you can't die ... not you

it double sucks because the scene itself is so good and funny and dustin delivers the hell out of the my little pony monologue but then

it double sucks because the scene itself is so good and funny and dustin delivers the hell out of the my little pony monologue but then

He'd talked to countless police in the last decade. When he was younger, it was because on parties, because of buying weed at the wrong time and place, or because he and whichever girl he was with at the time got a little too hot and heavy in his car. Then, it was because of Barbara Holland, and everything changed.

"Did you see him? Can you describe the man who attempted to break into your trailer?" The officer asked him, a lucky chance that he'd been so nearby when Dustin radioed before running outside to find Steve.

"About 5'8-5'10. White, brown hair. Average build. Sounded closer to our age." Dustin answered immediately, shoulders straight. He, too, had come a long way from fumbling through his lies. Steve wondered if he should be concerned at the ease in which it came to him now.

"Right," the officer mumbled, writing notes down. "Well, we'll keep an eye out. You alright, son?"

Steve jerked his head up, meeting the man's eyes. The cop reminded him of every other police officer he'd run into. A bit soft around the midsection, an ugly moustache, and a sense that he thought he was the thin line between chaos and order. Inoffensive, but Steve wanted him out of his camper.

"I'm fine," Steve answered him, but his lip hurt when he spoke and reminded him that it was all a lie.

They didn't tell him why the stalker was actually there that night.

As soon as he'd left, Steve couldn't keep his gaze away from the door - from the window. He kept expecting to see a face, to hear a creak. He hadn't realized how tense he'd become until Dustin touched his arm, and caused him to jump. Dustin looked at him like he was afraid he'd just burned Steve simply by touching him.

"Steve..." Dustin whispered, voice cracking.

"I'm sorry," Steve told him, hands beginning to shake. "I'm sorry, I should have never brought you with. I should have never involved you, I should have- I should have been stronger, smarter, god, I wish I was smarter."

Dustin looked confused, eyes wide at Steve's outburst, before he inched in closer, their shoulders touching. "Don't say that, Steve. I... Steve, this is more my fault than yours, and it's not your fault. At all. It's not. How could you think that? You've done nothing wrong."

It didn't keep him from feeling like he had.

When Steve was 14, he started dating a girl. Laurie. She had a bit of a reputation, and Steve had initially been weary of her, but they began talking and he thought she was fun - no matter what Tommy said about her. It wasn't until they'd been together for a few months, and he'd lost his virginity, that Laurie told him why she had a reputation. She'd dated another guy at 13, and told him she wasn't a virgin - but he didn't care or didn't listen to why. She'd been raped, as a child, by a family friend who had threatened her. When the truth had come out, her family asked her why she'd never told anyone earlier. She'd thought she was keeping them safe, and she'd just been a kid. She told him that sometimes, she blamed herself.

Steve told her he didn't care about any of that, didn't care about her reputation - and he didn't understand how she'd ever blame anyone but the piece of shit who'd abused her.

Steve still felt sick to his stomach, guilty that after she moved away, when people called Laurie a slut, he hadn't done more to argue with them, to tell them off. They had no idea what she'd been through, what kind of person she was, that her favorite movie was Monty Python and the Holy Grail.

"It's not your fault, Steve." Dustin told him quietly, reaching out to take his hand, holding it steady. When Steve met his gaze, Dustin's eyes were intense - focused fully on him. "I'll make him pay."

Reality seemed to turn again, starting like an engine inside Steve's mind. Memories of the hours earlier began to replay in his head. The sickly feeling of his hands on Steve's body, that came to him too - but, it was Dustin.

'I know who you are'

"Who?" Steve asked, heart hammering in his chest.

'I was wrong'

Dustin looked at him, really looked at him, and Steve could see his own guilt reflected in his eyes.

"... It's Andy. I hurt him, Steve. Bad. Those scars- did you see? That was me, Steve that was- it was from what I did to him. I thought he'd moved away when the walls around Hawkins came down, but- I'm sorry, I'm so sorry."

