The Lying Pierrot

Donna | 27 Honestly this blog has become a library for all the guilty pleasure fanfics I’ve read and my latest hyperfixations…you’re welcome ;)

[thelyingpierrot]

Navigation For My Own Personal Sanity

Disclaimer: All credit for these fics, drabbles, imagines, preferences, headcannons, etc. goes to the blogs I have reblogged them from. This tag-list was made just to navigate the library of all my reblogged reading material.

The Arcana

Asra Alnazar

Muriel

COD

Alejandro Vargas

Captain John Price

David ‘Hesh’ Walker

Johnny ‘Soap’ Mactavish

Kyle ‘Gaz’ Garrick

Keegan P Russ

König

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Kaldur

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Hotaru Haganezuka

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Uzui Tengen

Game of Thrones/House of the Dragon/A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms

Baelor Targaryen

Lyonel Baratheon

Podrick Payne

Sandor Clegane

Valarr Targaryen

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Harry Potter

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Nogitsune

Scott McCall

Stiles Stilinski

Theo Raeken

Video Games

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Brynjolf

The Witcher

Eskel

Lambert

Misc.

Adrien Tepes

Din Djarin

Fatgum

Game of thrones

Harry Styles

Nick Jakoby

The Lost Boys

[artm-is87]

keegan's the type of man to catch feelings and refuse to acknowledge them until it kills him. it would take years for him to open, to let himself want someone as much as he does. it'd be after something horrible happening, something so devastating that his control snaps, the thick hold on his restraint slipping; so much death encompasses them at all times, so many friends lost and buried, the realisation that he could lose someone who doesn't even know how much he can love, destroys him more than the mere thought of them slipping through his fingers. he'd grip hard, hold on possessively in an attempt to quell that fear, before it choked him. if it finally came to it, he wouldn't be rough, wouldn't be like a feral beast gnashing at the bars of its cage; he'd be gentle, reverent, his quietness shining through like the sign of what it is -- admiration. he'd worship, care for and provide whoever managed to worm their way so deep into what seemed like a steel heart, but you'd know. how much this man cares, how his aloofness isn't what it seems, and that he's willing to do everything it takes to protect the ones he loves; wreck havoc on anyone daring to hurt you.

keegan p. russ is a yearner. he watches from afar, always hiding away in the dark shadows, unnoticed unless he wants to be seen. he strikes fast, merciless, before disappearing into the pitch black once more. he'd keep to the corners still, gradually moving closer as time flows by, unwilling and incapable of staying away. he'd memorise everything, every single detail about you that he has at his disposal, commit your mere form to memory and hold it close in the dead of night. he needs patience, understanding and trust, something not freely available. but once he gets it, once he lets himself have it, he stands in your shadow instead.

[punk-in-docs]

Since asks are open, I’m curious about the 4 staglings. Can we get more information about them? - 🪿

Five little stags-

Lyonel Baratheon x Lady D - Domestic fluff x parenting

MASTERLIST - SEND PROMPTS - AO3

Goosey anon, my beloved 🪿 I couldn’t stop with this couple. This has been in my brain for a solid month. It is so long and rambling I’m so so sorry. It ran off with me- I hope you enjoy it. Fluff enough to rot your teeth.

As the name of the story suggests, they have five little stags (which sounds like a nursery rhyme) and they are as follows; Jorys, Olira, Ceres, Durran and Ormund.

Storm Land beaches are rare, so you’ve been told; you snatch up the opportunity of them when you can.

Ash grey sand that drinks up the colour of the sky. There are no shells intact, just fragments of them. Rocks dashed on the sand, so sharp they could cut your palms to cup them. The land slanting towards the sea, is sparsely tufted with dry dune grass. Even grass struggled to grow here but it relented. It’s just the right kind of Storm Land bleak you’re used too, and you take the chance to use it.

Coves like this come unbidden, in that rare flat gap when the sea isn’t as power hungry or battering as it usually seeks to be.

A calm day. Wind stirs up slow. The sky arrives trying its best to be birds egg blue. You’d taken the golden, gorse-tangled coastal path right the other side of the bay.

A well trampled route, that’s tickled with the bright yellow scent of the hardy shrub flowers that overhang it. Melding with the fierce knife cut and the mineral kiss of the salty winds. Gulls wheeling overhead in high arcs with their cries. Fishing boats and merchant vessels bob on the horizon. Pale square sails stark against the gradient blue-grey. Today the sea fell heavy and dark as blue ink.

You walk to where the jagged corner rounds, smooths, and there a cove hides. A rocky incline down the headland that slopes. Gathered into the land, lays flat the salty stretch of sand that the ocean, for once, isn’t hugging. Gently huddling itself away from the mighty headland rock like the shore had peeled itself away, and was proudly showing you it’s naked beige secret.

The Stormlands are not well known for their gentleness. You should know; you’ve been the Lady of it, near going on twenty years now.

You sit back on the blanket you’d spread on the dry sands. Watching your Stagling’s roam, cause trouble, and grow. Shooting off in different directions. You marvel at the variety.

Spying how Jorys runs as fast as his strong, long legs will take him. A kite in his hands. Prompting the wind to try and take it and soar it high above. A golden diamond of a Baratheon flag ready to swoop far up to the pushed back clouds.

He’s no boy anymore; your oldest, soaring well into adulthood. You can’t believe how time has swallowed away your toddling little boy and brought out a grown man. Jawline as carved as his fathers. Hair a wild sweep, and black as night. Grin equally as devastating. His height nearly towers over Lyonel’s.

He inherited your husbands love for wilderness. For sailing. Hunting. Hawking. Gathering up as much of the world as he could in his hands. Every scar and lesson he earned with hard grit and determination. He ran untamed to Tarth and Lys and had already sailed much of the rest beyond the Stepsones and Tyrosh. Itching to discover more of Bloodstone and the Grey Gallows.

He’s more drawn back than his father. Less of a tempest, more of a sly lightning bolt that lays in wait to strike. Lyonel always tells you with a proud grin that he spies your hand in that side to him. He’s diplomatic, but not weak. Learned how to read a room before he enters. Weights and tests his words with clever strength before he speaks them.

Just like you do, Lady Storm. You’ve taught our stag well. He beams.

Lyonel boasted that his Jory was not far off discovering the joys of wine and women. And then you’d all be sorry; he was like to be the bold devastation of many a noble girl. And the root cause of desolation to many hearts. With a grin as bright as the one Lyonel won you over with; you don’t doubt it. A little part of you dreads it. That soon he will flee the safety of the keep.

He will make his mark in time. He’s been guided wisely. Lyonel was careful to weed out of all his own shortcomings when they cropped up, and made themselves known in his son.

There were many years yet before he’s come to take the Storm Lords seat. He used his every second wisely. He trained with every weapon there was in the armoury.

Had sailed and broken many a mast on some of your ships. He read up on so many topics the master damn near ran out of books to ply him with. He learned his way through languages like running water, Valyrian, the old tongue, and was an avid student of histories like he was training to be shipped off to the citadel. Always studious. Seeking. Laughing and smiling as much as his fathers old namesake.

Durran is Jorys shadow. Running along, always at his ankles like an inky haired burr; had done since the day he was born. He looked upwards to his big brother in every regard. Now Jory was trying to show him how to fly the kite they’d painted together. A messily limbed stag stamped on the yellow. Antlers wonky, legs fat and misshapen like it was club footed. But the special thing about it was the fact they’d been waiting for two moons to come fly it together.

Only just nudging four, Durran was your second youngest. Born during a storm that near deafened the keep alongside your pained cries. Lighting struck the sea, green as wildfire, and flashing powerful.

When the midwife told you it was a boy; You and Lyonel took one look at each other, knowing instantly his name needed to be a devotion to the man who raised those very walls. The ones that were used to the sea throwing themselves at, hard enough to try and knock it back into the land.

Ceres is spinning off wild somewhere. As per her usual stride. If there’s nature to explore, she’d find it. Possibly she had headed up towards the headlands with little Ormund, your youngest, propped like a lumpy, warm weight on her hip.

She scooped him up from where he stood patting and mushing his little hands in the wet sand, making piles of it, and told the little tot they were off to look for smugglers caves, and pirate gold, rum or treasure, hiding in salt flecked caves in the rocks. Bare feet squishing in the sand.

“Please be careful. No rock climbing. Stay where we can see you both.” You call over. Voice dancing and rippling on the wind.

She calls her assent over her shoulder. Hoiking her brother up her hip to hear him laugh. Fingers clutching at a chunk of her hair. She’s looking skywards. Pointing out the path of the swallows that dipped ahead. Letting his little eyes follow her slim finger. “Look at the birdies. Ormund. Look-“

She truly was your adventuress. Your ray of utter sunshine - never dimming. Long, perpetually waving, untamed hair that exactly mirrored your own. Always wrestled back off her face, but never behaving. Forever with pencils or sagging ribbons lost in it. Her face was dotted with a spray of dark freckles. Like sharpened stars scattered across her skin. Eyes silver as the sea. Lightning Dondarrion grey.

She’s combed through every biological book in Storm’s End. Knew everything there was to be known about this natural world. Of animals and nature. Sea creatures. Dragons. Birds. Every walk of wildlife. You’ve never seen a girl so taken with a love of animals and the like.

She had a way with all your stable stock that was almost otherworldly. The only slip of a girl you knew you could stare down and calm a warhorse ten times her size. More comfortable on horseback in boiled leathers and boots, than she ever had been in a dress.

From her first stubby rounded pony to her current fine speckled grey palfrey. Forever riding off on her own to the woods in search of a hedgehog, deer, or a fox to study. She was not a lover of hunts. Oft going off to hide so she didn’t have to witness the bloody slaughter of a deer or boar.

Her love of eating meat had declined over the years. She didn’t warm to the cruelty of a hunt. Though she still did have a soft spot for cheese, and any wounded animal she came across.

She has gathered up quite the menagerie back at the keep over the years. A nest of baby starlings in the rookery eaves to watch over. A new clutch of kittens from the kitchen cat. She fed and named the rats in the dungeons. Took in any bird with a poor leg or an undeveloped wing. Orphaned underfed piglets. Chickens. Old mules with missing teeth. A shaggy rust coloured steer with one horn. Strays and runts of litters of all kinds.

You’d no doubt they’ll come back with their hands clutching dried starfish or the broken curl of mussel shells. Cockle and limpet shells too. Dune grass sticking out their hair and sand damp and cloying on their clothes. Smiles bright as any sun.

Ceres told you she wants to gather as many whole shells as she can, to make a twinkling seashell chime to hang over Ormund’s cot. Let it sparkle in the meagre sun with butter yellow periwinkles, the iridescent mottled blue and green of mussel shells, the white and brown of cockles. A starfish or two if they’re lucky enough to reach the tide pools.

Ormund with his wide dark two year old eyes that sparkled in awe at everything new. Wide smiley cheeks kissed with the salty breeze of his home. A taste he was born too and will come to know better than his own name. He was such a smiley baby already. Everything posed to him met with laughter in his milk teethed mouth.

Your eyes scan to find them. Which you do. Dipping in and out of a cave. Ceres letting him feel the wet rock with his little fingers. Sand dusting his soft skin.

You have no fear for their safety. The tide is well out and you have time. Besides which, your dogged old knight, Ser Seldan, lays in wait up on the headland, dark cloak swathing his wide shoulders, with three soldiers.

Your loyal direwolf never lurked far away. Silvered and grey as he was now; hair bolted silver like a dragonseed, but as stocky and resolute as the wall. Age had not wearied him. Only made the old wolf sharper. Especially now he has this rowdy clutch of little stags to oversee.

You sweep your gaze across the beach. Coming past where Jorys and Durran are still running wild. Kite swirling and tugging on the air. Jerking and dropping. Jorys laughter swells and falls, along with Durrans.

You sit on the dryer sand, shoes off, skirt draped to your calves, feet curled into the dry sugar soft grain of the sand. Wind whipped and trickling some of it back across to the ocean.

The waves crawl slow to the shore rather than the usual thrashing it gets. You’d spread a rug out. Woolen and thick under your hands where you sit back. Watching your family bolt to all corners of the cove.

Mostly they gather at the mouth of the rocks ahead where you can see them. A picnic basket lays unopened beside you. A simple fare, soft bread, milk and honey for the little ones, carved thick slabs of ham, some cheeses, hard and soft and blue. Apples and pears to cut with a knife and some berry cordial for the children. A wine skin of red for you and Lyonel.

Your eyes go to your husband. Who is walking along, cutting a dark figure into the white crush of the waves, Olira walks beside him. Skirts held up out the sand so they don’t stain.

He’s got her arm crooked in his elbow. His Doe, he calls her. Soft and sweet as one. Lyonel has promised her, when the day does come, he will solicit ravens from all over the seven, far and wide, for a good suitor for her. They will invite him to Storms End and vet him thoroughly.

They are probably discussing poetry if you had to guess. Or stories. Maybe histories. She liked the nicer ones. Tales of love, duty. The unfailing honour of man.

Your oldest girl, in similar respects to Jory, wouldn’t bear her girlhood much longer. She’s nearly a woman now too. Tall and willowly as you’d been at that age. Seemingly sprouting long legs out of nowhere. Hair long and often worn unbound to her waist. A vision of unquestionably feminine beauty. Brushed and attended carefully.

Her clothes a careful representation of her vanity. She had raised herself to know of every court courtesy and every fashion there was. Demure and quietly respectful. Her head rampant with stories of great loves and famous songs of chivalry. She vowed when she was seven, that one day she’d find a great a love as you and Lyonel had.

She took more kindly to the Septa’s teachings than Ceres. She embroidered beautifully. She sang as sweet as a peeping songbird. She could play a good handful of instruments that she’d taken care to learn over the years. Chided herself if any aspect wasn’t perfect. A little to unfair with herself, you feel, sometimes. And you like that there is a sillier, softer side that being around her brothers and especially her sister, draws out.

You like the duality. One daughter who would never be caught dead at court, let alone in a dress. And another who sees it as her undeniable birthright to be the perfect lady. You love them both unequivocally. You do often wonder what adulthood will make of the both of them.

You watch with a smile. Hand shading your eyes as Durran sprints alongside his brother, but then his path veers out towards his father. Toddling too fast on little legs. Arms outstretched. “This way Durry.” Jory calls. “The sea will get you.”

Lyonel turns and a huge grin takes his mouth. Curls flying out in the sea flecked breeze. He launches down, arms wide. Scoops up his boy, sweeping his feet right off the ground. “Never mind the sea boy. A big bold stag has got you instead. Aha.” He booms.

Cups him up to his chest, torn off the sand, roaring laughter, legs sticking out sideways as Lyonel dips his head low and pretends to eat and kiss his ears. Whirling him around. The sound of his delighted shrieking breaking upon the waves. It makes you smile. Sea splashing out under his boots.

Olira smiles at the sight. Fiddling with a birds feather Ormund gave her. Going to Jorys side to watch the kite spin. Lyonel twirls him round and round enough to make him lose his breakfast nearly. Tickling his ribs til he cries so hard he can scarce breathe.

He hefts the boy up into his arms. Holding him sideways still like a plank of wood and not a boy. Strong arms cupping as he spins him to hear the laughter grow. Taking him up the beach and back toward you. “Go find your mother. Go get her. Pup. She looks lonely. Go go go. Run.”

Lyonel spins him one last time. Before setting him down. Crouching and whispering in his ear with a grin. Letting him loose like a spinning top. One that reels straight for you.

You brace for him. Waiting for the pounce. The bowling of little antlers.

When he gets there, he flattens you with all his four year old barreling weight and might. Hands seeking up for your hair. Giggling as he gets you on your back. Arms around his little body. You clutch him tight. Rolling in the sand. Hair flying out. Cushioned back behind you.

Lyonel laughs at the sight of you. Quite literally bowled over.

Durran presses a slobbery kiss to your cheek. “Got you.” He laughs. Breathless and grinning.

“So you have. What will you do with me now Durry Baratheon?” You check.

“Hug.” He snuggles into you as his answer. Arms over you. He’d just learnt the word.

“Oh no. A veritable blood bath.” Lyonel announces. Walking to your rug and taking to a knee to splay himself out beside you. The sand sighing out under him.

He rests on his side. Up on an elbow. Watching your son fling himself to your chest and rest his head there. Possibly in an attempt at a respite from all the running around. Lungs rattling about in his ribs.

“Come on. Pup. I said cuddle mama. Can’t let her be lonely. Big squeeze.” Lyonel urges.

They attack you from both sides. Pincer movement. Lyonel from the right. You feel him press an army of kisses into your silvery hair. Strong arm coming over your stomach to band you in place. Durry finds it great fun. Cuddling the breath out of you from the left side.

You sit up. Smiling. Watching as Durry shuffles up to better watch Jory twirl the kite around the sky. Over the sand and then jerkily flying out to the sea.

“Was it fun?” You ask him. Eyes on his curious grin. Looking up. “Watching it fly so high.” Swiping a hand through his hair. Dark curls flopping back into place after you brush through them.

He nods quickly. Bobbling his little head. Grin barely contained.

You reach for the food. Amazed this hamper had lasted unmolested so long. Usually the boys attack food like starved orphans and eat twice their body weight. Appetites like gannets. You tear off some of the soft loaf, dip it in a bit of honey. And wedge cheese into it. Durry gratefully curls it into his fingers. Mashes it into his mouth.

He takes off at a run again. Kite in his sight. Yelling for Jory. But the way he said his name hasn’t quite come out right yet. He’s not got a hold of his letters. Sounds more like ‘Gory.’

“Durry! Not with your mouth full. You’ll choke. Slow down.” You call after him. Brushing your hands of crumbs and sand. He only just listens.

“Mercy me.” You mutter.

“A whirlwind that one.”

Lyonel grins like a proud mother hen. Or like a strutting stag. Chest puffed up. Antlers high.

“That’s what happens when you’re a stormborn babe. The maester did warn us.” You grin.

Lyonel smirks. Lip curling on one side. “Good thing we didn’t fucking listen. All his doddery portends and omens.”

Staying by your side. He tilts on a hip. His breath slinks hot and muggy across your ear. “Get over here. Lady Storm.” He smiles like sin.

“Not here with the children belting around.” You sigh back. But you’re moving anyway.

“We’ve fucked in this cove before. On our honeymoon, if my memory serves.”

He gets you between his spread legs. Back to his chest. Chin resting itself on the crown of your head. “Didn’t we manage to dodge out of the rain in that little cave just a way down the beach.”

“That was an age ago. My stag.”

You remember. A sun bleached spectre of a memory. Cold hands. Hot lips. Biting his lip to keep from moaning too loud. Just enough warmth to the air to lift your skirts over your waist so he could shift your smalls aside. Fucked you standing, with your back pressing into jagged, cold wet rock. You’d been too needy to ride all the way back to the keep.

“Aye. Nearly drowned too. Like stupid horny fools we were.” You supplied. “It started much like this. Picnicking on a blanket. Kissing. Then more than kissing…” you tilt your head. His nose runs along the back of your neck. Breathes in the mineral rich sea. The smell of strong stone from the keep. Your perfume living on your hair.

He recalls that blissful interlude; He’d kissed your lips numb. Stuffed one hand up your skirts and made you cum like that. Legs spread to his body. Arching to his hand as he strummed your clit with his thumb and drank in your choking moans. Had you gasping and crying in his arms. Fisting his clothes.

“Did the tide nearly come in before we were done?” He checks.

“Your memory does serve. Yes. We waded out when we were done. You carried me much of the way. I was picking seaweed out my hair and brushing sand out my shifts for weeks.” You explain. Patting your hand on his kneecap. Smoothing it afterwards.

He chuckles. It’s filthy. The sound muffles into your scalp. “Reckon we conceived Jory in that cave…” He simpers.

You tutt to that. Bat at his knee.

“I’d not given it much thought. I think Jorys may have been conceived in several places.” Comes your chuckled answer. You had been voracious at the beginning. And really, you hadn’t entirely stopped all throughout the marriage.

“Don’t let him overhear that. He’s scarred enough already by our amour for each other.” He smiles.

You twist back. Plonking a stern kiss to the side of his bearded chin.

