might take weeks before discussion of our specific cultural differences comes up. As a consequence, my first deep conversations with a Costa Rican American gentile friend were not about Costa Rica or my Jewishness but about things we had in common: classical music and coping with breakups--which are obviously conversations I could have had if we were both Jewish, both Costa Rican gentiles, or both something else. So in other words, I’m having trouble seeing how knowing so little about these characters is supposed to give me something to want to see on the page.

Thank you for understanding.

(And yes, I agree with Lesya, what’s with this trend of people trying to explain their fandom in a roundabout way instead of mentioning it by name? It makes it harder to give meaningful help….)

--Shira

[platypan]

Rewriting Keg-King...

for @ihni

It wasn’t like the dances in New South Wales, nor yet was it like the ball Billy had attended in London, where everyone had seemed to blur together in endless lines of pearl buttons and curly white wigs.  His first sight of Hawkins society was a confusion of colors and heights—the person offering to take his coat, he realized, pulling his eyes from the constellations of candles, was at least partly horse, and clapped their hooves over it, bowing.  He bowed back, pulling Max forward through the doorway—she was as wide-eyed as he, her gaze catching on a woman floating near the punch bowl with a face either covered in moss, or made of it.  

Billy wondered, watching the dancers, whether he could be less careful here—whether iron was more easily avoided, and he could apply himself at a stranger’s dinner table without burning his hands.  The keys at the inn--where they’d flung their dinner clothes on and their baggage anywhere in an excitable flurry--had been iron, and he’d dropped them twice before Max took them, rolling her eyes.

He suspected there would be no such dangers here, in a house where the footmen greeting the carriages outside were horses themselves, formed of water.  In the center of the room, surrounded by the most candles—and, he noted, after some consideration, floating flames with no visible source—were two empty ornate chairs, like thrones.  Between them was a huge head, cut and seared bloodless from some hairy, fanged, one-eyed beast, on oilcloth, and he registered how many of the dancers had bandages, and torn clothes.  

He’d stand out, he realized, smug in the knowledge that his new ocean-blue tailcoat brought out his eyes, and the embroidered brown brocade of his waistcoat complemented it perfectly.  As he was congratulating himself on his lack of cravat, and the unbuttoned shirt that exposed his collarbones, the dance shifted to pairs. 

A young man with a bloodied scrape across his face, a flower crown, and a wide grin spun his partner down the room.  Billy stumbled, cataloguing fine shoulders under the torn and bloodstained shirt, collarbones gleaming with sweat.   

Billy’s arm and shoulder pulled nearly asunder as Max yanked him, wide-eyed and wandering towards a person whose silvery ruffles matched their wheeled ambulatory device.  Billy glanced at her, then back to the dancer, whose teeth and eyes gleamed in the candlelight.  “I need that arm, give it,” he whispered, “I—I have to—dance—”, he trailed off, yanking at Max’s grip on his arm. 

Her jaw firmed.  “Stop gawking,” she hissed.  “You look like a pillock.  I want to talk to that person about their wheels.  Alas, we should really greet the sheriff.  We’d be kicking our heels in our rooms at the inn if he hadn’t invited us, Billy—” 

“Right now, I have to go dance with him.” Billy pointed, and Max stood on her toes, still a head shorter than he, until he lifted her by her securely corseted waist, and she kicked out.  “The one dancing.  Everyone’s watching him.”

“You’ll have time after--Billy!”  She squirmed, growling like a trapped fox.  “I’m fourteen,” she snarled, her cheeks reddening.  “You can’t put me on your shoulders, Billy, it’s a ball—”

“I’d suffocate in petticoats,” he told her, and she snorted a laugh, then smacked his head.  

“Oh, I see him!  There, with the—ah, the flowers on his head?  He’s dancing with someone?”

“With the flowers,” he agreed, “—and the smile.”  The grin was heady in the heat of the room, and Billy took a steadying breath.  It didn’t help--everything smelled strange and exciting, unlike any ball he’d ever attended, the air full of the oils for the whirring machinery helping a woman with a fishtail dance, and the smell of the burned flesh of the beast on the dais, and the garlanded flowers. 

[platypanthewriter]

Unless...? (Chapter 10!)

In this chapter:  Billy's still sick as a dog, and watching him, Steve has time to think up plans to be a romantic goon.  

He sure is glad Billy's his best friend forever...unless...?

So I'm back!  After some burnout and what in retrospect was probably depression, I'm eating again and all that, so have a chapter in celebration!  Thanks so much to commenters finding me after season 4 dropped and prying me out of my hole!  XD <3 <3 <3!!!  Here are the other chapters: Ao3 | Tumblr fic pileup (under “Modern AUs)

Billy slept on Steve’s couch for hours, snoring and sniffling disgustingly.

Steve made faces and ran his fingers through Billy’s curls, warm at the back of his neck. The sweat tricked down Steve’s back--he was pinned under a couple hundred pounds of bartender, every blanket he owned, at least twenty throw pillows, and the situation was getting pretty sweaty. (Once Robin had seen the handful of throw pillows Nancy had given him, she started buying him ones that said things like ‘I tried running but I kept spilling my wine’, just to watch him cringe.)

Steve’s leg and most of his arm were entirely asleep, and his wrist was twinging, bent in a weird position under Billy’s ribs. Sun poured in the window, lighting the dust motes, making Billy’s curls glow, and turning his bent head and lowered lashes into a melodrama of shadows and light.

  An Ode to Freckles, Steve thought idly, trying to ignore the sensation that his torqued wrist tendons were being slowly torn by the weight of Billy’s torso.

He lays there, still For once, not waving his hands, sauntering, licking his teeth in a grin Just his fingers twitching, his lashes Casting shadows on his cheek, stirring with the breath Of the creepy, sweaty watcher Counting freckles

The couch creaked, startling Steve out of his reverie as Billy wriggled, mumbled “Fucking skank,” and nuzzled closer. He hummed happily as Steve bit back a laugh, wondering what his bartender was dreaming about.

By the time Billy finally groaned and twitched, Steve had sweat dripping down his neck and face, and he gasped with relief. “You awake?!”

“...ner,” Billy mumbled, squirming.

“You stopped snoring,” Steve pointed out, narrowing his eyes.

“G’tta piss,” Billy sighed.

“Get up,” Steve told him, pushing. “Don’t do it here!”

“If you really loved me you’d go get me a gallon jug,” Billy rasped out, and Steve burst into snickers, squirming out from under him.

“Get up! Get up, get up, get up!” he chanted, tugging gently at the blankets in Billy’s fists.

“Gotta be one I can piss on…I think you could spare this ‘Surviving motherhood one bottle of Merlot at a time,’ pillow,” Billy muttered. “God, that’s depressing—”

“Robin thinks they’re hilarious,” Steve told him, making a face, and pushing the blankets back away from Billy’s face. “Come on, babe.”

“No,” Billy growled. “M’fin’ly warm. Fuck you.”

“You could take a shower,” Steve told him, enticingly. “Good water pressure. Maybe your sinuses would clear a little.”

“...don’t wanna get wet,” Billy mumbled, but he heaved himself up with a grumble like a cartoon bear, and lumbered off to the bathroom. Steve grabbed pajamas for both of them, texted Joyce to tell her he was staying home to feed Billy soup, and wandered towards the bathroom like his whole body was a compass oriented towards Billy Hargrove.

“You sure you don’t want a shower?” Steve asked when Billy stumbled out of the bathroom. “I’m gonna take one.”

“...you wanna shower with me?” Billy asked, squinting at him in bleary confusion, and Steve felt his whole body heat at the thought of Billy’s slick muscles against his. “...you don’ shower with pajamas on,” Billy muttered, sighing.

“Nope,” Steve told him, biting back a laugh.

“I’ll stay out here,” Billy told him, dropping abruptly to sit against the wall next to the bathroom door.

“...I’ll serenade you,” Steve told him, sliding inside to press his face against a towel and suppress screams at the thought of showering together. Maybe living with Billy wasn’t such a good idea, he thought wildly. He thought about the number of times he might walk in on Billy changing, or—or working out, and groaned, rubbing his face.

“...are you dying,” Billy asked, his voice clear under the bathroom door.

“No, nah, nope,” Steve told him, and turned on the water. He stripped down fast, reminding himself Billy still hadn’t really eaten, and Steve needed to get some soup in him, even if it meant ladling it in Billy’s open mouth.

As he climbed in the shower and pulled the curtain closed, he heard the bathroom door open. “...steam might, uh, might do me some good,” Billy said hoarsely, and Steve stared at the shower curtain, frozen in place.

“Uh,” he said, his brain shorting out at the idea of Billy climbing in.

“Shit,” Billy mumbled, with a scrabbling noise. “You—your damn rug’s trying to kill me.”

Steve snickered. “Okay,” he called over the curtain. “Siddown before you fall down, maybe.”

“Yeah,” Billy said quietly. “...yeah.”

Steve focused on washing. “Washing my pecs,” he sang to himself. “Washin’ my haaaair. Washing my ass cheek, washing my spaaaaare—”

Billy burst out laughing, wet gross giggles that made Steve grin. “You got a favorite ass cheek and a spare?” he asked, snickering.

“Everybody has a best side,” Steve told him. “I look twenty percent cooler—”

“I think I can do this,” Billy said, over him. “I—I think I can…” he took a deep, shaky breath. “It’d just be...like this, right. Living in your damn house. We’d just...ass around.”

“Yes!” Steve shouted, jerking the shower curtain aside to beam at him, and then yanking it closed again, as they both cackled with laughter. “Whoops,” he said, ducking his head under the shower.

“Didn’t know you were a flasher,” Billy said, his voice weirdly high. “Is that—you gonna get arrested for flashing people, Steve, because I don’t wanna be one of those sad jailbird chasers writing to the prison—”

“No!” Steve cackled, laughing so hard he had to lean against the wall of the shower. “No, I swear, I just, uh. I forgot.”

“Jesus,” Billy muttered, clearing his throat, which turned into more racking coughs. “But—yeah. Uh, m-married. I could...do this. I could just...watch you be a fucking dweeb.”

“Together, forever,” Steve sang, laughing along with Billy, because Billy’d sounded like he might run away, before, and now he sounded...mostly relaxed.

“...I can do this,” Billy said again, softly, then, louder, “—course, you need to clean out that hall closet, I’m gonna need it for porn and sex toys.”

Steve dropped the shampoo on his foot. “What?!” he squawked, laughing.

“You wanna get, like, actual married,” Billy said, his voice cracking. “I’m gonna get horny as hell. I’m gonna watch so much porn.”

“Oh,” Steve said, his stomach kind of falling down through his feet and through the floor, it felt like, because Billy wanted someone Steve wasn’t, but also he seemed willing to just...not have sex, forever, if he could have Steve. Steve had never felt so delighted and so guilty at the same time. “Yeah,” he tried to say, and nothing came out. He cleared his throat, trying not to think about sex noises, and Billy on the couch, his hand on his cock, as Steve tried not to make it weird. “Yeah, uh, that...makes sense, I’ll...I’ll clear it out.”

“Might still be better to get a new place,” Billy told him. “Before one of us dies on those stairs of yours.”

“Yeah, okay,” Steve said, nodding as he scrubbed at his hair, his cheeks so red they throbbed.

“Separate bedrooms,” Billy reminded him, and Steve nodded again, reminding himself that Billy liked hugging him, but didn’t want to be pressed up against him all night long. It was probably just as well, he told himself. If Billy woke up to a half-asleep Steve Harrington humping his leg, he might change his mind entirely.

“...yeah,” Steve agreed, closing his eyes. “Yeah, that makes sense.” He concentrated on scrubbing the green from under his nails from where he’d been chopping oregano for the soup, telling himself Billy was silent because he’d fallen asleep.

“You’re just right, y’know,” Billy told him, after long enough that Steve startled.

“Okay, Goldilocks,” Steve told him, snorting a laugh.

“I mean it,” Billy said, barely audible over the shower, and Steve stilled to listen. “You’re...so much better than my ex, for one—”

“Low bar,” Steve shot back, making a face.

Billy laughed, a little harshly. “Yeah, I know. I know. But—but living with you. S-staying with you. I’m not...settling, I can’t believe I’m so lucky, getting all this.”

Steve stared at the shower curtain for a long second, and then yanked it partly aside again, so Billy wasn’t confronted with his dick. Billy stared at his face, then his chest and arms, red-faced, as Steve splashed a foot out onto the rug—still holding the curtain over himself, mostly. He bent to yank Billy into a wet hug as Billy yelped, coughing and barking like a seal. Since Billy wouldn’t know the difference anyway, Steve kissed his hair.

After a moment of frozen stillness, Billy groaned and relaxed into Steve’s shoulder. “You’re all wet,” he groaned.

“I’m just right,” Steve told him, snickering gleefully. “Jesus, I’m so...god. Can’t believe Jonathan fucking knew you all this time and I just fucking met you. Like. I’ve only known you a year, I had to just…”

“Hey, you’re always like ‘I’ve known you a whole year, Billy, this is such a good idea, Billy, let’s get friend-married, Billy,’ what the fuck are you—” Billy muttered, pushing halfheartedly at Steve’s chest, and Steve smacked a loud kiss on his ear.

“What the fuck,” Billy growled.