When Andrew - Andy Harper moved to Hawkins, he'd come in partway through the year. He'd met a few other guys in town when he'd first moved in with his grandmother, and Jason Carver lived just across the street from him. He'd invited them to come over for dinner, invited his grandmother to church with the family, and told Andy where all the best restaurants were, of which there were very few. He was older than Andy by a year, but easy going, kind, helpful.

It was a stark contrast to the kids Andy met as a foster, before his grandmother became his caregiver. She was an awful old bat, smacked the hell out of him, but she too was better than being in the system or back with his folks. At least most of the time she left him alone to do whatever he wanted, and she'd be dead soon and he'd inherit her shit.

"You should join the basketball team if you can, we could be on the same team, and you'll make a bunch of friends there. We on the team try to take care of our own, we try to protect each other." Jason suggested as they walked down the hall, and Andy tossed it over in his head. "Steve Harrington is the one you want to talk to - great guy, a senior this year. He used to go to my church, his parents still do. When I was just a kid, he actually helped the younger kids in sunday school make these macaroni monsters... It was ridiculous, but he made us all feel like he was our older brother." Jason said with a smile, and Andy felt himself matching the same energy even without knowing anything about the guy Jason was talking about.

"Stay clear of Hargrove, though. He's on the team too, but he's a real piece of..." Jason trailed off, sending Andy a telling look. "Plus, he's Catholic."

Andy didn't know anything about that, never grew up caring, but Jason did, and Andy decided to follow his new friend's lead. After lunch, Andy wove through the halls, between other students until he found the men's locker room. He'd been told that Harrington usually washed off after practice, before coming to lunch late.

"-fuck away from me, man." Andy heard an annoyed voice coming from the showers. After just a fraction of a second, a young man rounded the corner of the shower stalls, a towel wrapped low on his hips. His chest and body were bare, brown hair turned dark from the water still dripping off of it.

Almost immediately, another man followed him, blonde, with a subtle grin on his face as he watched the first leave. He'd reached out, and grabbed a strand of brown hair between his fingers, until the other guy pulled away with a venomous glare.

"Scared, Harrington?"

"You really just don't drop your bullshit for even a minute, do you?" Steve Harrington snapped over his shoulder, and Andy could see the shadow of a bruise around his eye. Had that black eye been from practice? "Go bother someone else for a change, Hargrove. I'm sure you have someone's lunch money to steal, or a cat to put up a tree."

The blond just smiled casually, still staying far too close to Harrington, right on his heels. "I apologized, didn't I?"

It was then that Hargrove noticed Andy standing in the locker room, and the amusement dropped off of his face. There was simmering fury in those blue eyes, and something else. Andy wasn't particularly scared of him, he'd had foster brothers bigger than Hargrove, who'd wailed on him plenty.

Harrington then noticed him too, and his face relaxed some. "Hey, man. Harper, right? Jason told me you were going to ask about try outs?"

"Just what we need, more little pissants on the team." Hargrove finally broke away from shadowing Harrington, going towards another locker.

Harrington made a face at that, mouthing the word, 'pissant', to himself.

"Open a dictionary sometime, Stevie." Hargrove said over his shoulder, as he tugged on his blue jeans, sans boxers or briefs. "Unless you want to turn out like the Freak."

Harrington just shook his head, annoyance clearly dripping off of him, as he took off his own towel, grabbing his clothes out of his locker. Bare as he was, Andy could see every curve of his body, and the scratches and healing bruises on pale skin. He felt transfixed by it, and the urge to dig his nails into him and watch the skin turn red, bloomed in Andy's mind.

All too soon, it was covered, and Harrington was turning back to him with a smile. "You want to walk and talk with me? I'll tell you how things work on the team, and when we can fit you in for a tryout. I don't have time after school today, I've got to go pick up someone."

Stranger Things || 3.06