@moodpoisons asked: “ how could you do this to me? ”
because you weren’t fucking here. that’s what he should’ve said. make it sound like he did this out of spite, like it came from a vindictive and ugly place that eddie’s not even sure exists within him anymore. so if he can’t fool himself, he can’t fool the only person who’s ever known him for real. wholly and completely, down to the marrow in his bones. and he can’t lie to him. not like that.
a couple of months back, chrissy cunningham had bumped into him in the hallway. down that empty section near the gym and the auditorium where there were no lockers, so nobody had reason to loiter. she’d had her head bowed and her arms crossed, and she’d looked up like a startled deer, eyes blown wide at the sight of her collision. eddie used that back exit because it was usually empty. it opened up closer to the athletic fields that stretched all the way to the tree line, and from there, it was a modest stone’s throw to his picnic table. she’d bumped into him in the hallway and when he’d been the one to say sorry, she smiled. cut ahead to the first time she sought him out. cut ahead to the first time he drove her home, the first time she unloaded about jason, the first time she was stunned that he wanted to listen when nobody else ever did, and that made him heartsick. cut ahead to late nights at the overlook or in his trailer, to dancing around the living room, to falling asleep with her head on his chest or his in her lap, her fingers in his hair. to the polaroids, the candid of her laughing that he told her to keep so she could look at it whenever she forgot what laughing felt like.
cut ahead to yesterday. eugie had fucked him before they’d even kissed.
only that’s not fair, and eddie knows it. eugie hadn’t done anything that he wouldn’t have done himself. there was never any escaping this. escaping them.
“ you wanna know somethin’? ”
half asleep with his face buried in the pillow, eugie mumbles something unintelligible. eddie grins, hooking a leg over his hips, wrapping his arms around him and rolling them both over so he’s got him flush against his chest. there’s a groan of flimsy protest before he goes limp, flopping into the crook of eddie’s arm. eddie noses at his hair, nips at his earlobe. it’s four in the morning and the only noise is the rattle of the baseboard heater. the soft rustle of sheets and their synchronized breathing.
it’s november, and eugie’s birthday is at the end of next month. eddie’s got big plans. keeping them a secret is killing him a little, but it’ll be worth it to see the look on his face.
“ i think you should wake up, ” eddie says, husky and warm against the shell of his ear. eugie lets out a long breath. he’s got that drowsy rasp in his voice that makes eddie fucking weak.
“ i think you should shut the fuck up. ”
“ mmmm … nah. sorry. ballots are closed, man. the votes are in. do youuuu, ” he starts again, drawing out the syllables, mouthing at the slope between the hook of his jaw and the curve of his shoulder, “ wanna know … what … we … are. ”
“ you mean other than the light of your goddamn life? the fire in your loins? the whole reason you get out of bed in the morning? you know how flattery works with me. ”
eugie’s comeback fades to another hazy breath, and this one’s a little shakier. the arm bracketed around his chest shifts so eddie can slide a hand up to the base of his throat. that slow breath hitches. eddie grins, sucking a lazy hickey onto the side of his neck. under the blankets, his hips roll gently forward. eugie ruts back.
“ what, ” he finally concedes. “ what are we. ”
“ we are … ” eddie’s other hand dips under the blankets, too. finding him in the dark and stroking him slow, turning his head to kiss him, licking into his open mouth. “ inescapable, ” he murmurs, and bites gently at his lower lip. “ fire and gasoline, baby. we’re never gonna stop burning. ”
eddie can’t look him in the eyes. he’s afraid of what he’ll find there. he wants to run — to get out of this room, this trailer, this entire fucking town. but he can’t move. his limbs won’t let him, like he’s shackled to the floor. he can’t look him in the eyes because where he wants to see anger and hatred, he’ll only see hurt, and he can’t handle being the cause of it. eugie left as one person and came back another, like he’d buried himself in the yard and thrown one last handful of dirt before he’d disappeared. eddie spent two and a half years trying not to dig up the corpse. turned out he didn’t have to. it’s already rotted to dust.
they killed something in each other, and he doesn’t know how to bring it back. that’s a cardinal rule, though, right? you can’t raise the dead.
“ i —— ” he tries to start talking but no sound comes out of his mouth. there’s that sting at his waterline again. there’s that pain in his chest, in his throat, that searing in his veins. we’re never gonna stop burning. he opens his mouth again and the noise cracks like a dry sob. dry because he’s holding it in, swallowing it. swallowing gravel would be easier.
he knows what happens next. the retreat. the closed door. the empty space. eugie said he was staying, but after this, eddie wouldn’t blame him for changing his mind. so maybe it’s selfish, what he says. maybe it’s the most selfish thing he’s ever fucking said in his life because it boils down to this: he can’t lose him again. he won’t survive it a second time.
“ don’t, ” he says. he begs. “ don’t—— don’t leave. ” there’s more. a pitiful fucking whimpering pitch of more that starts and ends with the spill from his eyes when he squeezes them shut, because he’s still too much of a goddamn coward to look at him. his teeth grit and his fists clench, one of them pressed near his mouth.