“I just mean how come I didn’t meet you when I was like. An embryo,” Steve told him, feeling cheated, and squeezing him tighter, as he started to shiver. Billy’s face was hot against his chest. “I coulda been your friend this whole time.”

“Well now you’re stuck with me,” Billy told him, sighing, but he sounded kinda fond. “Now when you’re lonesome—”

“I wasn’t lonesome,” Steve argued, on reflex, and Billy laughed. “...I had my guitar,” Steve told him, soulfully, trying not to snicker.

“Play me like an instrument,” Billy breathed, and Steve froze.

“What?”

“Nothing, nothing,” Billy said hoarsely, coughing and pushing him away. “Get the hell back in your shower, dumbass. Your lips are turning blue. Rinse off and get out. I’ll, uh, I’ll go turn the heat up. ...you’re turning into a prune in there,” Billy told him. “I’ll get out, I’m uh, I’m gonna go—out. There.”

Steve climbed back into the shower, heaving a sigh as he stuck his head under the hot water. His heart pounded with the relief of finally figuring out the formula—the equation of how much Steve Harrington to hold back, and how much to let show. It’d be a little bit of a balancing act, living with Billy, but he was confident he could lie just enough.

As the door closed, he smiled helplessly, thinking again about songs for their wedding. Billy liked it traditional, Steve told himself. Billy was uncertain what to make of the silly stuff Steve did—but proposals, rings, all the traditional trappings—they made Billy’s brain short out, and his eyes tear up a little. Steve was guiltily grateful to all Billy’s shitty exes that had pushed his standards so low, but he was entirely willing to take advantage.

Traditional, he told himself. When he wandered back out of the bathroom, Billy was cocooned on the couch again, and Steve texted Robin.

I need ur help with a plan, he sent. While he waited for her reply, he recorded a couple lines of song, playing them back to himself until his phone chimed.

is it evil, she returned, and he cocked his head, considering.

it might break Billys brain, he offered, and then he waited for a reply.

gimme the deets, she sent, and he grinned.

Steve waited until the Wednesday before the wedding—the slowest day at the bar, ever since they’d started Trivia Tuesdays. Billy was finally back from coughing up a lung, taking the opportunity of a slow night to get the ladder out to clean all the bottles on the lit shelves and change one of the ceiling light bulbs. Fussing around the bar, he didn’t notice his sister Max arriving and fist-bumping Steve, or her boyfriend—Dustin’s friend, Steve realized, cursing how connected he’d been to Billy all this time—Lucas, who was setting up the confetti bombs. Robin had the lights and disco ball she and Steve had stolen years before from the old roller rink, an epic, extremely stoned heist before it was torn down, and she was setting them up over the stage.

People kept smirking at Steve, like he didn’t know how corny he was being—but as he’d told Robin, he’d figured out Billy’s goddamn cheat codes, and he was gonna damn well use them. She and Jonathan had submitted to the secret band practices, and Robin had even stopped making her gagging audible, so if you didn’t look at her, you’d never know she found the entire experience nauseating. “I will play the, uh, the Addams Family theme or whatever for your proposal,” he’d promised, and she’d looked thoughtful.

“I might actually take you up on that,” she’d said. “Gomez and Morticia are pretty rad.”

“Anytime,” he’d told her fervently, watching her nod, and wondering who she was thinking of, with the little smile on her face. He’d have to pay more attention, he told himself, grimacing. He’d been too caught up in falling in love with Billy.

Behind the bar, over Billy’s shoulder as he scrubbed industriously behind the faucet, Joyce nodded to Steve, her hand on the breaker switches. Robin waved her arms, quelling the audience of mostly friends, and silence fell.

Joyce switched off most of the lights.

Billy swore with a loud thud like maybe he’d hit his head on the faucet, but the disco ball and spotlights started rainbowing around, and Steve was committed now, so he just started in. “Love is like oxygen,” he announced, watching Billy whip around to look at him from the single light still on over the bar. “Love is a many-splendored thing.”

Steve could hear Max cackling breathlessly into Lucas’ shoulder as he tried to hug her hard enough to muffle it, and Billy stared at the stage. He said something, but without a mike, Steve had no idea what it was.

“Love lifts us up where we belong. All we need is love,” Steve said, earnestly, and Billy just stared at him, frozen in place. It didn’t matter whether he recognized the medley from Moulin Rouge, Steve had figured, all that mattered was the absolute blast of love songs he was about to be hit with, like a fire hose.

“All you need is love,” Steve sang, and Robin stepped up beside him for the duet, smacking her lips with a grimace like something gross had flown into her mouth. Steve raised his voice to cover her smacking near the microphone. “I was made for loving you, baby, you were made for loving me—”

“The only way of loving me, baby, is to ask me publically—” Robin added, sardonically, and Steve resisted the urge to kick her in the leg, but Billy laughed, startling himself, it looked like.

Joyce pushed Billy out from behind the bar, and somebody was following him with what looked like the high-powered LED bar flashlight so he was spotlit, his hair shining like a halo, his knuckles white around the grimy rag in his hand.

“Marry me,” Steve sang, to the ‘just one night’ part, since Billy wasn’t the sex worker lady in the movie. “Mar~ry me.”

“There’s no way, whatever you say,” Robin sang, back behind him, and Billy startled, squinting behind Steve into the darkness.

Steve wondered, trying not to laugh, whether Billy had forgotten everyone else was still there.

“Marry me in the name of love~” Steve sang—thanking the universe for cordless mikes as he stepped down off the stage towards Billy, who jerked his head up to stare, his fist tightening on the rag. When he got close enough, Billy hissed “I already said yes, you psycho,” but Steve just kept singing, taking his hand.

“You crazy fool, I won’t give in to you,” Billy muttered along with Robin’s rich voice, his voice a growl, and Steve laughed with delight, because Billy knew the song, knew what a nerd Steve was being, and the man Steve was marrying looked like he wanted to die of humiliation, but he set his jaw and bit out the words. Steve’s whole body swayed forward a little before he caught himself, and sang the next line instead of just—grabbing Billy, and pressing kisses all over his hot angry face. “What are you doing?!” Billy mouthed, but they were so close now, Steve could see his mouth twitching, and his shoulders shaking with suppressed laughter, his brows still drawn together disbelievingly.

Steve grinned back. He’d rehearsed enough to mostly just let himself sing—ignoring Max whooping in the background—and he watched Billy’s face as they hit the love lifts us up where we belong lines, and more lights hit the disco ball, and Lucas and Max started firing off the confetti bombs. Joyce was behind Billy earnestly blowing bubbles, which nearly made Steve flub his line, but Billy cracked up, his eyes red and shiny with tears.

Steve managed to keep singing, instead of laughing along.

“Yes, you moron,” Billy yelled over their voices, grabbing Steve’s shirt and yanking him close. “Yes, yes, I’m already marrying you, what are you doing, Jesus H. Christ, shut up—” he shouted, beaming and wiping his eyes as Steve and Robin held the final notes, and everyone cheered. “Shut up,” Billy mumbled, his eyes fixed on Steve’s mouth, and he stepped closer.

Steve’s heart skipped a beat in his chest, it felt like, an uneven thud as he leaned forward a little, just—just in case Billy really wanted to sell it to his sister. Just in case he was gonna finally let Steve find out what kissing him was like. Steve licked his lips, wondering whether it was worse to never get kissed at all, or to get kissed once, and know what it felt like. Billy’s breath was warm, his eyes intent—and then he smacked his hand over Steve’s mouth and took a long shaky breath, and Steve knew which was worse.

The idea that Billy wouldn’t even kiss him as a joke, a fakeout to sell his sister on Steve, just something quick, was a harder realization than Steve expected, and he stood there for a long second as Billy’s sister ran over to give Billy a hug.

“He doesn’t even get a kiss?” Robin asked dryly, wandering down from the stage to throw an arm around Steve as somebody turned the lights back on.

“Oh, I wouldn’t be able to stop,” Billy told her, grimacing as he shot a glance at Steve, and Steve remembered to smile. “I’d have my hands under that shirt—”

“Yeah, don’t fuck him on the floor, at least get him on the counter where you do body shots,” Max said, rolling her eyes, and Billy snorted and gave a weird tense laugh.

Probably, Steve thought, he could see how deflated Steve was, and he thought things were getting weird. “...gonna go get a drink,” Steve told the people crowding around—even Dustin had driven out from Indianapolis, his face full of mischievous confusion as he surveyed Billy—and Steve’s old band was whooping.

Steve just needed…quiet, for a second, so he walked rapidly back behind the bar and poured himself a whiskey. Robin was watching him, he registered, and he waved at her, but she just frowned between him and Billy, narrowing her eyes.

There were some regulars wandering aimlessly around the bar with a poor confused tourist, and Steve sold them beers and apologized, getting shoulder slaps and thumbs-ups all around. “That was the most romantic thing I’ve ever seen,” the tourist whispered, his eyes watery, and Steve winced, forcing a smile back on his face.

Every single person at the bar seemed to want to buy he or Billy a drink, and Steve started sending them over to Billy, because he wasn’t sure he could be trusted getting drunk. He imagined himself just improvising a song into the microphone, the same line over and over, as everyone ran out the door to escape him screaming why can’t you want me.

Billy glanced over occasionally, frowning, and Steve tried to smile back, but it was just as well Billy didn’t come closer, because all Steve could think about was the almost-kiss, looping over and over in his head.

After nearly an hour, Joyce came and gave Steve a hug. “It’s okay,” she said, grinning, and squeezing his hands in hers. “He said yes! He’s been watching you all night! Don’t worry!”

“I’m not worried,” Steve told her, his throat closing so he had a weird rasp in his voice.

“Why don’t you head home, sweetie,” she told him, laughing. “I’ll take Billy home. You’ll be excited about the wedding in the morning, okay? Just go to sleep and remember that boy thinks you hung the moon.”

‘He couldn’t even give me a peck on the mouth. Like a grandma, a grandma-peck,’ Steve wanted to argue back, but he nodded, and let her usher him out.

“It’s just nerves,” she told him, smiling past him, like she was remembering something.

“Yeah,” Steve agreed, nodding, his eyes stinging. “It’s just nerves.”

As he drove home, he considered—for the first time—that maybe marrying Billy was a dumb as shit thing to do. He imagined every time they bumped into each other in the kitchen, seeing Billy’s smile so close—or seeing Billy get out of the shower, drips running down his collarbones. Steve clenched his fingers on the steering wheel, gritting his teeth. His brain offered another awful question: was it better to call off the fake wedding, living together, all the temptation, and just…stay close friends? Or better to take what he could have, and one day push too far, and watch Billy leave.

It wasn’t really a question, Steve thought grimly. He’d never been one to make the smart choices. He’d just have to be careful, always. Once he got home, he checked for rentals in the area with separate bedrooms.

Around midnight, his phone chimed, and Steve nearly dropped his guitar grabbing for it.

arent you glad i didnkiss you

putmy mouth pn yr mouth

stillvtime for ‘no homo’ attac

Steve snorted, gritting his teeth. I don’t have no homo attacks

you fuckinf do, Billy shot back.

I don’t, Steve argued. Everybody else does, I don’t.

THFUCK IS THAT SUPPOSED TOVMEAN, Billy sent, and Steve cocked his head, frowning.

you wanna stick you rtongue down my throat invfront of your sister, go right ahead, Steve sent.

freak, he added. anyway your the one that stopped all ofba sudden

He tossed his phone on the bed as he pulled his shirt on around the toothbrush sticking out of his mouth, and then it started ringing, so he answered with his head still half inside his shirt. “Yeah,” he mumbled, around a mouthful of toothpaste and brush.

“The fuck do you mean you don’t have ‘no homo’ freakouts, but everybody else does,” Billy asked, sharply, and Steve kind of wished he hadn’t answered the phone.

“...nothing,” he muttered, wandering back to the bathroom, to spit. He rinsed his mouth loudly, hoping to redirect the conversation.

“Tell me,” Billy hissed.

“I just don’t,” Steve sighed, shrugging. “And you’re freaking out.”

“I’m not—” Billy groaned. “What...that’s not what I—”

“I’m not gonna, like, shove you off in front of your sister,” Steve said grimly. “I wouldn’t have freaked out.”

“...what did you mean,” Billy asked, again, and Steve groaned.

“I didn’t mean anyth—”

“Who’s everybody else that has ‘no homo’ attacks,” Billy hissed.

“...you’re acting really weird about this,” Steve told him, and then he listened to the echoing silence.

“Was it Tommy,” Billy said, finally, and Steve twitched. “Was it?” Billy asked, like he could see the face Steve was making.

“...he wanted to jack each other off while we watched porn, and then he never talked to me again,” Steve bit out, finally.

“...you jacked him off,” Billy whispered, with a weird high laugh, and Steve pinched the bridge of his nose.

“Yeah, he asked me to, okay, it was his idea.”

“So...no homo?” Billy asked, cackling in Steve’s ear like he was the fucking Joker. “All his idea. No homo at all, not Straighty-McStraight Harrington over there.”

“I don’t have any fucking idea what he wanted, because he never talked to me again,” Steve shot back, pretty sick of being the reason, always, that things went wrong. “I didn’t have a chance to no-homo him, asshole, I didn’t do anything—”

“Sounds like you put your hand on his cock, Mr. Straight-as-a-ruler,” Billy said, still snickering, and Steve hung up, crawling over to bury his face in the pillow. His phone rang again, and he ignored it. It kept ringing, though, and finally he grabbed it, checked that it was Billy, and sent fuck off.

who’s having a no-homo freakout now, Billy sent back, and Steve nearly threw the damned thing.

