#steve helps

[stevie-petey]

WAiT BUt can you imagine if Dustin or Max or Robin got the hiccups while they were exploring the Creel house? like dead silence and everyone is clutching their flashlights, just absolutely white knuckling it, and then the LOUDEST "HIC" YOU'VE EVER HEARD and everyone jumps out of their skin before realizing lol

it would 100% be robin who hiccups and bug throws a shoe at her

[eradacted]

This is Ben.

Ben is agoraphobic and is a hoarder, He is the main character of the fourth movie. He acts kinda pretentious as a facade for the fear he feels of everything. Starved in general for any kind of interaction he can't seem to move on from the things he builds due to his intense fear of losing things.

[platypanthewriter]

Selkie Skins and Daisy Chains

Day 7 of Harringrove April--Billy’s mom is a selkie

When Billy first heard about selkies and their skins, it had sounded romantic.  He’d imagined leaving his soft, silvery fur within reach of someone he admired, and watching their eyes widen as their fingers sank into its folds.  He imagined he would shiver, and they would offer it back, bringing it up to brush over his pink, hairless skin—and he would press it back into their hands, and maybe get a soft, salty kiss, cold from the wind off the sea.  

He imagined he’d see it often, carefully folded and kept, and run his fingers over it, but leave it every time to bury his face in the neck of the one he’d given it to.  Sometimes his love would bring it to the shore and pretend it needed a wash, and Billy would climb in, and they would swim, and after, they would take it back to their house.

It must have been obvious, because his redcap friend sometimes sat his club aside, and made a show of picking up Billy’s coat, and wrapping it around him, and Billy laughed, his face warming despite the drizzling rain.

 Billy couldn’t transform, not like his mother, but he imagined how it must have been, until the day he saw her skin at his grandfather’s, folded behind his great-grandmother’s lace tablecloths.  He slipped it out, and pressed his face in it, inhaling mostly the dried flowers from the sachets, but feeling the soft, soft fur.  

The floor creaked, and he stuffed it under his sweater, sweating with guilt, but he knew it shouldn’t be there, so he smuggled it back to her.  She clutched at it and him, and cried with horrible, gasping sobs.  By the time Billy’s dad came home, she was gone.

She would have taken Billy with her, everyone said, if he could transform.  

Billy hoped it was true.  

 His dad was furious he’d taken the skin, and Billy was glad, sometimes, that he wasn’t selkie enough to transform, imagining searching for it when it wasn’t laid out, easy to find.  It was hard to imagine letting someone take it, after feeling his mother’s hoarse sobs.  

The other fishermen began to avoid them, and Billy swam, immune to the cold, diving deeper than any human, and staring up at the sky from just under the surface for hours.  His father started casting nets, dumping seals in the boat in an effort to find her.  He harpooned three when they blinked stupidly back at him, dragging their corpses behind the boat, and screaming across the water for her return.

One day his father disappeared, and his redcap came dragging his club across the beach to sit with him, his cap freshly dyed with the blood of Billy’s enemy, and dripping still.  Billy watched him, wishing he was a selkie, and he could swim to the bottom of the ocean to stare up through to the sky, and glad he wasn’t, imagining the fear of his skin being taken, even by a protective friend.

The red cap had a daisy-chain.  

He crouched next to Billy on the beach, in a crunch of rocks, and tugged at Billy’s sleeve.  When Billy lifted his arm, the red cap grinned, weaving the last daisy through, so it fitted around Billy’s wrist, joining it to the red cap’s own.  “Be bound to me,” he whispered, kissing Billy’s knuckles, “—by the strength of this chain.”  His brown eyes flicked up, searching Billy’s face as he stood, and the daisy-chain pulled taut.  Billy scrambled up, and his red cap laughed, leaning in to press a kiss against his lips.  

“...yes,” Billy laughed, his whole body warm, even though his clothes were soaked from the salty tide.

“Thank you,” his red cap whispered back.

The other Harringrove April prompts I’ve done

[platypanthewriter]

Strangest 12/13

After the events at the Byers’ house in season two, Steve finds Billy where Max stuck him--in the trunk of his car. 

Previous chapter links

Steve and Max drank their hot chocolate in silence before wandering back to the garage, where El and Billy were applying the last licks of paint to the trim.  

“We’ll need to come back,” El said, putting her hands on her hips, and frowning from the trim, to Max, to Steve.  

“Guess it’s a real shop class then,” said Max, stalking over to carry the painted pieces carefully out of the way.  “Except El’s allowed to take shop already.”  She grinned between El and Billy, and Steve stepped closer, sensing a trap as her smirk widened.  “Maybe instead of shop, Billy should teach El home-ec.  Billy knows how to cook.”  

Billy stared at her, frowning warily, but El shrugged.

“All I need to know how to cook are waffles,” she told Steve, who snorted, coughing, and thought hard, watching Max and her brother work shoulder-to-shoulder as though they were used to it.  The sander filled the garage with its grating roar, and El plugged her ears.  

When it was done, Steve was ready.  “What about what goes on the waffles,” he asked triumphantly.  “I bet you don’t know how to make...those things.  You and Max could come over and we could make waffley things.”

El froze, then cocked her head, eyes narrowed.  “...IHOP things?”

Steve nodded, confident.  “He’s good at everything.”

There was a clatter as Billy dropped the board he was holding, and he and Max whispered furious insults at each other as they got it back in place.  Billy turned to stare over, his cheeks red, and his smile strained but present.  “Why the hell you telling this girl I’m some kind of...jam expert,” he asked, as Max glared up at him.

“When the hell you been making jam?” she hissed.  “I never saw you make jam.”

“It’s fine,” Steve waved his hands.  “We can ask Ms. Williams to supervise.  And like—whipped cream.  I bet he can make whipped cream,” he suggested daringly, only to look over to see Billy looking deeply unimpressed.  

“Yeah, anyone can whip cream, Harrington, glad you got such high estimation of my—”

Eleven stood as though struck.  “You can make those things?”

“Don’t you think Max and Eleven should come over, and we can have waffles?” Steve asked Billy, widening his eyes, and trying to send yes, Billy, say yes, telepathically.  

Max rolled her eyes and focused her glower back on the edge she was sanding.  “You know it’ll happen now Steve mentioned waffles.  Can we play your Atari?”

Billy stared down at her head, flicking a weirded-out glance at Steve.  “Y-yeah, we can...get some fruit, or something.  I can...figure out jam,” he told her, nudging Max with his elbow.  She nudged him back with her shoulder, and he shook his head, smiling uncertainly at Steve.

“Oh.  And they want us to come for waffles,” Steve told him.  “At the Byers’.

Billy blinked.  “Will’s house?”

“Tomorrow.  Will must have told us to ask you, like, ninety times,” Max bit out, rolling her eyes.  “He’s gonna cling like a koala.  He’s gonna clamp onto your leg.”  

It should have been a cute thought, and Steve smiled, but Billy’s shoulders clenched, and he stalked off to clatter around in the corner with the skis.  Max glared after him, biting her lips, and then kicked the sawhorse, twice.  

El blinked between them.  “...but you like Will?  Don’t you like Will?”

She looked betrayed, and Steve couldn’t help laughing.  

Neither could Max.  She grinned a little sardonically at El.  “I like Will fine.  Everybody likes Will.”  She stuck her hands in her back pockets, sighing.  “...just...glad my big brother found a kid he likes, I guess.  Great, right?  Just too bad I couldn’t deliver.”

“Oh!” El said, and turned a glare on Billy too, and Steve winced, stepping forward, just as Billy turned the Shopvac on and the noise drowned everything out.  He wandered back over, vacuuming carefully all around the sander and the sawhorses.  He ran the wand over the wood as he brushed it with a dry paintbrush.

He was pretty obviously taking way too long, and finally Max grabbed El’s hand and drug her up into the entryway.  

Max cleared her throat.  “I—I gotta talk to my mom.  Tonight.”

“I’ll go with you,” El offered, but Max shook her head.  Billy finally switched the vacuum off, and Steve resisted the urge to just walk over and hug him, or smack his ass.

“No, I just—I just need to—tell her.  I don’t—” Max said,  taking a deep, shaky breath.  “I don’t know—we can’t—I don’t know what—”

“If you need anything,” Steve said lamely, then steadier, “—if—you could stay in my room.  If she—if you need somewhere to um, to go—”

“Your room,” Billy repeated, squinting at him, while El nodded.  

“We can help you move out,” she told Max, who laughed.

“My mom’s not just going to leave,” she said hoarsely.  “M-maybe she’ll listen, maybe—maybe we could go—we could stay with Grammie a while and—and that would—” she stopped, pinching the bridge of her nose, and taking a deep breath, before looking back up with dry eyes.  “I—maybe.  I have to—I have to try and tell her.”

“Sure,” Billy sighed, his mouth quirked.

“I can help too,” El said again, her voice smaller, and Max reached over and squeezed her hand.  

“Yeah.  Thanks, El.  I—I need a ride home, it’s almost five—”

“Yeah, okay,” Steve nodded.

“Bring her here, and make Steve stay in my room,” Billy said, smirking at Max, and she relaxed a little as she shuddered, making a face.  

“Ew!  Eugh.  You’re so nasty—” the rest got muffled as El hugged her, and Max froze, then cautiously hugged her back.

Billy snorted, squinting at them, opened his mouth, and glanced at Steve before closing it.  He sighed.  “...Steve can drop you off.  I’ll clean up here.”

 When Steve got back, he yelled for Billy, and didn’t hear anything.  There wasn’t a lit cigarette glowing out by the pool, and Billy’s bedroom and bathroom doors were wide open, so Steve prowled around the house a few times before going in and trying his walkie-talkie—but it buzzed from Billy’s room, so he tossed it on the bed, and followed it, burying his head in the comforter.

He could only groan into the comforter so long, so he got his homework out, sat for a while staring at it, and put it away.  He went to clean up the garage, and Billy already had—the remaining box of Steve’s mom’s stuff was moved to a shelf, and all the sawdust had been swept away.  Billy’d moved his car back inside, and left a clear space for Steve’s, and Steve sighed, and grabbed a couple bags of marshmallows to restock the only cupboard he used.  After a few episodes of reruns in space, he turned off Kirk and Spock and muttered every swear word he knew into the pillows in the fort.  “Where the fuck are you,” he asked the Christmas lights, staring up, and hoping Billy wasn’t just...in the snow, somewhere.  He took a deep breath, and then another, his eyes stinging.

