But none of that mattered to you anymore once you met Ben.

Six years ago, you fell in love. Ben was a dream and a half. The kind of guy you bring home to your parents and revel in the way they gush over him and the both of you together. The kind of guy someone writes songs about with a swooning guitar and lyrics that wax poetic. The kind of guy you marry. At the time, Ben was it for you. 

Then, three years ago, Ben broke your heart. You hadn’t seen it coming. It felt completely out of left field. You believed you were everything each other wanted until he was walking out the door. 

“I’m not..happy anymore. I don’t know how to make you happy.” He had said and you remember a nauseating confusion coursing through your veins. What did that mean? You were happy….weren’t you? And before he walked out the door, “I hope you find someone who does.”

He clearly had. Two months later he was engaged to another woman you’d had in your home at dinner parties and holidays and suddenly it all clicked. You’re only slightly embarrassed to admit how long you cried and the amount of sweets you ate to try and feel better. 

While the wound was still fresh, the ache cutting so deep in your bones, you decided you never wanted to risk feeling like that again. It took you a while before you felt like you were yourself again.

Two years ago, you got a job as a columnist for the Daily Planet. A basic “how-to” column that you’ve come to love, even if you’d rather be writing something more substantial. There, you met Clark Kent. 

He was everything Ben wasn’t from the second you were introduced. The second he’d fixed his striking blue eyes on yours and smiled at you, something inside you jolted. And you’ve been petrified ever since.

Because if there was anyone who could make you consider taking that risk again, it was Clark.

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It’s a busy day at the Daily Planet. Well, it’s always “busy” but it’s especially so today. The printers are working overtime and there’s people fluttering all about, checking edits and typing like there’s no tomorrow. An argument splits open near the coffee counter. 

Deadlines will do that to you.

You’d arrived earlier than usual, earlier than you needed to considering you were basically done with your newest “how-to” for the next print. Still, the only time you can pin Perry White down to talk to him about writing for something other than your column is on his way from the coffee machine and back to his office. 

“But Perry, I think I’ve really got something here! If you’d just look at it-” your footsteps are hurried as you keep pace with Perry. He stops suddenly and you nearly stumble over yourself, words getting cut off.

“Look kid, I appreciate your enthusiasm but right now I need you to stick to your how-to’s,” he fixes you a look and fits his cigar between his lips before resuming his trail to his office. You sigh, but you don’t want to give up that easily.

“But could you at least just-” you start to plead and then you’re cut off again. He holds up a finger this time and heaves a sigh.

“I’ve given you my answer, kid. We’ve got a deadline to meet.” The words form around the cigar in his mouth. You wither, footsteps faltering. 

“Yes, Chief,” you sigh, to which he just shakes his head. Your shoulders sag, the entirety of your body drooping like a wilted rose. When Perry’s out of earshot you toss your head back with a frustrated groan. 

This wasn’t exactly where you thought you’d be by now. Two years seemed like enough time to establish yourself at the Daily Planet. Your little column that’s shoved towards the back of the paper seemed like as good a stepping stone as any towards writing about something more. 

It’s not like you dislike your column, in fact, you really enjoy it. You just feel like you have more to offer after two years if Perry would just give you the chance one of these days.

You’re admittedly, a little visibly pouty on your way to your desk. It feels a little childish, like you might as well cross your arms and stomp your foot with a hmph! You don’t, of course. Though maybe it’d provide some kind of emotional release. That’s why toddlers do it, right?

As you near your desk you notice there’s a new coffee cup waiting for you by your keyboard. The culprit, you notice next, is standing next to your desk with his bag still on his shoulder like he just got in. Which, he probably did.

It’s hard for you to stay grumpy at the sight of Clark. His tie is slightly askew and he’s holding his own cup of coffee, hot where yours is iced. 

He’s far too nice to you, you think, but he’s a wonderful friend. And God knows you were in dire need of a good one after what happened. Sometimes though, when you start to feel a little lonely, you wonder if he’d be a wonderful boyfriend too, but you’re quick to shove that aside. 

It’s better for you to just be friends. Less scary that way. Less of a risk that you end up absolutely demolished again, too.

“Was just dropping this off. Just how you like it,” he says when you’re within earshot, motioning towards the coffee that wasn’t there when you’d gone after Perry this morning. You can see the ring of condensation it leaves against the lacquered top of your desk. You smile at him.

“Thank you. You know you don’t have to.” 

He matches your smile and shrugs. 

“Yeah but I want to,” he says. There’s a faint pink that blushes his cheeks but you think it might just be the lighting. Still, you revel in the fact that he wants to do a nice thing for you. You try to quell it. The familiar fear of getting too close to someone again prickling your skin.

On paper, Clark is the perfect guy to be with after Ben. He’s charming and patient and kind, overwhelmingly so, to everything and everyone he encounters. He never fails to make you smile. Doesn’t hurt that he’s devastatingly handsome, too. 

Truth is, Clark Kent scares you to death.

“How’d it go with Perry this morning?” he asks, breaking you from your thoughts. You deflate, frustrated all over again. A grimace pulls at his face at the look on yours and the huff that escapes you. “That bad?”

“He refused to read it! Appreciates my enthusiasm but wants me to,” you twist your voice into your best impression of your editor-in-chief, “stick to my how-tos.”

You relish in the chuckle your impression pulls out of Clark. He opens his mouth to say something and is cut off.

“Stop flirting and get to work, Kent. We’ve got a deadline,” Perry’s voice seems to boom as he strides past your bullpen on the floor. Clark flounders, cheeks warming into an embarrassed red. You’re all too aware of the amount of eyes on you and you feel yourself start to fold inwards.

The two of you look at each other and Clark flashes you a tight lipped, shy smile. He motions towards his desk across the way and you nod, wordlessly communicating with each other.

“Thanks again for the coffee,” you say before he can walk away. 

“Anytime, really,” he says as he passes. There’s a fleeting press of his hand against your back. Your breath gets stuck in your throat, heat radiating out from where his touch lingered. You steel yourself for a beat before sitting down at your desk. 

The ice in your coffee shifts as you log into your computer. You glance over to Clark though you can only see the back of his head from here. The side of your hand brushes against the cold drops of condensation on your coffee cup. Goosebumps skitter up your arm.

When you finally take the first sip, a pleased hum drifts out of you. It’s just how you like it, like he had said, but it’s also better somehow. Familiar, but different in the best way. 

Just like Clark, you think.

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Despite it being sarcasm, you can’t get Perry’s insinuation that Clark was flirting with you out of your head. It’s been weeks and no matter how hard you try, it stays at the back of your mind constantly. And it’s starting to do a number to your nervous system.

Sure, maybe your interactions can be read as flirtatious but Clark’s also your closest friend. It’s just friendly banter and actions to show you care. Hardly anything romantic. 

That’s what you keep telling yourself anyway.

It’s a Wednesday towards the end of summer when you start to notice something different. 

The second the workday ends, you’re logging out with a swiftness. You’re not alone. Nearly everyone at the surrounding desks does the same. 

There’s a shuffle of sound as everyone starts to pack up their things. The corner of your notebook bends as you shove it in your bag and you curse under your breath. You’re inspecting it, trying to bend it back into place but the crease is still there in the corner. Annoying.

“Heading out?” 

The sound of Clark’s voice behind you makes you jump in surprise, your bag falling from your hands and to the ground. You’re pressing your hand to your chest, trying to calm your racing heart. He at least has the decency to look apologetic when you turn to face him.

Clark has a bad habit of sneaking up on you. You’re not sure how someone so…big can be so quiet. Or how he only seems to be able to sneak up on you, considering his occasional clumsiness tends to alert his presence. Too busy always trying to not occupy so much space that he almost seems to occupy even more. 

“Sorry! Sorry.” He’s dropped to the ground to retrieve your bag and bent notebook for you. His lips press together in a sympathetic grimace as he hands them over. Your hand falls from your chest to take them. 

“Jesus, you’re like a stealth agent or something, Clark. I’ll never understand it.” You shove the notebook into your bag and sling it over your shoulder. He shakes his head and is reaching to grab your water bottle for you before you even get a chance to turn around and get it yourself.

He holds it out to you and you smile your thanks. There’s a shock of something almost magnetic when your fingers brush his in the exchange. You try not to flinch away too noticeably. 

“Do you have plans? Like, now?” he asks, almost a little nervous. It makes you nervous and you hesitate in your movements. The corners of your eyes crease as you narrow them quizzically at him. “Sorry, that was..really forward.”