His arm is still banded steady around your waist. Holding over your belly like it was precious and sacred to him. Of course it was, you’d given him five little stags from this body. If you ever wobbled, confidence sinking low, and looking too hard with a pinched face in the mirror, he’d get on his knees and treat you like his altar. Lips pressing to every holy scar or stretch mark. He’d put his face between your legs and then fuck you with such devotion until you yielded.

Whilst the importance of your rowdy family remained steadfastly valuable. You both relished the opportunity sometimes to escape the keep and sail for somewhere warm and exotic, to break up the tiring monopoly of responsibilities as Lord and Lady.

You disappear for a handful of days on a ship, across the narrow seas. Slink quietly to a mansion in Tyrosh or Dorne. For time to yourselves as man and wife.

To soak up the sun like lounging sleepy tigers. Eat nothing but fruit bursting with juice. Sun ripened. Lay in bed all day and do nothing but read books. Wander hand in hand around an unfamiliar city on a warm purple, jasmine-scented, midnight under a yellow moon. Stock up on Tyroshi pear brandy and come home with a new suntan, and a wide never-ceasing smile that makes the children grimace.

You adore the freedom and the quiet. Drinking nothing but strong gold wine and laying around, humid skin sticky, garbed in thin cottons and silks all day - sometimes not even that if you feel so inclined. Oftentimes you’d been mostly alone, just you two, on a mad rare occasion, there’s still some who would join you in bed outright, if asked.

“They all are.” You answer about the children. “You must have noticed how they all make pinched faces when we kiss.” You twist back. Plonking another stern kiss to the side of his chin.

“Apparently from Jorys visits to other castles or keeps. That’s not how other Lords and ladies behave…” You parrot his words.

Warm laughter moves through him.

“Those poor unlucky fucks.” He decides. He can’t imagine not having a wife you’d be head over heels in love with and still horny for. It makes his chest swell in lucky pride. Knowing not every marriage is like yours. More fool them.

“We have the best of it. There’s no denying.” You point out. Sand under your bare feet. Your beloved man at your back. Watching the children grow as you get older and more grey.

It melted away all pithy titles and claims. You could have been just a woman. Small folk. A fisherman watching over the tides and the place he works. Admiring yet another sunset even if it was the thousandth one you’d seen. Still cause for joy-

“Please tell me Ceres has Ormund.” He wonders suddenly. Worry ebbing on his voice. Head tilted as you watch the waves bloat, and shudder, shrinking back. Foam kissing their tips. Wind carving through both your hair, combing it back like the touch of a calm lover.

“She does. Rest easy.” You calm him. Hand over his. “They’re in the caves looking for pirate gold.”

“Thank fuck. Thought a seagull had carried him off to nest.”

“Not with the wolf’s eyes on us. Trust me. Naught gets past Seldan.” You assure. You know he’s as bulky as a rock on the headland. Eyes on every one of you.

“Either that or she’s gone full tilt and escaped on a private vessel herself to sail the seas of Myr.” Lyonel proposes.

“Hmm.” You consider. “Maybe after her 14th nameday she can take the foray into piracy.”

“Seems a solid choice. What’s the betting we get down the aisle at any point in her lifetime?”

You shift back and shoot him a look. “Ceres? Marriage? Lyonel. When you and I are withered old crones, she’ll still be an old maid at Storms End with a never ending passel of cats and birds.”

“No chance in hell?” He asks. Brow buoyed.

“Zero chance.” Ceres calls across. Walking back. Ormund babbling happily away. She took care to pluck a cockle shell from his hold before he tried to eat it. Everything went to his mouth first-

“No. Ormund. You have three teeth. You can’t eat shell.” She frowns at the babe.

“Now. Dearest. Even you may find someone you wish to marry.” Lyonel persuades.

“I won’t.” She assures you both. A grimace on her face. Pulling a shell further away from Ormunds seeking hands.

“You have Jory and Olira to wed off. They’re the pretty, talented ones. Leave me out of it.” She scowls.

“I think you’ll change your mind. One blessed day.” You say to her. Leaning forwards.

Lyonel holds his arms open, wordless, she hands off Ormund to him in a crouch.

He lays a kiss into his sons hair with a solid smack. Brushes the sand off his little fingers. Ormund happily gets bounced in his fathers hold. Tries to stuff his pendant necklace in his mouth. Sucking on the gold chain of it.

Lyonel makes a harsh “ah” disapproving sound. Bats it out his gummy mouth. Lets him play with the huge chunky ring on his finger instead. He gums on that too.

She claps her hand of sand. Shells bulging and clinking in her pockets. “Why is that-“

“Because I pledged exactly the same at your age.” You smile easily. “And look at me now—“

“I’m not like you, mother.” She impresses. Firm. Little face so devout in her belief.

“Alright. Ceres. You’re not like me. I yield. I won’t force you into anything. I’d sooner die than see you unhappy. But. Your father and I reserve the right to smile very, very smug if one day, you do decide against those stout wishes.”

She rolls her eyes. “Fine.”

You grin. “Thank you-“

Lyonel catches your eye when you turn around. “Nicely handled. My storm.” He winks. Hand reaching down to pat your hip

Ceres is back to grimacing. “If you’re going to be all kissing and lovey, I’m going back to live in that cave-“

Lyonel’s smile grows. “Funnily enough. We have a story about that very cave… it involves your brother….” He waggles his dark brows.

“Oh don’t you dare-“ you laugh. Chucking a handful of sand at his lap. Let him try and get that out of his clothes for three weeks.

Forgive the random tags but I’m Tagging some phenomenal akotsk babes whose fics gave me life. Let me know if you want on/off the list. I’m new to AKOTSK so forgive my presumptions @the-darklings @jintaka-hane @mynameistocool @lovebugism @maekarsmistress @pearlessance @noxiiousstrawberriies @ingystark @oakleafing @marsrambles @just-some-random-blogger @vhagars-dementia @escapic-mezzanine @tearsweetenedtea @nerdyinfluencertastemaker @adumbgirlinloove @moonlitmaester @silens-oro @feral4youu @whatislovevavy @happinessisaloadedgun @faelinda @crayonbug @celestrys @sallymaywritings @captainfern @theprophaecy @multyfangirl @angstybadger @asterionex @liliac-dreamer

[lunarmoonanons]

Lyonel Baratheon: Just spoke to my wife, it was awesome. I know a lot of you are lonely and pathetic with nobody who really loves you or cares about you but you can rest assured that THAT is not the case for me.

[punk-in-docs]

Hi!! I do love your work for AKOTSK and especially with Lady Baratheon, she's so cool and has the patience of a saint 😂

Not sure if this can be a prompt or just a question but if you can, can we get a glimpse of their every day life? How do they behave during "normal" days, how the staff behaves around them (please tell me the maids grin and gossip about how the Lord is WHIPPED and their escapades), even ordinary intimate moments (not necessarily sexual).

If not (maybe you have something boiling...? 👀) please ignore this, just know i'm a BIG fan!!! 🤩

Heavenly mother

Lyonel Baratheon x Lady Dondarrion - domestic parent fluff

Forgive the fandom tags but I’m Tagging some phenomenal akotsk babes whose fics gave me life. @the-darklings @jintaka-hane @mynameistocool @lovebugism @maekarsmistress @pearlessance @noxiiousstrawberriies @ingystark @oakleafing @marsrambles @just-some-random-blogger @vhagars-dementia @escapic-mezzanine @tearsweetenedtea @nerdyinfluencertastemaker @adumbgirlinloove @moonlitmaester @silens-oro @feral4youu @whatislovevavy

Babes you are so very kind. Thank you so much. I had this on the boil… simmering for a while. I’m wondering if lady d x lyonel being very tired parents counts as domestic? I sure hope so. This ran away with me-

MASTERLIST - PROMPTS - AO3

Everyone from Castle Black right down to the last rock of Dorne, knew that your husband adored a good celebration.

He found his stride in the wild roar of a party. Tables groaning with boar and meat pies and sweet delights. The sweet spot where the wine is flowing - many hit by its brutal potency. Where the drums began to hit, the music began its enchantments. Smiles on many a face. A full cup in his hand. A tale to spin; that was his domain.

You like the calm after the laughing storm has blown through. Battered all to desolation. When the evening tapers to a slower pace;

When the shouting and drinking is done. Leaving hushed slurred whispers on tongues. The candles guttering low and dripping wax in melted gold pools. The food cleared away save for a few crumbs left. The only sounds in the hall is contentment and the slow, honey-languid hush of a party as it winds to its completion.

He can be found here. Still sipping down wine like a bacchanalian god. Debauchery and fun posed in his smile. Flushed cheeks. Lounging in his seat like a supine panther. All long loose limbs and wild coils of hair laying low in his eyes. Golden jewellery gleaming in the low light, and off the black shadow of his clothes.

Some couples still remain. Of course you and he are hosts. You’ll outlast them all. The sun will peek its rosy pink face through a tucked bed of fluffed blue clouds over the horizon, before you’re both abed.

Some guests are in each others laps. Some slumped on tables, snorting and slumbering drunk. Some still spin and sway near you like gentle waves. Lazy dances that look more like they’re simply trying to stay holding one another upright.

He tilts his head. Wine heavy like hot molasses in his blood. Eyes searching the thinning crowds, finding you on your feet.

Stood right the way across the cavern of a dining hall from him. Gold threaded its clever light over your clothes. The brocade sway of your dress, trails like a salacious lover’s whisper across the dark flagstones of his halls.

The way your frame appears in your black velvet gown, sleeves bell like and draping, striped with braided gold patterns. He doesn’t know how you haven’t collapsed from exhaustion yet. How your toes aren’t pinching sore in your pretty slippers.

Your earrings bash and sway in heady pendulums of gold into your neck. Hair braided off your face in the style you favour. Spilling down your back like dark twisted roots. You spin and twirl. Delight.

He gazes. Lazily. Happily and drowsy from drink.

Watches the contours of your profile as you smile, the round apple of your cheeks, the flash of a grin. Paying such devoted attention to the one whose currently in your arms.

It’s a celebration and you’ve danced and talked and taken time with everyone.

Now, you are teaching your oldest son how to dance.

Spinning him under your arm. Reeling him back. Telling him with a smile how to place his feet. Guiding his steps. Clapping and smiling when he whirls on his feet. Hugging back into your front when he’s done.

You hold him close. His arms barely able to close around the enormity that was your pregnant belly. Round and heavy with his fourth.

Your soft hand comes to cradle his head. Gold flash of a ring. Motherly hands in tufted coils. Nearly a grown lad but he was still your boy. Ruffling his dark raven curls under your hand. Taking his hand then in yours, showing him how to step properly with a young lady.

Lyonel peers across the hall. The corridor that ran down in steps from the upper Halls. Why can he see the tips of small slipper clad feet in the shadows- pink and blue.

He can make out the poke of little knees in cotton nightdresses. His daughters. Sat huddled on a low stair. Watching the ladies dresses. Spying lords and Knights and music. Eyes wide as they gorged themselves on the sight of a merry feast.

“Imps.” He sighs.

For certain, he could lay name a whole clutch of his grey hairs after his two daughters. Who knew they could be so much more trouble than sons.

“Right.” He pushes from his seat. Winds through a hallway that sets back to the upper floors. Doubles back on himself, opts for an ambush attack on the two little pests.

He creeps towards them slowly. Quiet as a grave. They haven’t noticed his chair vacated. Ceres had her rag doll plastered on her lap.

Olira was bashing her bony elbow to her sisters ribs. Pointing at the noble ladies gowns. Lamenting their brilliancy. Picking at the hem of her own plain night gown as if she were inferior.

He leans against the wall. Folds his arms. Ankle crossed over another. Sighing loudly. He makes himself known. A lightning strike of a bark that meant he’d spent too many years leeching the strictness you oft spoke with, when your child’s disobedience came your way.

“What in the seven hells are you two still doing up?” He remarks. Booming voice enough to make them flinch.

They freeze. Caught out. Shoulders hunching. Slowly twisting in unison like scarecrows bashing in the wind. Eyes wide and fearful as they fix on the frame of their beleaguered Storm Lord father. Behind them. Looking unimpressed.

“Father.” Liri says slowly in recognition. No doubt plucking her excuse with care.

Ceres says naught. Merely looks with those big dark baby cow eyes that were definitely heriditary. “Papa.”

He buoys one brow. “You are both out of bed, because?” He seeks.

“We were hungry?” Ceres points out.

Lyonel tilts his head down. Eyes narrow. Really?

“We wanted a glass of milk.” Liri adds.

“Yet I see neither bread nor cups of milk in your hands.”

They look to each other for a response. It is not quick in coming.

“You will give your nursemaid the fright of her life when she finds your beds empty. What did you do- stuff the blankets with a doll and a pin cushion to aid in your escape.” He checks.

“I used a pillow.” Ceres admits. Bold.

Whatever else could be said of her. His youngests tongue couldn’t be sold as dishonest.

“Are you terribly angry?” Liri winces. Dark brows pinching into a big V shape on her head. Ceres peers up at him like a fearful doe.

Dammit. It works.

He can’t stay incensed at those eyes.

He sighs. Curls shaking as he shifts himself off the wall. Eyes narrowed.

“Budge up.”

They excitedly skirt to the side to let him come sit with them on the steps. He slots himself between Olira and the wall. Snatches up, then plonks his Ceres down on his lap. Folds her little legs to rest over his. He nearly gets whacked in the nose with her doll. As per usual.

“You really shouldn’t be up this late, you know. Pests. Your mother will hang, draw and quarter me, when she sees you out of bed.”

“We just wanted to see the dresses.” Liri bemoans. Like she’d die if she didn’t.

“She wanted to see dresses. I wanted to see the food.” Ceres utters plainly. Stroking the woven hair on her dolly as he speaks.

Lyonel crushes a kiss to the wild nest of Ceres’ locks. All sleep tumbled. Smelling like cotton, warm milk and lilacs. The smell of their nursery. Woven into the cotton of their clothes and their dark tumbling hair.

“We’ll make sure they save you some pigeon pie.”

“And cheese?” Ceres brightens at the mere idea of it.

“And cheese.” He adds. Not knowing how such a little voracious mouth often could put away so much food.

“And pumpkin tarts. And sausages. And Brie and apple tarts. And custard….” She reels off a list.

“Mind you don’t explode. They shall call you Ceres Baratheon, the exploding storm.” He prods her belly with a ringed finger, enough to make her giggle and fuss in his lap. Squirming like a hooked trout.

Olira rests with her elbow on her knee. Hand cupping her face. Gazing wistfully at the dance floor. Filled with drowsy, drifting couples.

“What about you sour puss…” Lyonel knocks an elbow into her own. Jostling her where she sat. “What can we save you-“

“Mothers gown is so pretty. I wish I had a gown like hers. All mine are so plain. I want to dance at balls and not be told off for it.” She laments. Somewhat grumpily.

Coming up to the tender age of 10, he found Olria to be tenderly consumed with the need for knights and stories. Flowers and poets and all things pertaining to honour and love. She was forever holed up with her novels. Daydreams floating through her mind of ladies, kitten whiskers, rose petals and silks.

He loves to see the duality in his daughters;

One is dreaming of the day she can don silk gowns. And be paid court too-

The other has no goal in life, other than the want to eat her entire body weight in cheese.

“Darling. We can have you more gowns made if you wish. But you know you are too young for balls and courts just yet. Don’t wish your life away for love of it, my sweet.” He urges.

Liri sighs. Like all the breath and joy in the world had left her little body in one great gust.

“I want someone to talk too about poetry. Of love stories. All Ceres ever wants to talk about is cake, or cheese.”

His youngest frowns. A deep furrowed scowl. Scrunching up her little face.

“I like cheese.” Ceres fairly cries. Terribly indignant.

Olira glares at her sister. “It’s all you ever talk of. You’re so dull.” She snips.

Lyonel soothes the coming storm. He’s good at knowing when they’re about to break.

“Liri.” He warns. Eyes hard. Voice like the dark clouds that proceeded thunder. Danger.

She hunches in on herself. Apologetic. Elbows folded. Chin on them. Brows creased up. Looking miserable.

“If I were to tell you a love story. Would that make you feel better. And before you ask Ceres, no this story does not involve cheese.”

“Rubbish.” She huffs under her breath.

Liri turns to look at him. Piqued curiosity. “A love story?”

Hope sparkles in those dark eyes. The ones he oft gazes into, and finds all the quaint loving echoes of your own colour eyes staring back.

Lyonel grins. Got her.

“It’s a true love story.” He adds. Holding his arm up. A strong arch over her.

She sticks herself under it. Like a great eagle lifting a wing for their chick in stormy climes. She shuffled in. Nestled her head against his side. The comforting tick of his drunken heart beating in his leather tunic clad chest.

“How true?” Liri asks. As if the tales validity was the only thing keeping her interest.

“It’s true. Because it is about me, and your mother.”

Lyonel nods across to where you’re holding hands with Jorys. Dipping into another dance.

“I like this one already.” Ceres remarks. Slurping around the thumb she stuffed in her mouth.

“You know, when I first met her. I didn’t know who she was. Not one clue. I didn’t know she was the Lady Dondarrion. We danced together. And she wouldn’t give me her name. She made me chase after her to get it. And still she didn’t give it. So I did the only thing I could think to do…” He explains. Voice dipping into drama and rich with the vigour of storytelling.

“What did you do?”

“I kissed her.” He reveals. Face turned wicked. Smile; utterly cunning.

Ceres winces. Nose crumpled up in disgust. Liri sighs dreamily. Scandal be damned.

“We were stood under the stars. And she looked so beautiful. So serene. I thought to myself ‘I have to kiss this woman. Or I will go mad.”

He leans in to whisper ardently into Ceres scalp. Hair tickling his lips. She laughs again. Giggles like the little imp she is. They are all sat gazing over at you. The drunken tired sway of your skirts. The press of your joined hands.

“And after I kissed her, she ran away. Still without a name. So, I tried to ask if anyone knew of her. Not a soul knew. Nobody knew. So. The next day I rode on my horse to the tourney field. Because I was to meet my intended bride...”

“Mama.” Liri grins.

“Not Mama.” He tells. Ceres eyes blow wide. “I was first promised to your Aunt Mereya.”

Olira’s mouth gapes. “What did you do?”

“We tried to avoid each other for a while. To let things be. But we couldn’t ignore how we felt. It was a love that grew very quick and strong. We tried to push it aside. But it was no use…”

“I think we would have sacrificed our love for good. Had your Aunt not met Uncle Thorren.”

“Why?” Liri asks. The word wrenched out of her. All passion and feeling.

Lyonel sweeps his eyes to you.

“Because we didn’t want anyone to get hurt. We never meant to feel this way. Your mother would have been shamed very much, had she thrown over her arranged match for me. And I would have been reprimanded to hell and back for falling in love with a woman who was not my bride.”

“Your aunt came to me after the tourneys close, to tell me she had fallen in love with another. Thus releasing me, so, I went to straight find your mother. To tell her I loved her.”

“And?” Liri asks. “She accepted you?”

Lyonel shook his head. “She had gone.”

Liri gawps. Gasping. “No.”

“That very morning, she had publicly broken her proposal with her intended. And she had ridden all the way home to Castle Blackhaven. Without even saying goodbye. So I went after her.”

“On horseback?” Liri asks.

“Not quite. But I was still very handsome and chivalrous.”

Truth was, he was black and blue and sore all over. Scuffed and grazed like he’d taken a tumble off a cliff. A black eye that throbbed. A possibly sprained ankle. He was a collection of afflictions.

“I dragged my whole company of men to Blackhaven to catch up to her. Ignoring their protests. She couldn’t believe her eyes when she saw me.”

He leaves out the more explicit verbs you’d used upon seeing how he’d suddenly apparated in your courtyard. How he’d come out his caravan hissing and spitting hells anger at you for running away. A cowards move.

You’d not yet been informed of your sisters change of heart. And subsequently couldn’t fathom why he’d dragged his whole caravan of company, bannermen and all, miles out of the way, to your home.

“I was injured from the tourney. Could barely walk. Beaten black and blue. And I wanted to ask her to marry me.”

Olira looks enraptured. “And she said yes…”

“Not at first. No.”