His stomach growled.  

He opened the fridge and frowned in, sighing at the tubs of things like margarine, and sour cream, that he couldn’t just eat.  

He swiveled to study the coats by the door, trying to decide whether Billy had one, then just grabbed one, and a scarf and hat, and hauled the armload out and around.  “Where’s my knight,” he called softly.  

In the darkness, Billy snorted.  “My king,” he slurred.  “He calls for aid?” he mumbled, and Steve reached towards his voice and yanked him close by the sweatshirt, pulling him into a kiss that tasted like 120 proof sawdust.  “Jesus,” he whispered against Billy’s mustache, leaning in for another taste.  “You suck down a whole fifth of whiskey as soon as I drove off?”

“Shut up,” Billy hissed, shoving away, and Steve followed, following the sloshing noise of a bottle.  

“You coming back in?”

“Fuck off,” Billy’s footsteps crunched away through the snow, and Steve stopped.  

“Uh, I brought you a coat.  And stuff.”

“Fuck off,” Billy hissed, unevenly, Steve thought, and he stood for a second, wondering whether this was a time to listen, or whether he should think harder, like usual.  

“Um,” he cleared his throat, grimacing.  “Uh, just if you’re gonna stay out, put a coat on, here.”

“Harrington—” Billy snarled, crunching toward him in the snow, and Steve bit his lips together.

“Okay,” he told the angry voice in the dark, “I’ll go, I’ll go, just—just take the coat, okay, just—”

“Give it to me, you fucking sheepdog,” Billy’s hand brushed his arm, then grabbed the coat, and Steve stepped back.  “I’ll wear the damn coat, I won’t fall in the damn pool, go watch a fucking musical.”

“Yeah, okay,” Steve laughed, and let his eyes close for a second to take a few deep, easy breaths.  “Okay, I’m—I’m going,” he called over his shoulder, turning back to the house, and rubbing his hands to warm them.  

“She’s a little bitch,” Billy yelled, and Steve stopped.  

“What?”

“Why the fuck you want me hanging around my step-sister, Harrington?” Billy called, laughing.  “You know she shot me up with that shit.  I coulda died.  Now you want us to make nice?”

“She’s...your sister,” Steve said, feeling wrong-footed.  “...you can’t—”

“I can’t what?” Billy asked, the snow crunching under his feet as he stepped up to breathe smoke and whiskey in Steve’s face.  “Can’t hate her?  Can’t wish she’d fucking die?”

“You don’t wish she’d die,” Steve told him, sighing.  “You can’t—”

“Oh, I can,” Billy said, laughing.  “I can, Your Majesty.  I’m not—” 

“Stop it,” Steve argued.  “You don’t—”

“You think?” Billy asked, in the slow, smiley way he’d had right before walking into the Byers’ house, and attacking Lucas for no reason.  “You think I don’t hate her?”

Steve reached out in the dark until he found Billy’s chest.  “Put your damn coat on.  I think…” he trailed off, trying to figure it out, as Billy waited, shivering against his hand.  Steve tried to imagine what it would have been like, thinking your mom had left, living with Neil Hargrove.  He got a handful of sweatshirt and yanked Billy closer, imagining him coming home every day to Neil yelling, or—or yanking him around, or hitting him—“Bi—Billiam,” he stumbled, avoiding Billy’s name, and Billy snorted a laugh.  “...does, um.  Does your dad hit Max?”

“Why the fuck would he hit Max,” Billy growled back.

“Why the fuck would he hit you,” Steve hissed, shaking him, but bit his lip, breathing Billy’s breath, and feeling him tremble.  “He didn’t hit Max, did he.”

“Fuck you,” Billy spat back, sounding a little choked.  

“He brought a kid home he didn’t hit,” Steve whispered, and Billy shoved him off.  

“Fuck you!”

“He’s nice to her, isn’t he,” Steve thought aloud, blowing into his cupped fingers.  “Because of her mom—”

“He’s not nice to her,” Billy gritted out.  “He treats her like shit, he wants her to—he thinks he needs to fix her with a strong father figure,” he said, snorting.  

“He doesn’t hit her, though, I bet,” Steve pressed, and Billy laughed.  

“Fuck you,” he said again, lighting another cigarette.  

“He knows his last wife left him, and he doesn’t wanna piss this one off too much—” Steve muttered, steepling his hands to think.  Billy laughed roughly, his voice shaking with the cold, and Steve sighed.  “Put the coat on, trespasser.  ...he knows he can’t hurt Max or her mom, right,” Steve whispered, putting it together, “—so he takes it out on you.  Whenever he’s pissed—”

“He’s not like that,” Billy hissed back.  “I don’t know what the fuck you’re thinking, but he’s not—it’s—it’s not—”

“Yeah, he is,” Steve shot back.  “Good dads don’t fucking hit kids.”  Billy took a shaky breath, and Steve crunched a couple steps closer to where the orange light of his cigarette lit his face and curls as he inhaled.  “...you don’t hate Max,” Steve said again, gaining confidence.  “You like her too—” 

“I don’t give a shit—” Billy growled.

“You’re jealous as hell,” Steve decided.  “She moved here and she had like five friends in a day.  I fought for her, I fought you.”

“Yeah, we all know who you’re gonna pick,” Billy said, turning away with a jagged laugh.  “I see you testing me out.  Shit.  Screw you, Harrington, I can keep it up, jesus.  I can do this, okay.”

“...what,” Steve asked, caught off-balance.

“Making sure I know my place,” Billy whispered.  “I get it, Harrington.  I get to stay if I can behave.”  

“Shit, is that what your dad did?!” Steve burst out.  “What a shithead, what’d he do, say he’d throw you out?” 

“...nah,” Billy said, but he let Steve get close again, so Steve could see his eyes, resigned in the warm glow of the cigarette.  “That’s you.”

“I won’t—” Steve protested, grimacing.

“Dad wants me home,” Billy said, laughing.  “Says I’m his problem.”

“You’re not a problem,” Steve told him stoutly, and Billy laughed.  

“Yeah, I am—”

“Sometimes you are,” Steve agreed, stomping his feet to warm up.  “Sometimes everybody is though, I mean.  You’re not—you’re more than a problem, you’re—” he waved his hands in frustration, then grabbed Billy’s forearms.  “You’re Billy.”

“Yeah, that’s the problem,” Billy said, laughing, but his smile looked softer.  “Right there.”

“Not a problem,” Steve said nonsensically.  “You’re not.  You—”

“You keep saying he hits kids,” Billy said, leaning closer, and breathing smoke out over the dim orangey light like a dragon.  The smoke whorled around Billy’s hands, and Steve’s, holding his wrists.  “He doesn’t hit kids, Harrington, he only ever hit me—”

“You were a kid,” Steve shot back, shaking Billy, ineffectively, by his forearms.  “You—you’re his kid.  He hits you.”

“Doesn’t hit Max,” Billy whispered.  “Problem is me, Harrington—”

“No,” Steve shook him again, leaning close enough their arms were pressed between them.  “Your dad’s an asshole, that’s the—”

“Fucking...hate a little girl,” Billy said, looking down, then up again, deep into Steve’s eyes.  “Little—fucking—skateboarder—girl, Your Lordship.  I wish she got hit.”  He said it again, slower.  “I wish he hurt her.  That fucked up enough?  I wish he fucking—grabbed her hair and held her face down next to the stove burner.  ‘M’I still not the problem?”  He laughed at Steve’s expression, and Steve wondered what it looked like. 

“B—Knight,” Steve interrupted, but he didn’t have a good answer, so Billy grinned like a carnivore, and kept going.  

“When I can’t breathe I wish he’d hurt her instead,” Billy whispered, yanking his arms free of Steve’s hold, and stepped back.  “You can tell she doesn’t have any fucking idea what to do,” he rasped.  “Just standing there watching, trying to get him to stop, even, and I’m thinking I wish it was her.”

“Jesus,” Steve breathed, trying to keep track of Billy’s shape when he turned away, his body hiding the glow of the cigarette.

“Starting to see the cracks, finally?” Billy called back, laughing, and Steve jumped, squinting back into the darkness.  “I see her there and I want her to hurt—”

“Or wishing he’d stop hurting you, maybe,” Steve suggested.  

“Yeah, that’s what I should be hoping, isn’t it,” Billy laughed raggedly.  “What the fuck kinda monster watches her run off and wishes she was drowning too?”

“No, you don’t,” Steve argued, grabbing Billy’s arm to yank him around, to see his face, and Billy shoved him.  Steve stumbled backwards in the snow and fell on his ass, the cement around the pool jarring every bone in his body through the hard-packed snow of their footprints.  

“Fuck,” Billy whispered, dropping next to him, and patting at him clumsily in the dark.  “Shit, Harrington, go—go back inside.  I’m the fucking problem, Harrington, me—not my dad, not Max—” he cut off with a groan, shoving away again and stalking off.

“Stop,” Steve said breathlessly, pushing himself back up to his feet to follow, and Billy laughed again.  

“Stop,” Billy whined.  

“B-babe,” Steve gritted out, stomping after him.  “Quit it, jesus.”

“Waaah, is the truth scary, Your Majesty?” Billy asked, half crying, half laughing as he staggered to a stop, grabbing a scrubby tree for balance, silhouetted against the light of the house.  “Stop it,” he mimicked, like Steve was a whiny toddler.  “Ennnh, fucking baby—you seeing the cracks, now?”

“What?!” 

“Been spackling them over,” Billy laughed.  “Gotta keep it together.  Smooth surface for Steve, right?  Fill those cracks in.  Sand ‘em over, long as you—long as you don’t look close.  Just—I’ve just been hiding the cracks, Harrington, you gotta—you gotta hide the cracks.  But I—I can’t—can’t hide where...Max is,” he laughed, but it sounded harsh.  “That crack’s too big, y’know?  Can’t shovel enough in there, you see it, right?  You see now.”

Steve waited, squinting into the darkness.  “Uh,” he said, into the silence.  “...I know you’re—”

“Dirt gets in the cracks,” Billy whispered, from less than a yard away, and Steve startled again.  “Rots in there.  All the broken places.  Gathers flies and—and maggots—” he trailed off, laughing the kind of laugh that you had to listen carefully to to tell whether it was tears.