“No…why?” You start to walk away, full trust that he’ll follow you. He does. You slide your water bottle into your bag as you walk, Clark keeping pace. “Do you?”

“Oh! No, no I–Well…maybe?” he stumbles over his words and you glance at him out of the corner of your eye. His shoulders straighten just a tad. “There’s this new ice cream place that just opened downtown and I saw it and thought of you and I was wondering if maybe you wanted to check it out?”

You nearly trip over yourself, a pit dropping from your throat to your stomach. He thought of you. Is he asking you on a date? He thought of you. A mirage of emotions rushes through you and over your face. Clark starts to panic at your silence.

“Totally friendly!” You let out a soft breath. He thought of you. “Obviously! We don’t have to, unless you want to. And it doesn’t have to be tonight, sorry I didn’t–”

Clark’s a panic rambler you’ve come to notice. It’s rather endearing if you’re honest. The two of you pause outside the elevator. You nudge him with your shoulder which jostles you more than it does him.

“Tonight’s great, Clark,” you say, cutting off his rambling. He looks at you and breathes something like a sigh of relief at the sight of your smile. The elevator dings and the doors slide open. He lets you in first, mumbling under his breath.

“Great. Great, okay.”

Clark leads you around downtown Metropolis, his hand hovering just above the small of your back as a guide when needed. You fall into step and easy conversation the whole way, Clark making you laugh without even trying to be funny. 

You mention the argument that you heard break out by the coffee this morning and he tells you it was Jimmy and Lois arguing–Jimmy annoyed that Lois has used up all the sugar. He mentions his Ma is planning to come visit him in the coming weeks and you swear you can feel your chest start to expand at the evident admiration for her in his voice. 

“Here it is!” he announces a few minutes later as you turn a corner. 

The first thing you notice is the red, yellow, and blue striped awning with scalloped edges. A sign above reads Super Scoops in bright letters and a bold font. The obvious hero homage makes you snort but the small line out the door leads you to believe it must be good.

“How’d you find this place?” you ask, relishing in the shade the awning gives while you wait in line.

“Just happened upon it on the way into work today,” he shrugs. He hopes you don’t realize his route to work from his apartment never crosses this section of downtown. If you do, he’s none the wiser. 

“And the whole,” you wave a hand around, “Superman of it all isn’t at all why you wanted to try it?”

You’re teasing. Poking a jest at his superhero work connection. Clark scoffs a little though there’s no malice behind it, and briefly wonders if maybe you’ve figured him out. (You haven’t.)

“No!” his voice pitches up an inch. “I know you like ice cream and you just did that how-to bit about summer and I just thought you might like it s’all.”

There he goes again. Thinking of you and sending your heart ablaze. You need to get a grip. 

The line moves quickly for which you’re thankful. When you get to the counter, you opt for a swirl of soft serve on a cone and Clark gets his in a cup. The price seems a little outrageous for what you’re getting and you accredit it to the theming. 

You pull out your wallet and Clark gives you a piercing look, bumping your hand away though not unkindly. You go to protest but relent and put your wallet back in your bag when he swipes his card. He shoves his wallet back into the pocket of his slacks, stepping off to the side with you.

“I could’ve paid for that, you know,” you say, eyes locked onto the employee dispensing the swirl of chocolate and vanilla onto a cone. The uniforms here are rather silly. Blue t-shirts with little red capes attached, the parlor’s logo on the back. 

“I know. I didn’t want you to,” he states simply, like he’s telling you the sky is blue. You probably should’ve expected it. Small town, farm boy chivalry and such. 

Clark collects your ice creams from the teenager behind the counter who looks a little miserable. You accredit that to the uniform. He passes your cone off to you as he leads you out the door. 

A comforting silence hangs around you as you linger in a little grassy patch next door. There’s kids running around and a dog chases them off leash. A hum of delight escapes you at your first taste of the soft serve. It’s exceptionally good.

Golden rays of the fading sun cast a radiant haze around the outline of your body. Ice cream is starting to melt around the rim of your cone. The surface tension breaks and a rivulet slips over your knuckles. You let out a soft gasp, more an exhale than anything and quickly lick it off. 

Clark’s looking at you. Endearment glimmers in his irises, the sunlight reflecting off of it. You’re trying desperately to ignore the sticky feeling on your knuckles. You need to wash your hands. Or steal a generous glob of hand sanitizer even.

You catch his eye and feel pinned by his stare. You blink at him. 

“What?” you ask. A thorn of self-consciousness pokes at you for a brief moment. Clark shakes his head.

You’ve got a smear of vanilla soft serve across your left cheek from when you tilted your hand to lick the ice cream off your knuckles. Your eyes are doe like. Backlit by the setting sun, the fleeting rays highlight the frizz in your hair, creating a halo around your head. 

Clark thinks you’ve never looked more beautiful.

“You’ve got a little..” he gestures towards his own face. You bristle with a light embarrassment. Before you can reach up to wipe away the ice cream from your face, Clark beats you to it.

He’s somehow procured a napkin and softly wipes the ice cream you smeared across your cheek away. You don’t remember seeing him grab them on your way out of the parlor. 

Time seems to slow. The seconds drag by like the pouring of a thick stream of honey. The moment feels incredibly intimate for what it is. Your breath stills in your lungs. 

“There we go,” he says. He turns and tosses the napkin into the trashcan. The spell breaks. Your fingertips reach up to graze against the spot he cleaned. You drop them before he can turn back around to catch you.

“Thank you,” your voice feels a little shaky. Clark smiles at you with a soft shake of his head, a silent don’t worry about it, and takes a bite of his ice cream.

“This is really good,” he says, swallowing it down. He looks so..boyish in this moment and it does something funny to your heart. Combined with him wiping your face clean, you’re a little afraid you could go into spontaneous cardiac arrest.

You’re staring at him, something sweet and awe-like in your eyes. Something in Clark brightens at your attention. His cheeks twinge pink and he smiles softly. 

“Careful,” he points at your cone that’s starting to melt down to your fingers again. You blink away, embarrassed at your staring and hurriedly lick up the melted cream. What is going on with you?

Clark seems to have figured out a way to weasel himself inside and poke at your tender bits, making things in your chest twitch and move in a way they hadn’t in years. You weren’t sure when he had been able to step in so close to do so.

It feels all too familiar, yet different, just like that coffee he’d brought you a few weeks back. Your heart stutters, the beat spelling out an uh-oh.  

You think you might be falling in love with him.

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Things steadily progress with Clark after your ice cream not-date.

You’ve crossed into hug territory. Simple side ones when you see him in the office in the mornings. Longer, more proper ones when you go your separate ways after a hang out. Each one starts to untie the rope that’d been knotted around your heart three years ago. 

The risk grows more and more each day and now it feels even more ominous. Because now Clark’s more than just a potential romantic partner, he’s also one of your closest friends. And the thought of losing him in two ways instead of one scares you infinitely more.

You don’t mean to work so late on a Friday but it happens anyway and when you log out and pack up your things, the moon has risen completely in the sky. Clark has stayed late today too but you wonder if he was just waiting for you to finish so he can walk you home. 

You’ve never asked and he’s never outright offered except for the very first time. Now it’s just become something unspoken. A given in your friendship. You appreciate it all the same.

He lingers outside your apartment with you tonight and you can tell something’s bothering him. Like he’s holding himself back, restraining from something. You go to ask if he’s okay or what’s wrong but you never get the chance. 

Because Clark asks if you want to get dinner with him tomorrow night.

“Like a date. A nice, proper one with dinner and dessert.”

And despite the fear that shivers down your spine and the choking anxiety like a lump in your throat, you agree. 

“Yes. Yeah, that sounds…nice.” 

You hope your smile looks real and not as scared as you feel. He seems to buy it. He’s beaming with glee, trying to hide the intensity of it and failing. Quite adorably, you might add.

“Okay. I’ll pick you up at 7.” He states. No sense of a question, just a simple statement. Warmth rushes through you. 

“Okay.” The word is pushed out with a breath. Clark smiles at you. 

“It’s a date!” 

His enthusiasm is comforting and you squeak out a confirming uh huh! which is all you can seem to muster. Words are failing you. He reaches out to squeeze your hand briefly instead of hugging you goodbye tonight. 

You’re grateful for the change, certain he would’ve been able to feel your racing heart when your chest pressed against him. You watch him walk a few strides down the hall before you go inside. 

You’re already nervous when you wake up on Saturday morning. You spend a lot of the day panicking, over both the mundane and existential. Should you wear a dress? What if this goes horribly sideways and the two of you never speak again?

The usual.

