InsaneJournal

They all made jokes about the co-parenting and mom and dad thing, sure, but the truth was about as close to that as they could get. The kids from Hawkins were deeply fucked up and traumatized by the bullshit around them, and nobody had really settled yet, so the responsibility of making sure the kids were eating and resting and dealing fell on the shoulders of the older ones.

Steve wasn’t complaining, not really, even though a bullshit one came out here and there. He was used to harassing Dustin and Max and Mike into making sure they were eating something besides hot pockets, but Eddie had been twitchier than normal (which was saying a lot, since Steve had only ever seen him as some level of twitchy in the last few weeks) and Steve had noticed it enough to do something about it.

By “do something”, it meant he had a pizza and some beer as he knocked on the door to Eddie’s apartment when he knew the guys were out at the arcade or whatever they did on their free time. He didn’t wait for the door to actually be answered, just opting to enter without hesitation as they’d all done to him since their arrival. “I don’t know what horrible screeching you have going on today but cut it out for ten minutes, would you? I brought food.”

Eddie liked fantasy. He'd grown up immersed in it, had read piles upon piles of novels, had crafted his D&D campaigns with a loving attention to detail, even the music he listened to tended in that direction. But he'd known fantasy from reality. He'd never thought any of it was real.

Right up until he'd watched Chrissy Cunningham die in his living room, bones snapping, eyes imploding. It had been one thing after another back home – he was actually fairly certain he would have died if he hadn't been brought here. Maybe Dustin would get him home, and to a hospital, and somehow they'd clear his name, maybe, but he doubted it. He thought maybe Mike knew for sure, but Mike was the only one and hadn't said anything to him. He certainly wasn't going to ask.

But no, instead of dying he'd been brought here, which was every bit as weird as the Upside Down but for entirely different reasons. Better reasons. A place where worlds combined, more than 30 years in the future, with all the knowledge Eddie could want in the palm of his hands. He had 30 years of music, and fantasy novels and games to catch up on, not to mention the fact that magic and dragons and everything else was real. A place where elvish wizards roleplayed as human monks.

It was A Lot, but not necessarily in a bad way. In fact, it was just about the coolest thing that had ever happened to Eddie. And it gave him a lot to focus on, which had the bonus of making sure that he had no time to focus on the shitshow he'd come from.

He'd started reading a series called Wheel of Time, had been introduced to Mario Kart and vowed that, as soon as he got paid from his new part-time job teaching guitar at the Art of Expression, he'd get a console of some sort for the kids and himself, and was doing his best to catch up on thirty-odd years and a hundred universes worth of music.

One of the bands he'd stumbled across was Blind Guardian, a band that had done an entire Lord of the Rings based concept album, and he'd been playing along to the guitar solo in Mirror Mirror when Steve walked in.

He didn't realize how hungry he was until he saw the pizza in Steve's hands.

"Okay, but only because you asked so nicely," Eddie said, getting up to set aside his guitar and turn down the stereo. He gathered the guitar notes he had strewn about the table into a messy pile so Steve would have a place to set down the box, and made his way to the kitchen to get some plates. "Good timing, man. I'm starved."

“I know, I’m amazing.” Steve flashed a dumb grin across the table as he attempted to make room for the pizza box. It was habit for him to set it down and then start picking up around it - he wasn’t sure when he became that person but sometime in the last few years. Maybe it had to do with wanting to be a good influence for the kids, or whatever girls he was hooking up with.

“It’s supreme, because I refuse to play into the ridiculous pineapple pizza war everybody has going on. Pineapple belongs in fruity cocktails, end of story.” Steve liked to have solid opinions on things, and had already formed a friendship with the small one named Blue and frankly, she terrified Steve just enough that he was already on her side in the debate.

He pulled out a beer from the six pack and slid it across the table when Eddie came back with plates. Steve flashed another grin, “I also realized after picking up the beer that I could’ve brought you some yoohoos for old time’s sake.”

"Pineapple on pizza?" Eddie asked, for a moment revulsed, right up until he thought about it a bit more. "Might not be terrible. I'd try it at least." Probably after rolling a joint or two. "Is that some sort of Vallo thing?"

He put the plates on the table, grabbed a beer, and took a seat. "Beer was definitely the right choice. Beer is always the right choice."

Which he demonstrated, after opening the bottle with a lighter, by drinking about three quarters of the bottle before he came back up for air.

“I think it’s a California thing,” Steve shrugged and piled a few pieces of pizza on his plate to scarf down. He raised an eyebrow at the beer chugging, and was sorely tempted to compete but silently reminded himself that he was mature and above that sort of thing.

Mostly. Sorta.

Which was to say he was more subtle about it after popping the cap off, and slowly downed the bottle in it’s entirety before putting it back on the table with a small, self-satisfied smirk. “There’s lots of places here that have fancy mead and ale, and apparently a restaurant that the chefs are cats, so we’ll have to take the kids there for dinner or something. Maybe after you get paid, how’s the new job going?”