“Um,” Steve cut him off, and Billy paused, breathing in wet pants.  Steve bit his lip, thinking.  “Like...fruit?” he finally asked, into the silence, and Billy cracked up laughing.  

“Yeah, your majesty,” he finally answered.  “You’re right, I’m a fruit!  All rotten in the bruised places—I’m a fag, I’m a—I’m a fucking—”

“Shut up, that’s dumb,” Steve gritted out.  “You—you’re not—you’re a—you’re my goddamn boyfriend, not an apple.”

“You saw, you can fucking see it now, I know you—”

“No, listen, shut up,” Steve hissed, putting his hands in his pockets so he wouldn’t grab his drunk idiot and shake him.  “Listen.  Listen.  Apples bruise, okay, they rot, they do that, yeah.  People,” he stepped closer, “—people—I’m going in, I swear, I’ll go inside, but listen—people heal, okay.  You’re bruised, yeah, you—” he whispered, but he couldn’t take Billy’s silence, and put a hand out to find his stubbly face, rubbing his thumb over skin sticky with tears.  “He bruised you.  Maybe—maybe he cracked you, I don’t know—”

Billy leaned into his hand, and took a shaky breath.  

“You’re not a banana,” Steve growled.  “You—you’re not gonna turn black and rot away ‘cause he slammed you around, okay, you’re not—”

“It’s inside,” Billy whispered.  “S’not—s’nothing he did, I’m just—”

Steve opened his mouth, closed it, and then smiled slowly, feeling like the Grinch when he had a wonderful, awful idea.  “Hey,” he leaned in close.  “You saying your mom is bad at makin’ babies?”

“No!” Billy said instantly, and Steve resisted a victorious snort.  

“Yeah,” he agreed.  “She’d beat you up.  She’s a good mom, right?”

Billy growled and bit lightly at his hand, and Steve grabbed his face, ignoring Billy’s snickering, and the tongue licking his fingers. 

He stroked Billy’s cheeks.  “She’s a good mom, and she made a good kid, right?”

Billy shoved him away again.  “...shut your damn face, Harrington.”

“Yeah,” Steve nodded, listening to him crunch through the snow, and squinting towards his voice.  Steve sighed, and turned back towards the door.  “If you’re bruised, it’s his fault!” he yelled back, and then nearly fell on his ass, flailing his arms, as a snowball swiped his head.  

Billy was still laughing as Steve stomped the snow off his feet, and closed the back door.  

He boiled water, measured out ingredients, unwrapped candy canes, made hot chocolate, and cracked the window, only to hear a thin “PISS OFF, HARRINGTON” from the treeline.  He closed it again.  

 Steve waited hours, then finally stuck his head back out the back porch and yelled as he was grabbed by a black shape leaning over the edge of the porch.  Only the smell of cigarettes and whiskey kept him from punching Billy’s face, but he just leaned into him, his heart thumping with adrenaline.  “Jesus,” he whispered, pulling his half-frozen boyfriend closer.

“...fuck took you so long,” Billy slurred, and Steve grabbed him and shoved him inside, pulling a blanket off the couch and wrapping him up.  Billy curled easily against him, and Steve let them both drop onto the couch with a sigh, and wrapped his dumb blanketed boyfriend up in his arms.  

“Whaddaya mean it took me so long,” Steve growled.  “You told me not to go out there!”

“Yeah, but you don’ listen,” Billy mumbled into his shirt, and Steve sighed.

“You waiting for invitations now, trespasser?” he asked, and Billy squirmed closer.  

“Still came an’ got me.”

“Don’t wait for that,” Steve told him, rubbing his back as he started to shiver.  “Come in when you get cold, shithead.”

“Mmmm,” Billy laughed, warm against his neck.  “Maybe you thought ‘b-bout it a little more,” he slurred.

“No, listen,” Steve told him, shaking him gently.  “What if I’d fallen asleep, babe.  What if I went somewhere.”

“Mmmn,” Billy shook his head, nuzzling deeper in the blankets, and Steve took a deep breath, and manhandled his drunk slug of a boyfriend until he could cup his face.

“Billy,” he whispered, and Billy swallowed, trying to squirm away.  “No, ssh, c’mere, Billy Hargrove.”

“...listening,” Billy sighed, his mouth quirked, but his eyes fixed blearily on Steve’s face.  

“Need you to promise,” Steve told him, and Billy nodded vaguely.  “No, Billy, listen.  You’re in trouble, so I’m calling you Billy.”

Billy frowned, biting his lips together.

Steve kissed them.  “I—I love you.  I got feeblings, right?  So—so, you uh, you have to be nicer to me, okay?”  Billy burst out laughing, and Steve felt himself flush.  “Billy,” he whispered again.

“What happens when I’m in trouble with Steve Harrington,” Billy whispered back, smiling.  He was starting to shiver, and Steve stroked his hands over his boyfriend’s cold face, and neck, and frozen-feeling ears.

“We have to talk like this,” Steve told him, leaning in to press another kiss to Billy’s freezing-cold lips, and pulling back as Billy tried to deepen it.  “Pay attention, babe.  Trespasser.” 

“Okay,” Billy nodded, licking his lips.

“You have to—you gotta come in when you’re cold, okay?  You gotta come in out of the cold.”

“You come back,” Billy whispered, holding his freezing-cold hands over Steve’s on either side of his face.

“Yeah, I-I will, I’ll come get you,” Steve agreed, adjusting his hands on Billy’s face to cover more cold skin.  “But—” he took a shaky breath, “—you have to promise—”

“You’ll come back,” Billy said again, frowning.  “You—you gonna...stop coming?  Harrington?”  He laughed, an explosion of whiskey and smoke, and Steve made a face.

“I’m not gonna—that’s what I’m saying,” Steve hissed.  “You can’t just…you…”

“I’m gonna wait,” Billy whispered, his eyes bleary with whiskey.  “Wait for you.  You gotta come get me.  You don’t…” he took a wet, shaky breath, swallowing hard, “—you don’t want me anymore, don’t come get me.  You get...done.  If—if you’re done.  With me.”

“What if I have to take a shit,” Steve said, shaking him a little.  “What if—what if I eat two-week old Chinese food, and I shit for two hours, and you die, Bi—babe, what if you freeze to death—”

“That’s half a month,” Billy slurred, frowning at him.  He squeezed Steve’s hands, turning his head to kiss Steve’s thumb.  “Don’t eat that.”

“What if I fall asleep,” Steve whispered, starting to shake a little himself.  His eyes blurred with tears, and he blinked them away.  “What if I go to sleep and you go have a smoke and you don’t come back because you’re waiting for me to get up and get you.  I gotta get up and check to see if you’re alive?  I—I can’t sleep when you aren’t next to me?!  I can’t sleep because you might fucking die?!”

“No!  No,” Billy shook his head, wide-eyed, and yanked Steve closer, yanking the blanket around both of them.  “Sorry.  Sorry, shit.  Sorry.”

“Come in when it’s cold,” Steve said again, into to cold bulk of Billy’s shoulder, trying to sound stern, but his voice cracked and wobbled.  “I—I can’t—you gotta—Billy, you gotta come in—”

“I will, I will,” Billy muttered, wrapping both shivering arms around him, and squeezing until Steve’s bones felt like they creaked together.  Steve breathed against Billy’s shoulder, smelling snow, and cigarettes, and he turned his head to breathe against the damp skin of Billy’s neck.  Billy kissed his head.  “...I’ll come in, okay.  Harrington.  You can sleep.”

“I—I’ll just come get you,” Steve mumbled, pretty certain he’d be staring at the ceiling and jumping at imagined noises anyway, and Billy groaned into his hair.  “I’ll stay up for you—”

“...shit, no.  Fuck.  You—you’re right.  Not on you if I’m dumb.  I promise,” he said, pushing Steve away—he struggled, hanging on—so his still-shivering hands could cup Steve’s face, and Billy could look as serious as possible, drunk as hell.  “Harrington,” he whispered.  “Stevie.”

Steve laughed, startled, as his face heated.  “Nobody calls me that,” he whispered back, starting to snicker, and trying to duck his head.

“Stevie,” Billy said, squeezing Steve’s cheeks with a frown.  Steve tried to laugh through fishlips, and Billy smirked.  “Listen,” he said, and Steve nodded, blinking rapidly to try and get his eyes to clear.  “—’m gonna be more...careful, okay,” Billy said softly.  “I’ll—I’ll do better, okay, I’ll be good.  You don’t—you don’t have to—babysit me, okay.”

“‘M’a goo’babys’tr,” Steve mumbled, trying to talk through his squished lips.

“Gonna help you with that,” Billy sighed.  “With me.  Gonna help you make everybody safe, okay?  You don’t have to.”

“...okay,” Steve nodded, watching his face.

“Don’t have to babysit me,” Billy repeated.  “I’ll babysit me.”

“...you’re sure,” Steve pressed, laughing, so Billy wouldn’t notice his eyes—they were stinging, and probably red—or how hard he was trying not to just...stomp off and scream, scrabbling at his hair.  He wanted to just hide in his room again, have his little baby tantrum somewhere his boyfriend couldn’t see, but Billy’s hands held him fast.  Steve took a deep breath, and it caught in his lungs, so he took another.  “Love you,” he whispered, and Billy’s mouth quirked disbelievingly.  “Love you,” Steve emphasized.  “I’m not gonna let you die, so—so don’t tell me you—don’t say you’re gonna be okay, don’t lie to me if—if you need me to—do that.  For you.  Keep you safe.”

Billy watched his face for a long while—whole minutes, it felt like, and then shook his head.  “I’ll come in.  Harrington.  I—I promise, I’ll come in.  And if...if I...can’t take care of...me,” he said roughly, “—I promise I-I’ll tell you.  I won’t lie to you, I’ll say—”

Steve’s tear ducts overreacted and spilled entirely over, while his lungs made a weird noise more appropriate for braking trucks, so he tried to jerk away and get to—somewhere else, where nobody had to calm him down when he wasn’t even the one having a problem, but Billy yanked him into his shivering shoulder again, muttering into his hair.