In the end, you decide on your nicest dress, or rather, the nicest date night dress you own. You feel good. So long as you don’t think too seriously about it all. 

You’re trying to practice some age-old breathing exercise in the mirror to calm your nerves. Trying not to overthink too much about your shoes or your hair or how this is your first date in three years. You’re interrupted by a knock on your door.

A quick glance at the clock on your way to the door shows it’s seven on the dot. You’re a little surprised at Clark’s punctuality. Not because you didn’t think he wouldn’t be but because you’ve never experienced it before. A punctual date, that is.

You pause at the door for a beat. Then, you shake out your hands and swing it open.

Clark stands at your doorstep with a bouquet of fresh cut flowers. Peonies and delphiniums, chamomile sprinkled amongst blushing roses in a brown paper wrapping tied with string. He must’ve stopped by the florist for these, you think. It might be the prettiest arrangement anyone’s ever shown you, let alone given you.

Clark is staring at you, jaw a little slack. You feel yourself start to fluster under his gaze, shrinking slowly. 

“Wow. You look..” his voice trails off, eyes dropping to what you’re wearing and back up to lock with yours. “You look great.”

Your smile is a little shy, bright around the edges. The heat beneath your skin makes you feel like you could burst into flames.

“Thank you. You’re not so bad yourself,” you say. He’s wearing clothes similar to what he wears to work, a charcoal pair of slacks and the usual white button down but he’s not wearing a tie and the sleeves are pushed up his forearms. It’s really doing something to you. 

A blush rises on his cheeks and it’s his turn to offer you a shy smile. He clears his throat.

“These are for you,” he says, holding the flowers out for you to take. The paper crinkles as you take them from him. Your fingers brushing sends a pleasant zing! down your back. You can’t resist pressing your nose against the blossoms. 

“They’re beautiful,” you say on an inhale. Clark could say the same about you ten times over. “Come in. I’ll put them in a vase and then we can go?”

You back up to let Clark inside and he closes the door behind him. He stands in the tiny entryway. It’s not very big, your apartment; it looks even smaller with him standing in it.

“You can come in further, you know?” your laugh carries through the air like a breeze. He lingers in the entry of your shoebox kitchen now. The bouquet lays gently on the little kitchen table tucked away in a nook off the kitchen.

You’re grateful for the boost of height the kitten heels you decided on give you, albeit small, as you reach up to grab your favorite vase. Clark’s eyes trail after you as you flit around the kitchen. Watching as you bring the vase to the kitchen sink to fill it with water and take it over to the table.  

You untie the string and paper around the bouquet and place the flowers in the water with the utmost of care. It’s a perfect fit. You fluff it a little bit, arranging it so each blossom has space to shine. Then, you slide it to the center of your little homely kitchen table. 

It’s picturesque. And so are you, standing with your hands clasped, admiring it. Clark wishes he had a camera. You turn and look at him, taken aback a bit at the sweet look in his eyes.

“Ready?” you ask. Clark blinks like he’s been shaken out of a stupor. 

“Right. Yes! Let’s go.”

He follows close behind you as you grab your bag off the hook by the door and lock up. It’s your turn to follow him as soon as you leave your building. Ever the gentleman, he walks on the outside of the sidewalk and offers you his arm to hold.

Butterflies that have laid dormant inside you start to revive and flutter around your stomach. It’s a beautiful night in Metropolis, the sky clear and the air fresh. You think you’d be satisfied if you never made it to dinner and just walked around all night instead. Your feet might not thank you though. 

He takes you to a nice restaurant a few blocks over. A place as nice as this was always reserved for anniversary dates in the past, never for a first. This specific one Clark leads you into, you’d never been to. The reservations always too hard to come by.

You’re a little awestruck when you walk in. Your eyes dance around, taking it all in as you get seated. Beautiful artwork decorating the walls. The tables covered in pristine white linens. The lights are low and there’s music playing softly in the background. Clark pulls your chair out for you and pushes it in. 

“This place is so nice,” you say, as you sit. “How’d you even manage a reservation with so short notice?”

Clark looks a little sheepish, his shoulders hunching upwards towards his ears. 

“Oh I, uh- This is going to sound presumptuous and I apologize. I got one a while ago. It’s just taken me so long to work myself up to asking you out.” He says it like a confession. Something in you preens at the idea of Clark liking you so much, he’d plan so far ahead for a first date with you. 

Your nerves start to ease as the night progresses and maybe the bottle of red wine you share helps a bit too. It’s easy with Clark. As if you’ve always been doing this. It sends a thrill through you. 

Slowly but surely, your defenses start to come down. The hesitancy and fear that normally holds you back starts to fade. Clark starts to see you really shine with each new thing he learns and each new laugh that escapes you.

Just like he said when he asked you out, you get dessert after dinner. A rich slice of the most decadent chocolate cake you’ve ever had in your life. Your eyes close when you take the first bite, a delighted hum escaping you louder than you’d like. 

“Oh my god,” you open your eyes and the amused admiration in Clark’s eyes is clear as the moon in the sky. You get a little shy, your skin prickling under his gaze. “This is the best thing I’ve ever put in my mouth.”

You gesture for him to try it. Clark’s reaction almost mimics yours.

“Golly,” is all he says and you laugh a little at his choice of word, both of you going in for another bite. The cake is gone almost embarrassingly fast but you’re both too stuffed to care. The waiter drops off the check as you take your final sip of wine, draining the glass. 

He reaches for it without hesitation, doesn’t flinch at the total, just slides his card into the fold and sets it on the edge where it’s quickly retrieved. You fold your arms and rest them on the table, your hands holding on limply to the space above your elbows. 

The edges of you feel fuzzy. Your head is tilted a little towards your shoulder, a serene smile on your face. To Clark, you look radiant even in the dim lighting. When the waiter brings back his card, you watch as he signs and puts his card back in his wallet. 

He offers you his hand to help you out of your seat and neither of you let go as you walk out of the restaurant. In fact, you make the move to intertwine his fingers with yours and swing them a little between you. He pulls you into his side and you giggle, your shoulder bumping his bicep. 

You feel giddy head to toe. Maybe it’s the lingering effects of the wine. Maybe it’s Clark’s fingers slotted between yours. Or the way he’s been looking at you all night.

All you know is you feel more happy than scared and it’s been so long since you’ve felt this way that you’ve forgotten how good it feels. And maybe it’s your lapse in memory or maybe it’s Clark but it feels even better this time around.

You’re laughing at something Clark says–he’s been making you do that a lot tonight–when there’s a call of your name. The laughter gets stuck in your throat and dies out quick, your steps faltering on the sidewalk. Clark’s eyes are swimming with concern when he looks at your face. 

“Is that you?” Ben’s voice is just like you remember it. You turn towards it and your hand falls out of Clark’s grip when you catch sight of him. Because standing next to him is Jane. Beautiful, alluring Jane who drank your wine at your hosted parties and probably slept in your bed when you weren’t around. 

You think you might be sick. 

“Oh my god, how are you?” Ben gives you a hug, like you’re still friendly and things ended amicably. Like the last time you saw him he didn’t put your heart through a paper shredder. Your limbs feel wooden as you half-heartedly reciprocate. Ben steps back and wraps his arm around Jane’s waist. “You remember Jane?”

She lifts her left hand in a wave and the streetlight overhead catches on the ring on her finger, making it glint. At least she looks a little awkward at the whole situation. You nod, a pounding starting to form behind your brow. 

“Yeah, I..I remember,” you reply. You take a deep breath, force yourself to smile and sound way more friendly than you feel. “Good to see you.”

The puzzle pieces start to click into place in Clark’s head. He’s not completely aware of your dating history but he’s easily figures out that’s what this is. And that you’re completely beside yourself. He’s quick to wrap an arm around your waist, steady and strong. You relax a bit without even realizing. 

Ben catches the motion and his eyebrows raise a hair. He has to look up at Clark, not by a lot but enough that you notice it if you’re paying close attention. And you are. Then Ben looks at you, silently waiting for an introduction.

“Oh. Ben,” his name tastes like venom on your tongue. “This is-”

“Clark Kent.” He finishes for you, taking a step forward and extending his hand. You think you can see Ben wince from Clark’s grip but it’s gone as soon as it arrives. (And if Clark put more of a grip into the handshake than normal, well that’s nobody’s business but his own.)

There’s a beat of silence that passes. The four of you stand on the sidewalk, almost mirror images of each other. The same wave of nausea passes over you, the pressure in your head getting worse.

