Chapter 2: Adding Insult to Injury
Pairing: Eddie Munson x fem! reader
Summary: In a world where the first words that soulmates say to each other are displayed like tattoos, what do you do when your particular soulmate's opening line is an unequivocal rejection?
Warnings: a healthy dose of angst (with an eventual happy ending!); enemies to friends to lovers; smut in later chapters (planning this as a slow burn); mentions of past family trauma and personal issues; slightly ludicrous amount of swearing (apparently I am a complete potty mouth!)
A/N: A massive thank you to everyone who liked and commented on the first part of this story, I was really pleased to hear that you all enjoyed the opening!
It's fair to say that this chapter really digs into the "enemies" part of the enemies-friends-lovers dynamic. I'm sorry not sorry for the total douchebag behaviour on display in this chapter, but I wanted to ramp up the delicious tension between our reader and the glorious metalhead she's been paired with before starting any resolution. We'll start to unpick all of the FEELINGS in the next chapter with some split POVs, but for now I hope you enjoy!
(PS - If I've missed anyone out of the taglist at the end or you read this and fancy being added on, please give me a shout!)
Divider made by @pixynari
Stumbling back into the bar, you desperately scanned the room for Jen. When you spotted her with Steve at the head of a large table in the corner, you felt your shoulders sag with relief. Then you pasted on the biggest smile you could muster, dug your finger nails into your palms to stop yourself from screaming and headed towards the couple.
Jen squealed when she saw you, dragging you to her side with a bear hug. "Finally chica, I was starting to worry that you'd cut and run out of the bathroom window!"
"Course not Jenny, I'm right here."
"As you should be. Everybody!" she hollered, announcing your name to the wider group assembled around the table. "This gorgeous creature is my very best friend and right-hand woman. Be nice to her, please. Babe, this is everybody, be a sweetheart and say hello."
Your face flushed with embarrassment as the entire table swivelled their heads to look at you. If the ground under your feet had opened up there and then to swallow you whole, you would have called it a miracle. However, in the absence of divine intervention you hid your awkwardness with a hesitant smile and gave the group a shy wave. “Um, hi everybody, nice to meet you all”.
A cute, smiling girl with a dirty blonde bob cut and a fantastically raucous laugh was the first to respond. “Oh my god, dingus! Your soulmate has her very own Robin!” she wheezed, whacking Steve on the arm repeatedly. She then jumped up from the table and ran over to pull you into an unexpected hug. “That’s me, I’m Robin, Steve’s platonic with a P better half and long-suffering best friend. Oh man, we really need to sit down at some point and compare notes on these two crazy kids, I’m sure we can swap some great stories!”
You couldn’t help but giggle at her scatter-gun delivery and chaotic manner and you tentatively felt yourself start to relax. “Oh, I have plenty of dirt on Jennifer here, which I could definitely be persuaded to share with the right person!”
After that, the introductions from the rest of the group flowed quickly. You immediately took to Robin’s sweet-natured and calm girlfriend Vickie, complimenting her retro Molly Ringwald style. Nancy Wheeler was a slightly tougher sell, her direct tone momentarily intimidating you when she said hello. However, she quickly caught herself and laughingly apologised for slipping into reporter mode without thinking. Her boyfriend Jonathan was refreshingly chilled, although how much of that was his natural personality and how much was down to the very potent weed his other friend Argyle was slipping him was debatable.
All in all, they seemed like a close-knit, friendly group who you could see yourself getting along with. However, as you internally breathed the tiniest sigh of relief at the realisation, circumstances once again conspired to bite you on the backside.
"And last but not least, this sulky doofus here is our very own Eddie Munson," chirped Robin, tugging at the arm of a gangly metalhead who had slunk over to the table.
Turning to look at him, you felt your breath catch in your throat as you recognised the denim battle vest you’d rescued earlier. Eddie. The arsehole from the bathroom, the soulmate who had already decided that he loathed you without ever having met you.
Without realising that you were awkwardly gawping at him in the manner of a faintly horrified fish, you took in his appearance. And fuck if it didn't make it all the harder for you to ignore all of the pesky soulmate murmurings currently going crazy in your brain.
Eddie Munson was tall and lean without being scrawny. His face, even when scrunched up in a scowl, was just ridiculously pretty. Big brown Bambi eyes were framed by the kind of voluminous eyelashes that any supermodel would kill for. His lips were full, pink and pouty. A wild cloud of curly dark hair framed his features and you could spot the edges of various spidery tattoos inked on different parts of his pale skin. He was dressed like a classic metalhead, his outfit all worn leather, silver jewellery and distressed denim. He was, in all physical respects, exactly your type.
After a pause that could have been a few seconds or a few hours for all you knew, he abruptly punctured the silence. "Jen, do you know if I've done something to piss off your little friend here or does she stare at everyone like they've just shat in her beer?"