“Jesus shit,” he whispered.  “Christ, Harrington, I’m—sorry, sorry, fuck.  Sorry.  Shit.  I don’t—I won’t—I won’t let anything happen to me, jesus.  I promise, your majesty.  I’m your knight, right?  I gotta—I gotta be strong, right.  Keep myself safe.  Can’t make you worry about your knight.  Don’t be broken, holy shit—”

“—’m not broken, just—just don’t die in my yard,” Steve sniffled, laughing, and then made another noise like a squashed cat as Billy’s arms tightened.  “I just—I fucking love you,” Steve whispered.

“Yeah,” Billy told him.  “Yeah.  Jesus.  Sorry.  I can—I know you’d come for me, right, I don’t—I don’t need to freak you out.”

“A-asshole,” Steve whispered shakily, groaning.  “—f-fucking...prick.”

“Yeah,” Billy agreed, laughing a little unsteadily himself, and burying his face in Steve’s hair.  “Yeah.  Sorry.  I’m so sorry, shit, I’ll help, okay.  You can—you can relax some, I’ll help you.  Jesus, sorry—sorry—”

“Fucking dipshit,” Steve slid his arms around Billy, squirming further into the blanket.  “God, fucking...love you, you asshole.”

“Mmn,” Billy nodded, sighing shakily, and kissing his ear.

“...sweetie-pie,” Steve tried, and Billy started laughing, his breath hot against Steve’s head.

 The next day, El drug Max over while Billy and Steve stood around smoking.  They were hauling four full trash bags and a trifold cardboard presentation board that brought bitter memories up in Steve of middle-school science class.  

“The hell is all that,” Billy bit out, glaring at the bags, but he yanked his keys out of his jeans and opened Steve’s trunk.

“Max’s mom won’t leave,” El reported, and Max’s eyes went red and shiny.  Billy hesitated, then grabbed more bags and put them in the trunk, but Steve noticed he was gentle.  

“Is this stuff...in case?” Steve guessed, and Max shook her head, sniffling.  She swallowed hard, kicking a rock into the side of somebody’s car, and her tears didn’t spill over.  

Billy’s shoulders were nearly up around his ears, and Steve squeezed his shoulder, stepping between he and Max like Steve was some kind of wall.  He cleared his throat, feeling dumb.  

“She won’t listen,” Max said in a weird, raspy voice.  “She says not to worry.”

“I can blow up his brain,” El said, in the vaguely monotone voice she had when she was the last line of defense, and Billy twitched in Steve’s peripheral vision.  

“Don’t do anything,” Max hissed.  “She knows about you.  She’d be so—she’d hate me.  I gotta—I’ll try again.  Shit.  I shouldn’t have to deal with this.”

El shook her head solemnly, sighing.  

“You can bring her to our place,” Steve said, again, feeling useless.  “If, uh.”

“How come we have to figure this shit out,” Max growled, kicking another rock.  “She’s the mom.”

“...she sure knows how to pick ‘em,” Steve snorted, and Billy turned to glare at him, but Max laughed.

“Yeah,” she sighed.  “My dad, uh, he was...he wasn’t...great either.”  She rubbed her face roughly, groaning, and El dropped an arm around her.  

Bily opened his mouth, glaring, then closed it, and Steve took advantage of the girls’ bowed heads to blow him a kiss.  Billy smirked, digging his fingers into his forearms, and stalked off, lighting up a few cars away.

“Waffles,” declared El, after tucking Max’s hair behind her ear, seeing tears, and freezing in place for several seconds, her hands twitching with indecision.

“What,” Max whispered, wiping her nose.  

“M-Mrs. Byers,” El said.  “And, um, Will, remember, they um, they invited us.  Waffles.  She said she could make waffles.”

“So what?” Max snorted, rubbing her eyes with her sleeves.  

“So,” El said, then bit her lips together.  

“...you want waffles right away?” Steve asked, half tempted to chase Billy, and tell him it was fine he didn’t want his dad murdered, but feeling obligated to stick it out with two girls, one of which was crying, and the other one looking like she wanted to.  “Uh, we could take you girls uh, somewhere, before Will’s—”

“I’m fine,” Max laughed hoarsely.  “Waffles aren’t gonna solve my problems, El.”

El bit her lips together, her eyes glistening with tears, and Steve wondered about the El-scale—what was a one-waffle problem, or a whole-box-of-Eggos problem, and what it told her about Max, hearing that this was a problem too big for waffles.

 Once El just gave up and hugged Max, an awkward moment, as Max’s eyes begged him for help, Steve wandered over to where Billy was smoking, and bumped elbows.  “...El won’t kill your dad,” he whispered, and Billy raised his eyebrows, eyeing him doubtfully.  

“You sure about that?” he asked.  “Kinda sounded like she might no matter what Max said.”

“Um,” Steve said, grimacing, and remembering the stories of El just...breaking necks.  No great loss, he thought to himself, then cleared his throat guiltily.  “We can talk to her.  Tell her you, uh, you don’t want her to—”

“That’s why?” Billy snarled, turning to toss his cigarette away.  “That’s why she shouldn’t?  It’s murder, Harrington—”

“He hit you,” Steve pointed out, mumbling, and Billy reached out, glanced around, and then pulled his hand back and put it in his pocket.  

“...so did you,” Billy hissed back, but he was grinning, a little.  

“I didn’t want to,” Steve growled.  “And I won’t, ever again, I’d never—”

“Yeah, sure,” Billy grinned, but it looked soft, and so did his lips.  Steve cleared his throat, so many protests swarming his mouth that he couldn’t get any of them out.  “You’d never hit me until I’m standing in front of the mugs and you want the marshmallows—”

“I might elbow you—” Steve protested, and Billy leaned in, smirking.  

“Until I tease you about your feeblings,” he whispered, and Steve raised his arm to punch Billy’s shoulder, and glared at it in despair.  Billy threw an arm around his shoulders, and yanked him close.  “...it’s not the same, Harrington,” he whispered.  “I know you want me around.”

“He does too, he loves you, he has to,” Steve argued, and Billy laughed, rubbing his face.  “He does,” Steve insisted.  “He knows you, he’s known you forever!  He loves you. He—he has to—”

“Not sure your math works out,” Billy told him, and he looked fond, which had Steve lurching closer, licking his own lips, until he remembered they were in the school parking lot.

“Not gonna kiss you right now,” Steve informed him, stiffly, “—but I’m right.  If he doesn’t love you, he—” Steve tried to think of an option, remembering chubby-cheeked Billy from the Christmas photos, in his awful knitted overalls.  Steve frowned hard into the middle distance.  “...maybe he’s an alien,” he said slowly, and Billy dissolved into snickers, his face pink-cheeked around his fingers.  

“I don’t get how your brain works,” he whispered.

“It works better than your dad’s,” Steve shot back, sliding his hand down and around Billy’s forearm, where he’d drawn the hearts, and rubbing his thumb over Billy’s sleeve.  “We won’t let El kill your dad, okay, she likes you, she likes Will, she won’t do anything to—to you, she won’t—hurt your family.”  He groaned.  “How come he’s such an asshole?!  Jesus,” Steve asked the air around them, waving his arms, and Billy laughed.  “Come on,” Steve told him. “—we’re going to Will’s for waffles, remember?”

Billy shook his head like he was trying to clear it, but he didn’t argue, and when they piled into the car, he called shotgun and dropped next to Steve.  He grabbed Steve’s hand, trembling for some reason, but when Steve tried to ask, Billy took a deep breath and started an argument with Max and El about whether they needed to bring anything to dinner.  Billy and Steve both felt greasing the wheels with unfamiliar adults was wise, while Max and Eleven sounded perplexed.

El was eventually the only holdout on gifts for Mrs. Byers—from her obvious alarm, Steve suspected she was worried she’d been breaking some unknown taboo—so Steve swung into Bradley’s Big Buy and watched as Billy grabbed flowers, then stared at the sparkling cider.  He spun slowly in place, and Max, picking up his nerves, grabbed and put back four different kinds of fruit.  El advocated filling an entire cart with whipped cream, and Steve let her fill a basket.

“Grab that sparkly juice,” Steve advised, always inclined to charm parents.  “Y’know, that,” he said, waving at the Martinelli’s, and Billy and Max hoisted two bottles under each arm and followed each other to the checkout in silence.  El frowned at them, then slowly did the same, and Steve tried not to laugh, watching the three of them in a solemn row, bottles under their arms, like they were carrying munitions and rations to the front lines.  He considered telling Billy they could go back that night and use the spare cider to fill his pool, then considered the way Billy’s fingers were tight and pale against the bottles, and leaned to whisper, “Surprised you know what to do with an invite, Trespasser.”

“Thought I was your knight,” Billy whispered back, and Steve stared at his smirk.  He was leaning in for a kiss when Max’s foot tromped on the arch of his foot.

 At the Byers’, Billy drummed his thumbs on the steering wheel, and grabbed Steve’s arm when he started to climb out of the car.  “So this is it.  This is—this is what you’re doing for Will.  Now.  Momma Byers and ‘Hopper’—” he still enunciated ‘Hopper’ like it was in quotes, “—they’re watching, today is—now.”

“What?” Steve cocked his head, listening, but also watching Max and El haul bags of cider towards House Byers, and trying to evaluate how many of the Party were pressed against the windows.  It looked like an entire school bus in there.  He sighed, shutting his car door.

“At IHOP,” Billy hissed.  “You said you’d—you’d be—queer at people.  So Will’d know what to do.  See what his mom said.  That’s why he wants us here.”

“Oh,” Steve said, swallowing as the terrifying thought of telling Joyce Byers he was queer reared its ugly head.  Maybe I can get her alone before we eat, he told himself, grimacing.  She’s—she’s nice, maybe—maybe she won’t be—too angry.  He took a deep breath.  Better me than Will, anyway.  “I—yeah, maybe, I—” 

He was still squinting at the front windows of the Byers’ house, wondering how the kids hadn’t figured out they were visible, no matter how much they made shushing motions at each other, when Billy came around the car, wiping his palms on his jeans.  He yanked Steve out, and grabbed him like they were about to square dance.  Steve stared at his face, the landscape whirling behind Billy as he dipped Steve into an open-mouthed kiss.  

Steve swore into it, throwing his arms around Billy’s shoulders, then relaxed when he didn’t get dropped on his ass, and tried not to think about the muscles holding him a foot off the ground.  “Giving me so many feeblings,” he mumbled, and Billy did nearly drop him, laughing, but swung him back upright to a chorus of whoops and whistles from the house.