“Well, it’s good to see you. I’m glad you found someone who makes you happy,” Ben says, voice genuine. Something in you bristles at that, taking it more as one final nail in the coffin jab at you. Clark feels you stiffen in his hold. You’re not sure what to even say, lips parting but nothing coming out. 

It doesn’t seem to matter. Ben nods at you and Jane gives you a tight smile as they pass. You blink at their retreating figures. You’ve long since gotten over the love you held for him but you didn’t expect the pain of it all to still linger. 

You don’t want to let this one twisted encounter ruin the great night you’ve had with Clark but you can feel your reservations start to creep back in. It’s like Clark can see you start to slowly build those walls back up after he’d worked to pull them apart all night.

“Hey, you okay?” 

You focus on the good. The softness of his voice. The care in his eyes. The steadfast grip of his arm around your waist. You inhale and on your exhale, flash him a shaky smile.

“Yeah. Yeah, that was just…” A plethora of words dance around your head. Weird. Unexpected. Awful. Horrifying. “Strange.”

Clark nods and glances over his shoulder in the direction they walked off in. He looks back at you, your eyes locked where his just were. He clears his throat softly and your gaze finds his.

“Sorry but, I couldn’t stand that guy.” A sudden laugh, loud and genuine bursts out of you. A sentence so unlike Clark and yet, you can tell he means it. His eyes crinkle at the corners at the glow that’s started to come back to your face. He almost hadn’t noticed how dim you’d become in that guy’s presence. 

“Yeah,” you say, as your laughter dies down. Your smile softens. “Me too.”

Clark walks you home, conversation still full but maybe not as lively as it had been pre-Ben and Jane. You hate how they seem to haunt you like this. But you revel in how easy it was–and is–for Clark to make you laugh again. 

He expects the night to end at your doorstep but you invite him inside for a little while longer. You’re a little surprised, mostly delighted when he agrees. 

“Make yourself at home,” you say, kicking off your shoes and walking into your kitchen. Clark toes his shoes off and neatly arranges them next to yours. “Do you want anything to drink?”

Clark glances over and can see you grabbing two glasses down from a cupboard near your tiny stove. You set them on the counter and at his silence, look up to where he’s standing.

“Oh! Water’s fine.”

He takes interest in your photos hanging on the walls and the knick-knacks on your shelves. He particularly likes a corkboard you’ve got hung up with a bunch of mementos pinned: movie ticket stubs, fortunes from fortune cookies, postcards, one of your first how-to pieces from the Planet, a photobooth strip of you. 

You bring your drinks in, and set them on the coffee table, water for him and another glass of wine for you. You sit, knees pulled up on the couch and your feet tucked beneath you, your body facing Clark. You like how he looks sitting in your space. Like he fits right in. 

You talk for hours about anything and everything that seems to come to mind. You share the abridged version of Ben and Jane and your chest goes warm at how quick Clark notices your need for a subject change. He switches gears smoothly. You laugh so hard your stomach hurts.

The hours tick by without either of you paying much attention. Your drinks sit empty on the table and when the conversation lulls, you take them into the sink. Clark checks his watch when you leave the room. 

“Oh gosh, it’s late,” he says. You come out of the kitchen to an apology. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to keep you up. I hadn’t realized it was so late.”

“Clark, it’s okay,” you shake your head with a smile. His mouth is twisted into an apologetic frown. 

“Still. I should let you get to bed.” Only then do you realize how tired you feel.

You walk him to your front door and watch him put his shoes back on. When he straightens up, you take a step closer to him.

“I had a really good time tonight.” You say softly. Your eyes shine in the dim lamplight. 

“Me too.” Clark smiles. He swallows and shifts on his feet. “Would you..wanna do this again?”

“I’d like that.” You nod, smiling widely up at him. He nods.

Clark leans down to hug you goodnight, his arms wrapping tight around your waist. Yours reach up and over his shoulders. Your body sinks into his and you think you could stay right there forever. After a beat, he pulls back but you don’t let go right away.

With your arms around his neck and his around your waist, it leaves hardly any space between you both. Suddenly, the air feels similar to the moment before lightning strikes nearby in a storm. Your gazes both fall from eyes to lips and back. 

Clark’s tongue darts out to wet his lips and you track the motion with your eyes. You swallow, lips parting only just. He starts to lean in and your eyelids start to flutter shut. Your hands are trembling from both anticipation and uncertainty. Not about him, but about the unknown. You send a quick plea outwards that he doesn’t notice. 

There’s no telling what lies on the other side of letting Clark kiss you, a faint warning siren echoing in the back of your mind. You decide to ignore it the second his lips brush against yours. You’ll cross that bridge when it comes. 

The siren fades into a silent static hum, your senses flooded with ClarkClarkClark. Of the gentle press of his lips to yours, pliant and willing. Of the press of his body against yours as you eagerly push up to reciprocate. 

You wonder briefly why you hadn’t done this any sooner. There’s such an ease to it that you almost feel like you’re experiencing deja vu. Like there’s another version of you that wasn’t burned, that gets to kiss Clark like this all the time. You’re envious of her immediately.

His hands slide to your hips to pull you even closer to him and that dreaded siren breaks through the static in your brain. You pull back, your hands falling to his shoulders. Clark’s glasses are askew and have fogged up considerably but he doesn’t seem to care.

“Wait,” you say breathlessly. He’s quick to renew the gap of space between your bodies.

“Sorry-”

“No, no, it’s not- you’re okay,” you pause, chest heaving. You try to catch your breath, coming up short. Your arms fall from his shoulders as you take a step back. “I think I need a second.”

The wounded expression on Clark’s face makes you feel considerably worse. He resembles a confused, kicked puppy and you think you might be sick. 

You turn on your heel and make a beeline for the bathroom. Clark catches your shaking hand wiping at your eyes and doesn’t think twice before following after you. To apologize, if anything. Convinced he’s done something wrong enough to make you cry.

The counter of your bathroom is cold against your palms. You take a couple deep breaths in and out. Mentally kicking yourself because why can’t you just be normal about this and cursing Ben (and his bloodline, too) under your breath for causing your aversion to love in the first place. 

You turn the tap on, splashing cold water on your face in hopes that it’ll shock your system back to normal. Back to how it felt mere moments ago when you were kissing Clark. 

A gentle knock on the door makes you jump.

“Honey, talk to me. What’s wrong?” Your heart pinches, a piece of it chipping away at how sad he sounds. You don’t say anything for a beat. “Did I…” a defeated sigh, “sorry, did I do something wrong?”

You turn the water off. 

“Oh, Clark,” you sigh. He hears the lock click and then the door swings open. This time, his heart twists at the expression on your face. “No, you didn’t do anything wrong. I’m just..”

You let out a sad laugh and then your eyes are pinching shut. You press your face into your hands.

“I’m just a mess.” Your words are muffled against your palms. Clark tsks in disagreement and takes a step towards you. His fingers circle around your wrists and he’s so soft with you, you think you might burst into tears all over again. 

“Hey, hey, no. Look at me,” his voice is equally tender and you let him pull your hands away. The reveal of your eyes shiny with unshed tears chips away at his heart. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing, nothing, I’m fine,” you sniffle, rapidly trying to blink away the tears. One slips past anyway and he quickly smooths it away.

“You’re most certainly not fine,” he says, voice still gentle but firm. Your shoulders slump. Clark sighs. “Let’s get you some water. That sound good?”

You nod, looking at the floor. He leads you over to your couch and sits you down before getting you a glass of water from the kitchen. He’s back faster than you expect and you whisper a quiet thank you when he hands you the water. 

He doesn’t sit until you’ve drunk a considerable amount. You cradle the cup in your hands, looking anywhere but at Clark. 

“I’m sorry,” you finally say. You spare a quick glance up at him. “It wasn’t anything you did, I promise. I just…I haven’t done this since..”

“Since Ben?” Clark fills in. You look at him with a small smile that’s equal parts embarrassed and sad. 

“Yeah. I just spooked myself a bit,” you say. Clark nods in understanding. 

“You don’t have to apologize for that,” he says, resting a hand on your knee. Your eyes focus on it. 

“Okay. I just don’t want you to think it’s because of you,” you say, gaze lifting to his eyes. They’re looking at you like you’re made of porcelain. He scoots a little closer to you on the couch and lightly brushes a stray piece of hair behind your ear. His palm settles on your cheek. 

“We can take it slow, yeah?” Clark offers. You perk up, a little surprised. After all this, he still likes you. He still wants to try with you. The realization makes you ache. You nod, anyway.

Slow is perfect.

