what an empty epitaph

and it's not even the Big Obvious stuff, it's just images. very specific images that fuck him up in so many different ways.

he can't stop seeing mouths and the way bodies get pinned and strung up and infiltrated. can't stop thinking of how wet and violent and alive it all is. can't stop imagining those fucking tentacles around him, everywhere. he only saw that stuff for seconds at a time, but it just... won't leave his head.

and then it gets worse because of course it does. he'd squeeze out a laugh if he could, because his brain is like: congrats, you saved the world, here's your prize— weird sexual nightmares you did NOT ask for, did NOT want, and absolutely cannot admit to anyone because what the fuck. what would he even say? "yeah the interdimensional horror is haunting me and my dick reacts in a way that literally makes me want to die"? yeah, right. 

and also— steve thinks it's just a little fucking delirious that reality looks exactly like it does in that awful, terrible, no-good movie, alien. 

so steve's walking around all functional and smiling, being steve. but sometimes his mind goes white in the middle of the day and he just can't get it out of his head. and sometimes he wakes up half-hard but wrong, and billy is there, warm and drowsy, murmuring "good morning" in his ear, his hand already crawling down—

and steve freezes ice-cold inside.

and he has to stop him, has to grab billy's wrist and has to look at him without explaining anything—just wide eyes and guilt and fear— and billy stops, instantly, no questions. because he won't push, because that's who he is now. changed so much ever since they started doing this, and billy is good, so fucking good to him.

and steve still can't tell him.

but it keeps happening, and neither of them know why.

right until billy notices the detachment that seems to follow steve everywhere lately, the distance between them, the strange silences. the way steve isn't like he used to be in bed, the way he looks ashamed now.

until billy sits him down one evening and coaxes it out of him. and steve finally breaks and admits it, hands on his crimson face and voice cracked into a million jagged shards. 

he starts with "what we saw down there" and takes forever to get to the part that makes his voice drop entirely. talks about how his brain keeps putting him there instead, putting it in him, everywhere, choking and slithering and invading—

and how it's not consensual at all.

and how he still likes it.

how sick it makes him feel, depraved. how much he needs it and hates it and needs it. how he always wakes up feeling violated and wants to crawl out of his own skin.

billy just listens. keeps his face neutral while he holds steve, rubbing slow circles into his back. pulls him in closer, lets him get it out. silently scolds himself for not piecing it together sooner—because billy saw it too. because billy knows.

because billy has been there once before.

and billy hates it too but he understands suffering and shame and sex and fear sometimes getting tangled together in ways you don't get to choose.

and very gently—very gently—billy offers something steve is absolutely not prepared to hear.

what if they took the thing that keeps attacking steve in his sleep and put it somewhere steve actually has control? what if they tried it safely. together. with steve able to stop it at any second and with billy there the whole time. and—

hey. at the end of the day, it's just us, right?   

and steve hates the idea. is horrified by it. refuses, almost breaks down crying when he finally finds his voice again, because—

how is—how is that gonna help? don't you see it's the one thing i can't—

that is, until the nightmares get worse and he's so tired he'll try anything. 

so they do.

they buy some stuff that could help, ropes, blindfolds, shit like that. it's quiet and steve is nervous the entire time. but billy is there, guiding him and being so fucking patient steve thinks he might actually cook dinners for the rest of the month.

billy tells him to stop thinking so much already and start imagining.

and steve does.

focuses on the awful images that won't leave his head and turns them into fantasies instead, turns himself off— restrained and tied up, with billy filling him up and pressing him down, billy's fingers in his mouth and that thing still on his mind. and once the shame and guilt and still-conscious part of him finally disappear—

god.

it's fucking incredible. 

he's completely unprepared for how good it feels, for how hard it hits him. for the wave of immense relief afterward and the way his mind just goes point-blank. wrecked and ruined and imageless.

he almost blacks out. he actually cries.

but it's good. because he feels so much better somehow.

a little like dying, yes—but also like letting go. like accepting it, maybe. like making peace with himself.

so they do it again. and again. and with each time the images lose their grip a little more. and with each time steve gains more and more confidence.

until eventually he realizes that he slept thought the night. that he stopped thinking about it altogether.

one day, the intrusive thoughts simply... don't come back. just like that. 

he comes home that day, and without even saying a word, crosses the room and plants a firm kiss on billy's mouth. billy's eyebrows shoot up like— "well, hello to you too, pretty boy—" and steve just breathes,

i love you so fucking much.

because he didn't believe billy at first, didn't expect it to work.

but billy still tried, still stayed with him through it. and turns out, he was right. somehow, in some insane way—it did help.

Tommy: nah, I’m Tommy. That’s Steve *points at Steve*

i havent watched freeway but this breakdown is making me think HEAVILY about billy as a character and how he really is set up to never be taken seriously about his abuse via people within the stranger things universe and its audience

billys strength and muscles are focused on, so obviously he must be able to fight back against neil if he wanted to, neils physical violence cant be that bad.

billys shown to have a temper and become violent himself, so obviously neils just punishing him as any respectable parent would

and im drawing MANY a parallel between keifer and reeses characters in this movie and billy and karen. because karens a beloved mother shes a suburban goddess she couldnt POSSIBLY be a sexual predator. and so what if he was attracted to billy, its his own fault for being so good looking and looking older than his age of 17-18. karens such a good person she does so much for other people (what exactly i couldnt tell you but other people seemed convinced), okay she had a little transgression with a teenager, she's lonely in her marriage. you know how hard it is to be a woman #myfeminism

billys a rowdy boy, he gets around town, he flaunts his looks, karens just a victim to his sexual prowess.

billy breaking down in the sauna begging for max to believe him comes from an already learned knowledge that people WONT believe him when he says anything that sets him up as the victim.

because he's strong. because he's good looking. because he comes from the wrong side of town. because he's a "man". he's had the cards stacked against him his entire life, so what other choice does he have than to solve his own problems, even if they just end up creating more.

billy was never going to win. he was never going to be seen as the victim he is because he doesnt present as what peoples idea of a victim is. and when you have people like neil or karen, who present themselves as model citizens, just your typical do gooder neighbor, theyre the ones people are going to side with, no questions asked.