“What?” Liri spat out.

“She said, ‘Lyonel what in the seven hells are you doing here’.” He imitated your tone. Only you didn’t say seven.

“She refused you?” Ceres asked wetly around her thumb.

“She said no. Because she was a widow of House Swann. And she was terrified she couldn’t give me heirs.”

“Did she?” Ceres pipes up. Still talking with her thumb jammed in her mouth.

Liri rolled her brown eyes over. “Obviously. She did, Ceres, you idiot.”

“Actually no she didn’t. Didn’t I say? We found you one day, scavenging berries under a bush in the godswood and decided very generously to give you both a home.” He teases. Even Liri laughs.

Then she presses on.

“How did you get mother to accept you?”

“Not easily.” He begins.

“I said I’d have fared better if I tried to woo a rock. She didn’t find that an acceptable compliment. She’s incredibly stubborn. That mother of yours.” He adds.

“I said; ‘Are you going to come and be Lady Baratheon of Storms End or do I have to come over there, throw you over my shoulder, and drag you back there myself?’”

“She crossed her arms and said she doubted I could make it up the stairs before her. Let alone throw her over my shoulder. Did rather take the wind out my sails, a bit.”

“Cruel woman. She watched me hobble very painfully up the steps. My leg was near hanging off you know…. I was walking with a crutch like an invalid. Probably mere moments from death come to think of it…” He exaggerated.

“I repeated my most courteous and romantic offer of marriage…” He tells them.

When in truth he had wheezed and cursed and stumbled up the steps. Breathing the words ‘cunt’ and ‘fuck’ and ‘shagging hells’ under his breath, fighting tooth and nail against his injury, as you stood there like a damn Sept statue and watched him struggle to get to you.

He stood before you and panted out, half slumped on his antler crutch. In pain and frothing with impatience. ‘Will you just fucking marry me already. Lady Dondarrion.’

“And still she told me no. Told me again that I should seek a younger bride. That she couldn’t bare it if I woke up in ten years from then and regretted tying myself to her, when a younger prettier maiden could come along.”

“No one’s prettier than Mother.” Ceres chirps merrily.

“Indeed not.” He agrees. Stroking his curled knuckle over her plump, cherubic little cheek.

“I looked that stubborn beautiful woman right in the eyes, and boldly claimed that I had my chance for a young pretty bride. And I couldn’t even fathom or look at said bride because it was not her. I asked how she could even think I’d ever choose someone else.”

“She was starting to soften. I could see it. Weak in her knees she was. She said to me it would be the end of her if she couldn’t give me children.”

“I told her not to put obstacles in my way, cause I would knock every single problematic thing in the world down in order to have her.”

“Then what?” Olira urges. Hanging on his every word, as if he were preaching gospel.

“‘Ask me again.’ She said. And I did.” He beams.

Liri clutched onto his chest. Hands splayed to him. “She finally said yes.” She wriggled with excitement.

“Fucking finally.” He awarded.

Liri chides him with a little frown. Nudging her splayed l hand at his side. A push to his ribs to chide him. “Mother hates when you curse.”

“Yes, she does rather. Especially in front of the children.” You pipe up. Coming close. Interrupting their private little story corner.

Coming to a slow stop right in front of them down the bottom of the steps.

They look like a nest of rats whose hiding place had been uncovered.

“Is this some plot or party I’m not aware of.” You seek. You wouldn’t put it past Lyonel to hatch a dastardly plan with his daughters. They each had inventive ways of curling him like ribbon round their little fingers.

You actually adore it. He’s the most involved, beloved father.

He makes merry with their games. Indulges their hobbies. Climbs into their little beds when nightmares persist. More than once you find him heaped in the nursery. Asleep on one of their beds. Comically stuffing his big limbs into a tiny bed that was strewn with children and toys. More like a sprawl of daughter and limbs, than a stretch of bed or blanket.

He can sit to a tea party with Ceres and her dolls - provided there was cake of course. There always had to be cake.

He can talk through poetry books and history lessons of the great houses with Olira. Wandering her along the battlements and letting the wind snatch their recitations away. Sometimes you’d find them wind burned and laughing til tears came.

He was the bane of the master of arms existence. And Jorys passel of tutors. Forever scooping his boy from his schooling to take him for an impromptu ride in the woods. A hike along the cliffs. Down to the beach for sword practice in the salt sprayed air, dancing and parrying in the wet claggy sand. Off to bring him to sail in a loop around Tarth and back again.

Jorys stoops tiredly beside you. Rubbing a knuckle into his eye and boldly yawning. “Why are you both up?” He poses to his sisters. Eyes drooping.

“Cheese.” Is all Ceres offers as her excuse.

Lyonel plants his smile in her hair. Hiding it. Please never change. He thinks.

Liri scowls back. “Why are you allowed to dance.” She fires out at Jorys.

“I’m the oldest.” He holds out. A dark eyed scowl looming under the shade of the curls that flop into his face.

You drop your chin. Pin Liri with a gaze that would have grown men, or storms, shrinking back in fear. “Olira.” You caution. Icily.

“We have a host coming next month from Highgarden. To celebrate your Aunt’s nameday. I should hate to have those new dresses I commissioned for you for that occasion, returned.” You carry your threat with clever care.

“We are hosting Highgarden?” She asks. Desperation in her voice. The hunger for meeting new people. For parties where they might be Knights. Lord and Ladies. Feasts and events.

“A little more gentility wouldn’t go amiss.” Your eyes flick to Ceres. Your meaning clear.

“Yes, mother.”

“Jory. Maybe you could take your sisters to their chambers. It is well past time they were in bed. Nearly the hour of the wolf.” You pat your hand on his golden shoulder. The lean bones of him padding under his fine gambeson.

Ceres sticks her pudgy arms out. Jory comes down and plucks her off their fathers lap. Bundled her to his side. On his lanky teenage hip.

“Good lad.” Lyonel thanks him with a pat to the leg as he passes them by.

“G’ Night father. Night mother.” He smothered through a yawn.

Ceres grills him the second they round the corner going to the stairs. “Did you get cake?”

“No, Ceres.” He answers plainly. Tired but not unkind. Olira stands, turns and obediently follows. The dream of new dresses hanging in the balance in her head.

That left two.

You stand. One arm curled over your belly. Tilting your head at your very drunken, drowsy looking husband. Soft smile on your lips that he really needs to kiss. Soon.

“Your daughters are exhausting.” Lyonel groans as he heaves himself up from the stone steps.

“Not as exhausting as yours.” You counter.

He lazily thumps his booted feet to come knocking down the steps. A decent amount of wine sloshing around in his belly.

“When did Liri become so infatuated with knights and ladies… and fucking dresses.” He remarks. “It was just yesterday she was searching for pixies in the woods. Coming back with leaves and twigs stuck every which way in her hair.”

“She’s well on her way to being a young woman. That treacherous path is difficult enough as it is. Be gentle and give her time.” You decide. Easy as a calm wash of the tide.

One that can easily navigate the stormy seas that was a daughter nearly blooming into adolescence. You take it in your stride. Like the omnipotent, calming mother that you’ve grown to be.

“Ye gods. Daughters.” He sighs, very put upon. Coming to a stand in front of you. Hands reaching on instinct to smooth across your belly like he was magnetised to it. Lips swooping down to pluck a scratchy beardy kiss to your temple.

“This one better be a boy. I haven’t the patience or strength for another girl.” He laments.

“Liar.” You remark. Taking his chin in the pinch of your fingers. Dipping up on tiptoes to push a sweet kiss to those talkative lips.

He was utterly besotted with your girls from the day they were born. Holding them tenderly. When they were wrapped little pink swaddled bundles. Fresh off their first bath. Kissing their wrinkled little heads and promising them the moon and stars. Loving them so much with each breath he swore it made his heart stop.

“I hasten to add I think that particular fate of the babes sex was sealed months ago. My silver fox. It’s in the gods hands now. You smooth a hand over his cheek. Cupping one side of that bristled, trimmed beard afterward.

He hums thoughtfully. Kisses you back. “We could do with another boy. You know. Even some things up around here.”

His head tilts far to the left. Taking in the way his hands stroked over the round velvet covering you. Belly cradled in his hands. Hoping for to feel a kick.

“Have you complaints about our life?” You seek. Hands going to knead in the small of your back. To pummel the ache that sat there out.

He notices. Slips his arms around you. Joins your hands. Brings his front right to yours. Hip to hip. Chest to chest. Forever he was a man to sling himself across you no matter the mood or scenery.

“Fewer little storms underfoot would be nice.” He teases.

“Well. Your timing is just perfect.” You sass. Holding your back up as your belly sits between you like a hilariously, poignant bloated great elephant, in the room.

Ladies of your acquaintance had warned you time and time again of the perils of carrying. No one told you that for these last few months you’d begin to feel about as manouverable as a horse carriage. A large boxy one.

“Not my fault. You’re entirely to blame for that. The rate you keep after me I hadn’t the stamina or energy to refuse.” He smirks and dives to nibble a kiss at your neck when you sigh in offence.

“Oh. You poor man. Was laying back on our bed and being ridden like a stallion, too much for your delicate sensibilities?”

“Mm actually…. Come to think of it? I feel I’m due a reminder of said performance. With an added appearance of those gorgeous swollen tits swinging in my face.”

You snort. Unimpressed. “You’ve got to be joking. I would crush you.”

“Man’s got to die somehow.” He smirks. Hands still looped around you. Hips in line with yours.

“My cunt will not be held responsible for your death.”

“I’d die so happy.” He preens. Whispering. Leaning over to kiss you senseless.

You do moan into it. Smothered to his lips before you have to draw back - in order to breathe.

“Someone will die if I’m not allowed to retire soon. My ankles feel the same size as your destriers fetlocks.” You wince.

Being on said feet most of your day was beginning to take its toll. Hand sliding to his shoulder. Letting him take your weight for a moment.

You peer a look around the hall. Some servants have come to clear the crumb laden platters and trenchers. Some men are slumped asleep at table. Save for two very slowly swaying couples, you are literally among the last remaining guests and revellers.

“Must we be the last pair standing?” You ask. Hope lives as a brittle shard in your voice.

“Not if my Lady Storm has had enough.” He promises. He always keeps his words and promises. You suspect he would sooner die than dishonour you that way.

“She desires her bed. And Lord Storm in said bed.” You sigh. Happily so.

He takes your arm. “To bed, then.”

Anything else important can fuck off til tomorrow as far as he’s concerned. He had a feeling you will both have a rude awakening via some children come the morn.

“Reckon we’ll get the chance for a slow morning abed?” He asks. Helping guide you up and up the stone steps.

You know precisely what he means. Breakfast on a tray. And the opportunity for slow, lazy fucking under the sheets when you’re both still half asleep.

“What do you think?” You ask.

“Bolt the door?” He cheeks.

You chuckle. “They’d only knock it down off the hinges.”

“Honestly. Who’d have offspring.” He japes.

You consider his words witn a tilted head. Hand over your belly. “Seemed like a good idea at the time.”

“Oh.” He groans. “At the time it was fucking bliss.”

“Agreed.” You chuckle.

“Won’t make that mistake twice.” He teases.

“I think we have made that mistake more than just twice.”

“Then we are fools.”

You stop on the stairs. Where the walls close in for the stairwell. Squeeze you close to one another. “Then we must be lovesick fools.”

“Of that I’ve no doubt. My savage storm.” He agrees. Nuzzling you into a simple kiss. Smiling thereafter.

[punk-in-docs]

Im pretty sure I saw this on your blog (at least you’re the only GoT blog I follow). But anyway, I think I saw a post along the lines of I want a fanfiction where Lyonel and Duncan are a couple and they work together to find Lyonel a lady wife who’ll be open to “an arrangement”.

Well I saw this other post where it was like Once married, Lyonel would be this type of bisexual husband: 1)be extremely devoted to his lady wife 2) would check out handsome dudes wife her

Hear me out! What if these 2 prompts happen during a Lyonel x Lady Dondarrion x Duncan fic. Lyonel and Lady Dondarrion always scope out parties for a suitable third partner like the bisexual power couple they are, only this time they spot Duncan like fucking hawks. And then these two are oogling at the tall hedge from their place at the high table and Lyonel proposes an arrangement to Duncan? OR it can stick towards the prompt more closely and Lyonel and Duncan are the ones going after Lady Dondarrion.

Idk I’ve just been picturing Lady Dondarrion to be someone that matches Lyonel’s freak so well and Duncan being the more vanilla one in the relationship, so I feel like either would work

A stags proposition

Lyonel Baratheon x Lady Dondarrion x Ser Duncan SMUT

Forgive the random tags but I’m Tagging some phenomenal akotsk babes whose fics gave me life. @the-darklings @jintaka-hane @mynameistocool @lovebugism @maekarsmistress @pearlessance @noxiiousstrawberriies @ingystark @oakleafing @marsrambles @just-some-random-blogger @vhagars-dementia @escapic-mezzanine @tearsweetenedtea @nerdyinfluencertastemaker @adumbgirlinloove @moonlitmaester @silens-oro @feral4youu @s-u-t @happinessisaloadedgun

I need these bisexual married freaks to see poor sweet baby Ser Duncan and pounce on him like starved lions and he’s a wounded gazelle, ok. Also let’s pretend that lady d x lyonel are married before Ashford for it to work.

MASTERLIST - SEND PROMPTS - AO3

“Have you ever had a man in your bed?”

Your enquiry came softly. Without the granite sharp, crushing weight of attached judgement. A breeze of an expression worn teamed with a rare smile. Your eyes aglow in the flames.

You and Lyonel are currently abed. Technically enjoying your Honeymoon. Still. Though the wedding was a good week gone.

It’s a rarity that there isn’t a storm that rages outside the walls. Tonight is no different. It lashes its usual hell fury. Cocooning you both in your chambers. A near empty flagon of red on the side. Two glasses running low. Stained red. Catching a cradle of orange firelight in the glass.

It is nightfall and everyone in storms end know by know, to leave it’s Lord and Lady, well alone.

You are heaped under the covers. Entangled limbs. Lazy and dewy from a round of sleepy, languid sex. The bedchamber reeks of it. Of your perfume, his cologne, and salt skin and heady sweat.

He was currently kissing his way up your arm to your shoulder. He pauses when your words land on him. Your enquiry-

He pulls back. Bracing over your body. Pressed high up on his hands. Hairy, lean arms straining over you.

“Would my answer have you think less of me?” He checks. Bold as ever. Strategising.

“As if I’d ever dare.” You meet his dark eyes. Lose yourself, forever you’d been caught and wrapped in their umber gaze. Had been from the moment that fateful night when you first caught his eye.

He smiles. Salacious. Leans right down to kiss you. Smothering. Tip of his warm wine tasting tongue swirling to seek yours. Hips bracketing your naked ones. He speaks inbetween kisses to your neck. Words warm and heavy damp like Dornish rain against your ear.

“Then, yes.” He purrs. “More than one. On more than one occasion.”

“A common occurrence, my lord?” You ask. Brow buoying.

“Of course. I am deliriously good at living my life to its fullest. And yes, some of my lovers have been men. I had one once, my god, he was hung like a dornishman. I’ve had a Tyroshi. A Norvosi. Lorathi. A Stark. Even a Martell once. Some were younger than me. Some older. Some very virile.”

“Why do you ask?” He sought out. Following the curl of a lock of your hair where it kinked like a lolling river across the pillow.

You shrug. Hands stroking through his glorious hair. Combing through the bounce of curls with your fingers. Making his eyes roll back when you use your nails on his scalp. Mouth hanging open in a wide smile. Cock stiffening and leaking against your thigh. As well you knew it would.

“No specific reason. Just a curiosity. I was right in thinking you’d had hoards of men and women in your bed. As fond of passion and lust as you are.”

“Now what is the point of life if not to drink all the wine, and fuck every pretty person I wish.” He reveals openly.

“What indeed. You scoundrel.” You smile.

His veins pump with such life you wonder if pure storm winds would come rushing and bleeding out if you took a knife to him.

Then he deflects.

“What of you.” He narrows his eyes playfully.

“What of the Infamous sharp tongued Lady Dondarrion of Blackhaven. Before the Swann whelp. And before your handsome rutting stag of a husband….”

He rolled his hips to yours as he spoke of himself in a great roaring laugh. Made you chuckle too.

Grinning as you slipped your hands down his dewy back. Skin still raked fresh red swirl scratches and little nightshade purple bruises. A sign of where you’d been. He has the welt of your teeth set deep in one shoulder. Crimson crescent. Another little trophy to cherish.

“Did you ever bed anyone?” He asks. Nodding at you. There’s an odd irony to your answer.

Your smile grows. Sinful. “No one male.”

He looks wildly amused. And aroused. Machiavellian naughty smile. “A woman.”

“We both had too much wine. I don’t recall overmuch.”

“Try.” He begs. Looking cheeky.

“She was… a friend. She was Braavosi. Her father was my fathers steward. We grew close. It turned into attraction. It just happened. A kiss. Too much wine. We kissed even more. Undressed. Fell into bed and after that I’m afraid it’s all one long blur of fingers, sensation and so much kissing.”

“Who went on top?” He seeks.

“I didn’t ask you.”You frowned.

“That means it was you then. Fuck me.”

Now all he can picture is the partial image you’d painted. Kissing. Caressing. Nipples hard and licked by hot tongues. Hungry mouths. Squeezing flesh. Breasts crushed together. Obscene the way he pictured you writhing together. Legs locked. Cunts rubbing as one, and throwing your head back to moan to the heavens.

He loved the way you split your legs for him. Now all he think of is you having a dark haired maiden with a sultry mouth wrapping her lip gorgeous lips around your clit. Making you shout and buck to her smiling face. Covered in your slick all over her cheeks. Tongue curled deep in your trembling pussy.

“Did you cum?” He checks. Brow ticking up.

“Lots.” Is your answer. Though you were drunk, it was giddying.

The first time you’d been shown what a woman’s body could truly do and feel. Fingers stretching you just right. The circles she drew on your clit. Your awakening was a glorious one. Not many ladies could boast to that.

He launches you into a kiss. Growling. Speaking with spit wet lips laid to yours when he pulled away.

“Should any lucky lady catch your eye in the future my storm. Please I beg of you, let me watch her work you over til you sob.”

“Lyonel.” You gasp.

“What?” He cheeks. “I can’t be the only one in the seven kingdoms who loves to eat your cunt.”

His kisses make their way to your shoulders again. Cock even harder against your thigh.

“I was younger then….” you lament. “Things still had hope….And pointed upwards. And perked.” You refer to your body.

Although not ashamed of how you’d aged. Things had changed….Shifted. The pouch of your tummy and the hang of your breasts. Your thighs didn’t exactly stay trim no matter how often you took to saddle.

You were not a fresh faced maid, alien into her first blood. You were certainly no spring daisy fresh with dew anymore. More of a retired rose who’d long since bothered to stop blooming for the cares of others. But nor were you a dead dry old shrub just yet.

The insulting fact is, you were considered a dry old spinster in the marriage mart five long years ago. Any man who wed you was seeking a family connection, or was just plain desperate for a noble wife.

Then a stag, not exactly a young one himself, came and knocked your life sideways with a crushing blow of his antlers.

“Do fuck off. You know I would kill for this body. Don’t you ever let me hear you say otherwise. My storm.” He chides.

“Beautiful. Fiery. Fucking. Gorgeous. Storm.” His tongue is heading dangerous places. Licking down your neck. Kissing after each word. Heading to place swirling licks on your breasts.

“I’m serious.” You impress. Looking down at him. His mouth sucking a bruise on your sternum.

“As am I.” He hits back. Just as hard. Licking his lips.

“You don’t believe another would desire you? I’m willing to make a wager we would not even have to push to persuade them very hard to join us in bed. Not for my sake.” He smiles like a rogue.

“You’re only saying that cause you want to put your cock in me.” you decide flatly.

He comes up to cover your body again. Forcing eye contact.

“I’m saying it cause my wife is fucking vixen and I know for a fact plenty of my men have envisioned throwing your skirts to your ears taking you over the tables of Storms End dining hall.”

You look suspicious. A crinkle set between your brows. “What men? Give me names.”