⠂⠄⠄⠂⠁⠁⠂⠄⠄⠂⠁⠁⠂⠄⠄⠂ ⠂⠄⠄⠂☆

The air outside has started to go cold, summer finally fading away into a brisk autumn. You’ve five more dates with Clark now under your belt. It’s slowly getting easier, less scary though you can’t deny that your brain continues to do risk assessments over each new romantic gesture.

He brings you a new assortment of flowers each time. The newest, a golden arrangement featuring sunflowers and dahlias, sits in the usual spot on your kitchen table. The sun reflects off the petals through the window. 

Clark’s at your apartment again in a handknit sweater his Ma made him, sat at the table and warming his hands with a cup of cocoa. Speaking of.. 

“My Ma is visiting this weekend,” he says. 

“Yeah?” 

“And she’d…like to meet you.” 

The world seems to still, your body going with it. You blink at him, lips parting and closing. 

“Oh!”

Clark rushes his words out, sensing the rising panic in your chest.

“You don’t have to, I know we’re taking it slow and this is definitely, probably not even remotely close to that. But I’ve talked about you so much she won’t stop asking about you, even before this started. It’s only if you want to.”

Your heart picks up at the image in your head of Clark including you in his updates to his Ma. It makes you burn from the inside, a sweetness pooling in your veins. He talks about you. The pendulum swings back and forth in your head as you consider it. 

“Okay,” you say. Clark raises an eyebrow at you.

“You’re sure?” When you nod, he beams. He gets up from his seat and comes over to press a kiss against the top of your head. His excitement is sweet to witness. “I’ll call and let her know.”

On Sunday, you go over to Clark’s for dinner. 

You shift nervously outside the door to his apartment. Your fingers are stiff from the brisk air outside and from the tight grip you have on the flowers you picked up on the way over. You close your eyes and take a deep breath, willing your body to still.

Then, you lift your fist and knock it against his door. You’re wiping your palm against the front of your pants when he answers the door. His smile is blinding.

“Hi,” he steps aside to let you in. The door closes behind you and he dips his head to kiss your cheek in greeting as you’re toeing off your shoes. “You look nice.”

“Hi,” You smile, nerves still going haywire beneath your skin. “Thanks.”

“Clark? Is she here?” You can hear her voice from the kitchen and you glance at Clark, grip tightening on the small bouquet in your hand. You’re a little nervous that it's not as nice as it could be. Clark presses a hand against the small of your back and you remember to breathe.

He leads you the short distance to the kitchen in lieu of a response. As soon as she sees you, her eyes light up. You smile nervously at her and give a small wave of your hand.

“Ma, this is-” Clark starts to say, but he’s quickly cut off. 

“You must be, y/n!” Her accent is thick as honey and it warms your heart. 

“Hi,” you hope your voice doesn’t sound as nervous as you feel. “These are for you, Mrs. Kent.”

You hold out the flowers to her and she takes them with a soft audible aw. Then she’s pulling you into a hug and saying, “call me Martha.”

It takes you a beat to huge her back. You can’t remember the last time you’ve been hugged like this. Different from how Clark hugs you, different from your own mother’s hugs. This one has a specific air of home to it that’s overwhelming. 

You look at Clark over her shoulder who looks extra smiley.  When she pulls back, she looks at the flowers again. Then she turns to Clark who already has a hand extended to take them and go put them in water. 

“Clark has told me so much about you,” she says. A hand, weathered and gentle from age touches your cheek. “You’re even more beautiful than he described.”

“Ma,” Clark says, from the kitchen sink. You smile, loving that boyish part of him that still gets embarrassed when his mom shares something she probably shouldn’t. Martha tsks and angles herself slightly to look at him, her hand falling away.

“I’m serious, Clark.” She turns to you and lowers her voice a smidge. “He’s always talking about you, it's hard to get him to stop. I knew I had to meet the girl he’s so sweet on from the second he mentioned you.”

You can feel your skin start to flush. Your eyes catch onto Clark who’s arranging the flowers in the vase and setting them on his own kitchen table. 

“You’re the only girl he’s ever been like this over,” she says almost conspiratorially. Your body softens, something distantly familiar coursing through your veins. Clark catches your eye and smiles at you and it leaves you a little dizzy. 

When the food is ready, the two of them fall into a rhythm, bringing dishes to the table. Watching the two of them interact, you can tell where Clark gets it from. His mannerisms and certain words and phrases in his vernacular. 

Clark pulls out both yours and Martha’s chairs when you sit to eat. The food is delicious and you make a note to ask Martha for recipes when the night ends. 

It’s as easy to talk to her as it is Clark. She asks questions about you and your job and your family. And she also asks about you and Clark. How you met and when you started “going steady” as she puts it. You’re particularly fond of the stories she shares about Clark when he was little. Even more fond of the red blush that covers his cheeks at the more embarrassing ones. 

In the back of your mind though you can’t get Martha’s words out of your head. 

You’re the only girl he’s ever been like this over. 

It unnerves you slightly. And at the same time, you wonder how you could even begin to describe how much it means to you to have his Ma treat you so kind and warm. Like you’re already part of the family. Your mind starts to analyze a risk assessment, a voice in the back of your mind poking and prodding and whispering that something this good has to come down. 

Clark reaches for your hand at the table and gives it a quick squeeze, momentarily pulling you out of your spiral. You look at him with a soft smile, ever grateful and surprised that he can read you so well.

At the end of the night, Martha hugs you tight again and you soak it in. 

“It was so good to meet you, dear,” she says, pulling back from the hug. Her hands hold onto your forearms.

“You too,” you smile and she gives your arms a squeeze. She looks at Clark, who’s holding your purse for you in his hand. 

“You make sure she gets home safe, Clark.” 

Clark lips twitch. “I know, Ma. I always do.”

He’s true to his words, walks you safely home and all the way to your door like he always does. You linger outside the door until you’re toeing the line of inviting him in. He kisses you goodnight, soft and sweet, his hand cradling your jaw and yours pressed against his chest. 

It quiets your brain enough for you to get to bed but when you wake up the next morning, it’s racing immediately again. You’re distracted during the work day and no matter how much you try, you can’t get it to stop. A steady downward spiral.

Clark comes home with you after work. You’re unusually quiet on the walk to your apartment and through dinner–leftovers from the night before that Martha insisted you take home with you.

You clear the table of dishes and Clark helps you wash up. When the two of you go to sit on your couch, Clark sits first and holds out a hand. 

“C’mere,” he says, all but pulling you to sit in his lap, though really you might as well be straddling him. For the first time all day, the chatter in your brain starts to dim. “What’s wrong? You’ve been unusually quiet all day.”

You look down at your hands in your lap and shrug. You’re not sure how to phrase it even if you tried. 

“It’s..nothing. It’s silly,” you finally say, still refusing to look at him.

“Hey,” his voice is a soft caress against your skin, gentle like his fingers that tilt your cheek so you look at him. “It’s just me. You can tell me.”

Your gaze roves his face, stars in your eyes. Clark pushes a stray hair behind your ear, his fingertips grazing your cheek like a feather. His eyes haven’t once strayed from yours. 

A shiver runs down your spine and you try not to squirm. It’s still new being seen like this. Like he’s looking right through you, straight into the messy walls of your subconscious. You swallow, your mouth dry and the words hang in a lump in your throat.

“Just..when I met your mom yesterday,” you can feel the sting of tears behind your eyes, feeling a little silly. Clark’s looking at you, so tenderly it squeezes your heart in your chest. “She hugged me. Like really hugged me.”

The corner of his mouth twitches and something shimmers in his eyes as he scans your face. One hand rubs against your arm and his thumb on the other spreads a tear across the apple of your cheek as he wipes it away.

“Honey, that’s a good thing. Yeah?” 

“I-” You close your eyes and take a deep breath, nodding though your shoulders inch up towards your ears. “Yeah. Yes. I dunno, it just…”

Your shoulders drop on an exhale and your eyes flutter open and latch onto his. Clark looks at you with quiet reassurance. His fingertips trail against the skin of your arms featherlight while he waits for you to finish your thought.

“It felt like home,” your voice is so quiet it’s almost a whisper. Clark's eyes seem to soften even more than they already were. The corners of your mouth twitch into a small smile. You look away to wipe at your eyes, damp fingertips coming to rest along the side of his neck.  “Been a while since I’ve had that.”

Your eyes lock back on his. Something familiar is swirling in his eyes, your breath getting stuck in your throat for the briefest of moments. Your heart starts to play a symphony against your ribcage. Clark’s hands have migrated to the small of your back.