Billy froze, spinning to stare at the kids crowding onto the porch—it looked like Lucas had even brought his little sister, Steve thought, distracted by his heart thudding in his chest, half with adrenaline, and half with all his blood rushing to his dick.  He took a deep breath, watching Billy brace his feet like he expected to get punched.  “Shit, Harrington—I—I—fuck, I thought—”

“It’s fine,” Steve told him, “—come on, it’s okay—”, grabbed his hand, and tugged him towards the house.

Billy made a soft noise in the back of his throat, and didn’t move.  

“Okay, stay there for a sec,” Steve said, diving back into the car for the last bag of cider, and the flowers Billy had grabbed.  

Footsteps crunched, and Will’s voice piped up behind him.  “I’m so sorry!” he panted.  “I’m so sorry, Eleven told me, and Max, and Mike, and he told Nancy, and I told Jonathan, and Max told Lucas, and nobody’d told Dustin, and I thought that was mean—”

“It was,” Dustin’s voice confirmed, as Steve crawled half under his seats looking for an escaped can of whipped cream.  “It was an asshole move, Steve Harrington—”

Steve resurfaced with the groceries, and Billy cleared his throat, saying, hoarsely, “How many goddamn people did I just—” 

“Like a hundred,” Dustin said, and Will punched him in the shoulder.  Dustin snickered, smacking back at him.  “—I mean, all the Wheelers are in there, Hopper brought his deputies, there’s the science guys from the lab, Mrs. Byers’ coworkers from Radio Shack—The Mayor—the President—”

Billy narrowed his eyes at Dustin’s grin, and reached over slowly to brace one hand on his shoulder and shove him sideways.  Dustin staggered, but his grin didn’t falter.

“What the hell,” Billy hissed at Will, who turned to look at the house.

“Not everybody saw?” he said hopefully.

Dustin staggered, cackling.  “Oh, and we videotaped it, too.  I’m gonna play it on the school intercom.  With commentary.  Like a football game—”

Billy stooped to scoop up some snow, and tossed it at Dustin’s face.  About half of it went in Dustin’s open mouth, and Steve raised his eyebrows at the gauntlet of carrying bags of groceries through the sudden battlefield, where Will was packing together a snowball, glaring at Dustin, and Billy was shivering, but cackling into the cuffs of his borrowed sweatshirt.  Dustin smacked Will in the face with a snowball before Will got his properly shaped, and Will yowled in fury, chasing him around the yard.  

El trotted back out, eyes narrowed, and then crouched to form her own snowball, and Mike ran after her, waving a hat and scarf.  Luckily, Joyce Byers and Jonathan met Steve at the door, and relieved him of his bags of whipped cream, flowers, and sparkling cider.  Behind them, Nancy waved her arms at the bags, looking weirded out, and Steve shrugged back at her, rolling his eyes skyward.  She shook her head, laughing.

As Steve turned back to the melee, Lucas wandered out the door past him, adjusting his scarf under his coat and yanking a fluffy hat down over his ears.

Billy’s head jerked up.  He’d been helping Will layer more snow along the top of an existing snow fort, and Steve was distracted for a second thinking about all the hiding places and fortifications Will Byers built, and who he pulled in there every time.  Probably his mom, Steve thought.  Joyce Byers seemed like she threw a mean snowball.  He liked the image of the two of them pelting Jonathan, while Nancy mounted an attack on their flanks.

Billy’s eyes narrowed as he took a deep breath, muttered something to Will, and stuck his hands in the pockets of Steve’s sweatshirt again.  He made for Lucas.  

Lucas looked up, swallowed, and backed away, and Steve nearly stumbled catching up to them.  He ran up to hear Billy stage-whispering “Need to talk to you.  The sheriff’s watching from the kitchen, you’re fine, can—can I just—around the corner of the house?”

He’d chosen his moment well—Will had run out and tripped Dustin, shoveling snow into his face with both arms, while Mike tried to pull him off, and El tried to pull Mike out of the fray, and Max hit everyone with snowballs indiscriminately.  Nobody was watching Lucas and Billy, except Steve.

Lucas glanced over Billy’s shoulder at Steve, who froze, then flexed his biceps, and gave a salute.  Lucas covered a snort with his mitten, and turned his deep frown back on Billy, who was waiting, hunched and scowling at the ground.  “Fine,” Lucas said, and crunched around to the side of the house.

Steve tried to crunch through the snow exactly when they did, the sound of their footsteps—and Dustin cackling as he and El dropped an enormous snowball on Mike’s head—covering the loud crunches of Steve tiptoeing onto the Byer’s porch.  He sank onto the porch swing, listening.  

“Listen, I fucked up, I’m sorry—” Billy started, and Lucas snorted.  Steve winced, and started to stand, but Billy wasn’t knocked out of stride.  “—I shouldn’t—I was—sorry.”

“What, you want me to forgive you?” Lucas asked, sounding pissed.  “You’re such an—”

“No!  No, I don’t care, but uh—I mean.  It’s—ha.  It’s not gonna happen, right?  But you’re—you’re gonna be—around.  You’re one of Steve’s—”

“I’ve got parents, actually,” Lucas informed him.

“You’re Max’s friend, and I’ll—I’m gonna be—around,” Billy pushed on, and Steve half wanted to lean around the corner of the house and cheer for him.  “I just wanted to say you’re, uh, safe.  I know you don’t—”

“Bullshit,” Lucas hissed at him.

“No, you—you are, dammit—sorry,” Billy interrupted.  “Steve would beat me to death with a nailbat if I took another swing at you.  Hopper would help him hide the body.  Look, you don’t have to trust me, just believe I don’t want to die.”

Lucas barked a laugh.

“I can—I’ll stay away from Erica if you want,” Billy told him, “—and, uh, cat girl, Tomoko?  Tomiko?”

“It’s Tomika,” Lucas muttered.

“I’ll tell them I can’t help.  If you want, I’ll even tell them why, and they won’t want my help, but.  You don’t have to be...watching for me.”  There was what felt like a long pause, as Steve tried to crane his neck around the edge of the deck without the swing creaking.  Snow crunched as one of them adjusted his footing.

“...okay,” Lucas said, finally.  “I guess.”

“You want me to stay the hell away from them?  I wanted to know before I went in there,” Billy asked, keeping his voice low.

Lucas didn’t answer again for long minutes, with only the sounds of the snowball fight, and their feet crunching in the snow.  “You know what, you can run all the errands for those morons you want,” he said finally.  “But if you—if you do anything—”

“No, I know,” Billy laughed.  His voice cracked.  “I’m sorry I was such a shitheel.  I’m trying to be...less shitty.”

That dropped into silence, and Steve clenched his hands on the edge of the swing, shivering, and resisting leaning around to see what was going on.

“Won’t be hard,” Lucas muttered.  “Max is scared of you.  She’s—she’s not scared of much.  And you scare her—”

“I know.  Working on a truce with her too,” Billy told him.  

“That what this is?  A truce?”

“I agree to be less shitty, and you agree to wait and see whether I am?  I think that’s a truce,” Billy said, and Lucas laughed, coughing.  

“Might have to help that cat a few more times before I believe you,” he said, but he sounded less hostile.  

“I already told Steve I’d help with his child adoption franchise,” Billy said, and Steve’s mouth fell open in offense.  His eyes narrowed, but Billy was talking again.  “If you want anything, lemme know.  I can start trying to make it up to you.  And Max.  Or—or just tell me to fuck off.”

There was another long pause, and Steve wrung his hands like a soap opera star, but his face heated with pride for Billy, who didn’t start yelling or anything, just waited.

“...truce, then,” Lucas said, finally.  “I guess.”

“Truce,” Billy repeated, and Steve wondered whether they were shaking hands.  He stood carefully so the swing wouldn’t bang against the porch rail, and trotted out into the snow, crossing his arms, as Billy and Lucas came back around the house.  

Their appearance caught Max’s eye, and her head jerked up, wide-eyed as she looked Lucas up and down.  She dropped the snowball she was making, clenching her hands into fists, but Lucas sighed and gave her a thumbs-up, and Billy glanced at him, and then slowly echoed it.  

She stared, then cocked her head, mouth quirking, and took a shaky breath.  When she walked up to Lucas, and Billy walked by them towards Steve, Steve heard her hiss “About time,” at Billy, who glared over at her.  “Thank you,” she mouthed, looking indignant, but Billy stared back before nodding.  

“Good job,” Steve whispered, wondering whether he could just kiss Billy, now, since he’d done it already, in full view of basically everyone they knew.  Billy snorted, ducking his head.  “Y’know,” Steve whispered, dodging another ‘snowball’ from Dustin, who was having a frustrating time getting them to stick together in his mittens, and kept throwing showers of snow that only went about six feet.  “Y’know you don’t—have to do anything—”  Steve bent to scoop up a handful of snow and smack Dustin upside the head with a throw straight out of his days in Little League.

“—I don’t need to apologize to that kid?” Billy raised his eyebrows.

“Uh, I mean, yeah, you needed to do that,” Steve grimaced.  “Uh, that—that was good.  I thought—I thought you, uh, he might piss you off, so I was kinda...listening.”

Billy shrugged.  “Kinda dumb of him to let me get him alone, really.  He knew you were there?”

“Yeah, he saw me,” Steve shrugged, making a face at his current snowball, before surveying the battlefield, and smacking it between Max’s shoulderblades.  “Uh, no, I mean.  I don’t know who all...saw the, um, the—” he stopped, feeling his face heat as he remembered the feeling of Billy’s cold hands against his neck and lower back, the stomach clench of so many eyes, and the heady spin and drop in Billy’s arms, half kiss, half roller coaster.  

“I’m such a moron,” Billy muttered.  “Why the hell aren’t they out here yelling at us?  I thought Will’d get them to the damn window.  Did it even work?”

“We can just talk to Mrs. Byers,” Steve ended on a yelp, imagining Hopper grabbing them by their hoods and shaking them, and telling them to get the hell out.  He was pretty sure Eleven had told the man something, but Billy’s tension had brought up thoughts of his calls to the Party’s houses going unanswered, and no more little nosy shits hanging around his car asking for rides.  Will’s mom telling him not to talk to the Byers’ family.  Nancy having to choose between her new boyfriend, and her new friend.  “Shit,” he mumbled.  “What if she’s pissed?”