YOU, he sent back. you are, you prick

that’s why it’s a big secret, huh, Billy replied. show me where the scary gay man touched you, stevie

Steve really hadn’t been expecting the kind of bullshit from Billy that he’d gotten from Tommy, but there it was. He turned his phone off.

He couldn’t sleep. He rolled around, turned on the fan—it felt like there wasn’t any air to breathe—and finally just got up. When he turned his phone on to see it was three in the morning, there were eleven missed calls, and some texts.

Thisnisn't vonna work is it Any of it youre ginna get a footnfrom me at the xourthouse and break out in a rash

yur gonna gay panic me into the ground arntcha

fuckingmake a goddammnewspaper headline out of me

homophob herrington

saw you fuckingvchange you’re mind

Liar piece ofBSHIT

fuck you

“What the hell,” Steve said, kind of wanting to throw his phone out the window. He stared at the texts, wincing again as he reread them, before sending wtf???

fuvking talking again huh, Billy returned, and Steve groaned, wincing as it chimed again. the fuck is yr fucking deal

sure u arnt one of those fag jocks hiding yr queer

freaking out likemfucking homophobe wants to suck my cock

Steve turned his phone off again, his face burning as he remembered staring at Billy’s mouth, and Billy just watching him all evening after. He put his headphones on, and sat on the couch, his head in his hands. It was the perfect time to work on writing, he told himself, wiping his nose on his wrist. His eyes felt dry and raw, and he kept sniffling—but he told himself emotions made for good lyrics, probably, or something. He copied the lyrics he’d been jotting down on napkins and in text drafts into a notebook and sang them doggedly, trying to keep the catch out of his voice.

If looking was enough to fuck things up with Billy, he told himself, it would’ve happened pretty quick anyway.

Hours later, he hadn’t gotten much new written, but he had a tune—a repeating phrase in his head that circled around and around, like Steve himself, he thought, turning every choice he’d made in his life over in his head, and seeing how stupid they were in hindsight. Why’d he taken Nancy to a party after her friend just died?! What a fucking moron, he thought, leaning back on the couch, laughing a little and then slumping into a sigh. What a fucking idiot.

When he stood up, he considered getting drunk as hell, and instead opted to drive back to Indianapolis and try to suffocate himself in the motel pillow. He sang the refrain in his head over and over, trying different lyrics, thinking maybe it’d be something for Youtube, if he could bludgeon it into a song.

He didn’t turn his phone back on.

My Ao3 | My other fic on Tumblr

[platypanthewriter]

Unless...? Ch.1

FANTASTIC AMAZING ART by @lazybakerart​!  This is a PREVIEW--there will be more LOVELY ARTNESS in the chapters on Ao3!

The first time Steve met the new bartender, he’d come up on the stage to shout something at the crowd about new martinis, the roofie incidents in the bar down the street, and the importance of watching your drink.  Steve scrambled for his spare guitar strings in his bag, trying to switch up a broken string before the song started.  

Jonathan laughed at him.  

The new bartender took a step back, his boot caught on the cord for the amp, and Steve tossed his guitar around his back and caught the dude just before he collapsed the whole drum set, scooping him up like a rescued princess. 

He stared up at Steve’s face, wide-eyed and pink-cheeked, and somebody whooped.  

The bartender was a pretty big dude—Steve’s height, or close enough, but he lifted weights or something, from the way his shirt stretched across his biceps and shoulders.  The lights from the dance floor glittered off an eyebrow piercing, the studs in his ears, and shone over a big tattoo of a skateboard on his forearm with the letters BH&MM.  He made no effort to move.

“Can you make it to the floor?” Steve asked, grinning, and the bartender swallowed.

“Hello,” he said, and Steve burst out laughing, hoisting the dude’s bulk amidst cheers until he got to the steps at the edge of the stage, where he sat him back on his feet.  

“I’m Steve,” Steve said, steadying his catch, who looked a little drunk already, honestly, though he didn’t smell like alcohol.  

“...Billy.  Hargrove,” the bartender said uncertainly, watching Steve’s hands on his.  He was getting redder as the crowd laughed and cheered, and Steve wondered whether he was being mistaken for somebody way more important in the music industry.  

“There you go,” Steve said, crouching to let the guy lean as he tottered down from the stage, so they were eye-level.  “You, uh,” he asked, wanting to ask if the dude was gonna be all right, but also not imply he was drunk at work on his first day before he even started his shift.  “You feeling okay?”

“Shit, yeah,” Billy laughed, shaking his head.  “Shit.  Sorry.  I’ll, uh, I’ll—go—work.”

Steve nodded slowly, and tugged at his hand, and Billy blinked at him for a second before startling and letting go.  He stumbled back again, and Steve watched him warily, wondering whether he was just about to fall over a table.  Billy turned away, hunching his shoulders, and stalked through the crowd back to the bar.

“You said you knew that guy?” Steve asked Jonathan, as he restrung his broken string, and Robin led the crowd in song trivia.  “He always that clumsy?”

“No,” Jonathan said, frowning at him.  “No, uh, he’s not.”  He watched Steve yank the plastic string package open with his teeth, and cleared his throat.  “He’s, um.  He’s a good dude,” he offered, “—he’s got a little sister.  They’re close, I think she’s friends with Dustin.”

“Mmn,” said Steve, tuning.

Jonathan watched Billy the Bartender, then bit his lip at Steve again.  “Uh, he’s had kind of a rough time,” he said lamely, and Steve shot him a frown.

“...I’m not gonna give him a hard time, what the hell, man,” he muttered, finally ready, and stood up to play their set.  

The night’s star was a woman Jonathan had found playing violin in the subway, and they hadn’t had a ton of time to rehearse, but she was great, and after a while, they started taking requests, and she could play anything.  Steve joined her in a duet for Elvis’ All Shook Up, laughing nearly too hard to sing, but once they got rolling it was great.  

He glanced over a couple times to see Billy doing fine—smiling and talking, and twirling bottles around, and a couple other times to find him looking back at Steve.  

They finally bullied the violinist into playing some of her new compositions, and Steve realized Billy was dealing with a whole bachelorette party in pink penis hats.  As the spotlight narrowed to their soloist and her violin, Steve jumped down off the stage and slid behind the bar to pull draft beers, and wipe counters, while Billy was making a long list of increasingly fancy-sounding drinks.  

Steve shuffled around behind him, sliding glasses across the counter and collecting credit cards, and realized Billy wasn’t even googling all the weird shit they were ordering, and he’d yet to screw up.  He’d occasionally tell Steve to get more lemons, or something, but he was efficient, with an easy grin, and Steve could see why Jonathan had had that weird look on his face watching Billy Hargrove fail to interact like a human being.  Once the horde had passed, Billy turned to lean back against the bar, and said “Tha…” he trailed off as his eyes widened, and Steve bit back a grin, stepping up to pat his shoulder.

“Hey, Billy the bartender,” he said, leaning his elbows on the bar.  “Thought I’d come make sure those bachelorettes didn’t eat you alive.”

“...thanks,” Billy said, weirdly stiff next to him as they listened to the rest of the song.  “You, uh, you sounded good up there,” he said, over the sound of applause.

“Elvis reborn, that’s me,” Steve said idly, and Billy snickered.  

He leaned next to Steve, shoulder to shoulder, and Steve glanced over to see him looking back, but he dropped his gaze to the counter, laughing awkwardly as his cheeks pinked.  “...if I’m lucky they won’t be back for body shots,” Billy offered.

“...like...licking each other?” Steve blinked, and Billy raised his eyebrows.

“Licking me, more likely,” he said, running his thumb down his chest where the edges of a few more tattoos showed through his unbuttoned shirt.

Steve opened his mouth to ask about his other tattoos, then closed it again, then said, “—you know nobody’s gonna expect you to let customers lick you.”

“It’s not so bad,” Billy laughed.  “Good tips.”

Steve tried to imagine a host of bachelorettes surrounding him, giggling and salting him like he was a steak, and mostly thought it sounded weird.  He imagined Billy with a lime in his mouth, though, and salt across his freckled collarbones, and felt like a creep.  He cleared his throat.  

 Some more people came up for drinks, and Steve sank down on a stool in the corner to rest his feet.  He closed his eyes, listening to the playlist on his phone low as their new star answered questions from the audience.  He’d have to remember to have her drop off some CDs, he reminded himself.

When things went quiet again, he felt a soft knock on his elbow, and he opened his eyes on Billy’s smirk.

“What’s good to drink after singing?” he asked.  “What do you like?”

“Mmn,” Steve groaned, rubbing his face.  “Irish whiskey.”

Billy nodded, and brought him a shot, then ran back to the bar to make some fancy thing with a bunch of fruit and white wine for a dude that looked like a grizzled trucker.  He burst out laughing when he turned around to see Steve shuffling forward with five pint glasses precariously balanced in his hands.  

 Steve started wandering away after rehearsal to rest his elbows on the bar for a shot of whiskey, and a grin from Billy that lit up his whole face.  

Billy’s face always lit up when Steve waved.  He was tattooed over a good 75% of his body, and had metal in places Steve hadn’t known it could go, and Steve kept finding himself staring at all of...that, wondering what tattoos were peeking from under Billy’s rolled-up sleeves.

He was also usually bruised up like he’d been in a fight—he was immediately half bouncer, dragging shouty assholes across the floor by the scruff of the neck, and shoving them out the door—but he always had a smile for Steve.  It was hard, Steve thought, grinning into his hands afterwards, in his car, not to feel special with somebody so happy to see him.  

Steve started lingering after, helping sweep and mop the sticky floor around the bar—and also get the hug and soft grin he’d apparently earned now, a tight squeeze in strong arms Steve resigned himself to anticipating. 

 One night, he looked over to see Billy shirtless, lying on the bar, while a laughing crowd surrounded him.  

Robin leaned into the microphone between songs, whispering, “Special today, folks, you may now lick the bartender.”  She punched Steve for no reason as she said it, and he stared back at her, rubbing his arm.

“I saw you looking,” she whispered, luckily, not into the mike.  

“So what?!” he whispered back, looking over again to where Billy was laughing as somebody poured a shot of tequila over his abs, and the lights played over the liquor on his skin.  

“Go lick him up,” she said, waggling her eyebrows, and Steve’s mouth dropped open.  

“He—no,” he hissed back.  “I have to work with him!”

“Psssh,” she said, picking up a flyer and reading it, just so he’d know how hard she was ignoring him.

“I think he’s dating somebody, actually,” Jonathan said, and Steve rolled his eyes.  

“Guys.  I’m straight.  Remember Nancy?”

“Mmm,” Robin said, raising her eyebrows at the flyer.

“Uh...haha,” Jonathan said, uncomfortably, and Steve groaned.

Robin opened her mouth again, and Steve got up and announced another song—his favorite of hers, and her least favorite, as revenge.  As it was a Tuesday, there weren’t any guest musicians, and their regular Tuesday Trivia crowd was still assembling their teams.

Once they’d done a short set, just for fun, Steve registered Billy lurching a little behind the bar, and let Jonathan read the trivia questions, even though he always frowned really hard for no reason and made people nervous about their answers.

 “Hey,” Steve said, leaning around the bar, and Billy brightened, grinning at him.  “You need anything?”

“Hey,” Billy said, and Steve could see why Robin and Jonathan had the wrong idea about he and Billy, a little.  It was nice to have somebody so...unequivocally happy to see him.  

Even if, Steve thought, eyeing Billy, it was partially because he was bombed.  He was...cute, though, Steve admitted to himself, the alcohol making him flushed under his freckles.  Steve felt his cheeks warming to match Billy’s, and cleared his throat.  “You, uh, okay back here?  You looked a little unsteady.”

“They kept buying me drinks,” Billy shrugged, laughing.  “I’ll doub...double-check next time,” he said carefully.  “M’kinda loaded.”

“Yeah,” Steve agreed.  “You need a ride home?”

Billy stared at him.  “...you gonna take me home?”

“If you need me to,” Steve said, enjoying the flabbergasted way Drunk Billy responded to news.  

“...okay,” Billy said, smiling down at the bar, and Steve reached over and messed up his hair the way he would Dustin’s, just on reflex.  

“Hey,” Billy said, narrowing his eyes, but grinning.

Steve dropped him off that night in front of an apartment building with open stairs and balconies across the fronts.  He leaned over the steering wheel to survey the architecture, frowning.  “You want me to walk you up?” he asked, “I don’t want you to fall.  Bust your head in.”

“No!  No,” Billy laughed.  “No, you—you should—go.  I’m okay.”

“I’m at least watching you go in,” Steve said, setting his jaw, and Billy looked back at him for a long second, and leaned in way too close, smelling like tequila and limes.  

He stared into Steve’s eyes, and licked his lips, then laughed and shook his head, smiling.  “...thanks,” he said, climbing out, swaying, and righting himself.  He pointed to the railing, gave Steve two thumbs up like a dork, and held on to both sides as he climbed.  

When he got to the top, he waved, pointing at Steve and then to the road, and Steve crossed his arms.  Billy laughed again, and went to his apartment door, fumbling with his keys, and Steve waited until he cracked the door and turned back, waving again—but the apartment exploded with yelling, and Billy’s shoulders hunched.  