“You’re starting to feel like home,” he says. Your fingers against his neck can feel the timbre of his voice. There’s a rush of warmth that covers you from head to toe. It’s dizzying enough to leave you a little nauseous, though there’s a fleeting thought that wonders if it’s because his words feel like a euphemism for the L word. 

Despite the onslaught of emotion you feel, your lips start to curl into a giddy smile just as Clark leans in to kiss you. His lips slot against yours, slow and sure and it’s enough to steal the breath from your lungs. Your smile gets kissed away but the giddiness doesn’t fade.

His hands on your back pull you closer towards him and your thumbs press against his jawline. Your body feels like it’s starting to liquify in his arms as you melt against him. You pull back and Clark steals one more lingering kiss from you. It elicits another soft smile.

You don’t open your eyes right away, breathing in deep through your nose as you press your forehead against his. His thumbs rub circles against your back and his nose nudges yours. You blink your eyes open and lean back enough to look at him fully. 

You run a hand through the mess of curls on his head, eyes as soft as the edges of your smile. Clark’s looking at you like you hung the moon. The simplest of thoughts pops into your head. A flash of fear shocks your body. You push the feeling down and away, locking it up deep in the gooey center of your heart.

But you can’t lock away the thought that races around your brain like a news headline. 

You’re a thousand percent, without a doubt, in love with Clark Kent.

⠂⠄⠄⠂⠁⠁⠂⠄⠄⠂⠁⠁⠂⠄⠄⠂ ⠂⠄⠄⠂☆

It’s an almost difficult realization for you in the coming days. The familiar dip in your stomach, a pull on your heart, like passing by an old friend in the grocery store. Things are safe with Clark, you’re safe with Clark. But it doesn’t quell the stutter of fear in the beat of your heart that’s been opening itself back to love.

You can’t help it but you do the best thing you know how. You pull away even though it’s twisting your heart into knots. A part of you hopes that he’ll break things off if you push hard enough. Maybe it’ll hurt less that way.

Because what if you love him too much, too hard that he slips away? In your head, it’s better to withdraw now and first before he ever gets the chance to. Logically, you know it’s unlike Clark but you can’t help it. You’re not feeling very rational right now. Common sense has seemed to fly right out the window.

Clark feels utterly confused. You keep things about the same at work but the second you get home, he can feel you pulling away. You stop answering his calls. You don’t let him kiss you, barely let him hold your hand. 

He goes into fix-it mode, trying to retrace his steps and figure out if maybe he did something but he comes up short. He tries talking to you about it but you shrug it off, insisting everything is fine when he can clearly tell it’s not. 

He decides that maybe you just need a day or two to yourself and he acquiesces, giving you the space that he thinks you need. When he does, you think maybe he’s finally pulling away too and even though it makes you ache, you think it’s for the best.

But when space doesn’t work and you still won’t talk he knows something is really wrong. In his head, he makes a loose plan. He’ll get you to talk to him somehow, if anything to just get some kind of closure if you’ve decided this isn’t something you want to pursue with him anymore. The thought makes him ache but he has to know.

A couple weekends after dinner with his mom, you’re in your apartment staring at the wilted flowers on your kitchen table, wondering if you should maybe get rid of them. But that feels like getting rid of Clark somehow and you can’t bring yourself to do either of those things. 

There’s a knock on your door and your heart knows it’s him before you do. You open the door and there he stands. His nose is pink from the cold and there’s a sadness so heavy in his eyes it stabs at the tender bits of your heart. 

“We need to talk,” he says, and then at the last second, “please.”

You don’t say anything, just step aside to make room for him to come in. You close the door behind him with a click.

“What’s going on?” he asks as soon as you turn around. You fold your arms, hugging them to you like some kind of armor. 

“What do you mean?” you try to play a little dumb and Clark huffs. It’s the first time you’ve ever seen him anything close to angry. 

“You know what I mean. It’s what I’ve been trying to get you to talk to me about for weeks.” he sounds the slightest bit exasperated. “You won’t talk to me outside of work anymore. You won’t let me close enough to do much of anything. You’ve stopped returning my calls. It’s like you’ve completely pulled away.”

He sounds hurt more than anything. 

“Did I do something? What happened?” 

You close your eyes and sigh. “No Clark, you didn’t do anything. Nothing…happened.”

“Then why. Why are you pulling away?”

“Maybe we’re just better as friends!” you burst out, arms falling to your sides. “We were moving too fast. Maybe it’s just…easier if we just go back to being friends. Nothing more.”

“Don’t do that,” he says and you blink at him. Your eyebrows furrow. 

“What? I’m not-” you pinch the bridge of your nose. Your words have started leaving you both so fast your sentences almost overlap. “Clark-”

“You’re quitting before things get tough. You can’t do that.”

“What? I’m not..I’m not quitting. God, Clark I-” your voice starts to break. “I’m trying to protect myself. I’m terrified.”

Clark’s shoulders soften. “Terrified?”

“Yes,” you say and now the words won’t stop spilling out of you. “I’m scared to death of…of this. Of you! Of us! Of…of all of it! I’m scared.”

Clark looks like a kicked puppy again.

“Me? Us?” his voice sounds so small and your heart twists. “Why?” 

“Because I..” you’re almost panting. “Because I love you, Clark. I love you and it scares me because I never wanted to fall in love again. I never wanted to risk the pain of losing someone again. I didn’t want to risk the possibility of things ending just like they did with Ben three years ago.

And then I met you and I just knew if anyone would change my mind it would be you. The thought of being loved by you scared me and at the same time I was scared by how much I wanted that. And I tried not to but falling in love with you was the easiest thing for me to do.”

You’re not sure when you started crying or when Clark got close enough to be able to wipe your tears away with his thumbs. He looks pained at the sight of your tears but beneath that is a joy so vibrant it almost glows.

“Hey, hey, hey,” his voice is a soft melody in your ears. “I love you, too.”

It doesn’t sound as scary to you when he says it outloud. You sniffle, unable to fight the smile that spreads across your face. It’s teary and you’ve got a sudden worry that your nose is running. 

“You do? Even still?”

Clark lets out a soft laugh and nods, wiping away fresh tears that have fallen over your cheeks. “Yeah, honey, I do. Even still.”

“It’s an awful lot of work,” you say. Through a wet laugh, “I’m a mess, clearly.”

“No it’s not. Not for me. Not when it’s you.” 

The look in his eyes is so intense and serious, you’ve no choice but to believe him. Your heart soars. You sniffle again, feeling like a weight has been lifted off of your shoulders. Your fingers curl themselves into the fabric of the sweatshirt he’s wearing.

“Are you gonna kiss me or not?” you tease and it pulls a smile out of Clark. He presses his lips to yours, so tender and soft, it leaves you melting like that ice cream cone he bought you what seems like a lifetime ago.  

Love this go around feels familiar, but it’s different, better even in all the right ways. It’s like returning from a lifelong journey and sinking into a hug. 

It feels like coming home.

⠂⠄⠄⠂⠁⠁⠂⠄⠄⠂⠁⠁⠂⠄⠄⠂ ⠂⠄⠄⠂☆

Because Steve never hesitates.

Never acts like affection is something shameful.

Love pours out of him, as naturally as body heat.

If your hands are cold, he interrupts himself halfway through a story just to catch your fingers and tuck them into his jacket pockets alongside his own, rubbing warmth back into your knuckles while continuing his sentence without missing a beat.

If you yawn during movie night, his arm is around your shoulders before the sound can finish leaving your mouth. “C’mere, sleepy girl,” he murmurs automatically, pulling you sideways against his chest.

If your shoelaces come untied in the middle of the sidewalk, he drops immediately to one knee with a distracted, “hang on, baby.”

Rainwater hisses along the curb while he reties the bow tighter this time, fingers quick and practiced, one hand steadying lightly against your ankle. His knuckles brush your skin through your sock and you have to stand there, holding your breath until your lungs ache with it, staring down at the concentration pulling his brows together.

Wondering what it must be like to love someone with your whole heart and not feel like it’s going to break you open.

He’s warm everywhere, your Steve. Warm hands, warm mouth. Warm stomach pressed against your back beneath blankets. He smells like laundry detergent and faint cedar cologne rubbed into the collar of his jackets. Sometimes vanilla chapstick, sometimes mint gum. Always Steve.

And the kisses are constant too.

Quick, thoughtless ones, born entirely from fondness.

The corner of your mouth while waiting for the microwave to beep. Your forehead when he passes behind you in the kitchen. Your shoulder while you lean over the sink brushing your teeth side by side. The back of your neck when he reaches around you for orange juice in the fridge, mumbling a sleepy, “morning, honey,” against your skin before kissing beneath your hairline.