His sarcastic question successfully broke you out of your trance by really irritating you. 'Piss off your little friend?', you seethed in your head. ‘More like ripping my damn heart out with that oh-so romantic declaration of love to your dive bar fuck buddy. And now you stand there talking over me like I’m some annoying toddler who’s gotten in your way? You can absolutely go to hell, you patronising dick!’
Schooling your face with a breath and a shake of your head, you scoffed drily as you tried to think of an excuse for your mad-rabbit-in-headlights impression. "Uh no, sorry, you just look a lot like someone I used to know way back, it threw me for a second".
"That so?" he muttered, glaring at you with a particularly unconvinced look on his face. Over his shoulder, you saw a few of the Hawkins crew look on, completely bemused by what was happening. Meanwhile Jen sat quietly with a raised brow and an inquisitive look that suggested she would definitely be interrogating you about this later.
"Uh huh" you shrugged, trying to remain as nonchalant as possible as you stared back at him.
"Whatever" he sneered, turning on his heel and looking back at the table. "I need a drink. Stevie, you coming?"
You watched the two friends walk off towards the bar before slumping onto a bench at the table. "Wow, that was possibly one of my most awkward and deeply uncool moments ever. And I’ve had a lot of them in my time”.
Robin patted your shoulder sympathetically. “Hey, weird space-out moments happen to the best of us, don’t worry about it,” she shrugged. “If it helps, Eddie would normally find the whole episode pretty hilarious, but he’s currently stewing in his own bad mood right now. It’s nothing personal.”
'Oh, but it really is', you thought to yourself bitterly.
"Why's he in such a funk anyway?" Jen asked curiously.
“Eh, it’ll 100% have something to do with the fact that Chrissy Cunningham is currently at the other end of the bar smooching her douchebag on/off boyfriend Jason Carver”.
The three of you glanced up at the bar, where a picture perfect blonde couple stood giggling quietly and exchanging sweet kisses as they finished their drinks. Given what you’d heard this Chrissy woman say in the bathroom earlier, your eyebrows raised almost comically at the sight in puzzlement.
“OK, and?” Jen probed further, oblivious to your confusion.
Robin huffed dramatically. “Urgh, those two are long-standing but very problematic soulmates. Got their marks during their sophomore year of high school and became the ultimate Hawkins power couple. But after graduation, everything went south. Carver went off to do his sports jock thing at UCLA but made more of a name for himself as a campus Casanova than a future NBA prospect. Chrissy found out all about it and had the chance to get herself the hell away from his cheating ass. In the end though she stood by her man because apparently the money and privilege that comes with the Carver name is enough to ease the pain of realising your soulmate is a total prick”.
“So where does Van Halen’s stroppy clone fit into all this?” you asked.
On the other side of the table, Nancy snorted into her drink before speaking. “Eddie is Chrissy’s go-to revenge piece. There’s never been any love lost between him and Jason, those two can’t stand each other. So when Chrissy found out about Jason’s college “extracurriculars”, she played on Eddie’s painfully obvious crush on her to give Jason a taste of his own medicine”.
“Yeah, but once the novelty of slumming it with the town “freak” wore off, she caved and ran right back to Jason,” Robin scoffed. “And now the three of them are stuck in this stupid cycle: Barbie and Ken live in soulmate bliss for a little bit, Carver inevitably gets his dick wet elsewhere and Chrissy remembers Eddie exists for just long enough to have some hot revenge sex and regain her idiot boyfriend’s attention. The soulmates reunite, Eddie’s screwed over again and the whole sorry story rewinds back to the beginning”.
“So if Jason and Chrissy are currently loved up at the bar…?” Jen began.
“Then Ms Cunningham will be back to ignoring Eddie’s lovesick butt until she has another fight with Carver and fancies a bit of rough again,” Nancy confirmed with a grimace.
“Ouch, that’s brutal,” Jen winced sympathetically.
"It's totally fucked up. But no matter how many times we try to talk to Eddie about it, he won't see sense. He's obsessed with the fair Christine and nothing we can say will convince him that she's just stringing him along as a backup for when shit gets ugly with her real soulmate. But anyway, the boys are on their way back so we’d better take a rain check on this chat”.
Sure enough, Steve and Eddie returned carrying drinks and extra bar snacks for the table. While Steve curled himself around Jen once again, Eddie sat on the end of one of the benches the group was using, thankfully as far away from you as possible. The conversation drifted amiably across the table until Argyle decided that you needed some time in the spotlight.
“Sooooo Jen’s sister from another mister, you’re from England right?”, he breathed in your direction.
“Um, yeah. London originally. I came over to the States a few years ago”.
“Cool! England seems like a pretty awesome place, wouldn’t mind checking it out sometime”.
At this, Robin perked up and nudged Vickie’s arm. “Ooh, if you go you should take this one here too! She’s a total Anglophile, she’s into all of those classic novels about stubborn lords and ballrooms and swooning romance. I know England is up there on her bucket list of places to visit!”