Steve tried to wave for his attention again, but he ducked inside, and Steve sat in his idling car.  He couldn’t hear actual words, just volume, in a man’s voice, and he wondered what the hell kind of shitty roommate Billy had, that’d yell that loud at him when it was nearly morning.

 The next night, Billy looked tired, and he still smelled a little drunk when Steve threw an arm around him, but he grinned just as wide as ever at the exciting event of Steve showing up to work.  Steve had a weird temptation to kiss his head, like he would Robin’s, or Dustin’s, but he kept that weird shit to himself, just squeezing Billy against his side and feeling him laugh.

“Aren’t you the lead act or something?” he asked, as Steve helped him set up for the night, taking pity on Billy’s obvious hangover.

“Oh,” Steve laughed.  “We just got the owner to hire all of us.  She’s my friend’s mom.  Jonathan’s.  We have a couple albums out, but nobody’d show up to hear the same songs every night, y’know.  We’re just the house band, really, we play backup, and the rest of the time...I was bartending, pretty much.  Until Jonathan found you.”

“Oh,” Billy nodded, looking around with wide eyes like that made the shabby little bar more interesting, somehow.  

“If we could get our guitarist to stop flirting with the bartender,” came Robin’s voice over the speakers, and Steve snorted.  

“Ignore her,” he told Billy, who quirked his mouth, snorting softly, and nodding.

“Yeah, okay,” he said softly, and Steve squeezed his shoulder, and ran up to the stage.

 Billy showed up on Monday, even though the place was closed.

Steve was trying variations on a chord, his pen behind his ear, when he looked up and saw him standing at the edge of the stage, listening.  “Oh, shit, hey,” Steve said, laughing, and grabbing his phone to check the time.

“Sorry,” Billy said, waving his hands and backing away.  “I just—I thought I’d do some inventory.  I heard you.”

“Oh,” Steve said, nodding, and still half playing his song, in his head.

“Joyce said nobody’d be here,” Billy said, rubbing his hands on his jeans, and he stalked back to the bar.  

It was a little easier getting into writing a song, actually, with somebody making a little noise—Steve had already left his house, unable to focus, and sitting in a huge silent room hadn’t helped, but Billy’s soft clinks and muttered swears blended into the background as Steve tried matching his text-draft-message-lyrics to some in a notebook, and some he’d written on a napkin, watching Billy work the bar.  He worked until his stomach growled, and he checked his phone, and realized it was closer to dinnertime than lunch.  

He stood up and stretched, hopped down from the stage, and wandered over to the bar, lying across it to frown down at the top of Billy’s head while he scrubbed at the inside of the fridge.  

“Hey,” Steve said, and Billy jumped, smacking his head.  “Sorry,” Steve offered, grinning, as Billy frowned up warily.  “Uh, I was gonna make a sandwich or two.  You want something?”

Billy nodded, glancing at Steve a few times as Steve dug around for a breakfast sandwich, and flipped the fancy little convection oven on.  He scrubbed hard in the back, his butt sticking out in his tight jeans, and wiggling with the motion.  Steve looked away.  “You always here on Mondays?” Billy asked, “—’cause I don’t have to be here.  I’m basically done, I can get out of your hair—”

“Oh,” Steve paused, holding the oven open, like a dork.  “Um, sometimes?  I’m here?  Sorry, it’s probably annoying.”

“No, shit,” Billy laughed, shaking his head.  “No, it, uh, it sounded good.”  He slid his thumb over one of the tattoos mostly hidden by his shirt, rubbing it, and Steve wondered what it was, and reminded himself he was kinda Billy’s boss, in a way, and he did not need to be asking what Billy looked like under his clothes.

“...it was nice having somebody else here,” Steve told him, tossing their sandwiches in the oven, and turning the timer.  “I came in ‘cause my house was too quiet.  So.”

Billy snorted a laugh.  “I’ll clean the fridge and listen to you anytime.”

“Okay, it’s a deal,” Steve told him, grinning.  “Careful, I’ll start to think you’re a fan.”

The silence lasted long enough that Steve stopped willing his sandwich to heat faster, and turned to look at Billy, who had his eyebrows raised and his mouth quirked.  

“Fuck you, then,” Steve said amiably, jostling their shoulders together, and grabbing a paper towel to hold his hot sandwich with.  

“I bought your CD,” Billy gritted out, and Steve whipped around to grin at him again.  

“Seriously?  I’d have given you one.”

“The, uh.  The stuff you were playing onstage, is that on...anything?” Billy asked, and Steve laughed, shrugging.  

“I put stuff on youtube sometimes,” he said.  He nearly dropped his sandwich, burning himself as he pulled it out of the oven.

“This,” Billy said, poking him in the side.  Steve blinked up from his sandwich, and Billy was glaring at him.  “—this.  Right here,” Billy hissed, poking him in the forehead, “—is why you’re backing other musicians in a bar somewhere.  ‘Stuff on youtube’?!  What the fuck, tell me your channel.  Put it on your CD covers, moron.”

Steve snickered, and dug out his phone, and they sat with their heads together watching his songs as they ate—and to his dismay, and Billy’s delight, there were more.  Steve groaned over the old live videos Robin had put up, and the even older videos of Steve in his spinny chair in front of his computer, all legs and arms like a spider, and restlessly spinning as he covered Savage Garden’s I knew I loved you before I met you.  His voice had been high and clear, and starting to crack.

“Oh jesus,” he groaned, but Billy snatched his phone and held it just out of reach, laughing until he cried.  Steve tried to grab it—urgently, as he heard his reedy little voice start covering Sarah McLachlan, and knew Coldplay was next, and Billy dodged around the counter, laughing.  

“You know I’ll just watch ‘em when I get home,” he whispered, his eyes sparkling evilly as he cranked the volume up as high as it would go, and Steve buried his hot face in his arms.  

“I will bribe you to stop,” Steve moaned.  “Tell me what you want.”

“I wanna watch the Christmas playlist.  What kinda bribe could be better than that?” Billy laughed, leaning across so their arms brushed.  “That’s all I want in the world.  Steve Harrington in this little santa hat.  Oh shit, that one’s from last year.”

“Kill me,” Steve whispered into the counter, his arm warm, pressed against Billy’s, and his whole body hot at the thought of Billy Hargrove spending over an hour watching him sing and dance in his computer chair.

“If you don’t want people watching them, why are they on here,” Billy asked, laughing, and Steve bit back the admission that he just didn’t want Billy watching them.  

“...usually I don’t have to hear myself...warbling,” he said, with a grimace.  

“You weren’t bad,” Billy said, grinning over, and Steve watched him smirk and mouth along with the songs, and felt like it was middle school all over again, and he was trying to figure out out how to bribe the cool new kid into being his friend.  

 A few nights later, Steve was pulling in to his parking spot at the bar as Billy walked up.

“...you don’t drive?” Steve asked him, and Billy shrugged.  

“Gives me a chance to walk it off after work,” he said, shrugging, and shivering, and Steve threw an arm around him, and got his hug, shivery and full of zippers from Billy’s leather jacket.  He hugged Billy back, trying to bite back his smile, and failing.  

“I can always give you a ride, though,” Steve said, after the hug stretched weirdly long, and they both cleared their throats, separating to fix their hair like they were embarrassed teenagers in Grease.  

Billy elbowed him, grinning.  His ears were red, and Steve squeezed his shoulders through his leather jacket.  That night, Billy came up and circled around him, trying to hint at a ride without asking for a ride, and when Robin offered him one, Steve and Billy both said “NO, IT’S FINE” at the same time.  

“I’ll give him one,” Steve said, as Billy groaned into his hand, and Robin spun around and turned her back to stare mutely at Jonathan, ignoring them completely.  Jonathan stared at his guitar, his cheeks red with sympathetic embarrassment, and flipped them both off as he threw an arm around Billy.

 It was nearly four am, so when Billy suggested Steve come upstairs—after fidgeting the whole ride—Steve just squinted at him.  “...what about your mean roommate?” he asked, and Billy laughed sharply.

“Oh,” he said, clearing his throat.  “He’s, uh, he’s out of town.”

“Oh,” Steve said, nodding.  “...man, I dunno, I’m half-asleep.”

“Yeah, never mind,” Billy laughed again, scrambling out of the car.  “It was dumb.”

“No,” Steve told him, grabbing his hand and squeezing it like a weirdo, but Billy stilled, biting his lips as he frowned down at their joined hands.  “It’s not,” Steve told him, rubbing his face with the hand that wasn’t holding Billy’s.  Friends can hold hands, he told himself, stubbornly.  He doesn’t even mind.  “It’s not dumb, just like...some other time.”

“Okay,” Billy said softly, laughing.  “You gonna keep holding my hand?”

“...I guess?” Steve asked helplessly, and Billy laughed harder, and climbed back in the car.

“Don’t want you to get lonely,” he said, grinning.

Steve snickered along with him, feeling exactly like in school, when he’d get giggling, and try not to look at anyone, or they’d start him off again, except nothing was really all that funny.  He slid his fingers between Billy’s, and squeezed tighter, and Billy sighed, sprawling across the seats so his head thunked into Steve’s lap.  

“Maybe I should sleep right here,” he said, sighing contentedly.  

“Kinda wish we were, y’know, ten,” Steve laughed.  “One of us would have a, like, tent set up for no reason.  Just go crawl in the tent.”

Billy opened his mouth, and even in the light of the streetlamps, Steve could see him go red across his cheeks and ears.  He bit his lip, and swallowed, squeezing Steve’s hand.

“...just fall asleep wherever,” Steve sighed.

“You saying I should just lie on you when you fall asleep on the couch?” Billy asked, and Steve started snickering again.  

“Doesn’t sound very comfortable,” Steve pointed out, and Billy laughed.

“Yeah, it does,” he whispered, and Steve wanted to—to pet him, or something, he didn’t know, but it was four am going on five, probably, and his brain was numb, so he let his fingers brush Billy’s curls where they lay over his thigh.  Billy watched his face, wide-eyed.

“Sorry,” Steve said, pausing, “—I’m so fucking tired, I’m—”

“Dude, you can pet me,” Billy told him, laughing, but he looked...exhausted, suddenly.  “Whatever you want.  Friends, right.”

“Yeah,” Steve told him, stroking his hair, and brushing his hand over Billy’s face, to feel the heat of his skin, and touch his eyebrow piercing.  “What, you got enough friends already?”

“...no,” Billy laughed, a little harshly.  “No, I haven’t got...enough friends.  Let’s be fucking...best friends.  Sure.”

Steve wanted to hug him, so he cleared his throat, instead.  “Yeah.  Yeah,” he laughed, giddy.  “Best friends.  No take-backs.”

“How old are you,” Billy asked, and his voice sounded weird, kinda thready and hoarse.  “The fuck are you so excited about—”

“I don’t know,” Steve admitted, still snickering.  “I just—I don’t know, you’re cool.  I’m the band nerd.  Best friends.  Match made in heaven.”

Billy turned to bury his head in Steve’s stomach with a long groan, and Steve turned the radio on, letting his fingers linger in Billy’s hair.

Next

But really READ IT ON Ao3 Y’ALL IT’S DONE EXCEPT FOR ART AND AN EPILOGUE!

[platypanthewriter]

Friday, 4pm: Gay Sex and Demodogs

Febuwhump prompt day 3: Imprisonment

Art by Nedahert

The hair all stood up on the back of Steve’s neck as he rummaged in his locker, and he whipped around at the sound of cement cracking to see the lights off at the end of the hallway.  He left his locker open, backing away, then turned and jogged in the other direction, glancing down corridors and in classrooms for anyone else.  

The first person he found was a woman he didn’t recognize as a teacher, not that it was easy to tell, with the lights flickering like crazy, over the sound of shearing metal behind him.  When he ran up and tried to turn her away from walking towards the noises, she smacked his hand away with a gun, hissing.  The lights sparked and burst in the hallway they were in, so he kept running past another shadowy shape with a gun.  

The next normal human he ran into was Billy Hargrove. 

Billy was leaning against his locker, his back to Steve.  He stiffened his shoulders at the sound of Steve’s sneakers pounding up behind him.  As Steve grabbed his shoulder, Billy swung around and jerked his chin up, opening his mouth to be an asshole. 

Steve could smell the weird, metallic smell of the Upside-Down, and hear the freaky trilling of the demodogs, so he just grabbed the sleeve of Billy’s denim jacket and yanked him along.  Billy jerked away, and Steve said “Come on, shithead,” and grabbed him around the shoulders, shoving him forward.

“What the fuck, Harrington,” Billy yelled, their shoes squeaking against the linoleum as he planted his feet, and then, “Harrington!” and “Are you fucking deaf.”

Steve ignored him, cursing his luck that Billy Hargrove hadn’t left school.

They didn’t run into anyone else.

They were just passing Chemistry when the lights went out ahead, and Steve saw motion, down low, too low and long to be a person.  The doors thudded and creaked as Steve shoved Billy back against them, holding him there with his forearm like a bar against Billy’s chest.

“The fuck—” Billy hissed, and Steve ssh-ed him, pressing his thumb to Billy’s mouth, leaning away to see around the lockers.  He tuned his whole body to listen for demodogs like a radio antennae, grateful in the back of his mind that Billy was keeping still, instead of fighting him.  All he could see was darkness, and the flickering light above them, when Billy pushed the door open into the chemistry classroom and drug him inside.