Billy took a step towards him, then stopped.  “That didn’t—you didn’t think of that?!” he hissed.  “Jesus christ on a cracker, Harrington.”

Steve blinked at him, imagining the blue-sashed blond dude of sunday school crosslegged on a Saltine.  “What?”

“...it’s a good thing you’ve got a loyal advisor,” Billy whispered, shaking his head.

After a few minutes, Mrs. Byers wandered out, shivering, and yelled “Who wants waffles?!” and El shoved the whole armload of snow she’d been compacting into Max’s arms.  Max twisted her whole body to sling it around at Billy, who put his hands up into claws and roared at her, covered in snow, resulting in the hitherto-never-before-seen sight of Max Hargrove collapsing in giggles.  Lucas and Dustin stared at her as her knees bent, and she slowly collapsed forward to cackle into her arms, crouched in the snow up to her elbows.  

Mrs. Byers was still holding the flowers, frowning at them like she wasn’t sure how they’d ended up in her arms, but she waved at the table, set with Bert and Ernie paper plates and a can of whipped cream by each.  

“There...certainly will be enough whipped cream for everyone,” she said gamely, and Steve wondered which he’d pick, if a genie asked him—Mrs. Byers for his own mother, or Billy’s.  “Get in here,” she rolled her eyes, grinning.  “You’re all crazy, it’s freezing out here!”

“I know, Mom!” Will yelled, but lowered his voice to whisper to Billy and Steve as they sat down.  “Do you think she saw you?  Kissing?”

“Well, I’m not doing it again,” Billy whispered back, and Steve caught Hopper’s frown—he saw us, he thought, swallowing hard, and then Nancy grinned at him across the table.  

She was sitting with Jonathan at the card table, pushed close to extend the seating, and raised a glass of cider to Steve.  He nodded, his stomach clenching, and exchanged another smile with Mrs. Byers.  She can’t have seen, he told himself, as Will hovered around their chairs, telling Billy about losing all but his green marker for two days and drawing everybody in his class as an alien.  

“Right,” Billy narrowed his eyes at him.  “I haveta talk to you later, Ringbearer.”

Will beamed at him, grabbing his arm.  “The waffles aren’t done yet.  I can show you my room.”

The whole gathering watched little Will Byers drag Billy Hargrove off, chattering away.  

“Predators first cull the weak and the small,” said Dustin, and Nancy threw her paper plate at him, and missed.  

Jonathan tripped over the edge of the rug jumping out of his seat to run after them while Nancy’s plate was still rolling around the table on one edge.  Everybody else was still quiet, watching Billy and Will disappear, and Jonathan’s protective charge, so Steve groaned, extricated himself from all the chairs shoved together—smacking the back of Dustin’s head, for good measure—and ran after them.    

 Jonathan had his hand on Will’s doorknob when Steve grabbed it.  

“It’s okay,” he whispered.  “They get along.”

Jonathan stared at him, shaking his head, and Steve squeezed the other boy’s wrist tighter, shaking his head, as they listened to Will saying “And this one I drew you as Boromir.”

“...great,” Billy laughed, a little tense, then, warming Steve’s heart, he summoned up some enthusiasm and added, “—no, I mean, it’s great, really, what’s that, can I even see in that helmet?”, and touched off a lecture on 14th century armor from Will that nearly put Steve to sleep right there in the hallway.  Billy was actually asking questions, so it kept going, and Jonathan listened with his jaw set, then finally glared at Steve and folded his arms, waiting.  

“Okay, okay, short William,” Billy finally said, when Will paused for breath.  “We have to get our stories straight.”

Jonathan grabbed for the door again, eyes wide, and Steve grabbed his arms, wondering how many conversations he was going to end up eavesdropping on in one day.

“We do?” Will asked.  “Why?  Help me put these markers away before I lose them again—about what?”

“Yeah, okay,” something creaked, “—I, uh, I told Steve you threatened me, when—uh, I mean, like Dustin said he’d put sugar in the gas tank of my Camaro if I fucked it up with Steve, and your mom had some stuff to say—”

Will was giggling.  “What did my mom say?!”

“Too scary to repeat,” Billy shuddered audibly, and Will giggled harder.  “And she thought we were just friends, she’s gonna tie my balls to an anchor—”

Jonathan had stopped trying to open the door, in favor of just staring at Steve’s face in the dim light of the hallway.  Steve was trying to cover his laughter, his eyes stinging.

“Anyway, I got—Steve was—anyway.  I was telling him about it, and I said you did the same thing, so we have to—if he asks you, we should say the same thing—”

“Ohhhh,” Will said.  “I have to tie, um, I don’t think I want to, uh, tie your—”

“No!” Billy yelped, laughing.  “No, something else!”

“What should I threaten you with?” Will asked thoughtfully.  “I can’t just tell my mom, it should be different—”

Steve let go of Jonathan’s wrists to lean back against the wall, his shoulders shaking with snickers.

“You don’t actually have to threaten me—” Billy said softly, and it sounded like bedsprings squeaked.

“No, I should!” came Will’s voice.  “I should!”

“I guess if you want to,” Billy groaned.  “I mean, who doesn’t.”

“I should threaten you,” Will announced again.  “And Steve, right?  I’ll threaten Steve too.  Because you’re my friend.  I have to threaten Steve for you!”

“Okay, lil’ buddy,” Billy laughed, sounding fond.

Jonathan was cocking his head like a confused dog, squinting at Steve in the dim light of the hallway, and Steve just shook his head, trying to muffle his snickering.

“Oh!” Will muttered, and the floor stopped creaking as he held still.  “I should threaten Nancy, and uh, and Max, and Lucas—”

From the sound, Billy burst out laughing as hard as Steve was.  “You—you got a lot to do there, Midget William.”

“Maybe the same threat would work for everyone,” Will said plaintively.  “It’d be simpler.”

“Any thoughts?” Billy asked, through giggles.

“I could sneak in and peroxide your hair,” Will offered.  He sounded doubtful.  “I’d have to get my mom to buy peroxide.”

Steve slid down the wall, letting his head lean back against it and clapping both hands over his mouth.

Jonathan sighed and sat down across from him.  “Wait,” he mouthed, his whisper nearly silent.  “—you and Billy Hargrove?!”

Steve shrugged, still muffling giggles, and unable to care what Jonathan Byers thought about who he was dating.  Maybe Jonathan would get some sexy photos of Billy this time through the window, Steve thought, and snickered harder.

Jonathan stared at the wallpaper across the narrow hall, then shook his head.

“You bleach my hair and we’ll have a problem, Smalliam Byers,” Billy said, snorting.  “Besides, I’d wake up.  Steve would wake up.”

“Well, if you screw that up that bad, he won’t be there,” Will pointed out, giggling, “—what did you call me?!”

“Jesus, you’re brutal,” Billy muttered, his laughter sounding pained.  “There you go, there’s my punishment, waking up alone—”

“I’ll get embarrassing stories from Max, and tell him,” Will decided.  “I bet she knows some good ones—I’ll tell Steve all your dumb baby stories—”

Billy cackled harder, and Jonathan stood up, dusting himself off.  “Waffles are gonna be ready, and El will yell,” he whispered, glaring down at Steve, who blinked teary eyes up at him.

Steve nodded, wiping his eyes.  His cheeks hurt from smiling.

 When he rejoined the table, Dustin dropped into Billy’s seat next to him.  “Will’s mom didn’t notice,” he whispered.  “The hell was that, anyway?  Didn’t you see us all?”

Steve tried to think of a way to explain without explaining...Will Byers’ secret queer identity, he thought, trying not to snicker.  His internal voice took the opportunity to sound like Batman.  It must stay secret, or his family, and the world, could be in danger.  “Uh,” he started.  “...um, ah,” he tried again, crossing his arms, and wishing Billy would come back.  “A-animal instinct.  Love?  He’s horny,” he mumbled.  

“Those were options, Steve,” Dustin hissed, eyes narrowed.  “You don’t know which it is?  Anyway, Hopper might have seen you—”

When El shrieked “WAFFLES!” from the kitchen door, Billy wandered out, with Will trailing behind him telling all about ghost stories he could bring over for another sleepover.  Billy ruffled his hair, sidling around the crowded front room to kick the chair Dustin was sitting in.

“I wanna sit next to Billy,” Will told Mike, who’d sat next to Dustin while Billy was in the bedroom talking to Will.

“I sure don’t,” Mike made a face, relinquishing the seat with a shudder, and stepping around the table only to stagger as El threw both arms around his neck.  He laughed as she swung him around in a spin, chanting ‘waffles, waffles, waffles,’ and Hopper finally scooped her up, and plopped her in the chair closest to the kitchen, before helping Joyce bring out plates with a soft smile on his face.  

Billy frowned around, then stood again—the whole table paused to watch—before snorting a laugh and walking into the kitchen.  “Why don’t you go sit down?” he smiled charmingly at Joyce Byers.  “I can keep my nose to the forge in here, you’re juggling enough out there.”

She squinted at him, then looked over at Will, whose face looked torn between disappointment and excitement.  “Thank you!” she said, finally.  “But as soon as I’m done, I’ll let you have a break!”

Billy nodded, bending to stare into the waffle-iron at eye level.  Preparing to meet his foe, Steve thought, and then Joyce dropped into the seat between he and Will, handing them both oven-warm plates of waffles.  

“You sure seem to like him,” she said to Will, grabbing at one of the gajillion bottles of whipped cream El had placed around the table.  

“Um,” Will’s chair thumped as he swung his legs.  He bit his lip.  “Uh, he’s, um, he’s Steve’s friend.”

Steve widened his eyes at Will, hoping he’d realize he was acting like they’d started a crime ring on their sleepover weekend.

“He’s over a lot,” Steve said, digging into his waffle and smiling over with the casual smile guaranteed to make moms invite him to stay for dinner.  “They bonded over Lord of the Rings.”

“And music,” Will breathed, bouncing in his chair.  “He has rock music about the Lord of the Rings, Mom!”  

“And they’re both named William,” Steve rolled his eyes as Will nodded wildly.  

“We’re both named William, Mom!”