Billy pushes open the door, ignoring the painful vomiting sounds three doors down and takes care of business. It's not until he saunters up to wash his hands that he notices a pair of very familiar Nike's sticking out across the floor. And there sits Harrington, hugging the toilet like a lifeline and panting into the crook of his elbow.

"Harrington? Shit, you alright?"

And normally he'd poke fun. Pretty boy is obviously on something, evident by his blown out pupils and glassy stare. But he's also sweating buckets and shaking, tears and snot running down his face. And Jesus ever loving *fuck*, whoever worked over pretty boy's face wasn't pulling any punches.

Steve squints, eyes traveling slowly from Billy's boots up to his face. He smiles, dopey and high and Billy winces at how it pulls the purple black swelling of his cheek.

"Yeah, I feel way better now."

Which. *Okaaaaay*.

"I'll bet. What the fuck happened to your face?"

"I was integrated-..inter...interror-...I was tortured by Russian spies"

Billy snorts, amused despite himself.

"Oh yeah? That why you weren't at the counter today, sailor?"

Steve scrunches up his nose, and damn, Billy's gunna have to ask Harrington what he took when he's a bit more sober. It's some potent stuff if he's not even flinching moving an obviously broken nose like that.

"You know my shift schedule?"

*Shit*. Billy feels the tips of his ears go hot. Clearing his throat awkwardly as he glances down at his boots.

Time to change the subject.

"Why were you being *interrogated* by Russian spies, pretty boy?"

Steve sucks his teeth.

"Cuz the monsters came back and Robin cracked Dustin's code and then we went under the mall in an elevator to a secret Russian Army base and got caught and then they beat me up and shot me and Robin up with truth syrup and-...umm....I think that's it."

Billy blinks.

Once.

Twice.

And. *Huh*.

"That right?"

Steve nods, swaying dangerously forward before catching himself on the stall doorway.

Whatever he's on, Steve obviously *believes* what he's saying. There might even be something to that 'truth serum' element considering how he's answered all of Billy's questions so easily. And Billy never once in his life claimed to be a good person.

"Why were you with my sister at the Byers' house last winter?"

Steve's head shoots up, eyes wide as saucers and for one horrifying moment Billy's sure the guy is going to start crying. Thankfully he doesn't, just slumps even heavier against the toilet with a sigh.

"Because there are monsters in the dark. And I was supposed to protect them. I *had* to protect them. Hopper said to *stay*. And then you showed up and Max said you were gonna kill her and I was supposed to keep them *safe*"

Billy tries to parse through whatever make believe bullshit Steve is spouting before getting caught on the whole *killing his sister* part.

"What, and you believed her?"

Steve gives him a considering look. Barring the rest of *whatever the fuck* Steve is talking about, Billy isn't sure he wants to hear the answer the guy is obviously mulling over.

Finally, he settles on "I don't anymore", and something sharp and hurt in Billy's chest settles.

"Hmm. Alright. If you've been *shot up with truth syrup*" Billy huffs a laugh "tell me a secret. Something you specifically don't want me to know."

Again, Billy's never claimed to be a good person.

Somewhere under all that blood and bruising, Billy thinks he sees a flush creep up Harrington's neck.

*Jackpot*

"I'm the one who keeps stealing your photo from the pool corkboard"

He-..

Wait

What?

"That's-. Uh. Not what I thought you were gonna say."

Steve shrugs, embarrassed and looking anywhere but Billy. And Billy *has to know*. Has to ask.

"Why?"

Harrington looks up at him, not a trace of a lie in his eyes.

"Cuz every time I go to the pool to ask you on a date I chicken out."

Billy can't feel his fucking *face*. He has no idea what to say.

It's at this exact moment one of Max's nerd friends kicks down the bathroom door, holding Scoops girl by the shirt while Sinclair's little sister levels Billy with a challenging glare that has shame curling hot and acrid in his gut.

"STEVE! We've been looking *everywhere* for you! C'mon buddy, we have to get outta here before the Russian guys find us."

These hicks are fucking insane.

After helping Steve up to rinse out his mouth in the sink, Billy walks out of the bathroom with Harrington hanging off his shoulder when a bullet whizzes past his nose to embed itself in the cement wall.

Henderson is screaming "Shit, they found us!" while two men in black combat gear come charging up the escalator, armed to the teeth. They bark orders out in what is obviously Russian before a show car *flies through the air* and crushes them against the wall.

After Billy is introduced to a little girl with God damn *superpowers*, he's given a bare bones explanation while Steve plays with one of Billy's stray curls like it's the most interesting thing in the world. And monsters are real and there's a spider made of people out to get them and apparently Heather is possessed and all Billy can hear is

kinda look familiar….thought I caught amnesia

to my knowledge, not really. at least not in the same casual way joe tends to bring dacre or billy up. i can't think of a specific interview off the top of my head. i'm sure he would've, if he got to spend a longer time working on the show. but.

dacre simply did far less stranger things press, and whenever he does talk about that period, it's usually centered around billy or billy & max. i'm slowly working my way through older interviews, so if i run into anything i'll absolutely update.