“That apple cunt wanted under your skirts. Looked at your tits like a starved wolf.”

“You will never let me forget him, will you.”

“Certainly not.” He tells. Eyes lidded as he runs his fingers down the cords of your neck. Nudges your head aside to kiss and nip at your jaw.

“What about your braavosi friend…” he urges. Hot clammy words against your skin. “Think we could get a repeat performance? Though I’d be reluctant to share your gorgeous cunt. I’m certain the both of us could play nicely together.”

The image gets your stomach flipping. The thought of Lyonel shoulder to shoulder with someone else between your legs. Tongue twirling to make you shout. Gods.

“I doubt so. My love. She’s happily married now. To a merchant from Volantis. Three children.”

“Long journey to be sure, but if a threesome is my reward. I’ll be very, very good.” He purrs.

You give him a look. “You’d be insufferable.” You breathe. “It’s your prevailing condition.”

“What of your sexual delights? We’ve spoken of mine in length. If it can’t be a woman. Would you ever take on another man in our bed?” You ask.

He smirks.

“Only if I could see you share me. Kissing him over the head of my cock. And I get to see how beautiful you are when you get fucked by another. Eyes rolling back in your head. Fuck. The thought has my blood boiling..”

“I can tell.” You remarks. He’s hard as stone against your thigh.

“You really do want to play with another man?” you ask. “Wherever will we find such a one.”

He kisses your neck. Tongue running into the divot of your collarbone. Hips sliding to yours. Making you cross your legs at his back. Naked skin sliding out from the sheets. Warm and wrapping your arms and legs around his back. He moans into a bite of your shoulder. He’ll take you soon.

“Well keep our options open. My stormy vixen.”

He pushes into you slowly. Enough to watch every flick of your face. Eyes rolling back as he grins and slams himself deep. The gape of your mouth that he wants to sink his tongue into

“There we are-“ He sighs. Head tipping back. “Gods. How divine you’d look. Crying my name as another man pounds you.”

“Shut up and kiss me.” You grab his curls. Open mouthed and panting.

“Anything for you.” He sighs. Mouth slanting to yours. Tongue unfurling to find yours. Hips slapping together. Wicked ideas sliding through his naughty head.

“That one….” Lyonel leaned to your seat. Heat of his breath brushed your ear. The faintest brush of his cologne rolls over you. Burnt birch and orange clove spices.

You were at the Ashford Tourney. His Pavillion risen high on the field. Gold and proud, standing as tall as all the antlers that decorate it. Guards outside keeping the merry peace. The air is sweet with roasted meats and ale. The faint stirring plucked strings of music.

He’s itching to dance. You know he is. Sat there in his antler crown like a stag made flesh. Eyes ravenously combing crowds.

Your little idea has stayed with him; you both wanted another man in your bed. He’d find you one

“Hm.” He purses his lips and spies another. A middle aged Lord. Fit enough. Not unhandsome. He wanted someone limber. Someone who could pound you, or perhaps him, to the bed with powerful hips. Good knees.

“Him?” He nods.

You spy who he means. A Tully. Flame haired and pretty. Pale too. Good cheekbones. He’s wearing blue and is talking with much drunk animation.

“Ugh no. I conversed with him earlier. His breath was like dead rotting fish.” You wince.

Another blonde caught his eye. Red doublet. One walking over near the far table.

“The rose boy?” He asks. About one of the Tyrell’s.

“Seven no. Too young. Barely out of leading strings. He looks like an untrained puppy.” You observe.

Lyonel takes a good long look at the man bends over the table to talk to his companion. Eyes up the span of his thighs and his strong backside.

“In a certain way puppyish can work. In my experience, always eager to please. To prove they’re good. So horny they’d get on their knees and beg for it.” He tells.

“Mm. No, he looks like he’d weep. Or wet himself. Next.” You decide.

Cradling your glass of wine and looking plotting. Legs crossed. You examine everyone with predatory ease. Like a lioness set back, picking her prey at the watering hole.

He chuckles. Links his fingers through yours on the arm of your chair. “My stern tongued wife. Gods be good. I love when you get strict on me.”

“There’s always Beesbury?” He announces.

“Mm.” You consider it with a positive shake of your head. “A bit wiry. Little wild. Though the moustache does have a certain appeal I supp-“

Your words get torn out your mouth. They leave in one breathy rush.

Him.

Across the tent, stands an absolute behemoth of a man. Trunks for legs. Arms that could crush iron. He stands three heads above the crowd. Nervously eating a pastry. Blue eyed and coppery blonde fair hair. Looking like butter wouldn’t melt. He flinched when others grew too raucous near him. A gentle giant, you think. Not a nasty bone in him.

Lyonel follows your gaze. Finds this cowering huge man on the end if it. Big as an aurochs.

He was handsome in a rugged way. Rough hewn. Shoulders double his own width. Hands big as spades. Most likely a heavy fat cock and balls swinging between his legs to rival a prize stud bull.

Oh yes. Lyonel could see it now.

You under him. Your hips pinned wide, so wide, by the man as he pounded the life out of you. Naked pale ass pumping between your thighs. Crushing you to his golden bed. Legs nearly at your chest as you cried this man’s name. He’s hard thinking of it.

“That one huh? Greedy woman.” He snickers.

You don’t take your eyes off the big man.

“You say that. Like you wouldn’t want your mouth stuffed with his big cock.”

Throwing his head back. He laughs. “You know me too well.”

Lyonel tilts to your side. You take a sip of wine. He whispers to you;

“I’m looking forward to seeing him on his knees. Begging to stick his tongue and face in your pretty cunt. Lord knows how a lowly man could deserve such heaven as the one between your legs.” He continues.

You swallow. Twist to look at him. He’s as turned on as you are. You both refocus your eyes on the man.

“Your small hand fisted in that short hair. Those mammoth hands on your hips pulling you close. Begging you to show him how to properly eat a noble ladies cunt.” He grins.

“You’re soaked at the thought. Don’t deny. I know the way you shift when you soak to your underclothes.”

You do shift. You really were dripping at the idea of using such a big sweet man. With the thought of Lyonel’s eyes on you too? His mouth in your ear as he watches. Oh You worry you’ll stain your dress.

“Reckon he’ll do?” You seek.

“Only one way to find out.” He curls a hand to bring forward one of his men.

“The large cunt. Get him over here.”

Your summons work. You watch every second as he shifts across. Weaving crowds.

You reckon he’s still trying to appear small. Wide blue eyes. Looking like a newborn fawn. All nerves and fear. He looks uncomfortable with the attention being solely on him.

Like he was trapped in a big muscled body that only knew how to grow. To stick out. His life had been spent being treated as a big stupid eyesore.

You don’t think so.

You think the opposite. You see the power in those shoulders. The wide set of those thighs. His dress marked him as a man who didn’t enjoy the privileges of wealth or the backing of a fine house. You find you like him more for it.

He’s a handsome face but he doesn’t act like he does. You find that very compelling. Some men of his size truly walk with the backed, spine stiff arrogance that they know they can win a fight. This nameless big man walks around like he’s scared to start one.

He’s standing before your table. Face half carved shadow, half gold in the candlelight. A sweep of cool, sweet night air comes with him. Dark as lilacs. He smells of cut meadow grass, and the earthen, boggy wet coldness that only comes from a river.

His smile is careful. Like a crease in cloth smoothed quickly away.

“My lord. My lady.” He bows. Eyes flicking between you both. Those baby blues seem to longer on you a tad more.

Lyonel can’t blame the man. You’re intoxicating at the best of times. More so tonight. You look like a voluptuous dream. Clean smile. Bright clever eyes. Glowing hair in butter gold candles light. You were every Knights dream.

He knows he shouldn’t lay his eyes to you. He shouldn’t even think of you. But you’re hard to look away from. Like rare, beautiful things to be savoured in life. A powder soft summer sky darted with swallow birds. A spectacular sunset bursting into melting coppers and striking golds, fierce crimson bloody at the edges. The smell of honeyed bread drifting warm from a bakers window. Warm. Sweet. Unbelievable.

A fine gown cups your body like a salacious kiss. Baratheon colours, naturally. Black trimmed with gold like shadow and light combined. Stag brooch of gold holding back your spilling curls that reach to your shoulders. A stag belt tight on the small of your waist. An easy look your eye from the strength of the wine. A smile that all men would call heaven.

“What is your name.” Lyonel begins.

Duncan sets his eyes to Lyonel. In looking to him too, he does seem stunned in an entirely different capacity. By the grandeur of his title and all that came with it. The legend that carried with him like an old, long cloak. But it was the vitality that also struck him. The handsome set of his jaw. The greying goatee beard and disarrayed, storm rioted curls. Lean build, but not lacking in power.

Duncan hadn’t expected his first thought of Lyonel to veer into thinking how handsome he was; Alive and present the way a tempest is. Vibrant energy. A smile, lips really, that perpetually held laughter close to hand. Dangerous or easy he couldn’t tell. Eyes the colour of burnt wood and twice as scalding.

Dunk shakes off his reverie. Enough to provide an answer.

“Ser Duncan. My Lord. Ser Duncan the tall.”

“Thank the gods for that. I was worried we’d have to talk around the obvious.” Lyonel grins. To the delighted mumble of chuckles rippling through the men and women set around you.

You watch Ser Duncan’s cheeks colour with a blush at the joke. Eyes to the floor. Keeping hold of the half eaten blueberry tart in his hand. He had the hungry, hollow cheeks of someone who didn’t often see such fine food.

“Where do you hail from Ser?” You prod.

He shifts. Uncertain. Like he’d be ribbed for his answer. A man who cowers with shame from his humble upbringing. In front of his supposed grander, betters. A man who never asked to take up space, and yet with his height, had to learn how - as quietly as possible.

“I’m from Kings Landing. My lady. Flea Bottom. Born and raised. Some would say the wrong end of Aegons Hill.”

You nod. And smile. It isn’t unkind of you. You do not make a holy joke of him. That eases to tension in his heavy set shoulders. The ones Lyonel would adore to see adorned with your scarlet teeth marks.

“One can’t be blamed for their place of birth. Ser. Just because it’s undesirable doesn’t make it wrong. I dare say lots of people remark their birthplaces to be inadequate. Hardly the fault of a babe.” You explain. “You’ve come to Ashford to compete. That says much about your character.”

He looks in agony. His brow furrowed. “That is kind of you to say. My lady.” More grace than I deserve, Dunk thinks.

“Are you married?” Lyonel tilts his head. Unwilling to be left out.

He carefully watches Duncan stuck gazing at your smile for a long moment. He doesn’t blame the man for being struck dumb. He smirks to see it. Off to a good start.

“No, my Lord.”

“Promised to anyone? A sweet little maid or some such.” Lyonel follows up.

“No. My lord.” Duncan answers. Looking quizzical. His eyes dart between you both.

“I beg pardon if I caused offence. My lord. My lady. I did not know the gathering was meant to be attended with offerings. I have come empty handed.”

“Rest easy. Ser. I assure you. We are not the least offended.” You calmly counter.

“Quite the opposite if anything.” Lyonel remakes lowly.

You lock eyes with your husband. “I think he’s perfect.” You grin.

Lyonel chuckles. “Happy wife. Happy life.”

He rubs a hand over his beard. Before he leans in. Pins Duncan under his gaze. Makes the man swallow in nervousness. Sweat started to bead on his brow. A stag sizing up his challenge.

“Ser Duncan. If you be so good— me and my wife have a little… proposition for you.”

A part II perhaps? Let me know what you think 👀

[jinxispunk]

the family he found

Steve Harrington x reader

Summary: Steve expects just another birthday. Instead, he discovers he's spent years building himself the family he'd always dreamed of.

Warnings/tags: 18+ ONLY, minors DNI, no use of y/n, established relationship, fluff, hurt/comfort, mentions of a neglectful childhood (steve's), found family, angst, everyone loves steve harrington (lmk if i missed anything)

A/N: pls blame jess (@holawdw) for the emotional damage 😭😭 thank you SO much for giving me this idea and then spending several days screaming about it with me in dms because i genuinely don't think i would've written this without you. i knew the second you said it that this had to become a fic. i really hope i did your beautiful idea justice. thank you for trusting me with it, and thank you for emotionally ruining both me and steve 🫶

W/C: 8k

Read more of my writing here: [masterlist]

If you want to be added to my taglist, leave a comment to lmk!

You wake before Steve does.

The curtains are still only half-lit, the early morning sun filtering through the gaps in soft bands of gold that stretch lazily across the bedroom floor. Outside, Hawkins hasn't quite decided to wake up yet. Somewhere in the distance a lawnmower coughs into life before giving up again, birds chatter noisily from the oak tree outside the window, and the whole house sits in that strange, peaceful quiet that only exists before the rest of the world remembers itself.

Steve is still asleep beside you, one arm escaped from beneath the duvet during the night, stretched lazily across the mattress until his fingertips brush yours, as though even unconscious he has some quiet need to know you're still there. His hair sticks up in every possible direction, flattened on one side and hopelessly unruly on the other, his face softer in sleep than it ever is when he's awake.

You smile to yourself.

Twenty-three.

It feels impossible somehow - not because twenty-three is particularly old, but because you've spent long enough loving Steve to remember nineteen. Twenty. Twenty-one. Twenty-two. Every version of him that existed between those birthdays and this one. Each year he'd grown a little gentler, a little quieter in himself, as though life had slowly been teaching him that he no longer had to carry everything alone.

Carefully, so as not to wake him too suddenly, you lean across and press a kiss against the centre of his forehead.

His nose wrinkles immediately. A low, sleepy groan rumbles somewhere beneath the blankets before one eye cracks open just enough to find you. "...Morning."

"Morning, birthday boy."

His expression falls with almost theatrical disappointment. "...Do I have to get older?"

You laugh quietly. "I'm afraid you don't have much choice."

"I was hoping we could skip this one."

"I'll write to the calendar."

"You think it'd listen?"

"Probably not."

He sighs dramatically before rolling onto his back, staring up at the ceiling with the sort of resignation usually reserved for tax returns and dentist appointments. "...Worth asking."

You reach over to smooth an impossibly stubborn piece of hair away from his forehead. "You know," you say, "most people get excited about their birthday."

Steve hums. "I know."

"You don't."

Another small shrug. "I've just never really been bothered."

He says it so casually that anyone else might have believed him.

But you've known him long enough to understand the difference between someone who doesn't care and someone who learned, very early on, not to expect much in the first place.

Steve never disliked birthdays. That wasn't it. He'd simply stopped allowing himself to build them into something worth looking forward to.

Growing up, they were... fine.

There'd usually be a couple of presents, carefully chosen by parents who knew roughly what an eight-year-old boy ought to like but never quite what their eight-year-old boy actually did. His mother insisted on the same dense, healthy carrot cake every year because she preferred it to chocolate, somehow never stopping to consider that perhaps the birthday boy himself might have had other opinions.

Sometimes his parents were away entirely, leaving him with grandparents or a childminder and promising they'd celebrate properly when they got back. Sometimes they were there, though never really present. A birthday dinner if everyone happened to be home. A quick "happy birthday" over breakfast before somebody rushed off to a meeting. There was never anything cruel about it.

Just... distance.

Nothing bad enough to complain about.

Nothing good enough to miss.

By the time you'd met him, birthdays had become something he accepted with the same quiet indifference he accepted rainy Tuesdays or running out of milk. Nice enough if somebody remembered. Easily forgotten if they didn't.

He catches you looking at him. "What?"

You realise you've been absent-mindedly tracing your thumb across the back of his hand. "Nothing."

"Your face tells me it isn't nothing."

You smile. "I was just thinking."

"Dangerous."

"Oh, absolutely."

He grins, the corners of his eyes creasing in that familiar way that still makes something inside your chest soften. Then, just as quickly, he stretches with another sleepy groan and reaches for his glasses on the bedside table.

"So..." He pushes them onto his nose. "...What's the plan today?"

The question is completely innocent.

There's no expectation behind it. No hopeful curiosity. No excitement. Just the quiet assumption that whatever happened would be perfectly nice, and perfectly ordinary.

You hold his gaze for a moment before leaning across to steal one more kiss.

"Oh," you murmur, smiling against his cheek. "I think you're going to have a very different birthday this year."

Robin is the first to arrive.

You hear her before you see her.

The front door flies open without so much as a knock, followed almost immediately by, "HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DINGUS."

Steve has barely managed to look up from the mug of coffee in his hands before something rectangular bounces unceremoniously off the side of his head.

"...Ow."

"You're welcome."

He picks the envelope up from the floor, turning it over suspiciously.

Across the front, written entirely in thick black marker, are the words:

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DINGUS.

Beneath them, in much smaller handwriting:

Don't let this inflate your ego.

Steve laughs quietly through his nose. "I haven't even opened it yet."

"I know." Robin folds her arms with exaggerated satisfaction. "I just wanted to establish the tone."

You disappear into the kitchen under the pretence of making more coffee, partly because somebody has to rescue breakfast before it burns, and partly because you've known Robin long enough to recognise the expression she's trying very hard to hide.

She's nervous.

Steve, blissfully unaware, slides a finger beneath the flap and unfolds the card.

Silence.

Then another page unfolds.

And another.

Steve blinks. "...Robin."

"What?"

"It's..." He flips another page over. "...Really long."

She shrugs with studied indifference. "I got carried away."

"What did you write?"

"I don't know."

"You wrote it."

"I wasn't paying attention."

He gives her a look.

She refuses to meet it.

You watch him begin reading.

The smile appears immediately, tugging at one corner of his mouth as he reaches the first insult.

Happy Birthday to Hawkins' second-biggest idiot.

Congratulations on somehow surviving another year despite making some of the dumbest decisions I've ever witnessed.

He snorts.

Robin looks insufferably pleased with herself.

Then the smile begins to change.

It softens almost imperceptibly, his eyes moving more slowly across the page now.

You can't read the words from where you're standing, but you know Robin well enough to know exactly what she'll have hidden between the jokes.

She'll have thanked him for making Family Video bearable, for never making her feel like she had to be anyone other than herself, for listening when she came out without making it weird, without asking questions she didn't want to answer, without changing the way he looked at her afterwards. She'll have written about Starcourt. About Russian secret bases and demobats and everything in between. About the fact that, somehow, Steve Harrington had quietly become the safest place she'd ever known.

By the time he reaches the final page, the kitchen has gone strangely quiet. Robin is studying a loose thread on her sleeve with almost academic concentration.

Steve clears his throat before reading the last line aloud, his voice noticeably softer than before. "'Don't get emotional.'" He smiles to himself. "'I'm only saying this once.'"

Robin points at him immediately. "Exactly."

"You literally wrote three pages."

"I know."

"You called me your favourite person."

"I was clearly concussed."

"You said you'd trust me with your life."

"I mean..." She sighs dramatically. "I would."

His smile grows impossibly soft. "You know..." He glances down at the card again. "...Thank you."

Robin groans so loudly you almost laugh. "Ugh."

"What?"

"Stop looking at me like that."

"Like what?"

"Like you're about to hug me."

Steve doesn't even pretend to think about it. He simply walks around the table and wraps his arms around her.

Robin lets out the most exaggerated sigh you've ever heard. "This is disgusting."

"You started it."

"I wrote a card."

"You wrote three pages."

"I regret everything."

"No, you don't."

"...No."

She hugs him back anyway. Only for a second. Only because nobody's looking.

Except you absolutely are.

When they finally pull apart, Robin immediately pokes him in the shoulder.

"If you tell anybody I have feelings, I'll deny the whole thing."

Steve laughs. "My lips are sealed."

"They'd better be." She narrows her eyes. "And if you cry..."

"I'm not going to cry."

"You looked dangerously close."

"I wasn't."

"You were."

"I definitely wasn't."

Robin glances towards you. "He was, wasn't he?"

You smile over the rim of your coffee mug. "A little."

"I wasn't."

"You've still got watery eyes."

"It's allergies."

"In February?"

"...Shut up."

The conversation drifts naturally onto something else after that.

Dustin is apparently running late. Robin immediately starts complaining about his inability to tell the time while Steve joins in as though nothing unusual has happened, the two of them slipping back into familiar bickering before Nancy wanders in from the hallway carrying an armful of paper plates, looking between them with a knowing smile. "He's late again?"