Eddie couldn’t remember the last thing he ate – it had probably been a handful or two of dry cereal hours ago when he’d been trying to tab out Mirror Mirror – which meant that he probably shouldn’t get goaded into drinking too much too fast, but that didn’t stop him from finishing off the rest of his bottle and cracking a new one.

He made himself grab a couple slices of pizza before he started on the fresh bottle though.

“I honestly can’t tell: how are cat chefs on the scale of weird when measured up against internet-using dragons and siren metalheads?” Was there even a scale anymore, or did it all just get categorized as ‘better than anything that ever existed in the Upside Down’?

“Work’s going good though. I’ve got a couple students already. One of them’s a fairy? I didn’t even know they made guitars that small, but hey, I guess every day’s an adventure when you find yourself dimension hopping like you’re some sort of multi-dimensional Gulliver.”

Okay, so more beer now, pizza later.

“I think if we add up cat chefs and fairy guitar students, alongside internet-using dragons and siren metalheads, we can pretty much make our own scale of weird.” Steve pointed out. He propped his feet up on the empty chair next to him and settled in comfortably to shovel pizza down his throat.

“Saying anything is better than the Upside Down makes me twitchy thinking we’ll jinx ourselves.” A shudder ran through him, and Steve shrugged it off. “Whatever, we’re due a break. And pizza.” Steve shoved a little more away before giving himself leave to continue again, his eyes touching on Eddie for just a brief period of time. A specific amount of seconds that he allowed himself without it looking like he was staring.

Cause he wasn’t, thank you very fucking much.

“Hey, got something to run by you.” And it wasn’t just you’re twitchy as hell, man, even if he wanted it to be.

“I don’t know if anything we say has anything to do with it. I was here less than a week and Henderson went ahead and saved the place through the power of D&D. And Steve The Hair, of course,” he added with a wink. Whatever good impressions this place might have made, he wasn’t about to forget people going into comas two days after he arrived because of music of all things.

“But yeah, we’re due for some fucking pizza.” He lofted a slice into the air as if he were going to cheers with it, and then took a bite. “Shoot,” he said, mouth full.

Steve wasn’t easily flustered, but still felt the faint blush rise up his cheeks. Ugh. Ridiculous. It made him grab another beer just to stave off any embarrassment from being praised. “Whatever, we’re all good at saving the world, congratulations, we’ve elevated you.” If he kept at the beers just to keep blushing at bay, he’d end up drunk before the pizza was finished and then they’d get nowhere.

“Blue - El mentioned it I guess - has a house here that she’s not using, or something? She offered it to all of us, if we wanted to live together. It’d be for like, everyone. And it’s got an attic for your dungeon shit.” Basement dwelling was probably better for them but he’d already been told all they needed was a table, so Steve was holding them to that.

There were few things in life, Eddie was beginning to realize, that pleased him more than making Steve Harrington flustered, and even with all the shit going on in his head, he still took a moment to bask.

“Well, if the kids are all staying there, then I probably don’t want to set up the dungeon in the attic,” Eddie mused, and then, feigning shock, said, “Oh, wait! You mean the game.” He shot Steve a wolvish grin before he actually thought about it.

“What’s the catch? It’s not haunted, is it?”

A month ago, if someone had asked Eddie if he wanted to live in a haunted house, he would have answered with a resounding yes. That was before he’d learned that things worse than ghosts actually existed.

Steve threw a napkin at Eddie’s head. It only floated about halfway before landing limply on the table, but it was the thought that counted. “Shut the fuck up, man.”

It almost made him laugh that Eddie asked the same question he had, but- well. The trauma. Steve sure as shit couldn’t blame him for worrying about that, he’d worried about that. “First thing I asked. She’s getting rid of the clocks? But otherwise just that nobody’s living in it, I guess it belonged to someone and they’re not here anymore so it’s sitting around doing nothing. Not haunted, might have money squirreled away inside shit.”

Steve couldn’t think of many downsides other than all of them together might be a disaster waiting to happen. “You’d have to put up with me telling you to take out the trash and to rinse your fucking dishes.”

The smile on Eddie’s face as he watched the napkin float harmlessly down onto the table could only be described as a smirk, though it faded into a thoughtful frown as Steve talked about the place.

Eddie’s dad had gone to prison just before Eddie had started high school – his mom had taken off long before that – and he’d lived with his uncle in his trailer ever since. He loved his uncle, but he hadn’t been around much. Wayne worked nights, which generally meant that Eddie saw him in the short amount of time he had between when he woke up and when he had to leave for school (which generally wasn’t more than few minutes: Eddie slept late more often than not) and for an hour or two after school, if Eddie or Wayne didn’t already have plans, and on weekends. It had probably been for the best: the trailer had been small, and having them getting in one another’s way all the time probably would have been a good way to sour their otherwise good relationship.

But a big house filled with a ton of people was about as far from living functionally alone in a tiny trailer as you could get. He liked all of them, but he wasn’t sure if he’d be a good roommate – the relatively frictionless time he’d spent living with Mike aside – and the idea of living with Steve and Nancy while they no doubt made googly-eyes at one another was unpleasant in a way that Eddie knew wasn’t entirely fair.