Sometimes he just looks at you for a second. Expression softening imperceptibly, like some private thought crossed his mind, and then he leans over and kisses your cheek with this quiet little hum in his throat.

Like loving you tastes good.

And god, the neck kissing.

It’s terrible.

And right now, in the middle of a museum gallery so quiet you can hear shoes squeak against polished floors, he’s doing it again.

You’re trying to read the plaque beneath some enormous renaissance painting—something about divinity and grief, oil on canvas—but Steve is behind you, arms folded around your waist while he scans the museum brochure one-handed.

One of his hands has slipped beneath your cardigan, warm palm spread low across your stomach.

“Okay, so,” he murmurs near your ear, voice low enough that the sound vibrates through you, “there’s the Greek sculpture thing upstairs, or... there’s apparently a room with these like, tiny dollhouses?”

You wrinkle your nose. “That sounds horrifying.”

“Right?” His lips brush the shell of your ear as he speaks. “Like what if one of them’s haunted?”

Then his mouth finds the hinge of your jaw.

One lazy, distracted kiss.

His lips are soft, slightly chapped from the cold outside. Warm breath spills across your skin afterward, making your pulse jump beneath his mouth. He lingers there, nose nudging lightly against your neck while he keeps mumbling off different sections of the museum.

You feel the shape of his smile against your skin when he finds another ridiculous exhibit.

“Apparently there’s a room that’s just chairs.”

“That can’t be true.”

“No, I swear to god.”

Then his mouth drifts lower.

Open-mouthed kisses this time.

Slow enough that warmth blooms beneath every press of his lips. You feel the faint scrape of his teeth catch your skin playfully before he smooths over it with another softer kiss, his thumb stroking across your stomach.

Your entire body tightens around the feeling.

The worst part is knowing that he isn’t trying to fluster you.

Steve isn’t performing intimacy.

He just never second-guesses affection.

Unlike you.

For you, every touch feels catastrophic.

The second Steve touches you, awareness crashes through your body all at once—your pulse, your breathing, the weight of his hand, whether your hair smells okay, whether your stomach feels too soft beneath his palm, whether someone across the gallery can see this.

Whether you deserve to be loved this openly at all.

“....and Robin said there’s some painting of a guy eating his own son which honestly seems kinda—”

He stops, hand stilling against your stomach.

“Babe?”

You blink hard, staring at the plaque without reading a single word.

Steve leans back, concern creasing immediately between his brows.

“Hey,” his hand slides higher, rubbing gently over your ribs. “You okay?”

“Hm? Mhm.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah, I’m fine.”

Another lie.

Your skin still burns where he kissed you.

And underneath all the panic is something worse.

Fear and hunger, knotted so tightly you can’t separate them anymore.

Wanting him closer, wanting him to keep touching you forever. Wanting to crawl inside every warm, gentle thing he gives you and stay there.

Not knowing what you’d do if he ever stopped.

Because as terrifying as it is to be loved this softly, you think losing it might actually destroy you.

“You wanna sit down for a sec?” Steve asks quietly. “I think I still have that granola bar in my bag if you’re hungry.”

You almost laugh, because of course that’s where his mind goes.  

Care.

Always care.

“No, I’m okay,” you say quickly, forcing a smile. “We can keep going. The uh, Greek sculpture thing sounds good.”

He watches you for a beat longer than comfortable, thumb rubbing against your hipbone through your jeans.

“Okay,” he says finally.

His hand slides up your arm, gently fixing the cardigan slipping off your shoulder. His fingers brush your neck in the process, absentmindedly smoothing your hair back into place too.

And then, because he’s Steve—because affection lives inside him so naturally he doesn’t know how to love except with his whole body—

He reaches down and interlaces your fingers with his.

Warmth immediately fills the spaces between your knuckles, his callused fingers curling around yours with steady, secure pressure.

He keeps holding your hand the entire walk toward the staircase, thumb stroking across your skin while he talks about haunted dollhouses and ugly marble babies and whether you think ancient Greek people had chest hair.

And isn’t it terrifying, how quickly your body has learned what safety feels like in someone else’s hands?

...

It isn’t just the touching.

You almost wish it was.

Because that would be easier to understand.

A touch can be explained away:

Steve’s just naturally affectionate. Steve likes physical contact.  

But it’s not just that.

It’s the way he loves you without condition. Without making you earn it first.

A few weeks into dating, he showed up at your apartment carrying a bouquet so enormous it nearly blocked his entire face.

When you opened the door, all you could see were flowers.

Soft cream roses crowded against pale pink delphiniums, petals curling delicately at the edges like silk ribbon. Deep burgundy dahlias bloomed low in the arrangement, velvety and dark as spilled wine, white baby’s breath drifting between everything like tiny bursts of snowfall.

And hidden right in the middle were your favorites.

Blue hydrangeas.

Dusty-blue petals clustered together like storm clouds at dusk, edges fading lavender where the light caught them.  

You had pointed them out exactly once while passing a florist downtown.

Three seconds, maybe.  

You remembered slowing briefly in front of the shop window because they looked beautiful beneath the warm yellow display lights. Rain had just started misting softly against the sidewalk and Steve had been halfway through ranting about some middle schooler trying to rent an R-rated horror movie with a fake ID. You’d smiled at his story before murmuring, almost absentmindedly, “Those are so pretty.”

That was it.

You hadn’t even thought he heard you.

But Steve Harrington has a habit of holding onto the tiniest details about you like they're something precious.

“Baby, I swear to god,” Steve was saying now as he stepped inside your apartment, nudging the door shut with his foot, “I had the craziest day today. This guy at work tried to return a tape completely melted.”

The bouquet landed in your arms before he shrugged off his jacket.

“Melted,” he repeated, horrified, running a hand through his hair. “Like, fully warped. Looked like somebody cooked that thing in a microwave.”

You stared down at the flowers.

The bouquet was heavy enough that you had to support it with both arms. Thick stems pressed cool and damp against your palms beneath layers of cream florist paper, the wrapping folded slightly unevenly around the flowers and tied together with rough twine that looked suspiciously hand-done.

Not florist-perfect, but Steve-perfect.

The flowers smelled dizzyingly alive: sweet rose perfume softened by rainwater and the cool, earthy scent of freshly cut stems.

“…um, Steve?”

“—and Keith asked me if I did that,” he huffed, toeing off his shoes. “I mean, can you believe that shit? What does he think I do at work all day, destroy tapes for fun?”

“Steve.”

“Yeah?”

You blinked at him slowly.

“What’s…” Your throat tightened strangely around the words. “What’s this for?”

He looked down at the bouquet like he’d genuinely forgotten he walked in carrying it.

“Uh…” His brows lifted slightly. “Flowers?”

He laughed softly after saying it, confused.

But you didn’t laugh.

Because your brain was already doing what it always did: rummaging frantically for conditions. For expectations and hidden meanings tucked beneath kindness.

Your heartbeat started creeping unpleasantly high in your throat.

Was it an anniversary?

Oh god.

Had you forgotten something?

Your stomach dropped, dates scrambling uselessly through your head too fast to follow. One month? Six weeks? Was there something couples were supposed to celebrate this early? Had Steve done something thoughtful and now you were standing there empty-handed like the worst girlfriend alive?

The cellophane crackled beneath your tightening grip.

“Did I…” You cleared your throat quietly. “Did I forget something?”

Steve’s forehead wrinkled.

“Huh?”

“The flowers.”

“What about ‘em?”

Your voice came out impossibly small. “Why’d you get these?”

“Uh, ‘cause I…” He huffed a tiny laugh through his nose, head tilting. “’Cause I wanted to?”

His confusion only made your chest tighten more.

“Is it our anniversary or something?”

His frown deepened. “What? No.”

“Then… why?”

Steve stared at you for a second, slightly open-mouthed now, the soft amusement on his face fading into gentle concern.

“Baby, they’re just flowers.”

You stared back helplessly.

“But why?” you asked again, quieter this time.

“Well, I…” He shrugged one shoulder slightly. “I saw them. And I thought about you.”

The apartment suddenly felt very quiet.

You looked back down at the bouquet in your arms.

The hydrangeas were even prettier up close, petals shifting between pale blue and soft lavender depending on how the light hit them. Tiny sprays of baby’s breath caught between larger blooms like stars scattered through clouds.

A single sunflower tucked near the back, drooping sideways because Steve probably had the bouquet strapped into the passenger's seat on the drive over.

Your throat burned.

“That’s it?” you asked quietly.

Steve let out a soft breath through his nose.

His socked feet whispered against the floor as he stepped closer, one hand rising to cup your cheek.