Will was talking into almost complete silence, as Hopper, Dustin, Mike, Lucas, Erica, Max, Eleven, Nancy, and Jonathan all considered Billy, who was burning a waffle.  He grabbed the smoky thing and threw it in the sink, tensed, and looked over at their silently watching faces.  “Sorry, ma’am,” he laughed.  “Not used to this waffle maker.”

“We made a whole fort in the front room and slept there,” Will continued stubbornly, cutting his waffle so the knife scraped loudly on his plate.  “Didn’t think it was dumb.  I didn’t have to say I can’t—sleep, sometimes.”

Oh, Steve thought, blinking.  That’s why he wanted us down there.

Billy’d started doing the dishes, which was probably loud enough to drown them out, and also why he’d gotten distracted enough to start subtly shuffle-dancing to the music in his head.  Hopper’s frown at him intensified, then turned on Steve.  

Steve tried to dodge his gaze, and looked the other way to find Nancy and Jonathan Byers’ eyes trying to burn a hole in his head.  He grabbed the whipped cream and began slowly coating his entire waffle in perfect rows.  

“...I’m glad you had a good time,” Joyce said, finally, exchanging glances with Will’s little goblin horde of friends.

“He helped Tomika and me get her cat out of a tree,” said Erica, and Mike choked.  Dustin slapped his back.  

“Tomika’s cat?!”  Mike spluttered.  “That’s not a cat, it’s—it’s a beast.  Slashing damage.  Roll a save against Fear.”

“Only for cowards,” Erica huffed.

“I don’t know what she thinks could hurt that cat.  It’s gonna die one day trying to fight a Mack truck,” Lucas sighed, and Erica punched him in the shoulder.

“Billy said he’d help us if we needed it, Lucas,” she hissed.

“Should have just left it in the tree,” Max filled her hand with whipped cream and licked it, and El stared, then stared at the whipped cream bottle.  Max caught El’s stare, and waved the bottle of whipped cream, watching Eleven’s head follow it.  Max grinned, and leaned close to fill El’s hands with whipped cream.  “I told Billy to run, if he saw them coming again.  He looked like he’d been mauled,” Max muttered, carefully putting a twirl around the top of El’s double handful of whipped cream. 

“Good,” Mike snorted, glancing at Lucas, who grimaced faintly.  

“Where the hell was I?!” Dustin glared at Steve.  “Your—uh, Billy meets a wolverine vigilante, and nobody calls me?!”

“No idea,” Steve sighed, remembering Lucas’ panic over his little sister alone with the boy who’d started punching him for no reason.  It was easier to focus on Billy now.  

Steve reminded himself about Tommy, and much easier it’d been, just pretending everything was okay, and going along with whatever dumb shit idea Tommy suggested.  It helped him resist wandering into the kitchen and just pushing Billy against the cupboards for a warm kiss that tasted like strawberries and apple cider.  

He beat me unconscious because I got in his way, Steve told himself, chewing the suddenly tasteless waffle.  There’s good inside him, Luke Skywalker, but there’s other stuff too.  He sighed, wishing he could—time travel, or something, back to before Billy stomped in and beat the shit out of him and terrified the kids—and maybe, he thought idly, before he spray-painted shit about Nancy all over town.  

“I fixed him up,” El told them, breaking Steve’s train of thought.  She beamed at Max, between surveying her hands full of whipped cream with the wide eyes of one given a priceless treasure.  “Nancy’s first aid book said you could use bread to bandage wounds, and I wanted to try it, but nobody had a sandwich.”

“Stick to gauze first,” Hopper laughed, pinching between his eyebrows.  “He rescued a cat out of a tree?” 

“Should have taken some photos,” Jonathan muttered to Nancy.  “Evidence.”

“I can testify for the court,” Max shot over, her eyebrows raised.

Steve was half torn between resigned annoyance that evidence of Billy’s few good actions was questioned, and longing for pictures of Billy wrangling tiny, hissing Marcenia Lyle Alberga out of the tree and stuffing her in his sweatshirt pocket for the climb down.  “Definitely happened,” he shrugged.  “That’s why he’s got band-aids on his fingers.”

“I did those too,” El told Hopper, for some reason.  “I know what to do.”  He waved her off, shaking his head and grinning.  

 At around this point, Billy brought everyone a refill on the waffles, and the kids opened every single bottle of sparkling cider, and Dustin smacked his lips, half-closing his eyes and saying, “1981.  It was a good year.”  

“To Hawkin’s resident Jedi,” Mike said, toasting Eleven, who narrowed her eyes and clinked her glass against his as Max toasted Lucas as Fastest Skateboard Rookie and he burst out laughing, grimacing and rubbing his elbows.  Max elbowed him companiably, and blushed.

“Very fruity on the palate,” Dustin declared, smirking.  Will giggled, and Mrs. Byers made a show of swirling her plastic cup.  

“Hold it on the roof of your mouth for a moment,” she said, in a bad French accent, “—then you will feel the flavor,” and Will cackled harder, covering his mouth so he didn’t spit cider.

When Billy sauntered out with more waffles, Will dubbed him “Most Honorable Cat Wrangler”, amist cheers, and Mrs. Byers stood back up to give him his seat next to Steve.  She walked back in the kitchen to exclaim “Oh, you didn’t have to wash everything.”

“I housetrained him!” yelled Max, and Dustin dubbed her the Great High Housetrainer.  Will flopped half into Billy’s lap, proclaiming him the Favored Lasagna Maker to the King in a flood of giggles.  

Nancy, then Jonathan, got up to offer help to Joyce clear the table, and Hopper began collecting plates, a spare fork behind his ear to stab every free-range strawberry segment scattered across the tablecloth and stick it in his mouth.

Steve, now officially the King Of Ceramic Monsters and Lord Nailbat, got up to pee after five cups of cider.  

He’d finished fixing his hair, and was just unzipping his pants, when he heard a thump and creak what sounded like inches away, and realized it was through the wall.  He frowned at it, extracting his dick from his briefs, to hear a horrible wet sound, like a garbage disposal full of slugs, and then, clearly, and inches away, Nancy’s voice saying “Um, mmm—uh, maybe less tongue?”

Steve clapped his hand over his mouth, hearing himself squeak.  He stared at the wall.

“You said you wanted it sloppy,” Jonathan replied, and Steve stared from the toilet, to the wall, taking a step away.  The floor creaked, and the squeaking of Jonathan’s ancient rusty bedsprings stopped.  

“Something creaked,” Jonathan whispered.  “Wait, wait, wha—what if that was Will—”

“They’re all busy cleaning up,” Nancy whispered back, and Steve held very still, wondering whether he could tiptoe outside, and pee on a tree, or whether he’d look up to see another lineup of children—probably holding up point cards, like Olympic judges were assessing his dick.  Yes, wait, he thought desperately.  Just let me take a piss and leave.

The noise started again, sucking and slurping.  Steve yanked his zipper back up, pressing his hand so hard over his mouth to muffle his laughter that he started seeing stars from lack of oxygen, and started to fear he’d pee down his own leg.  He inched to the door, and poked his head out to see a bunch of neon knit triangles—El’s sweater, he realized, right outside the door.  

“Aren’t you glad to be getting along better with him?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” Max’s choked-up voice replied, and Steve pulled the door nearly closed again as she continued.  “I don’t—he’s such a prick, El!  He’s—he’s so goddamned mean, he’s always—now he’s just what, just nice now, and I’m supposed to trust him?”

Steve leaned against the sink, scrabbling at his newly-fixed hair.  Behind him, through the bathroom wall, the awful saliva-demon noise changed, and Nancy yelped.  “Why is that cold—” she hissed, and he wheezed into the back of his hand, shaking with suppressed giggles.  He wondered why Max and El couldn’t hear the horror going on through the wall—maybe Jonathan had blankets nailed to his door, or maybe they were just too caught up in talking about Billy.

“You don’t...you don’t have to be friends with him,” El offered, sounding uncertain, and Max laughed, sounding a little unhinged.  

“I know!  I know!  He’s—he’s a waste of space, but he—we were—”

Steve felt bad, leaning closer, but it helped drown out what sounded like a dog licking itself on the other side of the wall.  He plugged the ear facing what must be Jonathan’s bedroom.

“Was he...nice sometimes?” El asked, and Max stomped, growling.  

“I guess?” she hissed back.  “Yeah?  Sometimes he’d—give me skating advice, or—or he’d be mad, and Billy’d push me to the side like a shithead and—and draw the—draw—he’d get hurt.”  El was quiet, and Max’s voice got shakier.  “I didn’t—I don’t know what to do when Billy gets hurt.”

“I’ll save you,” El said, her voice low, and Steve couldn’t help smiling as he pictured her seeing the Batsignal, and grabbing her mask.  

“I don’t need saving,” Max said hoarsely, with a snort.  “My mom needs saving.  Billy needs—he could—I think he’s—”

“What?” El asked, sounding as confused as Steve was.

“I think he’s—pretending to be nice, for Steve,” Max whispered.  “He always—he’s good for a while, you know, he’s good in...stores, he’s nice if people are watching.  But then as soon as we’re alone—”

Even the sound of a loud bedspring creak, two squawks, a thud, and an explosion of giggles through the wall didn’t distract Steve from considering Max’s point.  

“But he’s been nice to Will,” Max went on, the floor creaked as she stomped in a circle, but Nancy and Jonathan were laughing too hard to hear.  “I just—how come he can keep it together for Will, y’know?  He never built me any goddamn pillow forts, this is to show off for Steve.”

“Maybe...maybe he wasn’t trying before,” El offered, and Max made kind of an awful noise, deep in her throat.  

“Yeah,” she whispered.  “I—I don’t think he was.  He—y’know, he took me once, out to a skate park.  He knew the skaters, it wasn’t just—he ignored me the whole time—but mom was upset because of something, and he’d been nasty to us all day, and Billy—he grabbed me, and he hauled me off to the skate park.  It was—I thought he—”

“I will take you to the skate park,” El told her, and Max laughed, sniffling.  “When you are sad.  Billy can come if he’s nice to you.  If you want him there.  I will take you to the skate park.”

Max’s sniffling sounded wetter.  “I-I’ll teach you to do flips.  I—we could—get you a board—Billy’s old one—”

“I could ask for one,” El said.  “Do you want another waffle?”

“I never want to eat waffles again,” Max laughed, making gulping noises.  “I’m so sick of waffles, El.”

“...I—we could—I—” El stumbled under this new load of information, and Max giggled harder.  