“You trying to get your own back, your majesty,” he asked roughly, pulling Steve close again as he tried to look around the room in the dim, cloud-filtered afternoon light of the windows.  

Steve grabbed one of the heavy lab tables and yanked on it.  “Get the other side,” he hissed, and Billy did, helping him shove it against the door.  He slid a shaking hand up Steve’s arm, and Steve took a deep breath of relief that he didn’t need to explain, and stalked away to check the other door.  He couldn’t tell whether it was locked, so he shoved a table against that one too, and turned around to see Billy taking slow breaths into his steepled hands.  

He jerked back as Steve stepped closer, then grabbed at Steve’s shirt and yanked him in, so close they were breathing each other’s air—like the goddamn weirdo he was—and Steve groaned inwardly again that out of all the people he could be locked in a room with, it would be Billy Hargrove.

Just my luck, Steve thought, rolling his eyes, and Billy cleared his throat, his hands tightening on Steve’s biceps.  

“...nobody’s gonna find us now,” Billy laughed, his eyes fixed on Steve’s mouth, and Steve felt a little more sympathy for Billy Hargrove than he had in a while, feeling him tremble.  

“Look, you’ll be—” Steve started to say, reassuringly, but Billy Hargrove kissed him, a full-body, urgent kiss like Steve had always been afraid to give.  Billy’s fingers dug into his shoulder, yanking him close, his lips opened where Billy’s thumb pressed against his mouth, and Billy’s tongue slipped in, hot and surprisingly gentle.

Steve froze, forgetting the monsters outside as Billy’s whole, hard body pressed against his, shoving him back against the tables.  Billy’s nails scraped Steve’s back through his shirt as his arms held Steve so tight it hurt.  

Billy was shaking.  His kisses were breathy—he had a—it was almost a whine in the back of his throat Steve couldn’t help chasing, and Billy laughed incredulously, as though he hadn’t been the one to grab Steve in the first place, and kiss him like Steve Harrington was his only source of oxygen.  

“T-take what you want,” he whispered, biting his lip.  His lips were already getting pink from rough kissing, and Steve wondered, vaguely, whether Billy wished Steve had shaved more carefully that morning.  Billy’s skin was soft, except for the roughness of his mustache.  “You want me on the floor or over a table,” he asked, laughing unsteadily.  His eyes were red.

“What,” Steve asked, the only word he could form, half listening in case their quiet voices brought demodogs to the door.  

“Or on my knees,” Billy whispered, his nails digging into the skin under Steve’s shoulder blades.  His eyes were steady, watching Steve’s.  “Teach me a lesson.”

“Jesus,” Steve whispered back, trying to figure out how to explain there were monsters, it wasn’t some—weird power...sex...game.  Billy licked his lips, watching Steve’s mouth, and then flicked a glance up at Steve’s eyes, and grinned crookedly.  

“You caught me,” he laughed, his eyes reddening.  “Fucking...queer.  What now.”

“Wait,” Steve whispered, as Billy shook his head, and kissed him again, shoving Steve and the heavy table he was braced against a few inches across the floor with the sound of metal squeaking against linoleum.  “Sssh!” Steve hissed, turning Billy away from the table, and pulling him into the free space at the front of the room.  

“Are you fucking me,” Billy asked, his eyes fixed on Steve’s hand in his.  “Get some back for me kicking your ass.”

“That’s not—” Steve started, but Billy wasn’t listening, he stepped in and kissed Steve again, closing his eyes, and giving a little pained grunt as Steve opened his mouth willingly.

“Come on,” Billy panted, swallowing.  “You got this over me, now.  Nobody’ll believe me.  You can take it out of my hide.”

“I don’t want to hurt you,” Steve said, to be clear, and Billy frowned, jerking back.

“...the hell are we doing in here, then,” he asked roughly, frowning at the doors.  “Come on.”

“Billy—”

“Don’t be a pussy, Harrington, you gonna fuck my face or my ass, huh?  Don’t pretend you don’t…” Billy stepped close again, sliding his fingers under the waistband of Steve’s jeans, and Steve grabbed his hand.

“Holy crap.”  Steve breathed, as Billy tried to yank away.

“You just want me to admit it, then,” Billy asked roughly, shoving Steve back hard enough he stumbled.  “Fine, you fuck, I’m a fag.  What now?!  You got me alone in here.  You—you gonna show me my place, huh?  You—you gonna beat my head in—” he stepped forward, wiping his eyes, and Steve stepped back and around the teacher’s desk, recognizing the helpless fury on Billy’s face.  

Billy tried to catch him a few times, circling the desk, then grabbed the apple paperweight and hefted it to throw.  As the grey light caught his face, Steve could see tears streaking it.  “Billy, you gotta shut up,” he hissed.

“Why the hell did you bring me in here,” Billy yelled.  “The fuck do you want,” and Steve stopped, holding his hands up.  

“Okay,” he tried, “—come here.  Billy.”

Billy stepped back, his shoulders lifting, then laughed, swallowing visibly.  “What are you doing,” he asked flatly.

“Come here,” Steve told him, stepping around the desk towards him, and Billy took a step backwards again, then stopped, holding himself stiffly.  “Billy,” Steve whispered, approaching slowly, like Billy Hargrove was an injured, snarling dog.  “Give me that,” he said, taking Billy’s hand, and pulling Billy’s unresisting fingers from around the paperweight.  Billy twitched when Steve took it, but Steve just put it back on the desk.  

“What do you want,” Billy asked, unsteadily, as Steve turned back to him.  “What are you gonna do with me?”

It didn’t seem like the time to try and explain the demodogs—so much for Billy having seen one, and cooperating like—like a person who made sense, Steve thought.  He tried to think of what to say to keep Billy quiet, and finally held his hands out, flat.

“You wanna make out,” he asked softly, and Billy laughed, his voice cracking loud in the quiet, so Steve yanked him close again, and sealed his mouth with another kiss.  

He’d never dated anyone who acted like the best thing in the world was getting closer to Steve Harrington, and he relaxed into it as Billy wrapped around him again, his fingers painfully tight.  Steve’d also never had his ass squeezed so enthusiastically his crotch rubbed all up on the person he was necking, and he almost apologized--but Billy groaned, gripping him tighter.

It was hot in the chemistry lab, stuffy from the wall of windows, and suddenly Steve was sweating, his skin tingling and burning with the heat of Billy’s open-mouthed kisses.

Billy explored him like it was a once-in-a-lifetime chance, running his thumb along Steve’s jaw and down his neck, then over his ear and thorough his hair, all fast and clumsy like he had to check as much as possible.  He buried his face in Steve’s neck and breathed, and then his hair, and Steve tried not to giggle.  

“I got nowhere to be,” he whispered, and Billy snorted a laugh, leaving hot, sloppy kisses down the side of Steve’s neck from his ear to his collarbone.  Steve groaned, relaxing into it, and Billy’s hands twitched.

“You should fuck me, then,” he whispered back, laughing a little and looking away, like he wanted to be able to say it was a joke.  

Steve licked his lips, considering the idea of boning the violent gay kid who’d nearly beaten his head in, to keep him from yelling, to protect them both from getting eaten by monsters.  He couldn’t quite wrap his head around it, and he licked his lips, wondering how to reply.

“...screw you, Harrington,” Billy sighed, and Steve snorted.

“Yeah, you wish.”

Billy laughed aloud at that, fiddling with the hem of Steve’s polo shirt, and Steve slid his hand down his own ribs and lifted his shirt a few inches, so Billy’s chilly hand was against skin.  Billy took a sharp breath, scanning his face, and Steve grinned, panting, so Billy bit his lip, sliding his hands up under Steve’s shirt.  He lifted it to press more kisses to Steve’s belly, and then up over his ribs to his sternum and chest.  Billy leaned there, breathing, like Steve could possibly smell good after a whole day of school, and Steve’s face flamed, feeling his blood pound in his chest against Billy’s lips.  

“...Harrington,” he whispered, and Steve leaned to kiss his head, running his fingers through Billy’s warm hair.  Billy’s fingers clenched in the skin of his back, and Steve realized he was gonna have marks like he’d been screwing a woman with long nails.  

He snickered, nervous.  “I’m gonna be all over scratches and hickies,” he said, when Billy glared up.  

Billy licked his lips, watching Steve’s mouth.  Steve pulled Billy back upright to kiss him again, relishing the shaky breath every time their lips connected, and Billy’s immediate attempt to squirm under Steve’s skin, wrapping both arms around Steve’s torso, and throwing a leg around Steve’s butt.  

Steve staggered, remembered the squeak of the table, and pulled Billy down right there on the ground.  Billy rolled on top of him, licking into his mouth, and Steve lost himself for a few seconds under the warm weight, the taste of cigarettes and—weirdly—tequila, and Billy’s still-trembling hands stroking over his face and head. 

The chemistry lab looked like a different place with the lights out, like the creepy Upside-Down of Steve’s normal life, and he barely noticed how hard the dirty linoleum was under his back.  He grunted, squirming as Billy’s hard-on squished his in his jeans, and his dick gave absolutely no shits that it was Billy Hargrove on top of him.

“Fuck me,” Billy whispered.  “I’ll make it good, I swear.  It’ll be good.  Harrington,” he trailed off, his breath shaky, and Steve swallowed, shaking his head to clear it.  He pushed Billy’s face up enough to look at his face, squishing his stubbly cheeks and squinting to see Billy’s blue eyes, grey-green in the dim classroom.  

“...not to make us...even,” Steve said, frowning up as he panted.  “Just—”

Billy nodded, taking a shaky breath.  “Yeah.  Yeah.  Jesus.  Lemme—lemme go—” he staggered getting to his feet, wincing as his fingers brushed the hard lump in his jeans.  

Steve started to unzip, then realized Billy was heading for the door.  He reached for the table blocking it, and Steve scrambled to his feet, grabbing Billy’s arm.  “Where you going,” he whispered.

“I—I gotta—bathroom,” Billy hissed, letting himself be tugged closer, and nuzzling his face into Steve’s shoulder to take a deep breath.

“Don’t leave,” Steve told him, and Billy pulled back, frowning.

“I’ll be right back,” he whispered, and Steve shook his head, leaning in to kiss Billy’s kiss-swollen lips, to soften his words.

“Don’t leave this room,” he whispered back, rubbing his hands up and down Billy’s upper arms.  “Don’t go outside.”

“Why,” Billy asked, flicking a glance at the door, and Steve had no idea how to explain the monsters now, so he just kissed him again, slowly, until Billy slumped against him again.  

“Stay with me,” Steve whispered, and Billy nodded, licking his lips, and then bumping his nose into Steve’s gently as he leaned in for another kiss.

“Yeah,” he nodded.  “Yeah, anything, anything you want.”

Anything thrilled up Steve’s spine, and he laughed, trying, impossibly, to pull Billy closer.  

“I—I’ll use the sink over there, then,” Billy said hoarsely.  “Don’t look.”

 “Okay,” Steve said, then impulsively added, “—gorgeous,” and Billy gave a startled snort, his fingers lingering on Steve’s skin as he pulled away.

Billy busying himself by the sink was fine with Steve, who made the chilling discovery that while they’d been sucking face, the table against the door had been shoved three inches inward.  He imagined the slow pressure of a veiny, hairless shoulder pressed against the door and shuddered, pushing it flush against the door again.  He pulled another table over against the first to hold the line, under cover of Billy’s running water noise, and then scoped out the room.  The blowtorch was an obvious find, and he sat it close to the door.

The metal stands for holding glassware in the air were heavy, and long enough, maybe, he thought, swinging one around, and he sat it on one of the tables braced against the door.  The stools were tall, and solidly metal, so he put a couple of those handy too, and a few cans of Coke he found in the teacher’s desk, figuring they were heavy enough to throw through an open door.  Better than nothing.  He walked around the wall, ignoring whatever Billy was doing—he’d smelled fine, Steve thought, rolling his eyes.  

His gaze fell on the cupboard of chemicals—hydrochloric acid looked back at him, and he raised his eyebrows thoughtfully, then remembered he was checking the other door, and paced around to it.  It hadn’t budged, but he pulled another table over anyway, and sat some empty test tubes around, so if it got shoved, they’d roll and make a noise falling.

“You want me on hands and knees, right,” Billy asked, his eyes entirely on Steve’s, and not on the suspicious barricade Steve was building.  Steve walked over and slid his arms around him, wondering some that it was already comfortable, having his arms around Billy Hargrove.

Billy grunted into his kiss, startled, then put his arms around Steve again, too tight, like he thought he had to grab hard at things he wanted.  He licked into Steve’s mouth again, and Steve completely forgot what they were doing.  “...how you want me,” Billy asked again, nearly vibrating with tension.  “Facing away, right.”

“Mmmn,” Steve considered, his ribs hurting with the pressure, but his everything else relaxing into it.  He kissed Billy’s tense jaw, then under it, and Billy huffed.  

“Harrington,” he hissed, bucking their hips together.  

“Which way you want it?” Steve asked, and Billy took a shaky breath, hugging him even tighter, so Steve’s face thunked against Billy’s jaw.  

“Why’re you—” Billy started hoarsely, then laughed, digging his nails in again.  “I don’t care.  I don’t care, just fuck me, jesus—”

Steve pushed his hands between them to undo Billy’s jeans, and Billy went from ordering him to begging him as Steve got his fingers around the hot, familiar shape of Billy’s dick.  