On the other hand, he’d felt safer with the group than he had on his own, and it was more than a little comforting knowing that the only thing that separated him from Steve and Dustin was a wall. Which, ultimately, won out over any of the numerous cons.

“If the kids and the elder Wheeler are into it, then I don’t see why not. Better together than apart, right? And it’s not like you’re knocking when you walk into my place as it is,” he added pointedly – and probably pointlessly. He did the exact same thing when he visited their apartment.

Steve tried to act casual when he shrugged this time, “Nance might want a place of her own.” Some kind of love-shack for her and Jonathan whenever he inevitably arrived. He was happy for her, that she seemed happy, even if all of that had happened over the lap of Steve having to figure his own path out.

But they’d found their way, right? He got along better with Nancy now than he ever had before. Probably in thanks to the fact that he’d grown the fuck up and she had gone off to do her own thing, so that was good. They both had their own shit, and Steve had come to terms with that.

“But the kids, yeah. I want them to be all on board. Maybe we could talk to them all together or some shit? I just wanna make sure they stay safe and stick together, who knows what the fuck this world is going to throw at us next?” There had already been people in comas, and he’d heard stories about other stuff happening. Steve just wanted to give the little fucks some stability.

“Yeah, we can get them all together for a family dinner,” Eddie said. “Sit them down, let them know that mom and dad are willing to put aside their differences and want to get a place together. You should be prepared for Wheeler to fight us on this though, you know how he was looking forward to the double holidays.”

This time, Steve balled the napkin up so he could hit Eddie square in the face with it. “Shut the fuck up.” He ruined the tough guy act by immediately giving in with a grin. “But yeah, whatever, let’s do it that way. I can take Wheeler on.”

Steve should’ve left it at that and gone back to his pizza but instead he gave Eddie a look that was probably a little too personal. “When was the last time you slept, man?”

Eddie laughed, turning his head so the napkin hit him in the side of the head instead of the face. His answering grin disappeared a little when Steve asked the question. He wondered if it was that obvious, and then decided that it probably was, if Steve was asking him point blank like that.

He ran a hand over his face. “I don’t know man, what day it?” he asked, and attempted a bit of a smile at what was supposed to be a joke, but neither the joke nor the smile really worked. “I think I’ve dozed off a few times, but I don’t think I’ve managed a good night’s rest since Chrissy.”

He saw her every time he closed his eyes, and if it wasn’t her, then it was a whirlwind of demobats, or McKinney rising out of the water like some sort of horrifying marionette, and sometimes, if he managed to get into a sleep deep enough for actual dreams, then the entire town of Hawkins was coming after him with pitchforks and torches.

He was… not keeping things together nearly as well as he liked to pretend he was, but the nice thing about Vallo was that it was so overwhelming with literally everything that he never had to sit still long enough to actually think about it.

Steve knew how that was, when things had come to a head a few years before when Steve had been thrown into everything. Eddie’d had a lot of abrupt trauma thrown in his face and things got even worse as the stakes got higher.

It reminded him to check in to see how Henderson was handling all of this shit, too. He didn’t really know how to help, but he’d try anyway.

“C’mon,” Steve pushed his chair back and snagged his beer between two fingers. He clapped a hand on Eddie’s shoulder. “I’m not going to tuck you in and read you a bedtime story but we’ve got thirty years of movies to catch up on. I think we covered five years alone with your nerd marathon, so it’s my turn. Just have to find a clean spot on your couch.”

“I wouldn’t want you to read me a bedtime story anyway. You probably don’t even do the voices,” Eddie snorted. “And we have many more nerd marathons to go, dude. But sure, I’ll let you pick the movie tonight.”

He could guess the kind of movies Steve probably liked. Either some horrible comedy, or some mindless action flick.

It wasn’t hard to clear a spot on the couch – he just had to throw all the magazines on the ground, problem solved – and he sat down and, after some searching between couch cushions, handed the remote to Steve.

“Have at ‘er.”

Steve snorted and plopped down on the couch, ignoring the fact that his leg bumped Eddie’s as he sat. Remote in hand, he wagged his eyebrows as the tv turned on. “Hold onto your butt, man, cause it’s Terminator Time.”

Eddie did not ignore the way that Steve’s leg bumped against his, and spent far too much time wondering if it had been intentional before he realized that he really was sleep deprived, holy shit. He grabbed one of the throw pillows and hugged it to his chest so he didn’t do anything monumentally stupid and fueled with a lack of sleep and the beers he’d with his hands.

“Of course it is,” Eddie snorted. He’d actually liked the first Terminator, but he wasn’t planning on bothering with any of the sequels, which would, undoubtedly, be terrible.

He had no regrets at all when his eyes drifted shut barely three minutes into the movie, and he was already asleep by the time his head hit Steve’s shoulder. And for once, when he dreamed, he didn’t dream of Chrissy or anything else related to the Upside Down or Hawkins.