“I’m not hungry, El.  Let’s—let’s go back.  Let me blow my nose.”  

At this, she pushed the door to the bathroom open, clonking it into Steve’s knee, and he scrambled back, holding his finger over his mouth and pointing to the wall, through which came clearly the sound of Nancy and Jonathan reading a love poem, in unison.

“I’m so sorry,” Steve whispered, as Max laughed so hard she had to lean against the bathroom counter.  

“Oh my god,” she whispered back.  “How long have you been stuck in here?!”

“Blow your nose,” he held out a handful of toilet paper.  “It’ll sound just like their kissing.”

“Were you listening to them?” El asked under her breath, frowning as Nancy and Jonathan started kissing again.  

“I didn’t want to,” he hissed back.  “I was trying to pee—”

“Hurry up,” Nancy’s voice came through the wall, and Jonathan said “It’s a really small room, okay—”, and Max and Steve’s eyes met in horror.

“Heeeeellllp,” Max wheezed, snickering.  She grabbed El’s arm in one hand, and Steve’s in the other, and drug them out of the bathroom and down the hall, back into the kitchen/dining part of the trailer.  “Oh my god, what was that—”

 “Harrington,” Billy said, seated at the dinner table with his face a little too blank, as his little sister drug Steve into the front room.  “Where’ve you been,” he hissed, as Steve dropped into the seat next to him, registering the general silence.  The sounds of giggling and screaming came from out front, in the snow, and Billy had been alone in the Byers’ front room with Hopper and Joyce.  

“So you’re staying at Steve’s house,” Joyce was saying.  She and Hopper had matching frowns, and folded arms.

Max looked from the two of them to her brother, and rubbed her face.  She groaned.  “Who wants to snowball fight,” she asked joylessly.  “Billy, last one outside is...a soggy waffle.”

“Thank you,” he hissed, laughing unevenly, the cider cup in his hand twitching towards her in a weak toast.  He stood, glancing at the door, but froze at Mrs. Byers’ voice.  

“Wait,” she said, and Billy dropped back into the chair with a shaky sigh.  “Steve’s parents are okay with that?” she continued, underailable.  

“They’re fine,” Steve told her, resisting the urge to squirm like a toddler who has to potty.  “Can we—”

“But you’re the—” she frowned at Hopper, then Billy again.  “You are the one who showed up and started the fight?  Broke my dishes?”

Billy nodded, glancing at Hopper.  His shoulderblades hit the back of his chair, and he twitched.  “Yes ma’am.”

“Why?!” Mrs. Byers flailed her arms, and Billy stared past her.

“It was unacceptable,” he said.  Steve slid his hand over and squeezed Billy’s knee, and he jerked, shooting a startled frown back at Steve.  “There was no good reason, ma’am.  I apologize, and it will never happen again.” 

Hopper crossed his arms, backing all the way away to the far wall and turning to frown out the window, and Billy’s gaze flicked after him, then back to Joyce, who was squinting at him, her arms hovering in midair.  Billy’s shoulders relaxed, a little.

“What?” Joyce asked, frowning from Steve’s face to Hopper’s back.

Max wandered over and lingered by the door with El, both of them looking torn.

“I can make it up to you,” Billy told the wall behind Joyce.  “I can replace the plate.  I can—” he cut off, gasping a shuddery breath as Hopper turned to face them.

“You got a couple more boys on call if you have any chores need doing,” Hopper said to Mrs. Byers, and Steve willed her to say that was fine.  Billy tensed again every time Hopper talked, and Steve wanted to reach over and squeeze his hand even more than he wanted to use a goddamn toilet.  

“Sorry we made a mess,” he said quickly, trying to extract Billy, instead of thinking about his bladder.  “We, um, there was a lot happening—”

Joyce Byers wasn’t stupid, and her eyes were widening as she watched Billy twitch every time Hopper moved.  

“You’re...staying with Steve,” she said again, looking over at Hopper, who nodded.  

“It’s fine,” Steve told her, swallowing.  “He and Will, um, they—they get on, they have—stuff to talk about,” he said, clumsily trying not to mention what he was coming to think of as the gay thing, but Joyce Byers seemed to get something else out of his rambling, because she sat down across from them.

“Will doesn’t have a lot of people he wants to talk to,” she said, reaching toward Billy’s hands on the table, then yanking her hands back and folding them together.  “If—if he’s found somebody that he has—things—in common—”

“Lonnie is a piece of work, but you got Will out of there,” Hopper said, and Steve blinked, wondering who the hell that was.  “Your kids got lucky.”

“Oh, oh no,” Joyce said, for whatever reason, and Steve couldn’t take it anymore.  

He stood up, squeezing Billy’s shoulder.  “We haveta go now,” he said, unable to resist the call of his bladder, or return to the Byers’ bathroom.  

“You boys are welcome anytime,” Joyce said, leaning to catch Billy’s eye.  

He frowned at her, but nodded.  “Just tell me what you want me to do,” he told her, and she leaned forward across the table, grabbing his hands.  

“Honey,” she said, staring Billy down, “—you make my kid way too happy for me to care about a plate.  Okay?”  Her hands looked tiny and white against Billy’s big tanned ones.  “You too, hon,” she said louder, frowning over at Max, who frowned warily.  Joyce smiled a little sadly.  “Have your mom give me a call, sweetie.”

Billy had kind of...frozen, and Steve kneed him in the side, hoping his engine would engage.  

“Come on, trespasser, we’re going.”

“Come again next time,” Mrs. Byers said, squeezing Billy’s hands, and smiling up at Steve.  

Steve, as ever when faced with somebody’s mom, fought down the urge to suggest they just stay.  Probably Billy was a better cook than Jonathan.  Steve was a better babysitter.  She probably doesn’t mean forever, he told himself, smiling.  She didn’t mean ‘I’ll keep you’.  “Billy can make lasagna,” he said instead, and Billy glared up, his cheeks reddening.  He hadn’t pulled his hands back from Mrs. Byers’, and Steve watched her pat them, like she had Will’s, after she took off his little snow-covered gloves.  

Billy watched her hands with the weird blank look he got sometimes, and Steve leaned against his side, trying to remind him he was there.

“Everyone likes lasagna,” Mrs. Byers told Billy, and his eyes flicked back to her face.  “Would it be evil of me to trade on my broken plate to get some lasagna?”

“No,” Max answered, from the door.  “Billy, make Will’s mom some lasagna.  You broke her plate.”

“He doesn’t have to!” Mrs. Byers protested, and Billy snorted a laugh, watching her hands again, and shooting a wary glance at Hopper.

“No, I—I can do that.  Uh, Will likes it.  Lasagna.”

“There!” Mrs. Byers squeezed Billy’s hands again, and looked over at Hopper.  “Aren’t I lucky he broke a plate?  Now I get lasagna.”  

Hopper shook his head, then met Steve’s eyes.  He jerked his head at the door, smiling, and Steve sighed with relief.  

“What’s lasagna,” El whispered to Max, sounding suspicious.

“Seriously,” Steve said, “—we need to go, uh, can we—I need to—”

“Oh, hey,” said Max.  “Can you drop me close to my house?  Like, a ways away—”

“We didn’t talk about—” El frowned at Hopper.

“I think we talked enough,” he said, nodding at Billy, who was letting Steve haul him to his feet, but hadn’t tried to pull away from Joyce Byers.

“Too many people here anyway,” said Max, rubbing her eyes, and El squeezed her hand.  

“I will go with Max,” she told Hopper, who opened his mouth, narrowed his eyes at Max’s red-splotched face, and nodded.  

“See you at home, kid,” he waved, then turned his glower on Steve and Billy.  “Treat your cargo with care,” he said, and Joyce laughed.

Once they got outside, Steve took a deep breath.  “Holy fucking christ I have to pee.”

Billy and Max both burst into snickers, white-faced and shiny-eyed, and Lucas hailed Max.  El shoved Max towards Lucas, then turned to stop Billy with a hand on his chest.  

“What do you need for skateboarding,” she asked, without it sounding like a question.  “For Max.”

“Uh,” he blinked at her.

“When Max was sad once, you took her skateboarding.  She liked it,” El told him, and he lowered his eyes, biting his lips.

“Really have to pee,” Steve hissed at them.  

“It’s snowing,” Billy told El.  “There’s nowhere—”

“So, a roof,” she said, unmoving, and crossed her arms.

“Uh,” Billy frowned, stroking his mustache.  “There’s not much around.  Even if we broke into the gym, it’s just a big empty room—”

“Nancy could break in again,” El said, folding her arms, and Billy blinked at her.

“The princess broke into the gym?” he asked, and Steve remembered he needed to sit his boyfriend down, sometime, and tell him the whole story.  

Sometime his bladder wasn’t about to explode.  “I’m about to make yellow snow,” Steve hissed, and Billy shoved his shoulder.  

“Go in the bushes, your majesty, nobody’s watching!”

“What if Mrs. Byers sees my dick,” Steve asked, crossing his arms, but Billy pushed him again, so he stumbled off into the darkening twilight.  He crouched in a bush, hoping he didn’t get poison ivy, and watched Billy and El talk seriously, both nodding, and looking over at Max.

[platypanthewriter]

Strangest: Cut Scene

Billy and Neil scene I wrote to figure out chapter five--fic link in the notes:

“I think it would be best, don’t you,” he let go of Billy’s shirt, straightening it, “if you think about your sister.  How is it for her, never knowing?  Is it better to just...have it over?  Is she gonna be sad if she finds out you had one too many and went into the ravine...or is it a relief?  Knowing she doesn’t have to dread you starting another fight, and upsetting her mother...you know I don’t want to be someone who...upsets his wife.  What other option have you given me, Billy?” 

Billy shook his head, swallowing.

“Answer me.”

“No option,” Billy choked out.  “Sir.”

“How do you think she’d feel, knowing she can have friends over--” Billy took a jerky breath, and his father spread his arms.  “Oh, yes, she told me about that.  You know I’d love to meet her friends.”

“They’re--they’re just kids.  Sir.”

“I heard you did not make that boy feel welcome.  Maybe that’s why she’s being...difficult, Billy, did you think of that?  Why would anyone want a home where you’re always causing trouble?”

Billy’d been watching his hands as he walked closer, and his chin jerked up as his shoulders thudded back against the wall.