“Anything you want,” Billy whispered, “—anything, anything you want from me—”  Steve contemplated pushing Billy over the desk, and dismissed it, remembering the screech the table had made, shoved across the floor.  “Tell me what you want,” Billy moaned in his ear, his hips jerking so his cock shoved against Steve’s fingers.  

It was a little like having his hand fall asleep, Steve thought, like feeling the familiar shape of a cock with no sensation that it was his.  He wrapped his hand around Billy’s dick, yanking the way he liked it, and Billy gave a strangled moan, grabbing at his shoulders.

“Get down on the ground,” Steve whispered, and Billy shuddered, dropping to his knees.  He curled into Steve’s shoulder when Steve crouched next to him, and Steve slid his hand along Billy’s cock again, rubbing his thumb through the drips, fascinated with his shuddery breaths.  “You want to wrap yourself around me the whole time,” Steve guessed, and Billy snorted, but didn’t argue, leaning back on the floor easily as Steve pushed him around.  

They ended up under the blackboard, next to a motivational poster that read ‘Genius is 1% inspiration, 99% perspiration’, and Steve stared at it for a long second and started giggling.  Billy growled, but Steve pointed at it, wheezing helplessly, and Billy relaxed, leaning close for another kiss.  “Let’s make some genius,” he whispered, and Steve laughed harder.

Billy yanked his shoes and jeans off as Steve undid his own, lying back on his elbows until Steve shoved his jeans and Fruit-of-the-Looms down his thighs.  Billy flapped a hand out.  “Lemme suck you first, jesus,” he whispered.  Steve blinked, his giggles gone as Billy Hargrove crawled closer to bury his face in Steve’s crotch, breathing deeply, and then sank Steve’s whole cock between his lips, choking and drooling.  

Steve’s whole brain flickered off and on, like the lights in the corridors, and he bit back a groan, grabbing Billy’s hair and thrusting a couple times in his mouth before he came to himself and yanked his hands back, mumbling apologies.  

Billy pulled off, coughing and gagging, and Steve rubbed his back, grimacing.  “Sorry, sorry, shit,” he whispered.  “That was shitty, I’m sorry, fuck—”

“You can fuck my face if you want to,” Billy said hoarsely.  “I’m sturdy—”

“What kind of asshole d’you think I am,” Steve muttered, mostly to himself, and Billy laughed, burying his face between Steve’s cock and his thigh again.

“You got hard for me,” he whispered, hugging Steve’s naked butt, and Steve stroked his hair, wondering whether the slow breaths were Billy being a gross freak of nature, or whether he was trying not to flip his shit.  

“Come on,” Steve told him, softly, huffing a laugh.  “Didn’t you want me to fuck you?”

“Jesus,” Billy muttered, letting Steve push him onto his back again.  “Condom,” he said, holding one up, and Steve blinked at it, mostly familiar with them to keep girls from getting pregnant.  He shrugged, and yanked it open, sliding it down over his cock with a soft groan.

Billy scrambled over to a pump bottle next to the desk on the floor, and Steve recognized it as the lotion that sat next to the handwashing station.  Billy pumped a few squirts into his hand, and held it out to Steve, his eyes wary, so Steve scooted closer, feeling like an idiot as his dick bounced back and forth with the motion.  

“Jesus,” Billy muttered again, slicking Steve up, and then holding his hairy, muscled legs apart.  “...you can just go for it,” he said tensely, his skin cool and a little clammy, trembling as Steve knelt between his thighs.  “I can take it.”

He’d undone his cuffs, pushing them up his arms, and Steve registered bruises on his forearms.  Not like he’d bumped something, more like he’d held his arms up to protect his face, and Steve thought about that for a long second.  He shifted his hand from gripping Billy’s leg to smoothing down it.

“Go on already,” Billy hissed.

Steve bit his lips together, eyeing the little puckered pink hole, shiny with lotion, but small looking, and then looked at Billy’s face.  He had it turned aside, his jaw locked, and his eyes closed.  Steve frowned harder, and ran his thumb over Billy’s asshole, then blinked as he jerked and moaned.

“...okay,” Steve said, nodding.  He could feel his heartbeat through his whole body.  The air on his skin felt good, and he took a steadying breath.  “...I’ll—I’ll go slow.”

“You don’t have to—unh,” Billy grunted, as Steve’s dick bumped against him.  Billy let himself fall back flat against the floor, wrapping his legs around Steve’s waist.  “Pound me,” he whispered, and Steve squinted at him, then shook his head, reminding himself—nearly chanting in his head—to be careful, to go slow.  

“Nope,” he said, trying to keep track of any words at all as he aimed his dick, and pushed into Billy’s tight heat.  “M’—m’goin’ slow.”

“S’fine—ah,” Billy twitched, clenching his eyes shut, and Steve stopped, watching him.  Steve ran his hands over Billy’s thighs, soothing himself more than Billy, he was pretty sure, but Billy didn’t swear at him again, so Steve waited until he relaxed to push a little further.  He scootched his knees under Billy’s butt, nearly bending him in half as Steve leaned until he was seated fully, his balls against Billy’s butt, and Billy was taking shaky, shallow breaths and staring at the ceiling, tears rolling out of his eyes into his ears.

“D’you want me to pull out,” Steve asked, and Billy shook his head, squeezing his legs tighter around Steve’s waist.  “Maybe I should ask you for a tongue twister,” Steve rambled aloud, leaning in to brush tears off Billy’s cheek.  “You--you can, um, lie, you keep saying it’s fine,” Steve panted, “--but--but I bet you can’t say a tongue twister.”    

“Shut up,” Billy snorted, groaning as he shifted against the floor.  His hair pooled around his head.

Billy felt so good Steve was almost content to just stay there, unmoving inside him, if the thought of how incredible it had felt pushing in wasn’t tempting his hips into thrusting all on their own.  Steve took another deep breath in, and blew out, and held still.  

“O-okay,” Billy whispered.  “Move.  Move.”  

“Mmmn,” Steve acknowledged, and slowly lifted his hips, pulling out as Billy clamped down around him, and moaned.  “Ready?” Steve asked, and Billy growled and clenched his nails in Steve’s shoulders again, bucking his hips up from the ground, so Steve took that as a definite yes and let his hips do what his whole body wanted.  

It was so good.  Billy squirmed and grunted under him, his nails scraping Steve’s back, and Steve pounded into him until the whole classroom filled with the sound of wet slaps.  “God it’s good,” he whispered, “—you’re so, so good,” and Billy made a broken noise in the back of his throat, holding him ever closer.  

Steve came with a soft cry, and heard one of the test tubes shatter on the floor.  He froze, listening, and then pulled out, yanking the condom off, as he scrambled to his feet.  He tossed it in the trash, and jerked his pants up as he ran for the back door, where the table was pushed nearly a foot away from the door.  He shoved it back to, then climbed up to peer through the wire gridded glass into the darkness of the hallway outside.  

He couldn’t see anything, so he jumped back down, walked over, and used the closest stool to break the glass of the chemical cabinet.  He took out the three bottles of hydrochloric acid, and sat it on the counter, squinting into the depths to see if there was anything else useful.  Sweat stung his eyes, and he wiped it away, looking back to see Billy curled on his side, jacking off.  He lay on the ground, his head lifted to watch Steve, and came in his hand as Steve walked back towards him.

Billy pushed himself shakily upright, and staggered.  “Guess you’re done with me,” he laughed, smirking, but he didn’t look up.  “I—I should go, huh.  Get—get out of your hair.”

“No,” Steve said quickly, going over to pull him close again, ignoring the mess on Billy’s fingers and stomach.  “Sorry I—that was shitty, jesus, I’m sorry.”

“Got what you wanted,” Billy shrugged, his hand gripping Steve’s shirt again, and Steve pulled him into a deep kiss, feeling him more than hearing him moan.  

“Don’t leave,” Steve whispered, watching Billy frown at the double layer of tables holding the door shut.  “We could try it the other way,” he offered, grimacing, but Billy laughed disbelievingly, and kissed him again.  

“You wanna fuck me on hands and knees now?” he asked, smiling a little, and when Steve nodded, sighing with relief, Billy curled into his shoulder, sliding his arms around Steve’s waist.  “What is happening,” he whispered, his face nestled against Steve’s neck.  He sounded soft and happy, and Steve felt a guilty twinge in his stomach.

“What were you doing?” Billy asked, taking a few steps towards the door, and Steve saw his expression change when it fell on the blowtorch, and the metal rods lying next to it, and the cans of coke, and the flasks of hydrochloric acid.  “Oh shit, no,” he whispered, his eyes going wet.  “Oh fuck, please.  Lemme go, just—just lemme go—”

“Oh shit, no,” Steve hissed, grabbing him around the waist as he tried to yell.  He covered Billy’s mouth, shoving him back against the side of the broken cabinet, and Billy pushed at him, but his whole body was shaking, and his arms had no strength to them.  He made a noise in his throat that was almost a whine.  “You’re safe,” Steve whispered.  “I’m not gonna hurt you, you’re safe, I would never—”

Billy tried to jerk away, and his tears spilled down his cheeks.  He didn’t struggle for very long, and once he bowed his head, Steve whispered, “Stay quiet, and I’ll move my hand.”

He nodded, swallowing.  When Steve moved his hand, Billy bit his lips together, and Steve stepped back slowly—then had to tackle Billy again as he broke for the door.  They hit the ground hard, scuffling, but Billy was just trying to scramble away, so he wasn’t hard to pin.  

“Please don’t do this to me,” Billy whispered shakily, against the linoleum. “Please, fuck, Harrington, jesus—please don’t fucking burn me—”

Steve held him tighter, scrambling to cover his mouth, and tried a different truth.  “Ssh, ssh! There are people out there with guns,” he hissed.  “I’m trying to keep you in here.  I’m not gonna hurt you, I’m trying to—it’s safe in here, Hargrove—”

Billy nodded, scrambling away again, and shielding his head with his banged-up arms.  Steve let him go, grimacing, but this time Billy just scooted up against the cabinets, ridiculous-looking, naked from the waist down.  

“You should go back over by the desk, Hargrove,” Steve whispered.  “There’s broken glass over here.”

“Fuck you,” Billy hissed.  “The fuck do you want?  Why didn’t you say anything?!  Why the fuck would you—”

“I’m just keeping you in here where it’s safe,” Steve whispered back, the guilt in his stomach spreading roots as he looked back at Billy’s red-rimmed eyes, and remembered how uncertain he’d sounded, offering more sex.

“...fuck you,” Billy whispered again, getting to his feet and stalking over to sit on the floor by the desk.  “How long are you keeping me here?”

Steve, who had been wondering the same thing, grimaced.  “Until it’s safe to leave,” he said, and Billy laughed, burying his head in his hands.  

“...the hell do you mean people with guns,” he hissed, as Steve went to the wall of windows, eyeing the hedge outside, and wondering whether they could break a pane of glass, and make it to their cars.  Whether Billy would even run, or whether he’d argue, and then Steve would look up to find them surrounded, just like in the junkyard, but with no Sheriff Hopper and Mrs. Byers coming to help.

“People with guns,” Steve repeated, shrugging.  

“Maybe it was the police,” Billy shot back, and Steve snorted, backing away from the window.  

“Nope,” he sighed, suddenly remembering the sinister warnings he’d been given if he tried to help anyone else avoid this exact situation. 

“The fuck would anyone try to rob a school,” Billy yelled at the ceiling, and Steve ran over, crouching next to him.  

“Sssh,” he whispered, reaching to cover Billy’s mouth, then jerking his hand back as Billy flinched away.  “They’re not trying to rob the school.”

“The fuck is going on, Harrington,” Billy hissed, shoving him back, his eyes brimming with tears again.  “What’s so fucking important you’d let me…”

“Shush,” Steve shot back, as the two tables in front of the door they’d come in screeched across the floor, and the weird-as-shit noise the demodogs made whinnied into the room.  He ran over and shoved back, shoving the door shut with his whole weight, and yelled, “Billy, throw the acid at them!”

Billy stared at him, and the door, hugging his knees, and something else shoved against the door, forcing Steve back across the floor with a squeeeeak of his shoes.  He hissed “Shit, fuck, damn it—” and then Billy was there, his naked ass right at Steve’s eye-level, and there was a crash and a terrible hissing, screaming noise, and some thuds, and Steve shoved the door closed.

“Wha—” Billy began, shakily, but Steve grabbed him around the mouth again and pulled him silently back into the room, watching both doors, and the windows.  

“Sshhh,” he breathed in Billy’s ear, and Billy nodded, shaking against him.  They listened for long minutes.  “Are you all right,” Steve said under his breath, clenching his hands tighter in Billy’s shirt, and Billy snorted softly.

“It didn’t make it inside,” he breathed, almost inaudibly.  “What about you?”

“God,” Steve whispered, hugging him.  

A test tube crashed off the table at the other door, and Billy ran and yanked his shoes on, still pantsless, before clambering up and blowtorching through the crack while Steve held the line, his shoulder braced against the juddering table.  Billy had to lean out, and the blowtorch fell outside the room, but Steve yanked him back as more screaming started.  

They slammed the door.

Billy must have gotten a better look in the light of the blowtorch, because he stared blankly at the dim hallway through the glass even as Steve yanked him around and into a kiss.  