Robin throws her hands into the air. "When isn't he?"

The room fills with laughter, and before long the conversation has moved on entirely.

Later, while everyone else is distracted in the kitchen and Robin is attempting to convince Joyce that frozen chips absolutely count as a vegetable, you catch Steve standing alone in the hallway.

The card is open again.

He's reading the third page for a second time, his thumb lingering over the final paragraph before he quietly folds it closed with surprising care. The smile on his face is small, thoughtful, the sort that only ever appears when someone has managed to tell him something he didn't realise he'd needed to hear.

He slips the card carefully back into its envelope.

Not tossed onto the side. Not left amongst the wrapping paper.

Carefully. Like something he already knows he'll keep forever.

Dustin arrives nearly forty minutes late.

He bursts through the front door carrying three different bags, a box of doughnuts, and what appears to be a screwdriver for reasons known only to himself.

"Sorry!" he announces before anybody has the chance to say hello. "The bus was late, the car wouldn't start, and then I had to help my mum move a bookshelf because apparently I'm 'the man of the house now.'"

Robin raises an eyebrow. "...You brought a screwdriver."

"I know."

"Why?"

Dustin looks down at it as though only just noticing it in his own hand. "...Huh."

Steve laughs. "There he is."

Dustin grins, dropping everything onto the kitchen table with considerably more force than necessary. "Happy birthday, old man."

"Thanks."

"You look ancient."

"I'm twenty-three."

"Exactly."

Steve rolls his eyes. "You'll understand one day."

"I'll never be twenty-three."

"You literally will."

"I refuse."

The conversation dissolves into laughter almost immediately.

Nancy is still trying to work out where everyone's coats are supposed to go. Joyce keeps disappearing back to the kitchen because she insists she's forgotten something. Holly trails after Steve, carrying a balloon almost as big as she is, asking if she can help despite clearly having no idea how. Derek is outside trying to light the barbecue with considerably less success than he'd predicted.

After everything that's happened over the last few years, days like this have become strangely precious. Nothing extraordinary. Nobody saving the world. Just everyone existing in the same place at the same time, talking over one another, stealing chips from each other's plates, and interrupting conversations with terrible jokes as though they haven't spent the better part of adolescence fighting monsters together.

More than once, you catch Steve quietly looking around the room.

Not at anything in particular.

Just... everyone.

It makes something warm settle gently inside your chest.

Eventually, as plates begin disappearing into the kitchen, Dustin freezes mid-conversation. "...Oh."

Steve glances up. "What?"

Dustin slaps a hand dramatically against his forehead. "...I forgot your present."

Robin doesn't even look up from her drink. "No, you didn't."

"I did."

"You absolutely didn't."

"I absolutely-" He stops, sighing with theatrical defeat. "...Fine."

Steve laughs. "I knew it."

"You were supposed to believe me."

"I've known you too long."

Dustin disappears into the hallway before returning a moment later, carrying something wrapped in Christmas wrapping paper. It's awkwardly shaped, too large to be a book and too flat to be anything else. Without meeting Steve's eyes, he thrusts it into his hands. "There."

Steve turns it over carefully. "...What's this?"

"I said don't ask questions."

"You literally handed it to me."

"I know."

"Can I open it?"

Dustin rubs awkwardly at the back of his neck. "...Yeah."

The room gradually quietens. Even Mike abandons the card game long enough to look over.

Steve peels the paper back with surprising care, trying not to tear it.

Inside is a thick scrapbook.

The cover is slightly crooked, one corner clearly glued back into place after an unfortunate accident, and across the front, in unmistakably Dustin Henderson handwriting, is written a single word.

STEVE.

Nothing else. Just... Steve.

His smile falters almost immediately.

Slowly, he opens it.

The first page is covered in old cinema tickets from Family Video movie nights.

The second is photographs.

Robin asleep against his shoulder. Lucas laughing so hard at something Steve had said that he's almost falling over. Max pulling a face behind Steve's back while he remains blissfully oblivious. A much younger Dustin wearing Steve's sunglasses, the frames so oversized they practically swallow his face.

Then come the things Steve doesn't even remember keeping.

Campaign maps from old Dungeons & Dragons sessions. Drawings Holly had made years ago that somehow ended up forgotten in his glove compartment. Polaroids. County fair wristbands. Birthday invitations. Receipts. Little scraps of paper everyone else would have thrown away.

One page is filled entirely with handwriting.

Robin's. Nancy's. Lucas's. Mike's. Will's.

Even Erica's, squeezed into one corner with the words:

"Don't let it go to your head, Harrington."

Beneath each name is a tiny memory.

"Steve bought me fries because I forgot my wallet."

"He waited outside my maths exam because he knew I'd panic afterwards."

"Drove us home in a thunderstorm even though he hates driving in the rain."

"He always says yes."

"Best babysitter ever."

Steve turns the next page much more slowly.

His fingertips linger against the edges as though he's frightened of damaging something.

"...Dude." His voice is barely above a whisper.

Dustin shrugs without looking up. "I know."

"You..." Steve lets out one quiet, disbelieving laugh. "...You made this?"

"...Shut up."

"No, seriously."

"It wasn't a big deal."

Robin snorts immediately. "He spent three weeks chasing us for photos."

"I did not."

"You literally made Joyce search her loft."

"That," Dustin points accusingly, "was research."

"And you bullied me into writing two pages."

"You wrote three because you got emotional."

"I did not."

"You absolutely-"

"Shut up, Henderson."

Laughter ripples around the room.

Steve doesn't join in.

He's still turning the pages. Slowly. As though every photograph contains a memory he'd forgotten belonged to him.

Then he stops. Halfway through the book.

You can't see the page from where you're standing.

You only notice the way his expression changes.

His shoulders soften. His eyes linger. His thumb brushes gently across whatever Dustin has glued onto the paper. "...You kept that?"

Dustin finally looks up. "...Yeah."

Steve swallows. "I didn't even know anybody still had it."

Dustin shrugs as though the answer should be obvious. "You don't throw away stuff that matters."

The words are so matter-of-fact that Dustin probably doesn't even realise what he's said.

But the room falls quiet anyway.

Because Steve is looking down at years of little moments he'd long since forgotten.

Movie tickets. Drawings. Receipts. Photographs. Inside jokes. Evidence. Proof that people had been quietly collecting pieces of him long before he'd ever thought to collect pieces of himself.

You watch him blink rapidly once. Then again.

Very carefully, he closes the scrapbook, resting one hand against its cover. "...Thank you."

Dustin clears his throat. "Yeah." A beat. "...Don't cry, dude."

Steve laughs softly, rubbing quickly beneath one eye. "I'm not crying."

Robin doesn't even glance up from her drink. "Third lie of the day."

Another ripple of laughter breaks the silence, the conversation slowly picking back up around him. But you notice something Steve doesn't seem aware he's doing.

He never lets go of the scrapbook.

Every time somebody shifts it to make room on the table, his hand finds it again almost instinctively, fingertips resting lightly against the cover as though he's quietly reassuring himself that it's still there.

The presents continue throughout the afternoon, though calling them presents hardly feels accurate anymore. Some are wrapped carefully, others arrive in supermarket carrier bags or with the price stickers hastily scratched away, and none of them are particularly expensive. None of them need to be. Somewhere between Robin's card and Dustin's scrapbook, the day has quietly stopped being about gifts at all; instead, it becomes a long series of people finding their own ways to tell Steve Harrington that they love him.

Lucas is next. He hands Steve a neatly wrapped box with a shrug that tries very hard to look casual, though he watches far too closely as Steve begins peeling back the paper. "It's not a big deal."

Steve smiles. "It didn't have to be."

Inside is a new baseball glove, the leather still stiff and untouched. Steve hadn't asked for one, but Lucas had noticed weeks ago that the stitching was beginning to unravel on the old glove he used whenever he played with the kids.

"You remembered," Steve says, turning it carefully in his hands.

Lucas looks almost confused. "Well... yeah."

"You noticed that?"

"You use it every week."

A quiet laugh escapes Steve. "I didn't think anybody was paying attention."

"Steve." Lucas shakes his head as though the answer should be obvious. "We notice everything."

Steve looks down again, his thumb moving slowly across the smooth leather before he thanks him with one of those small, genuine smiles that always reaches his eyes. Across the garden, Erica loudly informs Derek that the new glove still won't make Steve any less terrible at baseball, prompting Lucas to shout something defensive on his behalf while Steve laughs and calls them both ungrateful.

Max wanders over a few minutes later carrying nothing but a dog-eared paperback she'd spent the last month insisting he needed to read.

"You keep stealing mine," she says, pushing it into his hands. "Now you have your own."

Steve turns the book over. "I thought you liked lending them to me."

"I don't. I like getting them back eventually."

"I always return them."

"After six months."

"They're long books."

"They're four hundred pages."

"I'm a slow reader."

"I know." Her mouth twitches despite herself, but the amusement fades as she hesitates, scuffing the toe of her trainer against the grass. "...Thanks, though."

Steve blinks. "For what?"

"For always treating me like..." She pauses, searching for something precise enough. "...Just me. You never acted like I was broken."

His smile softens immediately. "You aren't."

"I know." Max shrugs one shoulder, suddenly fascinated by the book in his hands. "You just made it easier to remember."

She bumps her shoulder against his before walking away, leaving Steve watching after her for a moment before his attention drops back to the paperback. Nearby, Will quietly makes room for her beside him on the patio steps, neither of them saying anything as she steals a crisp from his plate.

Nancy catches Steve later while he's helping Joyce carry a tray of drinks into the garden. She slips a small envelope into his pocket so discreetly that nobody else notices. "Open it later."

He raises an eyebrow. "Secret?"

"I'd rather Robin didn't make fun of me."

"Fair."

When you find him reading it alone in the hallway a little while later, you discover it isn't really a birthday card at all. It's a letter, short enough to fit on half a page but written with the sort of care that makes every sentence feel deliberate. Nancy thanks him for always showing up, for never once asking whether somebody deserved saving before trying anyway, and for reminding her that kindness and courage were never mutually exclusive.

She ends simply:

The world is better because you're in it.

Nothing more. Nothing less.

Jonathan doesn't write anything. That wouldn't be him.

Instead, while everyone mills around the garden balancing paper plates and cups of lemonade, he quietly hands Steve a photograph he'd developed himself. It was taken the previous summer, though nobody had realised Jonathan was holding a camera that afternoon. Steve is sitting on the grass with Holly asleep against one shoulder while Joyce is topping up everybody's drinks without asking. Will is showing Max one of his sketches, Mike is laughing at something beyond the frame, and El is lying flat on the grass looking at clouds.

You aren't looking at the camera either.

You're looking at Steve, smiling in that completely unconscious way people only ever do when they don't know they're being watched.

On the back, Jonathan has written a single sentence.

You always make it feel like home.

Steve stares at it for a long time. "...You took this?"

Jonathan nods. "You looked happy."

"I was."

"I know."

A quiet, bewildered laugh leaves Steve as he looks around the garden. Nancy is collecting empty plates; meanwhile, Robin is stealing chips off them before they can be picked up and taken into the kitchen. Everyone is talking over everyone else. Nobody is paying Steve any particular attention anymore.

The celebration has simply become itself.

"...You all remembered," he says, his voice nearly lost beneath the noise.

Jonathan studies him for a moment before giving the smallest shake of his head. "No."

Steve frowns. "What?"

"We didn't just remember." Jonathan glances towards the garden. "We wanted to."

It's such an ordinary sentence, spoken so quietly it almost disappears beneath the laughter drifting through the open door, but you watch something shift inside Steve anyway.

All day, some part of him has been waiting for somebody to admit they felt obligated; that birthdays are merely something decent people acknowledge because convention tells them to. Instead, every person keeps offering him the same truth in a different form.

Not simply happy birthday, but:

I'm glad you're here.

You make things better.

Life would look different without you.

And, perhaps for the first time in his life, Steve doesn't quite know what to do with the possibility that every one of them genuinely means it.

By the time the sun begins dipping behind the trees, the garden has dissolved into the sort of comfortable chaos that always seems to follow this particular group of people. Dustin and Erica have started teaching Holly a card game that she keeps accidentally cheating at. Mike and Lucas are throwing around a football, while El keeps spectacularly missing the catches and laughing anyway. Hopper has claimed the garden chair furthest from the noise with the determination of a man pretending not to enjoy himself, and Jonathan wanders quietly between them with his camera, capturing moments nobody else seems to notice.

Joyce, meanwhile, has somehow produced enough food to cater for an entire wedding.

Steve stands in the kitchen doorway, staring at the dining table. "...Joyce."

She looks up from the casserole she's carrying. "Hm?"

"There's enough food here to feed about thirty people."

"I know."

"There are, like, twelve of us."

"I know."

He gestures helplessly towards the mountain of dishes covering every available surface. "How did you even make all this?"

Joyce shrugs as though she'd thrown together a sandwich rather than enough food to sustain Hawkins through the winter. "I got carried away."

Robin wanders past and steals a roast potato straight from the tray. "She always gets carried away."

"I heard that."

"I wanted you to."

Steve laughs, shaking his head. "This is ridiculous."

Joyce smiles without looking up. "I know."

Nobody goes hungry when Joyce Byers is involved. Plates are filled faster than they're emptied, second helpings appear before anyone has the chance to refuse them, and every attempt to help clear away is met with a gentle but immovable, "Sit down. I've got it."

Steve tries anyway. Of course he does.

He appears beside Joyce with an armful of empty plates before she's even reached the sink. "I can help."

"I know." She takes them from him. "But today's your birthday."

"I don't mind."

"I know." She smiles at him over the top of the washing-up bowl. "So let somebody look after you for once."

The words are spoken so casually they almost disappear beneath the rush of running water, but you see Steve pause.

Only for a second.

Later, after dinner has dissolved into coffee, cake and half a dozen conversations happening at once, you wander back into the kitchen in search of more plates and find Joyce standing at the counter surrounded by plastic containers. She fills one, then another, then another: pasta, roast potatoes, slices of pie, enough leftovers to feed two people for the better part of a week.

Steve wanders in behind you just as she's clipping the lid onto the final container. "...Joyce?"

"Hm?"

"What's all this?"

She looks at him as though the answer is obvious. "Your dinners."

"My..."

"You work long shifts." She stacks another container neatly on top. "And I know you'll forget to cook for yourself if I don't send you home with something."

Steve laughs softly. "You don't have to do that."

"I know."

"You've already fed all of us."

"I know."

"This is too much."

Joyce finally stops what she's doing, placing both hands on the lid of the last container before sliding the entire stack towards him. "You'll take these."

He hesitates. "I don't need-"

"I wasn't asking."

There's no sharpness to it, no irritation, only the gentle certainty of someone who has spent years making sure the people she loves never leave her house hungry.

Steve looks down at the containers, then back at Joyce, and something shifts across his face so quickly that, had you not been watching for it all day, you might have missed it.

Recognition.

Not of the food.

Of the feeling.

Joyce has done this before: when he'd arrived after a shift looking exhausted, when he'd spent too many evenings helping the kids instead of himself, when she'd quietly wrapped slices of lasagne in foil because she'd "made too much again," despite everyone knowing perfectly well she'd cooked extra on purpose.

You realise, with a sudden ache beneath your ribs, that she has been mothering Steve for years. Neither of them has ever said it aloud. Neither of them has needed to.

Joyce notices his silence. "What?"

Steve blinks, almost startled back into the room. "...Nothing."

"You've got that look where you're thinking too hard."

A small smile finds him. "I was just..." He glances down at the containers again. "...Nobody's ever packed me leftovers before."

The kitchen falls unexpectedly quiet.

Joyce's expression softens almost imperceptibly. "Oh, sweetheart." She reaches out without hesitation, smoothing an affectionate hand over his shoulder as though she's done it a hundred times before. "Well." Another gentle squeeze. "They do now."

Steve doesn't answer. He only nods once, swallowing a little too hard before carefully carrying the stack across the kitchen and opening the fridge. He rearranges half the shelves to make room, setting each container inside with absurd precision before closing the door as though he's placing something valuable somewhere safe.

They're only leftovers. A few plastic tubs that will probably become lunch before work tomorrow.

But as you watch his hand linger briefly on the fridge handle, you realise they were never really about food at all. They were proof that somebody had been thinking about tomorrow on his behalf.

For someone who'd spent most of his life quietly taking care of everyone else, that might just have been the greatest gift he'd received all day.

When he finally wanders back outside, the evening has settled into that soft golden hour where everything seems to slow down. Fairy lights strung between the fence posts have begun to glow faintly against the darkening sky, somebody has started another pot of coffee, and the birthday cake sits half-demolished in the middle of the table, one candle still stubbornly refusing to go out despite Robin's repeated attempts to blow it over with exaggerated determination.

You lean against the kitchen doorway for a moment, simply watching.

Steve barely makes it back onto the patio before Dustin catches him again, insisting he absolutely has to see the scrapbook page he'd forgotten to point out earlier. Mike throws a crisp at him. Lucas joins in without even asking what they're arguing about. Max rolls her eyes so dramatically you're surprised they don't disappear entirely.

And through it all...

Steve laughs.

Not the polite laugh he gives customers. Not the awkward one he used to force whenever his parents invited colleagues over for dinner.

This one is different.

Loose. Easy. It belongs here.

You don't think he'd even realised the difference.

Not until today.

Hopper chooses his moment carefully.

He waits until Steve wanders away from the noise with another cup of coffee, escaping towards the edge of the garden where the old oak tree throws long shadows across the grass. It's the sort of place Steve always drifts towards when everything gets a little too loud - not because he dislikes the company, but because he's always needed a minute to breathe between moments.

Hopper follows a few seconds later.

Not obviously.

You watch from the patio without saying anything.

Steve hears the footsteps and glances over his shoulder. "Oh. Hey."

Hopper grunts something that could generously be interpreted as a greeting before stopping beside him.

For a while, neither of them says anything.

They simply stand shoulder to shoulder, looking out across the garden while laughter drifts faintly behind them. Joyce is gathering empty mugs onto a tray. Nancy is folding paper napkins that don't really need folding. Robin has somehow persuaded Holly to help blow bubbles across the garden while Dustin insists bubbles are scientifically impossible to catch.

Steve smiles into his coffee. "...Nice day."

Hopper nods once. "Yeah."

Silence settles again.

Not uncomfortable. Just... Hopper.

Eventually, he clears his throat. "Happy birthday."

Steve looks faintly surprised. "Oh." A small smile appears. "...Thanks."

Another long pause passes, and you almost wonder whether that's going to be the entire conversation.

Then Hopper speaks again, his eyes still fixed somewhere out across the garden. "You've done good."

Steve frowns. "What?"

"The kids."

A shrug. "They're good kids."

"They are." Hopper nods slowly. "They're better because you're around."

Steve's expression changes almost imperceptibly.

Hopper keeps talking before he has the chance to interrupt. "I've seen the way they look at you." Only then does he turn his head. "They trust you."

Steve opens his mouth.

Nothing comes out.

"You didn't have to keep showing up." Hopper's voice is as gruff as ever. "Nobody asked you to." Another pause. "But you did."

Steve looks down at the coffee cup in his hands. "I just..." A quiet laugh escapes him. "...They needed somebody."

"They did." Hopper nods once. "They got you."

For a moment, neither of them moves.

The sounds of the party carry on behind them as though nothing extraordinary is happening. Someone starts another round of Happy Birthday purely to annoy Steve. Robin groans loudly enough for the entire neighbourhood to hear.

Steve laughs automatically.

His eyes, however, have become suspiciously bright.

Hopper notices.

Naturally.

He pretends not to.

Instead, he reaches out, giving Steve's shoulder one firm, awkward squeeze before offering his hand.

Steve blinks. "...Really?"

"What?"

"The handshake."

"I'm trying."

Steve laughs through the thickness in his throat. "I know."

He takes Hopper's hand.

The handshake lasts barely two seconds.

It's probably the closest Hopper has ever come to saying I'm proud of you.

When he lets go, he clears his throat. "Don't make it weird."

"I wasn't gonna."

"You were thinkin' about it."