You laughed at the sight of Robin falling back dramatically onto Vickie’s shoulder, her arm flung over her eyes like a Victorian damsel having a conniption. “I wouldn’t want to get your hopes up too much about what England is like. Eligible lords and ladies are pretty scarce, to be honest, as are the fancy ballrooms. At least where I grew up anyway, which was a much more scuzzy part of London”.
From the other end of the table, a deep voice suddenly chuckled coldly. “Scuzzy, huh? How bad are we talking about, Princess? Houses with less than ten bedrooms and a skeleton serving staff? No room for a swimming pool or a pony?”
Looking up, you saw the provocation in Eddie’s face as he sneered right at you. ‘Oh fucker, someone’s spoiling for a fight today’. You shrugged and kept your expression as bland as possible. “I mean, the children’s home I lived in definitely had no room for any animals other than the odd rat or insect infestation, but it did have way more than ten bedrooms, so where would that put me on the poverty scale, do you reckon?”
Your comment hit exactly as intended as you held Eddie’s gaze and briefly saw something that looked a lot like guilt flicker across his face. He recovered quickly however, grunting into his beer and dropping back out of the conversation.
The rest of the table, however, became very invested in finding out more about you. Accepting that they were genuinely just being curious rather than nasty (with the exception of the long-haired grouch in the corner), you answered their questions good-naturedly. “OK, here’s the Cliff’s Notes version for you all as it’s a pretty boring story. My A+ parents left me outside a church as a baby after apparently deciding they couldn’t be bothered with raising me themselves. I spent my childhood in the care system which was very far from perfect, but was at least a step up from sleeping on the streets. And I have no desire to chase after the aforementioned birth parents now seeing as they’re the ones who wanted rid of me in the first place.”
“Damn woman, that’s definitely not a boring story at all!” replied a wide-eyed Robin. “Dare I ask how you ended up Stateside or am I being way to nosy right now?”
“A little, but I’ll let you off Ms Buckley,” you grinned at her. ”Long story short, I met one of your countrymen at a work thing in London a few years back. I thought he was my Prince Charming and ended up moving with him to New York, but found out too late that he was really just a massive fucking toad”.
“What a dick”, you heard Steve murmur nearby.
“Meh, not my first rodeo with shitty partners, unfortunately. Luckily for me in this instance, I met this goddess before the break-up,” you continued, squeezing Jen’s hand. “When Mr Not-So-Charming left me in the lurch back in the city, she helped me pick myself up and relocate to Indy which has been a million times better in the main. So yeah, cheers to Jen quite frankly”.
A raucous shout of ‘cheers’ was flung in Jen’s direction from the group as drinks were finished and the table took in your words. Once again, however, the night wasn’t quite done with messing you around.
Having remained silent since his previous comment and resolutely focused on drinking more than was a sensible idea, Eddie let out an amused snort.
“Something on your mind, Edward?” asked Jen, eyes narrowed in obvious irritation.
“No no, just thinking about your friend’s story is all,” he replied, slurring slightly.
“Eddie…”, Nancy interjected, sensing her friend’s mood was not a sober one and that trouble was brewing.
“What?! I’m not trying to cause trouble or anything, I swear. It’s just… shit, Princess, are you chalking up all of these abandonments and awful relationships to bad luck or do you reckon the common problem in all of them could actually be you?”
Your eyes met his across the table as the arsehole actually giggled to himself like a drunk high-school mean girl. As admonishments started to flow from the rest of the table, you stayed silent. Internally, you were possibly the most livid you had ever been with another person, but you refused to let this man know just how much he had hurt you during this car crash of an evening.
Downing the rest of your drink, you finally answered him. “I guess I haven’t thought of myself as the problem up until now, no. We all prefer to be the righteous innocent rather than the villain in our own stories, don’t we? But, on reflection, it’s perfectly possible that I may be and have always been such a colossal arsehole than no one wants to be anywhere near me, starting from the day that I was fucking born”.
If your previous answer to him about the children’s home had made him feel a bit guilty, this one had the effect of sobering him up very quickly as he realised just how far he’d taken the insult. “I didn’t mean…” he started.
“Save it”, you interrupted quickly. “I really don’t give a fuck”. Standing up from the bench, you gave Jen’s hand another quick squeeze and made to leave. “Thanks all for the interesting night, but I’m done”. As Jen started to get up as well, you shook your head. “Don’t. I know you’re staying with Steve tonight, finish your evening and have fun. I’ll call a cab and text you in the morning. See you guys around”. And with that, you picked up your stuff and walked out of the bar, leaving a shell-shocked table in your midst.
Taglist: @variarant-s1; @alicemarie730; @lananabanana42; @softstaticclub; @beloveddiary2; @frankensteingotwet; @veravee-blog; @eddiessweethrt; @ur2moms; @jestthejoker-12; @kozume-ko; @itmekelpy