“...why are you kissing me,” he whispered, once Steve pulled away, and Steve thought about it, listening, and trembling with adrenaline.  

“I wanted to,” Steve whispered back.

“What are those things,” Billy whispered again, just as crashing noises came from both doors at once, and Steve handed him the other flask of hydrochloric acid, and ran to tip the table so its top blocked the other door.  One scraped through, and he beat it over the head with a stool.  

“How many are there,” Billy yelled, throwing his shoulder against the door, and Steve shouted back No idea because it wasn’t like they could actually get louder than the shrieking, scrabbling demodogs.  

When everything went silent again, they both wandered back to the clear space where they’d fucked, shaky and panting for different reasons this time.  “Did we win,” Billy asked, but he was watching the doors like he knew the answer, and Steve slid an arm around him and pulled him close.  

“Sorry,” Steve whispered.  “I tried to get you out of the school, but there was one between us and the parking lot.”

“That’s what was in the hallway?!” Billy hissed back, wide-eyed, and Steve bit his lips, raising his eyebrows.  “Holy shit,” Billy breathed.

“They’re why I had the bat that night,” Steve offered, grimacing.

“...the night I…”

“When you beat my head in,” Steve said dryly, and Billy twitched.  “I’d just killed one when you pulled up.  We hid it in the fridge.”

“You what,” Billy said flatly.  “What are they?!”

Steve had never, he realized, had to explain the demodogs or the Upside-Down before.  They’d been explained to him, and he tried to remember what Nancy had said.  “Ssssh,” he whispered, and Billy’s head jerked in a nod.  “They, um,” Steve started, then let his head bow to breathe against Billy’s hair.  “The, uh, Hawkins Lab?  They...found...them,” he finished lamely.  “They, um, they get loose...sometimes.”

“...so you told me there were people with guns,” Billy said flatly.

“No, no, there were, there--there probably still are,” Steve sighed.  “They come out to shoot the demon dogs.  Demodogs.  They’ll, uh, they’ll probably shoot you too, if you’re in the way.”

“What the fuck is this place,” Billy breathed, and Steve laughed, sighing again.  “...so you fucked me to keep me quiet,” Billy grated out, “—because you figured I wouldn’t believe you about the—demo...dogs.”

It was hard to say he’d wanted to, somehow, harder than it had been for just a kiss, hard to admit he’d pushed Billy Hargove down on the ground, wanting to feel every sound he made, and taste his skin.  “...I wanted to,” Steve forced out.  

“Holy shit,” Billy breathed, staring at him.  “Tommy, that fuckhead, he didn’t tell me.  You two—you fucked around?  Holy shit, King of Hawkins High, queer as a three-dollar bill—”

“No,” Steve cut him off, and bit his lips together.  “N-no, we never—maybe he wanted to,” he said, thinking of Tommy’s weird jealousy, “—but uh, he never—he never said anything.  Just—you.”

Billy went very still, then laughed again, shaking his head.  “...holy shit.”  He bucked his hips against Steve’s, and his hard cock rubbed against Steve’s jeans.  “You wanna fuck me again after all?”

“...they’re probably not gone,” Steve reminded him, and Billy laughed.  He looked tired, and rumpled, and his hair was sweaty, but he was smiling more genuinely than Steve had ever seen him.

“Hell of a way to die,” he whispered, grinning.

“...yeah, okay,” Steve whispered back, and kissed up his neck, wet, open-mouthed kisses that made Billy laugh disbelievingly against his shoulder.  

“I got another condom in my jeans,” Billy whispered, and Steve patted his own down, whipping out the little packet, and yanking on it with his teeth.  Billy grabbed it, dropped to his knees, and yanked it open, pushing the condom between his lips, and unzipping Steve’s jeans.  

He pushed them down around Steve’s hips, stretched Steve’s tighty-whities down over his hard-on, and leaned in, sliding his hands around to squeeze at Steve’s ass, and rolling the condom up Steve’s dick with his lips and tongue.  

Steve bit back a moan, but behaved himself this time, keeping his hips still even as Billy struggled to breathe around him, forcing Steve’s cock down the tight heat of his throat.  “God, you’re good,” Steve whispered, stroking his hair gently, and Billy moaned, pulling off, and clearing his throat, coughing.  

“How you want me?” he asked, leaning his face against Steve’s thigh.  

“How d’you want it?” Steve asked, crouching, and lifting Billy’s chin for a slow, latex-y kiss.  

“Mmn,” Billy mumbled, wrapping his arms around Steve’s neck and head, and Steve grinned into the kiss, his cheeks warming at having anybody so eager to kiss him.  “I don’t give a shit,” Billy breathed, and Steve considered.  

“...why don’t you put your pants mostly back on, and your shoes,” Steve whispered, and Billy rolled his eyes, groaning.  “I can--I mean,” Steve stopped, his face flushing, and lowered his voice.  “I can still fuck you on your hands and knees, and--and if something crashes through the door, you aren’t naked—”

“Fine,” Billy said, smirking, and stood up, making sure to wave his ass at Steve’s eye-level as he yanked his jeans on.  When he got his clothes mostly on, he dropped to hands and knees, looking behind him coyly, and Steve laughed, grabbing the lotion and slicking himself up.  He pumped some more lotion in his hand this time, promising himself he wouldn’t leave Billy to get himself off on the floor this time, like the shittiest sex partner alive.

It was easier, the second go-around.  Steve let Billy push himself back onto Steve’s dick, waiting while he paused a few times, taking shaky breaths.  Billy wasn’t as tight, and he never went so tense, this time, that Steve thought he must be in pain.  It was just as good, and Steve tried to go slow and not just—buck his hips wildly, like he had the first time.  He let Billy control it, and took shuddery breaths against Billy’s sweaty neck and into his hair.

Once their whole bodies were pressed together, Steve kissed the crook of Billy’s neck, biting him gently, and Billy bit back a moan.  Steve slid his arm around and stroked the lotion up Billy’s cock, and Billy yelped, thudding to the floor as his elbows gave out.  Steve laughed smugly, working Billy from the outside and the inside, and listening as he made soft noises in his throat.  

“...jesus,” Billy whispered, fully Jell-O between Steve’s hand and his cock.  

Steve kissed down his spine, fucking him in a slow rolling motion, when the windows burst inward, and he had to yank Billy backwards and upright, and tuck him back into his jeans as three demodogs stalked towards them.  

One of them was gushing blood from the broken glass, and the one that rushed Steve slipped in it, scrabbling on its side to right itself.  Steve grabbed a metal stool, dick swinging, and swung the stool to connect with the thing’s tooth-flower head, three times, four times, and it stopped moving.  

Billy was yelling behind him, and Steve spun to see him scrambling backwards over the broken glass, his jeans still around his thighs, smacking the thing with the metal rod, and Steve slammed the stool down on its spine, then twice more for good measure, and once at the base of its skull.  

The air from the windows was much cooler, and Steve tried to pant quietly, listening in the darkness.

Billy yelled and chucked a can of coke behind Steve, and Steve turned to see the bleeding one lurching towards them.  It opened its head, shrieking its awful feedbacky noises like it was trying to shatter their eardrums, and Billy ran to flank it, slamming the rod point-first into the gushing wound.  

It wailed, jerking its mouth towards him, but Steve slammed its head away with the stool.  He nudged it with his foot, then kicked it.  Billy kicked the others, and they both rained down a few more blows, just in case.  

“Jesus fuck,” Billy whispered, staggering, and Steve reached out and pulled him well back from the window.  “The hell are those people with guns doing?!  Shoot these fuckers,” he panted, and Steve snorted a laugh.  

“...you wanna try again,” he asked, smirking, and Billy started laughing, silently, shaking his head.

“...gonna bite my dick off,” he panted.

 He let Steve pull him up on one of the tables closer to the doors, away from the wall of windows, and curled against him, his face buried against Steve’s shoulder.  Steve held him, his heart still pounding, feeling like an animatronic at Disney World as his head surveyed the door they’d come in, and the windows, and the bodies, and the other door, over and over.  

Billy breathed against his chest, heavy and warm, and Steve glanced down to see Billy’s jeans straining over his hard cock again.

Steve’s dick twitched.  “...I can take care of that for you,” he offered, glancing around his circuit again.

“Lemme blow you,” Billy said, loud in the silence, and then turned his face harder into Steve’s shoulder, where Steve could feel more than hear him groan.  

“I wanna keep watch,” Steve told him, biting back a snicker, but he slid his hand down to run his knuckles up and down the bulge in Billy’s jeans, and Billy scooted closer, pulling his knee up.  

“...why the fuck do monsters turn you on,” he whispered, and Steve snorted, tugging at Billy’s fly.  

“They don’t,” he hissed, jerking the zipper down, and sliding his hand in Billy’s jeans.  Billy hissed, squirming closer so the table gave a loud creak, and they both froze for long minutes.

“Fuck,” Billy groaned into Steve’s shoulder, and Steve snorted a laugh, holding the elastic of Billy’s underwear out with the back of his hand as he rubbed his palm over Billy’s cock.  “Jesus,” Billy whispered, his hips jerking as his hands clenched in Steve’s shirt.  “...monsterfucker,” he added, breathily, in Steve’s ear, and Steve squeezed hard, his eyes narrowing, so Billy yelped.

“Shut up,” Steve hissed back, trying not to laugh, and Billy snickered into his shoulder, his breaths shortening into pants as Steve stroked him faster, then yanked his hand out to lick.

“Jesus god,” Billy said under his breath, bucking his hips as Steve slid his hand back down.  He bit some of Steve’s shirt, muffling soft noises as he tried to hold still, his breath hot where Steve’s shirt grew wet against his chest.  He came with a soft grunt, going still, then slowly relaxing, and Steve grimaced at his hand, then wiped it on Billy’s jeans.  Billy laughed softly against Steve’s neck, and pressed a relaxed, sloppy kiss there, and Steve squeezed him tighter.

 Billy was asleep when the sirens finally showed up.  “Police are here,” he whispered.  “Is that...good?  The sirens gonna draw them all out?”

“The sheriff knows,” Steve told him, groaning sleepily into Billy’s shoulder.  “He’ll have...shotgun.”

“Wish we had shotgun,” Billy said drily, and Steve snorted, leaning in closer to kiss him.  Billy held perfectly still, then sighed.  

When Hopper banged on the door, blinding them both with his flashlight, they drug the tables out of the way.  He clapped them both on the shoulder, told Steve he was a good kid for taking care of Billy, and turned to look at the broken bodies under the window.   Steve cleared his throat, glancing at the jizz drying on their shirts, and exchanging a glance with Billy.  They bit back grins, looking away.

Hopper sent Billy and Steve off to the parking lot with two nervous patrolmen who jumped and pointed their pistols at every shadow.  “We’re gonna get shot,” Billy whispered, snickering, and Steve lost it too, squeezing his shoulders.  

“You wanna go to Denny’s,” Steve whispered back, and Billy blinked at him.  “My treat,” Steve tried.  “I mean, I know it’s not fancy, but I think it’s after two in the morning.  I think I got some clean gym shirts in my car.”

“...sure,” Billy said, shrugging, and Steve grinned.  “...should probably stay out anyway,” Billy said, stretching.  “‘F’I come in now I’ll just piss everybody off.”

“Oh,” Steve blinked, running his fingers along Billy’s forearm, on the way to grabbing his hand.  He didn’t know how to ask about the bruises.  “Um, we can sneak in to my room.”

“...what?  I can...I can sleep in my car,” Billy said, slowing down to frown at him.

“Tomorrow’s Saturday,” Steve pointed out, and Billy nodded, raising his eyebrows.  “Uh,” Steve tried.  “Um, I know Denny’s isn’t...I could take you to a movie.”

“...what,” Billy asked again, his mouth quirking as his eyes lingered on his hand in Steve’s.

“Thought we could sleep in tomorrow.  I could...finish what I started?” Steve asked, uncertainly, as Billy raised his head to stare at him.

He snorted, shaking his head.  “...you can just say you want a fuck.  Don’t be squeamish, King Harrington!”

Steve bit his lips together, keeping an eye out for any demodogs that somehow escaped the eyes of the line of cop cars.  “No, that’s not—” he blew air through his cheeks, swinging their linked hands.  “I like you.”

“You fucking don’t,” Billy shot back, glaring over, offended, and Steve started snickering again.

“I like you,” he said again, nodding firmly, and Billy’s mouth dropped open a little, but he just started walking faster to his car.  “Wait, wait,” Steve jogged along.  Billy glared at him, squeezing his hand hard, and Steve squeezed back, like they were assholes competing in Handshake Crush.  “I want you,” Steve told him, a little out of breath after the day they’d had, and Billy dragging him across the parking lot at a run.  “I like you.  Let’s go out.”

“I’m queer,” Billy hissed at him, stopping so suddenly their hands yanked Steve’s arm half out of its socket.

“Yeah, you wouldn’t probably want to, otherwise,” Steve said, thinking about it, and Billy drew an angry breath through his nose, then stepped forward and kissed Steve right there in the parking lot, and Steve kissed him back, grabbing his other hand, too.  

“...that was supposed to make you realize you were being an idiot,” Billy told him, panting, and licking his lips.

“I already was one,” Steve admitted, grinning, and Billy groaned, his cheeks darkening.  Steve ducked his head, trying to catch Billy’s eye.  “Date me?”