"...Maybe."

Hopper points back towards the house. "Go enjoy your party."

Steve smiles. "...Yeah."

He watches Hopper wander back towards the others before letting his gaze drift across the garden.

Robin has somehow ended up with Holly asleep against her shoulder despite loudly insisting children "smell weird". Joyce is packing slices of cake into foil while Nancy labels the containers before anyone can forget whose is whose. Lucas and Mike have wandered to the end of the garden with a football, Jonathan is crouched beside the flowerbed trying to photograph a butterfly Holly spotted, and Erica is shamelessly raiding the snack table one last time before anybody notices.

You catch Steve's eye from across the lawn.

He smiles at you.

Not because anything funny has happened. Not because he's trying to.

Simply because, for perhaps the first time all day, he's beginning to understand what every single person has been trying to tell him.

He hadn't just been thrown a birthday party.

He was home.

By the time the last of the washing up has been stacked beside the sink, the house has settled into a gentler kind of noise.

The loud laughter has softened into quieter conversations, and the music drifting from the old radio has become little more than background static. Through the kitchen doorway you can still see everyone scattered comfortably around the house, no longer celebrating in any organised sense of the word, simply... staying.

Robin has somehow ended up half-curled across one end of the sofa, arguing lazily with Max over what film everyone should watch before they eventually leave. El sits cross-legged on the rug with Mike, the two of them still passionately debating something that nobody else is listening to anymore, while Will quietly contributes the occasional comment that neither of them acknowledges. Joyce is wrapping the last slices of birthday cake in foil, Hopper pretending not to help while hovering close enough to hand her the tape every few minutes without ever admitting that's exactly what he's doing. Holly has fallen asleep against Nancy's side, Jonathan is carefully packing away his camera, and Erica is wandering through the living room helping herself to whatever snacks everyone else has forgotten about.

Nobody seems in any hurry to go home. Nobody seems to want the day to end.

Steve stands beside you at the sink, drying the final plate with considerably more concentration than the task really requires.

He's been quieter ever since Hopper wandered back inside. Not unhappy. Just... Thoughtful.

You hand him another plate, and he dries it automatically before speaking into the comfortable silence. "...I don't get it."

You glance sideways. "What don't you get?"

A quiet laugh escapes him, though it carries none of its usual ease. "Today." He runs the tea towel slowly around the edge of the plate. "They all..." He trails off, searching for words. "...They actually wanted to come."

The sentence settles heavily between you. Not because of what he's saying. Because of what he's accidentally revealing.

You wait.

He keeps looking down at the plate in his hands. "I know birthdays are..." He shrugs awkwardly. "People feel like they have to come, right? You buy a present. You sing. You eat cake." Another small shrug. "It's just... what people do."

You lean your hip against the counter. "Is that what you think today was?"

"I don't know." His smile is almost embarrassed. "It didn't feel like that."

"No."

"They weren't just doing birthday stuff."

"No."

He looks through the doorway towards the living room, where Robin has thrown another cushion at Dustin, Lucas catches it before it reaches him, and Joyce laughs so hard she has to steady herself against the arm of the sofa. "...They were celebrating me."

You smile. "They were."

He looks back at you, his brow creasing slightly. "I've never..." The sentence never reaches the end. Instead, he laughs quietly, rubbing at the back of his neck. "...I don't think I've ever had that before."

Your heart aches. Not because he's upset. Because he says it with such genuine surprise, as though the possibility had never once occurred to him.

You reach for his hand. "C'mere."

He follows without question.

You lead him slowly through the house without saying anything, simply letting him look.

Nancy is gently lifting Holly so she doesn't wake her. Hopper is quietly locking the back door, while Joyce wraps up slices of cake in individual napkins. Jonathan is wiping down camera lenses, Mike has drifted asleep in the armchair, and El gently covers him with a blanket. Robin is trying to convince Max that one more film won't kill anyone, despite half the room already falling asleep, while Erica is counting how much birthday cake she's managed to smuggle home.

Nobody's performing anymore. The party is over. This is simply what remains. People comfortable enough to exist in one another's spaces without needing a reason.

Steve watches them quietly. "They're still here."

"Mhm."

"They don't have to be."

"No."

"They've all got homes."

"They do."

He looks around again, confusion softening into something quieter. "So why..."

You squeeze his hand gently. "They are home."

He frowns. "What?"

"They're home." You smile. "And so are you."

This time he really looks.

Robin. Dustin. Lucas. Max. Mike. Will. El. Joyce. Hopper. Nancy. Jonathan. Erica. Holly. Derek.

People who had arrived separately, from entirely different corners of his life, and somehow fit together now. People who, before him, had never all belonged in the same room.

"You spent years looking after everyone because you thought that's what made you useful."

His eyes meet yours.

"You drove them everywhere. You showed up. You fixed things. You carried everyone else's worries until they stopped feeling so heavy."

He nods slowly. "I thought..."

"I know." You step closer, your thumb brushing gently across his knuckles. "But somewhere along the way... they stopped needing you because of what you did."

His brow furrows.

"They stayed because of who you are."

The words seem to settle somewhere deep inside him.

"You became loved long before you even noticed."

For a long moment he simply looks at you.

Then his eyes begin to shine again.

You smile softly. "I've still got one more present."

He blinks. "You do?"

"Mhm."

You disappear upstairs for barely a minute before returning with something wrapped carefully in plain brown paper and tied with twine.

Steve laughs quietly. "I thought we'd finished."

"We had." You place it gently into his hands. "This one's different."

He unwraps it slowly.

Inside is a dark leather-bound photo album.

No title. No ribbon.

Just his name, pressed carefully into the cover in tiny gold letters.

Steve.

He opens it.

The first page isn't a photograph.

Just a single sentence:

You spend so much of your life looking after everybody else.

He turns the page.

Steve teaching Dustin how to drive. Steve asleep on the sofa with Holly curled against his chest. Robin laughing so hard she's crying while Steve looks completely bewildered. Max stealing chips from his plate. Lucas teaching him a ridiculous handshake. Jonathan catching him mid-laugh behind the camera. Joyce handing him another plate of food. Hopper clapping him awkwardly on the shoulder.

You.

All of them.

Beneath each photograph you've written a single line.

Not describing the picture.

Describing what it meant:

The day Dustin stopped needing a babysitter and started needing a brother.

The first time Robin laughed like she wasn't afraid anymore.

The afternoon you accidentally became Holly's favourite person.

He keeps turning the pages until he reaches the last one.

There are only six words:

Home isn't always somewhere you arrive.

He turns one final page:

Sometimes it's something you build.

Nothing else.

Steve doesn't realise he's crying until a tear lands quietly on the paper.

He lets out a breath that sounds almost like a laugh, shaking his head. "...Honey."

Very gently, you close the album beneath his hands.

"So..." You smile. "Happy birthday."

He looks at you for a long moment.

Then, without saying a single word, he wraps both arms around you.

Not because he doesn't know what to say.

Because, for perhaps the first time in his life... being loved has left Steve Harrington completely speechless.

By the time the two of you finally climb into bed, the house has fallen completely silent.

The fairy lights outside the bedroom window still glow faintly against the darkness, casting soft pools of amber across the ceiling, and somewhere downstairs the dishwasher hums steadily through the last traces of the evening. Steve's birthday cards are stacked neatly on the dresser, Robin's sitting proudly on top, still slightly bent where she'd thrown it at his head that morning.

The leather photo album rests beside them.

Closed now, but not put away.

You curl instinctively beneath the duvet, expecting exhaustion to pull you under almost immediately after such a long day.

It doesn't.

Some time later, you wake to find Steve still lying beside you, exactly where he'd been when you fell asleep. Only now his eyes are open, fixed quietly on the ceiling, his hands folded loosely across his stomach as though he's trying to untangle a thought that's been sitting with him for hours.

"...Hey."

He turns his head. "Oh." His voice is barely above a whisper. "Sorry."

"You don't have to apologise for existing."

A tired smile appears. "I know."

You roll onto your side, propping yourself up on one elbow. "What're you thinking about?"

For a while, he doesn't answer. The silence between the two of you has never needed filling.

Eventually, he lets out a quiet breath. "...When I was little..." He laughs softly to himself. "...I always wished I'd grown up with a big family."

The confession catches you off guard. He keeps looking at the ceiling.

"I used to imagine one of those really noisy houses. People everywhere. Dinner all squashed around one table. Too many birthdays. Too many Christmas presents." He smiles faintly at the thought before it fades again. "I don't know... I just thought it'd be nice."

You reach across the mattress until your fingers find his. He threads them through yours automatically.

"I thought..." He swallows. "...I thought I'd missed my chance."

You shake your head. "No."

For the first time since he started talking, he turns to look at you. "No?"

"You didn't miss it."

His brow furrows.

"You built it."

A quiet, disbelieving laugh escapes him. "I don't..."

"You've got Robin. Dustin. Lucas. Max. Mike. Will. El. Erica." You smile gently. "Nancy. Jonathan. Joyce. Hopper. Holly." You pause. "And me."

His eyes soften.

"They're your family, Steve."

He looks away again. "They..."

"They are."

"I know they care about me, but-"

"No." You squeeze his hand before he can disappear back into old habits. "They don't love you because you drove them everywhere. They don't love you because you babysat them. They don't love you because you fixed every problem before anyone else even noticed it."

You think back over the day.

Robin's card. Dustin's scrapbook. Jonathan's photograph. Joyce quietly packing tomorrow's dinner before Steve had even thought about feeding himself. Hopper, standing beneath the oak tree, trying to say I'm proud of you without ever using the words.

"They love you because you're Steve."

The room falls quiet again.

"You spent years believing people only stayed because you made yourself useful."

His eyes glisten.

"But somewhere along the way..." You smile. "...they stayed anyway."

He lets out one small, disbelieving laugh. "...When did that happen?"

"I honestly don't think anybody knows."

You think about Dustin, twelve years old, following Steve everywhere. Robin slowly deciding she could trust him. Joyce wrapping leftovers in foil because she'd quietly started expecting him for dinner. Holly climbing into his lap without asking.

None of it had happened all at once.

There wasn't a single moment where strangers became family.

It happened on ordinary Tuesdays. On lifts home from school. Movie nights. Late-night phone calls. Shared meals. Inside jokes.

One quiet act of kindness after another until, somehow, nobody could remember a version of life that didn't include Steve Harrington standing somewhere in the middle of it.

"It just..." Your thumb brushes gently across his knuckles. "...Kept happening."

His breathing catches.

You nod gently towards the bedroom door, beyond which the cards, photographs and carefully stacked leftovers still wait downstairs.

"If every single person chose to spend today celebrating you..." Your voice is barely louder than the rain-soft silence outside. "...it's because every single one of them can't imagine their life without you in it."

For a long time, he doesn't speak.

His breathing catches once. Then again.

He laughs quietly through the tears gathering in his eyes. "...You're really laying it on thick for a birthday."

"I know."

"You trying to make me cry?"

You smile, brushing the same stubborn strand of hair away from his forehead that you'd smoothed back that morning. "No." A gentle kiss against his temple. "I'm just telling you the truth."

Something inside him finally gives way.

Not dramatically. There are no great sobs. No speeches.

Just one quiet exhale that seems to carry years of loneliness away with it.

A tear slips silently down his cheek. Then another.

Without saying a word, he turns towards you and buries his face against your neck exactly as though that's where he'd always belonged.

You wrap your arms around him instinctively, your fingers disappearing into his hair as he lets himself be held. Completely.

For perhaps the first time in his life, Steve Harrington doesn't apologise for crying.

He doesn't explain it away. He simply allows someone else to carry the weight for a little while.

You press one last kiss into his hair. "Happy birthday, sweetheart."

His reply is almost lost against your shoulder. "...Best one I've ever had."

You close your eyes, holding him a little tighter as the fairy lights continue glowing softly beyond the bedroom window.

This morning he'd asked if he could skip his birthday.

Now, listening to the steady rhythm of his breathing against your chest, you realise birthdays were never really supposed to celebrate surviving another year.

Sometimes they're simply an excuse for everybody who loves you to remind you how very glad they are that you did.

dividers: saradika-graphics

new taglist: @whispersoflost, @teheblue, @mr-joel-keeny, @je33123, @eller41, @bluehexagon8, @n4ina-07, @prettyfortucker, @leahfaith, @keerymylove, @sexyvixen7, @writingforuandme, @oohlillie, @lacywithdrawal, @stoneyggirl2, @kurtsw7rld96, @simply-a-book-lover

[jinxispunk]

hi! can i request a VERY fluffy steve fic of him just absolutely worshipping reader and being all over her and just being a cute obsessed bf

ahhh thank you so much for sending this one in!!

i fear "cute obsessed boyfriend steve" is one of my favourite versions of him to write. i love the idea that he doesn't even realise how obvious he is, while everybody else is just forced to watch this man orbit his girlfriend twenty-four hours a day pahah 😭

also, if you like fluffy obsessed bf steve fics, check out some of my other fics! (lovers lake, don't go far, nap trap, hold this for me, right where you left me, freckles) 🫶

i really hope i did your request justice, and thank you for such a lovely prompt x

like it's instinct

Steve Harrington x reader

Summary: Everybody has accepted one simple fact: if you walk into a room, Steve Harrington won't be far behind.

Warnings/tags: 18+ ONLY, minors DNI, no use of y/n, established relationship, fluff, obsessed boyfriend steve harrington, so much physical touch, praise, teasing, no plot just vibes, comfort fic (lmk if i missed anything)

W/C: 3k

Read more of my writing here: [masterlist]

If you want to be added to my taglist, leave a comment to lmk!

Robin notices first.

Not because Steve is being particularly obvious, but because she's spent enough years beside him to recognise the difference between habit and instinct.

Habit is grabbing his keys before leaving the house. Habit is checking the back door twice before bed, or reaching for the light switch with his elbow when both hands are full. Instinct is quieter than that. It lives beneath conscious thought. It's the tiny decisions your body makes before your brain has had chance to catch up.

Instinct is the way Steve's attention shifts every single time you enter a room.

He doesn't dramatically stop what he's doing. He doesn't lose his train of thought or stare like somebody in a romance film. It's subtler than that. Halfway through explaining something to Dustin behind the Family Video counter, his eyes lift almost imperceptibly towards the door a fraction of a second before the bell above it rings.

Then you walk in.

You're carrying two paper bags from the bakery down the road, your handbag slipping further down your shoulder as you nudge the door closed behind you with your hip.

Steve smiles.

Robin has seen Steve Harrington smile thousands of times over the years. She's seen the cocky smiles, the embarrassed smiles, the polite customer-service smiles he reserves for difficult customers, even the exhausted ones that followed too many nights spent fighting monsters.

This one is none of those.

It isn't bigger. It's softer. It settles across his face so naturally it almost looks unconscious, like the expression was already waiting for you before you'd even stepped through the door.

"...Hey."

You smile back immediately. "Hi."

"How'd it go?"

"Successful." You lift one of the paper bags slightly. "They had cinnamon swirls."

Steve looks absurdly pleased. "They did?"

"Mhm."

"I thought they'd sold out."

"They almost had."

The conversation carries on as though nothing remarkable has happened.

And that's exactly why Robin notices it.

Before you've even reached the counter, Steve reaches over without interrupting himself, lifting the strap of your handbag from your shoulder and setting it gently beside the till. He doesn't ask if you want him to. You don't thank him.

Neither of you even seems to register that it's happened.

Somewhere between your first date and now, little acts of care have stopped feeling like kindnesses.

They've simply become the shape your lives have quietly settled into.

Robin watches him continue talking to Dustin as though he'd done nothing at all.

Then, a few moments later, she watches his hand drift up again.

Your hair has started doing that thing it always does after a humid day, one stubborn strand curling across your face. Steve brushes it gently behind your ear without breaking the conversation, his fingertips lingering for barely a second before they disappear again.

You don't react.

Not because you don't like it.

Because it's so normal that neither of you thinks twice about it anymore.

Robin slowly turns towards Dustin.

He'd been watching exactly the same thing.

"...Did he just-"

"Yep."

"He literally couldn't help himself."

"Nope."

Steve finally glances over, faintly suspicious. "What?"

Robin folds her arms. "Nothing."

She nods vaguely towards Dustin. "Carry on."

Steve studies the two of them for another second before shrugging, immediately turning back towards you.

The conversation resumes.

Robin waits. "...Give it five minutes."

Dustin raises an eyebrow. "For what?"

"He'll do it again."

"You wanna bet?"

Robin doesn't even consider it. "No."

Barely thirty seconds later, you squeeze behind Steve to reach the shelves at the back of the shop.

Without looking, without thinking, he shifts sideways to make room before his hand settles lightly against the small of your back, guiding you past him with the sort of unconscious gentleness most people reserve for carrying something fragile.

Robin lets out a long sigh. "...Because I'd lose."

It isn't even that Steve is particularly affectionate.

It's that, somewhere along the way, affection stopped becoming something he consciously decided to do.

Love, you've discovered, doesn't always arrive in the form of three words.

Sometimes it looks like Steve quietly moving your favourite mug to the front of the cupboard because he knows you'll reach for it first. Sometimes it looks like him walking an extra ten minutes because one bakery makes the cinnamon swirls you like best. Sometimes it looks like the heavier shopping bag disappearing from your hand halfway through the walk home, or your favourite hoodie somehow finding its way into your wardrobe after you'd spent weeks stealing it from his.

None of those things is remarkable on their own.

Together, they become a language.

You don't remember exactly when it happened.

There wasn't a particular morning when Steve woke up and decided to memorise every tiny thing about you. He simply accumulated them. The way you always forgot to eat lunch when you were reading. Which songs you'd skip every single time they came on the radio. The fact that you unconsciously rubbed your wrists together whenever you were anxious. The tiny crease that appeared between your eyebrows whenever you were trying not to cry.

He notices everything.

Not because he's looking for things to notice.

Because, somewhere along the way, paying attention to you simply became one of the ways he moved through the world.

The sweetest moments are the ones nobody else is really supposed to hear.

You'll all be crowded around the Wheeler's dining table arguing over takeaway when Steve leans across just enough to murmur, "You eaten enough, honey?" so quietly you're not even sure anyone else heard him.

Or you'll be halfway through one of Dustin's increasingly dramatic conspiracy theories when Steve quietly asks, "You alright?" after noticing you've gone unusually quiet, his hand settling briefly against your knee beneath the table where nobody else can see.

They're never grand declarations.

Just tiny check-ins.

Little reminders that, even in a room full of people, some part of him is always listening for you.

The only problem is that Steve has absolutely no idea how loudly he speaks.

One afternoon you're all gathered in the Harringtons' living room for another movie marathon. Robin is attempting to ration the snacks with increasingly little success, Dustin is loudly complaining that nobody ever lets him pick the film, and Lucas has somehow managed to start a completely unrelated argument about whether Aliens counts as science fiction or horror.

You wander over with a bowl of popcorn, settling onto the sofa beside Steve before offering it to him.

Without taking his eyes off the television, he reaches in for a handful. "Thanks, sweetheart."

The room falls completely silent. Steve keeps watching the film. Robin slowly lowers the bag of crisps she'd been holding. Lucas bites the inside of his cheek so hard he almost hurts himself. Dustin simply stares.

Steve finally notices the silence. "...What?"

Robin points at him. "Sweetheart?"

He blinks. "...Yeah?"

"You just called her sweetheart."

"I know."

"...In front of people."

Another blink. "So?"

Robin looks genuinely lost for words. She turns to you instead. "Does he actually call you that all the time?"

You can't help smiling. "Honestly... I don't remember the last time he actually used my name."

Steve finally looks away from the television. "...That's not true."

You raise an eyebrow. "When was the last time?"

He opens his mouth. Pauses. Actually thinks about it. "...Huh."

Robin claps once. "Oh my God."

You laugh. "You call me Honey."

Steve nods. "Mhm."

"Sweetheart."

"Mhm."

"Pretty girl."

"Mhm."

"My love."

"Mhm."

"Baby."

Another nod. "Mhm."

Robin throws both hands into the air. "You are absolutely insufferable."

A faint blush creeps up Steve's neck. "I didn't realise."

"No," Robin says. "That's the worrying part."

Dustin leans forward. "Dude."

"What?"

"I think you might actually be the most down-bad person in Indiana."

Steve looks between the three of you, still appearing genuinely confused. "I've got a girlfriend."

"...Yeah."

"I like her."

The room dissolves into laughter.

Steve waits patiently for everyone to finish. Then, with complete sincerity, "...Am I missing something?"

You can't stop yourself. Still laughing, you shuffle a little closer until your shoulder brushes his, your hand finding his almost automatically. His fingers lace through yours without either of you looking down.

Robin watches the movement. She lets out a long, theatrical sigh. "...Hopeless."

Steve glances across. "For holding my girlfriend's hand?"

"No." She smiles despite herself. "For somehow making being disgustingly in love look like the most ordinary thing in the world."

Steve looks down at your joined hands. His thumb strokes once across your knuckles before he looks back up again. "...It is ordinary."

The room falls unexpectedly quiet. Not awkwardly. Just quietly.

Because that's the thing everybody keeps getting wrong.

Steve isn't trying to show you off. He isn't making some grand romantic gesture. He isn't performing for anyone.

This isn't the version of love that lives in films or Valentine's cards. It's smaller than that. Quieter.

It lives in mugs of tea and absent-minded touches. In pet names that have entirely replaced your own. In the unconscious certainty that if you're nearby, he'll somehow end up beside you without ever deciding to move.

To Steve, loving you has become so completely woven into the fabric of ordinary life that he no longer recognises it as anything unusual.

It's simply who he is.

The house is finally quiet by the time everyone leaves.

The front door clicks shut behind Dustin's endless complaints about carrying too many VHS tapes, Robin shouts something about Steve actually tidying up this time, and then, almost as suddenly as they'd all arrived, the noise disappears. Their laughter drifts down the driveway before dissolving into the familiar rumble of an engine somewhere beyond the end of the street, leaving the house wrapped in a kind of silence that only ever arrives after good company has gone home.

Steve doesn't move straight away.

He stands by the living room window for another moment, watching the last pair of taillights disappear into the darkness, one hand still loosely entwined with yours as though he'd forgotten he was holding it in the first place.

"They're never quiet when they leave," you murmur.

A smile tugs at the corner of his mouth. "I think they do it on purpose."

"They definitely do."

You give his hand a gentle tug. "C'mere."

He follows without hesitation. He always does.

The kitchen still bears all the evidence of movie night: half-empty bowls of popcorn, abandoned glasses, crumpled napkins and a deck of cards that nobody had ever actually used. You begin clearing it together without discussing who'll do what, moving around one another with the effortless rhythm that only comes from years of sharing ordinary evenings.

Steve rinses the bowls while you stack the dishwasher. You wipe the worktops just as he reaches over your shoulder to put the cloth back beneath the sink. Every so often your hands meet reaching for the same thing, and one of you instinctively steps aside before the other has even realised there's something to make room for.

It no longer feels like coordinating. It feels like remembering.

Like two people who have spent so long building a life together that even the smallest routines have settled into muscle memory.

You're reaching onto your tiptoes to return the final mug to the cupboard when Steve quietly appears behind you. "Need a hand?"

"I've got it."

"I know."

His hand settles against your waist anyway. Not because he thinks you need help. Simply because you're there.

You glance over your shoulder, catching the faintly absent expression on his face, and smile. "You know they keep making fun of you for this."

His brow furrows. "For what?"

"This." You rest your own hand lightly over his where it's still sitting against your waist. "You can't seem to go more than five minutes without touching me."

He actually thinks about it. "...Can't I?"

"I don't know."

A small frown settles between his eyebrows. "...Probably not."

You laugh. "I noticed."

A faint blush begins creeping across his cheeks. "I don't really mean to."

"I know."

"I'm not trying to..." He gestures vaguely between the two of you, searching for words that never seem to come quite as easily as his actions. "I don't want you thinking I'm following you around."

"I know."

"It's just..." He trails off again. Then shrugs. "...I always want to know where you are."

There's no flourish to the sentence. No dramatic confession. He says it with exactly the same honesty he'd use to tell you he's hungry, or that it's probably going to rain tomorrow. Simple. Matter-of-fact. Entirely true.

Your chest tightens. "Why?"

He looks genuinely puzzled by the question, as though the answer should be obvious. "I don't know." He smiles a little, almost shyly. "I just..." Another shrug. "...I like being wherever you are."

For a moment neither of you says anything.

The clock above the stove ticks softly in the background. Somewhere outside, a car passes at the end of the street.

You think about all the times you've caught him doing exactly that. Wandering into the garden because you'd gone out to water the flowers. Appearing in the kitchen moments after you'd decided to make tea. Sitting beside you on the sofa despite there being six perfectly empty seats elsewhere in the room. None of it calculated. None of it deliberate. Just Steve.

"So," you say eventually, slipping your fingers through his, "Robin's right."

He groans immediately. "Oh, don't encourage her."

"You crossed the entire kitchen because I opened one cupboard."

"I did not."

"You absolutely did."

"I..." His eyes drift down between the two of you for the first time, only now seeming to notice how close he's standing. "...Huh."

You can't help smiling. "Huh?"

"I really did."

"You really did."

He rubs the back of his neck, looking almost embarrassed now. "I swear I'm not trying to be weird."

"Weird?"

"I just..." He laughs quietly through his nose. "Sometimes I look up and somehow I've ended up next to you again."

The words make something warm unfurl inside your chest. Because he's right. You've noticed it too. Not just tonight. Always. It's almost impossible to remember a room where Steve hadn't eventually found his way beside you, as naturally as water finding its level.

You reach up and smooth an unruly strand of hair back from his forehead. "Steve."

"Hm?"

"I have never once wished you were further away."

His eyes flutter closed almost instantly. Such a tiny touch. Barely the brush of your fingertips through his hair. Yet he leans into it with the quiet contentment of someone who's finally stopped pretending they don't need to be looked after too.

"I like it when you do that," he admits.

"I know. I like it when you do it too. You always play with my hair when you think I'm tired."

"I know."

"You rub my back when I'm stressed."

"Yeah."

"You kiss my forehead whenever I'm overthinking."

"I know." His eyes open again. "You notice all that?"

You laugh softly. "Steve." Your thumb traces gently across his cheek. "I notice everything."

You notice the way he checks the locks twice before bed after a difficult week. The way he automatically reaches for your hand in crowded places without ever looking. The tiny crease between his eyebrows whenever he thinks everyone else is relying on him too much. The way he relaxes, almost imperceptibly, whenever you touch his hair. You notice the way he pretends he's not tired because everyone else is. The way he instinctively gives away the last slice of pizza. The way he apologises when somebody else bumps into him.

You notice him because you've spent years loving him.

Just as he's spent years loving you.

He looks at you for a long moment, something impossibly tender settling across his features. "I don't know why everyone keeps laughing."

"They think you're attached at my hip."

"They do."

"They're not wrong."

He smiles sheepishly. "I just..." Another pause. "...You're my favourite place."

The words leave him so quietly you almost think you'd imagined them. No rehearsed speech. No perfect line. Just the truth.

"I spend all day wanting to tell you things," he continues, almost laughing at himself now. "If Robin says something ridiculous, I want to tell you. If Dustin does something stupid, I want you to see it. If something good happens, you're the first person I think about. If something bad happens..." He shrugs. "...I still want you."

His fingers tighten gently around yours. "So I guess..." He smiles. "...I just end up wherever you are."

Your vision blurs before you even realise your eyes have filled. "You make it very difficult not to fall in love with you every single day."

His expression softens. "You still do?"

You laugh. "Steve."

"I know we've been together a long time."

"I know."

"I just..." He looks almost bashful. "I hope you still do."

Your answer is a kiss. Slow. Unhurried. The sort of kiss that has nothing left to prove.

When you finally pull away, his forehead settles against yours once more, his hand finding yours again without either of you acknowledging the movement.

Neither of you comments on it. Neither of you needs to.

For Steve Harrington, love has long since stopped being something he says.

It's the way he reaches for your hand without thinking. The way he unconsciously ends up beside you in every room. The way every ordinary day bends itself around one quiet certainty:

Wherever you are is exactly where he wants to be.

dividers: saradika-graphics

new taglist: @whispersoflost, @teheblue, @mr-joel-keeny, @je33123, @eller41, @bluehexagon8, @n4ina-07, @prettyfortucker, @leahfaith, @keerymylove, @sexyvixen7, @writingforuandme, @oohlillie, @lacywithdrawal, @stoneyggirl2, @kurtsw7rld96, @simply-a-book-lover

[yasministration]

the first little nugget - steve h.

summary: the party comes to visit you and steve after the newest member of your family is introduced. wc: 1.1k+ cw: family fluff

Steve almost tackles Mike at the door when he enters the house too loudly. The five guests go still in the doorway as Steve holds a finger to his lips, whispering “She just went to sleep.” Max breaks out into a grin at Steve words, taking in his appearance: hair messy, t-shirt crinkled, a tiny diaper in his free hand. And behind him approaches the most beautiful woman they’ve seen in a while, wearing a beautiful dress, a wide smile on her face. Dustin pushes past Steve to give you a tight hug, mumbling “Hi mom.”

You hug Dustin tightly, a hand cradling the back of his head, and Lucas asks “How come you’re over here looking beautiful and your husband looks like hell?” Steve huffs as he straightens up, accepting the kind hug Will comes to give him while everyone gushes over you. “Well, my husband has been on baby duty all day so I could feel human again. Been waiting to wear this dress for nine months.”

“So I take it we’re not going to have the chance to see the baby?” Dustin asks, and you glance over at Steve to see his response. “You’ll get to see her when she wakes up.” He decides, ushering everyone over to the couches. It’s only when he waves his arms around that he spots the diaper in his hand, and he settles it on a table as he follows everyone. Steve fights the pout off his face when Max and Will sit down on either side of you, Max cuddling into your side as you hug her. He supposes he can’t be constantly hogging you, especially since they hadn’t seen you since you’d given birth. None of them lingered around for long apart from Dustin. They had seen how tired you were, and only dropped off gifts and congratulations before disappearing from sight. Despite your exhaustion, Dustin stayed sat across from you as Steve held you in his arms, telling you stories. It made you feel good - being treated normally.

Steve disappears for a moment to get everyone glasses of water, and Mike smirks to himself, impressed with how well Steve is behaving. He doesn’t comment on it now, but he will later when they all leave. Steve breathes out, and just as he squats onto the chair behind him, a loud cry sounds. His eyes shut tightly, but he doesn’t utter a single complaint as he begins standing again. “Steve, sit.” You call out, unravelling yourself from Max’s arms and standing up. Your husband shakes his head, muttering “Everyone’s here to see you, hon.” You cup his face in a single hand, kissing him quickly before continuing down the hallway.

Max follows you, her footsteps light behind you as she asks “Can I come with?” Her only response is the way you intertwine your fingers in hers, pulling her along with you. Max stands in the doorway of the nursery, shifting her weight from foot to food as she watches you carefully lift up tiny little Charlotte into your arms. She cries loudly, little face scrunched up in dissatisfaction, but Max doesn’t see a hint of stress on your face. You sway with her in your arms for a few minutes, and when she doesn’t relent, you decide she’s hungry.

Max races to sit next to you when you take a seat, moving aside your clothing to feed your daughter. She watched in astonishment as Charlotte instantly calms down, and smiles widely. “You’re already so good at this.” Max mumbles, looking up at you with wide eyes shimmering with adoration. “You caught us on a good day,” You tell her, but smile down at your daughter and add “But yeah, I think we’re doing pretty good.”

“Steve being good to you?” She suddenly asks, voice completely serious. You’re surprised she asks, but at the same time you’re not. If anyone were to be this protective over you, it would be Max, even with a husband as pure as Steve. “Steve is taking such good care of both of us. Isn’t he, Charlie?” Charlotte hums against your breast, and you take that as a yes. Max laughs joyfully, but her attention is stolen from you when the door creaks open a little wider. Steve pokes his head through the doorway, nothing but love and fondness written on his face. “I love you girls so much.” He says, even though he had only come here to check up on you. You grin up at your husband as he walks towards you, and Max takes the moment to glance around the room.

She spots a little camera propped up on a shelf, specifically there for moments like this, and she rushes to turn it on, pressing her index finger down on the photo button when Steve rests a hand on the couch behind you, leaning down to capture your lips in a loving kiss.

“Um, where she’s done feeding, can I hold her?” Asks Max.

“And then me?” All three heads snap over to the door, where four other figures are now standing. Dustin smiles innocently, hoping to get baby carrying privileges. “Left you guys for two seconds.” Steve grumbles jokingly, but he smiles widely as Will retorts “You’re gonna have to get used to that with kids.”

“Can I also hold her?” Asks Mike from the doorway, where he perks up to get your attention. “Yeah, me too!” Lucas says, raising his hand.

Steve crouches down in front of you as you begin pulling Charlotte away from your breast, pinching the material of your dress to quickly cover you from your audience. “Give me ten minutes and you’ll all have a turn.” You let everyone know, but they stay in the doorway, watching as you carefully shift your daughter to your other side. They respectfully avert their eyes from you when Steve pulls aside the front of your dress, helping Charlotte latch on to your other breast.

Steve squeezes himself between you and Max on the couch, looking at the four boys who stay stood in the doorway. Your husband nods over to the cushions stacked up by the door and says “You guys can sit down if you want.” And then, “Wait, do you mind, baby?”

“Come sit down.”

The four boys scramble to line up the pillows in front of you, all sitting down and staring up at you. “Gosh I can’t believe you guys are married with a baby.” Lucas sighs, leaning his back on the wall. Steve throws an arm over your shoulders, humming softly. “Crazy, right? We were younger than you guys too when we got together.” Steve glances at the side of your face, humming softly as he says “But, you know. When you know…”

“God you’re cheesy.” Mike scoffs, but his lips purse as melancholy takes over him. He’s so undeniably happy for you, but he knew about his person and they’ll never be able to have children of their own, let alone a future together.

taglist: @bxuzi, @rory-cakes, @dlljdhsh, @aouoo, @fandomhoe101, @sharkers00, @joonbread, @paankhaleyaaar, @bearymuchso, @princesstiti14, @challengers4ev, @selenewowww, @lunavelha, @iceyyhyeji, @doiki3, @maymo0, @daisylove3, @ballylagginblues, @cosm1cpiink, @laufeysvalentine, @eyantice, @cheetoscmj, @l0vesreceipt, @snake-in-a-flower-crown

[grungewheeler]

𓂃 ࣪˖ ִֶָ🐇་༘࿐ some boyfriend!steve headcanons

boyfriend!steve, who hardly ever refers to you by name anymore. to him, you’re baby, angel, honey when he’s feeling particularly domestic. you wouldn’t be surprised if you discovered he had a whole rolodex of cheesy pet names to cycle through.

boyfriend!steve, who lives for non-sexual nudity (not that the sexual kind of nudity isn’t largely appreciated too). showering together after a long day at work, hot water and your gentle touches coaxing his muscles to relax and his mind to switch off. afterwards, you forgo dressing and simply curl up in bed. steve’s cheek rests against your chest, and the familiar sweetness of your body lotion reminds him he’s home.

boyfriend!steve, who makes you paper rings out of straw wrappers. he ties the crumpled paper ever so carefully around your ring finger across the diner’s sticky table, foot nudging your own in a childish game of footsie.

boyfriend!steve, whose passenger seat is reserved for you and you alone. the party quickly learn that, when in your company, they have zero chance of riding shotgun. quite frankly, steve would rather die than let you sit in the back whilst he’s up front. his hand is always glued to your knee, fingers drumming the beat of whatever song is playing on the car’s radio. one of your scrunchies sits on the gear stick.

boyfriend!steve, who happily carries your lip combo in his pocket so he can kiss you without fear of ruining your makeup. you put so much effort into looking so pretty, after all, and steve would hate to spoil your hard work with his neediness. besides, men’s pockets are so much deeper, anyways.

nsfw incoming…

boyfriend!steve, who is obsessed with fucking you in his sweaters, watching the way you bury your face in the knitted collar as he buries his cock deep into your cunt. your fingers curl helplessly around the sleeves each time his tip drags against your spongy walls just right, and he has a weakness for rucking the fabric up until the bottom of your tits are exposed, just enough to tease.

boyfriend!steve, who can’t help but smack your ass every time he passes you. it’s playful, most of the time, and you can hear him chuckling to himself before the gentle hit even lands. every so often, though, he can’t keep it innocent. a slap turns into a grope, and before you can blink, his bulge is heavy and hard against your ass.

boyfriend!steve, whose tone is so sweet that, in your fucked out state, you don’t even realise just how mean he’s being. he coos and kisses your temple as he mocks your little whimpers and mewls, eyes lighting up every time your lower lip quivers or your brows scrunch. ‘oh, ‘s too much? can’t take it, angel?’ he asks with a teasing pout, only driving his cock deeper, wanting you to feel him in your stomach.

[formallery]

mike realized his parents didn't love each other when he was very young, and he rationalized this as all couples don't love each other. that's until he sees the way steve treats you.

c.w. none, a little angsty in the beginning but not really sad, mostly fluff, canon divergent bc i'm pretending the byers never moved to california and max is still hanging out with the party

a/n: wrote this instead of studying for finals, do not bring ship wars into the reblogs. this is me psychoanalyzing a sad teenage boy and writing self-indulgent domestic fluff

───────── ⋅ ⋅ ⋅ ──── ♡ ─── ⋅ ⋅ ⋅ ─────────

Mike Wheeler's parents do not love each other. Maybe they have some semblance of love between them, but they are not engaged in the act of love. He isn't quite sure at what age, or even exactly when, he realized this. He can't point to one exact day of his life but rather a blur of the hundreds of evenings he's spent the same way.

Sitting at the dinner table with his parents and two sisters while his mother puts out emotional fires and his father picks at his chicken then tells his mom it's over salted. Nancy has a teeth-cleaning on Saturday so she needs to move her date with Jonathan. Also how is her chemistry grade? Mrs. Sinclair recommended a great tutor. Holly's daycare closes early tomorrow so someone needs to pick her up. Does one of Mike's friends want to earn some cash babysitting? Oh and is Mike still going out with his friends after school tomorrow?

Somewhere in the middle of his mother's rambles his father will stand up muttering a "thank you," not to be polite but because it's expected, and walks over to the couch to watch TV without putting his dish in the sink. He'll watch whatever sports game is on and crack a beer while his mother cleans the kitchen.

There is no animosity or arguing between Ted and Karen, only tolerance and mutual existence.

Eventually, the idea of love becomes near repulsive to him. The idea of his parents engaging in any sort of affection makes him nauseous. It's not the childish disgust Lucas has seeing his father kiss his mother but a deep-seated discomfort. A part of him (smaller or bigger than he'd like, he's not quite sure) believes love doesn't exist. It's simply a pleasant lie society feeds one another, because the idea of being alone is terrifying.

That's until he finds himself half-asleep on Steve Harrington's living room floor.

He's been having a lot of sleepovers with his friends since the Starcourt Mall incident. None of them want to be the person who says it but they're all terrified of being alone. He's woken up quite a few times in a cold sweat with gory images in his mind, and he doubts he's the only one. Steve's parents are hardly ever in town so his house becomes the designated place for sleepovers.

The credits are rolling for whatever movie they watched, Mike can't remember because he fell asleep half-way through. His memory is hazy of what time they started but if he had to guess it's probably close to one in the morning.

Dustin is fast asleep next to him on the floor and Will's knocked out on the couch above them. They had been designing their characters for a new DND campaign, Mike's pretty sure there's pen on his cheek from falling asleep while writing the character details.

One of the other side of the couch Max is squished between El and Lucas, and he sincerely doubts she'll mind come morning. She'll probably be grateful considering she's been having some of the worst nightmares.

His eyes make his way over to the loveseat where you had been sitting with Steve. What once started as a respectable distance to avoid incurring any teasing has disappeared. You're leaning on Steve, curled into his side and he has an arm wrapped around you, rubbing your shoulders. You're trying to focus on the credits, dangerously close to dozing off while Steve stares down at you with something in his eyes Mike can't quite understand.