“Jesus,” Billy whispered, rubbing his face.  “You’re gonna wake up tomorrow and realize we both hallucinated this whole day.”

“Mmm,” Steve hummed, waiting.

“Fuck yes,” Billy spat.  “Of course it’s a goddamn yes, jesus fucking—”

Steve leaned in and covered Billy’s mouth with his own, laughing.

My other Harringrove works!

[platypanthewriter]

Hiding a Multitude of Sins

Prompt day 13:  hidden injury

Billy accepted Steve’s bat, tossing his cigarette into the road, and holding his shoulders square.  He wished he hadn’t been such a fucking cunt the night before, asking his dad favors when he knew better.  

Just walking to Steve’s car had him breathless as he tried to force his lungs to expand—the pain didn’t even register right anymore.  It felt like the shock of cold water, when he slid off his surf board straight down into the Pacific—even when he swam back up, his whole body seized up against his commands to breathe, breathe, jesus, you’re gonna pass out.

He tried to hold his ribs expanded, keep his breaths short and shallow.  His vision blurred, a little.  He waited until Steve wasn’t looking to try and open the car door awkwardly with his left hand, so he didn’t have to shift his right side at all.  Even that motion torqued his ribs, and he made a weird gaspy noise, and Steve looked up.  

“...I told you, you don’t haveta come,” he grinned.  “I know not everybody can handle monsters.”

“I’m coming,” Billy managed, turning to drop his ass in the passenger seat, and nearly puking out the door.  His eyes stung with tears, and he closed them, cursing himself for arguing.  He coulda just gone to bed last night, and actually been useful somehow today, but he’d been a whiny fucking bitch instead.  “S’why I told you to pick me up, I’m not...not leaving your royal ass to get...eaten, your Kingship.”

“Hargrove,” Steve said, sounding concerned, and Billy sucked it the fuck up and swung his legs inside, yanked the door shut, and sat there trying to swallow back acid, looking at a field of rainbowy colors he was pretty sure he wasn’t supposed to see.  

“M’fine,” Billy said, and he didn’t grunt at the sensation of his ribs contracting with his exhalation, and he didn’t blink, knowing his blurry eyes would just spill over, and Harrington would notice he was a fucking weak link.  

“...Billy,” Steve said, reaching over, and Billy’s breath caught in his throat.  Steve yanked his hand back, biting his lip.

 The asphalt behind the nail salon was bumpy, and Billy kept his eyes fixed on the windshield as the jarring bumps rattled through him.  He fixed his eyes on the overflowing dumpster as he swung his legs out and pushed himself upright, but when Harrington got out he slammed the door hard. 

He stalked around to grab Billy by the collar of his shirt, hissing “Hargrove.”  Steve slid his other hand under Billy’s shirt, and yanked it up, and Billy made some kind of little pussy groan in his throat as Harrington stared at the bruises and bloody scrapes all down his side.

“Jesus hell,” he bit out, and Billy laughed, and regretted it.

“I can still help,” he bit out, “I’m not a broken doll, Harrington, get off me—”

“You can’t help like this,” Harrington said, yanking his hand back, and grabbing the bat.  “I shoulda grabbed Max, jesus.  Get the fuck back in the car.”

“I’m not fucking useless,” Billy yelled back, and Harrington pushed him, not hard, but hard enough that he cried out and set his jaw, clenching his eyes shut.

“Just get back in the car,” Steve hissed.  “We don’t have time for this, Hargrove—” 

Billy felt hot tears rolling down his cheeks, and hated them, and his lungs chose that moment to rebel and make this retarded—accordion noise—and Harrington squeezed his shoulder, hard.  

“Get back in the car, Billy,” he said flatly, and Billy bit his lips and swallowed hard, nodding.  He waited until Harrington had stalked off to open his eyes, wondering whether he’d even come back, whether Billy’s dumb shit backtalk to his dad the night before was gonna get King Steve Harrington killed.

Billy sat very slowly, catching his breath, and braced himself, taking shallow breaths.  There was yelling from Steve and the kids, and loud metallic thuds Billy thought—vaguely—might be something hitting the dumpster.  He bit his lip, hard, and turned his body to get his legs back in the car, trying at least to be ready.  He could at least not slow Harrington down trying to escape, the way he’d already wasted time not telling Harrington to leave him home.  That he was useless.

He swung his legs inside the car with a shuddery gasp, and swallowed, and swallowed, his stomach ready to empty all of the nothing he’d eaten all over Steve’s dashboard.  He went to lift his wrist and check his watch, and that hurt too, which was funny, in a way, and he was laughing, tears dripping off his chin, when Steve suddenly leaned in the door.

Billy couldn’t even remember whether it had been open, and he stared back into warm brown eyes, waiting.

“...jesus, Billy,” Steve hissed, and Billy laughed jerkily again, covering his mouth in case he puked.

“...Harrington,” Billy whispered, and Steve sighed, leaning his head against the car door.  

“Come on,” Steve said, slamming the door again, and he walked around and dropped into the driver’s seat, and backed out.

Billy wondered hazily where the bat was, and how long it had been, but focused on breathing, and digging his fingers into his thigh, because it drew his brain off his stomach roiling—until Steve pulled into the hospital, and Billy slowly turned to look at him.  “You—you got hurt, shit,” he said, looking Steve over.  He had bloody knuckles, and Billy grabbed them as Steve turned the car off.

“I’m fine,” Steve said shortly, then sighed.  “I’m okay.  Billy.”

Billy stared at the blood on Steve’s hand, but let go when Steve tugged his hand back.  

He got out and went in, and Billy watched him go.  It was too much effort to ask further, so he just sat there, breathing, until Steve came back and made him get out of the car and into a wheelchair, like he was actually really hurt.  Billy snickered, shaking his head, and Steve pushed it away and leaned in the car again.  

“Get in the chair,” he said, “—or—or I’ll just—shit,” he sighed, and Billy grinned at him, letting his eyes drift closed.  “Billy,” Steve said.  “Billy.”

It was getting harder to breathe, Billy thought, like his lungs didn’t have enough room in them, and he coughed.

“Billy,” Steve shouted, his fingers gentle on Billy’s face, and then Billy vaguely remembered being half-lifted out of the car, and wheeled through corridors and hallways.

 He awoke in a bed, and stared at the ceiling.  Everything felt a little numb, and he breathed, slowly, relishing the ease of his lungs filling.  

“Don’t go back to sleep, Billy,” came Steve’s voice, and Billy rolled his head to see him, and squinted.

Steve looked like he’d been fighting monsters—which figured, he guessed, groggily.  He had circles under his eyes, and his hair stuck out at weird angles, and Billy felt guilt burning through him again.

“...sorry I was useless as shit,” he whispered, coughing, and Steve’s eyes widened.  He held a straw to Billy’s lips, and squeezed his hand as Billy drank warm, plastic-flavored water.

“Jesus, Billy,” Steve sighed.  “...you know you can just...ask me for help.  You didn’t need to pretend you’d help fight monsters to get me to—”

“M’ sorry, jesus,” Billy interrupted, his eyes stinging.  “I’m a waste of fucking time.”

“That’s not—” Steve groaned, resting his head on the hand holding Billy’s, and Billy’s eyes widened at the sensation.  “...that’s not what I’m saying, Hargrove.”  He pressed a kiss to Billy’s knuckles, and Billy giggled, too much, and he realized he was full of drugs.  

Steve sighed.  “You can just call me.  You coughed blood everywhere,” he said, running his nails through his hair again, his eyes kinda...haunted, and Billy grimaced.  “Fucking—punctured lung.”

“...’m fucking useless,” Billy told Steve’s fingers, watching them squeeze his own, and Steve took a slow, shaky breath, and squeezed harder.

“What happened,” he whispered, and Billy blinked at him.

“How the fuck would I know?” he asked, registering that he was slurring, a little.  “I was in—in the...car.”

“What happened to you,” Steve bit out, and Billy blinked at him.

“...fell down the...stairs?” he offered, and Steve nodded, closing his eyes.  Billy cleared his dry throat, and Steve picked up the empty cup of water, and glared at it before getting up and dropping Billy’s hand.  He returned with cold water, and Billy drank gratefully, feeling it spread through his body.

“You had three broken ribs,” Steve told him.  “And a concussion.”

“Shit,” Billy sighed.  

“I’m gonna get a job,” Steve said, out of the blue, and Billy blinked at him.  “Hopper said he has somewhere we can rent.  We’re moving.”

“What,” Billy croaked.

“He said I can start paying him when I have a paycheck,” Steve said.  “It’s just got the one bedroom.”

“What,” Billy whispered. 

“Tell me it’s fine I moved your shit,” Steve told him, and Billy nodded, blinking wide eyes.  “There’s no stairs, either,” Steve said vindictively, and Billy snorted a laugh, and winced.  

Billy didn’t say anything for a long moment, watching Steve’s tired face, as he fidgeted with the straw in the now-empty cup.  

“...I know this isn’t what you wanted,” Steve said.  “You can get a job yourself and move out or whatever.”

“...what,” Billy asked again, and Steve grimaced.

“Kissed you like twice and then I just...kidnapped you,” he muttered, and Billy tried to get his brain to engage, and not just...think about kissing Steve.  He hadn’t really expected it to happen again, especially not after he’d fucked up so bad Steve had to fight a demogorgon with help from some middle school kids.

“...okay,” Billy told him, and then, when Steve frowned over, gave him a thumbs-up.

“...you’re loaded,” Steve told him, laughing, and Billy gave an amiable snort.  

“...why d’you want me in a house,” he asked, still trying to wrap his drugged brain around the weird shit Steve was saying.  Steve groaned, squeezing his hand again.  “...why’re you still here?” Billy asked, lifting his head to see better.  “You hurt?  Ha...Harrington?”

“I’m adopting you,” Steve sighed.  “Like a pound dog.”

“...okay,” Billy said, letting his head thump back on the pillow.  “I don...don’t play too well with others.”

“Yeah, I know,” Steve nodded, smiling tiredly.  “Everybody knows you bite, Hargrove.”

“Only ’f you ask nicely,” Billy told him, winking, and Steve started snickering, leaning his face on his hand again, and squeezing Billy’s fingers.

“...we’re moving,” Billy repeated, and Steve nodded.  “Two’ve...us.  ...in...together?” Billy asked, to clarify, pretty sure he was missing a loophole.

“Yeah,” Steve grimaced, and Billy bit his lips together, nodding.  “It’s, uh, it’s really small.  But…” he trailed off, glancing from the floor back to Billy’s face, and then setting his jaw.  “...I’ll help you figure shit out, uh, from there.”

“...what—what partic’lar shit,” Billy asked, aware how much there was.

“Um, not living with me forever, in somebody’s old hunting cabin,” Steve laughed, sighing, and Billy shook his head, flapping his other hand towards Steve until he smiled, and grabbed it.

“Don’t want to fix that shit,” Billy mumbled, and Steve laughed again, but his smile looked brighter.  “I got—there’s—worse shit to fix, Harrington, you adopt dogs, you keep ‘em—”

“Okay, okay,” Steve told him, beaming.  “I’ll...I’m gonna ask you when you’re sober, though, okay?”

“No,” Billy told him firmly, and Steve leaned in and kissed him a third time, despite Billy’s hospital-and-probably-puke-breath.  

“Okay,” Steve whispered.  “I’ll get you a license, asshole.  Buy you a collar.  You’re stuck now.”

“I’ll fucking wear it,” Billy hissed, shaking his hand loose from Steve’s to yank him closer, into a kiss.

[platypanthewriter]

Election Day

Billy'd yelled "HOORAY, I get to vote for the candidate I hate LESS" all the way to the polls, but when he shoved Steve awake at 5am on November 4th, he was wailing "He WON!  Trump won, look, he won, the asshole won somehow, I thought you said he'd fucking lose, Steve—Harrington—you god damn liar—"

"Fmgh," Steve mumbled, pushing the pillow out of his mouth, rubbing the drool off his chin with his wrist, and trying to make sense of the clock, which said something like SSSS:OOO22 until he blinked and squinted.  "Five am," he sighed, burying his head in his arms.  "Think I'm having a nightmare."

"Steve, you fucker," Billy hissed, elbowing him, and blinding him with his phone,  "—you said he'd lose, here he is declaring he's winning—"

"S'not winning," Steve sighed, squinting again as Billy waved the phone in his face.  It shook in his hand. "He is, he's fucking declared victory," Billy whispered, and Steve registered his husband's panic, and rolled to flap an arm around him, and grapple him close.  Billy was warm from the blankets, and he smelled like soap, and he was crying.  "He's won, they've—they've fucking won, we—we're gonna have to move to Amsterdam, we—we're gonna have to—"

Steve snorted at the plan, but squeezed Billy tighter, trying not to laugh.  "He's lying, babe," he mumbled.  "He's a lying sack of shit.  He's just lying."

"He says he won," Billy said softly, into Steve's shoulder, and Steve wrested the phone away to scroll through.  "Nah, nope," he said, kissing his husband's curls.  "M'better at math than he is, honeybunches, he's just a lying sack of shit.  Biden's leading, okay?"

"He declared victory," Billy sighed, nuzzling closer.  "Jesus."

"Yeah," Steve told him, pulling him into a soft kiss.  "What a fucking moron, right?  What an asswipe.”

"Okay," Billy whispered, relaxing into it, and snorting a laugh.  "Okay."