What he does understand is that his parents have never held each other like that.

"You sleepin' over there baby?" Steve's voice is a soft murmur, smiling as he looks down at you.

"Mmmm…" you let out a sleepy hum, barely acknowledging his words before burrowing deeper into his side.

Steve's smile widens in response and all of a sudden Mike's stomach twists. It's not disgust or repulsion but… embarrassment. He's intruding on something special, he should just close his eyes and go back to sleep. That's what he should do, but he can't bring himself to.

"Mmm…. need to put… the kids,” you mumble just barely comprehensible in your sleepy stupor.

“What about the kids sweetheart?” Steve whispers brushing hair out of your face.

“Put em to bed….” you’re practically in Steve’s lap despite the fact the loveseat was made for two. “Mike and Dustin are on the floor… and clean up…..”

“I’ll do it,” Steve murmurs gently and kisses your forehead, “but first I'm putting you to bed.”

“No…..” your brow furrows in your half conscious state.

“Yes,” Steve smooths out the crease with his thumb and kisses your cheek. Then in one smooth movement he’s standing up and hoisting you into his arms, all while making sure the blanket is still tucked around you. You let out a quiet giggle when he picks you up and he notices.

"Having fun over there?" he teases quietly, pressing a kiss to the top of your head. It's almost a knee-jerk reaction, he can't keep his lips off you.

"I feel special," you whisper as if you're sharing a secret and Steve's face softens even more. Mike didn't know it was possible for someone to look at another person like that.

"You are special," Steve whispers in that same secretive tone and kisses your forehead. "C'mon pretty, let's get you to bed."

Your words fade into quiet indecipherable whispers and giggles as Steve carries you to and up the staircase and Mike finds himself staring at the empty loveseat. A million thoughts swirling in his head and none at the same time. He's about to sit up when he hears Steve coming down the staircase and immediately closes his eyes, pretending to be asleep.

He doesn't know why, he could just pretend he woke up now. He doesn't have to give Steve any indication that he witnessed their intimate moment, but for some reason a part of him believe that waking up now would ruin something. Something he can't quite put words to.

The older teen shuffles around a little, turning off the TV, before coming over to where Mike and Dustin are laying on the floor. Then before Mike knows it Steve is lifting him up and placing him on the couch. He feels like a little kid being carried to bed after falling asleep on the car ride home. Though that only happened once or twice at his mother's insistence, usually his father woke him up to walk inside.

He hears some more shuffling and then the couch dips presumably with Dustin's weight. He hears the sounds of Steve cleaning up trash and crafts, carefully organizing their DND papers as to not be scolded later. Just when he thinks Steve is about to head upstairs a blanket is gently tucked around his shoulders and a damp cloth is pressed to his cheek to wipe the pen marks off.

"Wheeler?" Steve whispers gently, and his body tenses but his eyes don't open.

Noticing the tension in his body, Mike hears Steve let out a huff indicating he's smiling. He tucks the blanket a little tighter and ruffles Mike's hair.

"Go to bed kid."

Steve tucks a blanket around Dustin before flicking off all the lights and setting the heater to a comfortable temperature. Then he quietly creeps upstairs and Mike can hear the soft murmurs of you two speaking. He doesn't need to be in the room to have an idea of what's being said.

He sleeps better than he has in months.

[roanofarcc]

Hi! I think it would be pretty nice if like,Steve Harrington and reader are in a party or just a social event in their early relationship,then reader gets drunk and Steve is really scared to just stay close because he’s afraid that maybe what happened to Nancy happened to reader too. But then reader gets suuuper clingy and says she loves him and something like that (sorry if it’s a bit confusing,writing is not really my best quality 😓)

DRUNK (AND IN LOVE)

pairing. steve harrington x fem!reader

summary. when you get drunk at a holiday party, steve worries he'll relive when his heart was broken all over again. but you have a way of beating his expectations.

warnings. drunk reader; just lots of fluff and an anxious steve

word count. 1.1k | masterlist

The annual Buckley Christmas party was a clash of handmade decorations and expensive alcohol that Robin's dad's brother brought. The home was packed to the brim with people dressed in red and green, and smelled like cookies and wine.

Normally, Steve spent the party sneaking Robin booze when her mom wasn't looking, and standing on the sidelines until Max and El demanded that he dance with them.

This year was different, though; he had a date.

You and Steve had been dating for six months, but it was your first party together. You were excited, having planned out your outfit weeks in advance. Steve was excited too. There were a few things he liked as much as he liked having you at his side, so he could introduce you as his girlfriend. It made him giddy.

He would have spent the entire night showing you off as his brilliant, smart, quick-witted, and beautiful girlfriend, but you pulled him toward the kitchen, where Robin was snacking on the enormous amount of finger food that lined the counter.

Steve joined her in snacking while you poured yourself a drink. Since Steve drove, you had planned on having a drink or two. But as the night went on, between the dancing, a couple games of cards with the kids, and updates from Robin on any interesting family gossip, you had lost count of how many glasses you drank.

It didn't really hit you until you and Steve were back on the makeshift dance floor, full of young couples and old women who were reliving their glory days. Each sway felt like it was dialed up to ten in your head. Steve wasn't spinning you, but you were dizzy.

But it was a good kind of dizzy.

It was a noticeable kind of dizzy too.

You tried to keep dancing as normally as you could muster, not wanting to give away how tipsy you were, but your feet betrayed you. You stumbled slightly, but Steve re-adjusted his hold on your waist and gave you a funny look before you started giggling.

"Is the room spinning for you too?" you whispered, but it was still kind of loud. You had a drink in your hand and held onto Steve with your other.

"I think those drinks were a little stronger than Robin thought, huh?" he said, a small smile on his lips. You didn't see the twinkle of worry in his gaze; you were too caught up in how cute he was in his button-up shirt.

"Noooo," you said, drawing out the word a little more than necessary. "I feel fine. So fine! I could-" you cut yourself off with a hiccup before giggling once more.

In a series of missteps, partially due to your dizziness and because of the crowd, as you moved your arm with the drink, someone backed right into it. The amber color of the spiked cider splashed on your nice, light-colored top.

A frown pulled at your lips as you looked down at the wet stain. "Oh, man."

The person you bumped into you rushed out an apology, but you waved them off with a 'it's fine.' Putting one foot in front of the other, albeit a little clumsily, you started for the bathroom. Steve was quick on your heels, using his hands to steady you and ensure you didn't bump into anyone on your way.

In the bathroom, you reached for the sink and started to try to rub the stain out with a hand towel you pulled from the rack.

"Hey," Steve said, his voice soft, almost hesitant. "That's not gonna work, honey."

You huffed, letting him take the towel from you. Twisting around to face you, you noticed the frown that had settled on his lips. You almost forgot about your ruined shirt at the sight and reached up, poking the corners of his mouth with your fingers.

"You're too pretty to frown," you told him, frowning yourself. "Are you mad at me?"

He blinked and shook his head quickly. "No, I'm not mad."

"You don't look happy." Steve was often happy. When he was around you, you marveled at his little smile and the way his eyes seemed to shine when he laughed. You silently made it your mission to keep that look on his face forever. You liked him happy. You liked that you could make him happy.

Steve sighed and ran a hand through his hair. "I'm just a little...out of it."

You whispered, as if anyone could you were two in the locked bathroom near the back of the house, "Did you have some of the cider too?"

"No," he whispered back. "Here." His fingers moved quickly to unbutton his shirt and untuck it from his slacks. He had a soft t-shirt on underneath, one that matched the color of his socks, which you lovingly teased him for when you two were getting ready.

He helped you slip your arms into the shirt, and it perfectly covered your stained top, not that you cared that much what you looked like, but it was probably a better look.

You got that same lopsided grin on your face anytime he did something that you deemed 'stupidly romantic. You made that face a lot because Steve was such a sap. He was the kind of boyfriend who gave you his coat when there was a slight chill in the air, and carried you over puddles so you didn't ruin your shoes. He held your umbrella and always walked you to your door.

"Steve," you said, and he tensed up as you placed your hands on his shoulders, suddenly very serious. "I have to tell you something."

He swallowed thickly, hands just ghosting your hips like he was suddenly nervous to touch you.

You got close enough so you were nose to nose before you said, "I love you."

Steve's eyes widened, and a look of surprise overwhelmed his expression. "You what?"

You somehow managed to get even closer, pressing your forehead against his. "I. Love. You. A lot. Like...Like you know, when people say 'I love you to the moon and back?' Well, I like you to freaking Jupiter and back. Or to, like, another galaxy and back. I don't have the numbers on hand for how much distance that is, but I can ask Dustin or something because that's how much I love-"

A surprised gasp finished your sentence before Steve's lips were on yours. His hands gripped your waist as you circled your arms around his neck, pulling him impossibly closer.

You didn't want to pull away, not when his lips were soft and his skin was hot, but you both needed to breathe.

He grinned back at you, the worry in his eyes long gone. "I love you too."

[cielasolana]

10:33PM - A man who yearns is a man who earns. 

A man who yearns is a man who earns. And Steve Harrington is a yearner. In fact, he’s a bit embarrassed by how badly he yearns for you. The overwhelming desire to be in your presence. So, he tries to dial it back, he really does. Steve feels like nonchalance is key to keeping a girl, if he tries too hard, acts too into you— he’s gonna scare you off.

He tries, he really does. 

But it never goes to plan. Because the way Steve looks at you makes it clear that he wants you, and much to his dismay, he really really really wants to be clingy. 

Which is why, after your date, he meanders at your door. The poor boy is trying to get you to invite him in, it would be far too presumptuous of him to invite himself in, he’d never dare. Instead, he lurks, making small talk that you two haven’t engaged in since the very first time you met. It has you tilting your head at him, a bit confused, hand linked with his as you swing your arms back and forth lightly.

“So… you think the weather is gonna improve? It’s been snowing a lot.” 

The unimpressed look you give him is enough for him to offer you a sheepish smile, bringing your hand to his lips to kiss your knuckles in an attempt to distract you that almost works. “Steve, if you want to keep hanging out, you can just say that.”

And he blinks at you, owlish, as if that thought hadn’t occurred to him. His thumb rubs over your knuckles as he lowers your hand from his lips. “We don’t have to if you—”

“Did I say that?”

At this, his cheeks turn a delicious shade of pink, and he looks away for a moment. “If you wanna.” Is all he can manage, because who is he to impose? Steve has this constant worry of being too much, because if he’s too much you’ll grow tired of him. He can’t have that, he likes you after all, really likes you. 

And you sigh, releasing his hand and waving him inside with a finger to your lips to signify the need to be quiet. It’s a tad late after all. He’s a bit anxious over it, awkward as he follows you up the stairs like a lost puppy as he makes his way into your bedroom. He sits on your bed, plopping down onto it unceremoniously, toying with the stuffed animal that rests at the center. He brings it to his lap.

You laugh softly at the sight, and he looks up at you, a bashful sort of look on his face as he puts the stuffed animal to the side, spreading his legs so you can stand between them. He sighs contentedly as your hands come to his cheeks— his eyes fluttering shut as he lets head lull a bit in your palms. Pliant to your touch, per usual. His own hands come to your hips. 

“You can ask if you wanna hang out more.” Comes your soft murmur, thumbs smoothing over his cheeks. He sighs, his eyes fluttering open to look at you. Truly, he looks angelic, gazing up at you through his lashes as if you put the stars in the sky.

“I don't wanna be a bother.” Steve responds with a shrug, his attempt at maintaining nonchalance. But someone like Steve Harrington is simply not built for nonchalance. 

And you hum, hand coming to his chin. Man, he really likes when you do that. “You aren’t, ever.” 

Steve swears his heart melts, his hands sliding down, he brings a hand to your thigh to gently tug you into his lap. You go willingly, knees bracketing his sides, they press into the mattress as Steve’s hands slide to the backs of your thighs to support you. He revels in the affection, the closeness. “Yeah.”

“I’m serious.” You say, and he knows you are. Logically. But there’s a part of him that’s still nervous about being too much. 

He presses his lips together into a thin line, hands absently sliding up and down your thighs. “I really like you, y’know?” He admits, leaning forward to rest his forehead against your chest. 

“And I really like you.” 

Steve can’t help but shake his head. “You don’t get it. I really like you.” He says it almost insistently, a bit pained. “Like I wanna be around you all the time.”

A grin washes over your face, your hand sliding to his hair to gently scratch his scalp. “Is there a reason I wouldn’t like that?” 

And Steve gives you a look that says ‘you aren’t getting it.’ His brows furrowing, he almost pouts. “I’m not trying to act all clingy.” He says the word with such distaste and disgust, you’d think it personally offended him. 

“I like clingy.” You gently tug his hair to make him tilt his head back, meeting his gaze. "You're my boyfriend. Being clingy is a part of the package."

He huffs, because he really thinks you're underestimating how much he likes you. How much he yearns for you. But you really seem sincere. "I guess."

"I know." Is your response, leaning down to kiss him. Slow, but also chaste. You pull back after a few moments and Steve looks like he could simply die if he doesn't get more of you. "I like clingy. It means you want me. I want you too." You tap his cheek gently.

Steve sighs, pouting a bit. "Alright. But don't come whining to me—"

You're swatting his chest in response, shaking your head.

"I just— I really like you." He breathes out, almost shy.

And you hum in acknowledgement, leaning forward to press your forehead against his. Your gaze darts over his face, analytical and contemplative, you consider him and his words. "I happen to like you quite a bit too."

And even if Steve does like you more, who doesn't want that?

So, yeah. Steve is pretty sure he likes you a lot more than you like him. But evidently, you're kinda into that.

Masterlist

feel free to tip ☕️ — always appreciated, never expected 💛

[snoopyharrington]

lovesick!steve who has the biggest crush on you, but just quite hasn’t put the puzzle pieces together to figure out that his feelings extend beyond friend territory. because you’re just as flirty and affectionate back — linking pinkies together when you’re out together, or him greeting you with the biggest hug and a kiss to the forehead because he missed his girl.

and when he’s bored at work and missing you, you bet he’s calling your landline every chance he gets, telling you all the things that cross his mind — because that’s the other thing you love about steve; he’s fearless in his affection and unashamed of how clingy he is.

(one time, you called him out on it. he scoffed, mumbled under his breath, then thought about it some more, causing his brows to wrinkle and a pout to form on his face.

“‘m I really that clingy?”

you just smiled and shook your head, “no. just teasing.”

“okay. yeah, okay, good.”)

but when you’re not home to pick up the phone to talk to steve between blocks of songs or his very serious soundbite duties, he all but leaves sonnets on your voicemail:

“hey, it’s me. are y’busy this weekend? I was thinking we could go to the drive-in. they’re showing a double feature and you know the goonies is my favorite, so my treat? oh, shit, i gotta go, the tape’s about the run out on this whitney song—“

“hey, me again. so, like, what d’you think about hamsters? I’ve been wanting a pet and i really want a puppy, but robin says she doesn’t think I’m responsible enough, which is bullshit ‘cos I’ve basically kept dustin and all those shitheads alive for years. anyway, are hamsters more low maintenance? I think i’d feel bad about keeping it in a cage all the time, though. anyway, call me back. bye.”

“hey! so, the hamster idea is in the garbage. vickie came by to visit rob and she said she had one when she was a kid and apparently they like to, like, escape? which sounded fun at first but then i feel like it’d get lost and it’d be a whole thing… so yeah, back to square one on that. but, anyway, not sure if you’re listening today but I played a few songs i think you’d like. they weren’t, like, my recommendations or anything, robin showed them to me, but a few of them sounded like the tapes you left in my car last week. i still have those, by the way… I’ll give ‘em to you next time i see you. okay, well. hope you’re having a good day.”

and maybe a normal guy would be self-conscious about leaving 15 minutes worth of voicemails on your machine, but steve’s not normal. he’s consumed by your entire being, even after being friends for a solid year or so. one time, you left a scrunchie at his house and he pocketed it, carrying it around in his levis, just in case you needed one when you were hanging out. the photostrip from the photo booth at the carnival last summer is still in his wallet, creased and pressed over again and again, the image of you kissing his cheek being the one he runs his thumb over the most.

but he’s not obsessed with you, and he definitely, definitely doesn’t have a crush on you. not even when you end up going to the drive-in that weekend and you accidentally fall asleep on his shoulder during E.T. not even when he drives you home and gently wakes you up, ghosting a thumb over the apple of your cheek. and when your bleary eyes bat open, and you see the hazel-eyed boy before you, you smile and ask him to stay over tonight.

it’s one of the easier questions he’s had to answer.

[quarterlifekitty]

You’re in ghosts phone as “DO NOT FUCKING ANSWER” and he’s in yours as “DO NOT CALL EVER” and everyone assumes it’s because you’re messy exes that keep falling back into each other’s toxic orbits but the truth is that like every time you call ghost while he’s deployed you end up crying about how you miss him and it totally breaks his heart and makes him sulk for the rest of the mission because he wants to go home so bad. So every time he’s home you’re like “okay I promise I won’t call anymore” and he’s like “I promise I won’t pick up if you do” but guess who keeps calling and guess who keeps fucking picking up anyways

[rawme-price]

Inspired by [this] post by @hurrraaid

Imagine ghost getting shot in the knee during a mission, a career ending injury, right?

He also happens to take a crowbar to the head, and it'd only by you dragging him some two miles does he even survive. You feel horrible about it, ghost was assigned to work with you after all. You spend hours in his hospital bed, even in the medically induced coma he's in.

You know your lieutenant better that most people do, had he been anyone else you would've even called yourself his friend. You also know that the military is all he has, that his apartment is empty and the only time he gets a warm meal on leave is when you drag him to your own apartment.

The whole team is there when the doctors wake him up. For the longest moment, ghost says nothing. He just stares at his legs covered by the thin blanket, the raised portion where bandage is wrapped around.

"...I'm done for then, eh?" He finally asks, voice completely blank. You have no idea how he feels about it, but you nod and take his hand.

"Cap has already handled it, sir. We got you a decent house and a monthly paycheck." A fact you had to fight like hell for, but it worked out nonetheless.

Ghost nods, looks at price "I'm not a lieutenant now? Officially done?"

At prices nod, you brace for some sort of anger or despair. An apology is already on the tip of your tongue when ghost looks back to you. His hand grips onto your bicep.

And proceeds to pull you in for a kiss.

You startle for only a second, mind stuttering over the reality of your lieutenant kissing you. Your hands burn where you touch his skin, melting into the kiss that really could be better. His lips are dry and the angle is awkward, but you'll be thinking of this moment for years later.

A cough from across the room.

Oh shit, your teams still here. You pull away, face blazing in embarrassment. Ghost looks nothing but please, with a smug look on his face as he lies back in the bed with content. At gazs pointed look and soaps gaping mouth, he says "wot? Ahm' not a lieutenant anymore. Can't get me on fraternization now, can you?"

You should probably stop to think about what just happened, but you've been fantasizing about your lieutenant kissing you since you met him.

So you ignore the sigh price lets out when you dive back in for another kiss. Ghost hums into your mouth, taking his time with this one and letting his hand rest on your waist. It's hot, heavy, and everything you've wanted.

The room quickly empties when you swing your leg up onto the bed and over his waist.

[crashingcryptid]

Simon only has one emergency contact, and it's you. The two of you have lived together for five years now, so if anything happened to him, you would need to know. He'd always assumed you would only get a call that he had died in combat, not this.

"Si? Hey, baby... It's me, you're okay." Simon grunts in acknowledgment, heart rate still spiking the monitor beside him. "Hey, eyes on me."

"Did they call you?"

"Well, yeah... That's what an emergency contact is." You tease, taking his hand and giving it a squeeze. "Your captain, he thinks we're dating."

"Are we?" Simon croaks, turning a little in the bed so he could face you. "We live together. Go on trips together. Don't date anyone else. I always choose you when it comes to hanging out with others." He rambles, eyes wandering down to your hand in his.

"You aren't in love with me. And, while I love you, I'm not in love with you." You rub your thumb across his knuckles. "There's also no one else I'd get out of bed for at three in the morning. We don't have to name it. I just know I love you."

Simon squeezes your hand back with a steady smile growing on his face. "I love you too."