Big enough to hold the entire side of your face, his palm enveloped you in warmth. Your lashes fluttered at the feeling of his thumb sweeping beneath your eye, brushing over the apple of your cheek, soothing something there without even knowing what hurt.

“Yeah,” he said softly. “That’s it. I saw ’em and thought you’d like them.” His mouth tugged into a small smile. “You stared at those flowers for like, ten minutes.”  

You huffed weakly. “It was not ten minutes.”

Steve’s smile widened, encouraged by the sound of your laugh.

“There was this whole wrapping station thing too,” he added, gesturing proudly toward the bouquet still overflowing from your arms. The cream paper rustled softly as he touched it, uneven folds bunching around the stems where the twine had already started slipping loose on one side. “The lady kept trying to help me but I told her I could handle it.”

He tipped his head, inspecting his own work. “Pretty good, right?”

You looked down again.

The wrapping really was crooked. One corner folded inward strangely while another flared too wide, baby’s breath poking free through gaps in the paper.  

It couldn’t have been more beautiful.

Steve’s grin turned sheepish, one hand rubbing the back of his neck. “Honestly, I think she stopped helping 'cause I was stressing her out.”

A quiet bubble of laughter escaped you, and the second it did, you noticed the way his face changed. Grin softening, eyes gone warm at the realization that he’d made you smile.  

That was the other unbearable thing about him.

How carefully he watches for your joy, waiting for the next chance to do it again.   

He really had done all this just because he wanted to.

No special occasions—he just saw something beautiful and immediately thought of you.

You blinked quickly, staring down at the velvety rose petals before he could notice the dangerous sting gathering behind your eyes.

Nobody had ever remembered little things about you before.

Not enough to act on them later.

Certainly not enough to drive across town carrying an absurdly oversized bouquet because of one passing comment you barely remembered making yourself.  

But Steve noticed everything.

The tea you always reach for when you’re sick. The songs you hum in the car without realizing. Which side of the bed you like to sleep on. Which sweatshirt you wear when you’re sad. The way you peel pepperoni slices off pizza before eating.  

The flowers you paused to admire for three seconds on a rainy sidewalk weeks ago.

Your fingers tightened carefully around the bouquet.

“Thank you,” you managed quietly.  

Steve smiled, stepping closer until the bouquet crushed lightly between your bodies, cellophane crinkling in the quiet of the apartment.

“Yeah. Anytime, baby,” he hummed, bending down to press his smile into the curve of your mouth, as natural as breathing.

...

You don’t know why you get like this.

Why your body reacts like it’s bracing for impact when all he’s doing is being gentle. Why his affection makes your chest ache the way it does.

Why your first instinct is always to freeze.

Body going stiff whenever Steve wraps himself around your back in grocery store checkout lines, chin hooked over your shoulder while he complains about magazine prices and rubs his thumb beneath the hem of your shirt.

Sometimes he brushes your hair behind your ear mid-conversation and keeps talking without even realizing he did it. Sometimes he reaches for your hand in his sleep, eyes still closed, finding you beneath the blankets when his body notices your absence before he does.

And you wonder why, in all those sweet, wonderful moments—when he kisses your forehead while waiting for the microwave to beep, when he pulls you against his chest during movies, when he drops to his knees on dirty pavement because he doesn't want you to trip over your laces, when he holds your face in both hands like it’s something precious—you feel this horrible urge to apologize afterward.

Sorry I’m difficult. Sorry you picked me. Sorry you don’t realize yet there are easier people to love.

Love had always arrived transactional before him.

Conditional.

Dependent on being easy enough, pretty enough, quiet enough, useful enough.

But Steve loves you without condition.

And being seen that intimately by someone so good—someone as warm and earnest and sincere as Steve Harrington—feels unbearable sometimes.

Maybe that’s why nights like this overwhelm you so badly.

A fancy dinner downtown stretches long past sunset, candlelight flickering gold across Steve’s face while he steals bites from your plate despite insisting twenty minutes ago he was “seriously so stuffed.”

Wine leaves his cheeks faintly pink by the time you leave the restaurant. His tie hangs loose, crooked around his throat, top buttons undone and sleeves rolled to his elbows. Summer heat still clings to the sidewalks even this late at night, thick with blooming jasmine spilling from flower boxes outside storefronts. Somewhere farther downtown, music drifts through open bar doors, muffled bass and laughter carried through the warm air.

Steve's hand never leaves your lower back, fingers flexing gently against you whenever the crowd thickens, pulling you instinctively closer to his chest.

By the time you drift into the park, your heels are dangling from one hand and your body feels pleasantly heavy from the wine.

The grass is cool beneath your bare feet. Damp earth presses between your toes as you wander deeper along the meadow paths, fireflies blinking through the dark around you like floating embers.

Steve is halfway through retelling some ridiculous story his students had told him earlier that day, pausing every other sentence because he keeps getting distracted trying to kiss you.  

Grass stains smear across the knees of his expensive slacks when he finally pulls you down beside him into the field.

“Steve,” you protest weakly, glancing at his pants.

“What?” he asks innocently, tightening his hands around your waist.

“Those are gonna stain.”

“Mm.” He kisses the corner of your mouth, grin lazy. “Worth it.”

You lose track of time there.

Talking between kisses, lying shoulder-to-shoulder in the grass while Steve points out constellations he names wrong on purpose just to make you argue with him. His fingers comb slowly through your hair while your head rests against his shoulder, skin sticking together in the humid night air.

And by the time he gets you home, you’re half-floating.

Steve crowds you against the apartment door before the lock has even clicked shut.

Both hands on your waist, lips sealing over yours. The force of it nudges you softly into the door, his body fitting against yours as he grunts low into your mouth like he’s been holding himself back all night.

Sweet burgundy wine still lingers on his tongue when his lips part against yours.

He’s warm everywhere.

Warm hands sliding beneath your dress, warm mouth against your throat. Warm breath ghosting over newly exposed skin every time he pauses to look at you.

And he does pause, constantly.

Heavy-lidded hazel eyes drag across your face, your throat, the curve of your body beneath his hands, lips gone slack from that third glass of Merlot though his smile tells you he’s drunk on more than just the wine.

His palms skim along the back of your thighs while he kisses down your neck, the soft scrape of his stubble pulling a shaky breath in the shape of his name.

He smiles against your skin, feeling your fingers clutch tighter at his shoulders.

“C’mere,” he murmurs softly.

The bedroom lights stay low when he walks you backward toward the bed.

Blue comforter wrinkling beneath you when he eases you onto your back, following you down, kissing over every inch of exposed skin while your heartbeat stutters harder with each press of his mouth.

Broad palms smooth upward beneath your dress while his lips trail lower, the slow descent of it dizzying; his mouth dragging across your collarbone, the center of your chest, down your stomach, your ribs, each kiss separated by warm breaths and playful nips that make your muscles jump.

And when he kneels at the foot of the bed—nudging your legs apart carefully, lovingly, thumbs stroking slow circles into the soft skin inside your thighs as he settles himself in between—he lets out this quiet little sigh.

Like nowhere else on earth could possibly compare to this.

“Pretty girl,” he murmurs against you, pressing the words directly into your skin. “You’re so beautiful.”

His fingers hook beneath the waistband of your underwear while he glances up at you through heavy lashes, tongue darting briefly to wet his lower lip.

You reach for his hair quickly, panic flaring.

“Steve,” you whisper. “Wait.”

His hands still immediately where they rest on your hips. “What’s wrong?”

You swallow hard. “Nothing, I just...”

Your head spins pleasantly and horribly all at once from the wine and the heat and the sweet boy kneeling between your thighs looking at you like you hung the moon.

“I should shower first.”

His brows pull together. “Why?”

“Because,” you laugh weakly. “I’m sweaty.”

Steve smiles at that, like it’s the sweetest thing he’s heard all day.

He leans in even closer, nose brushing over your clothed mound before he presses a slow kiss there.

“Baby,” he murmurs against you, “I don’t care.”

“Steve...”

“I mean it.”

His hands glide upward along your waist, warm and heavy as velvet, fingertips grazing your ribs on the way up.

“I like you like this,” he says softly.

Then he takes in a breath.

A deep, deliberate pull through his nose, the warm drag of air against the damp fabric making your thighs twitch around him.

“You smell good,” he murmurs, kissing you there again. “Like summer.”

Your face burns, but Steve only smiles wider, already halfway gone.

“Just stay,” he whispers. “Let me take care of you. We can take a bath after, promise.”

He turns his head to the side, nose nudging affectionately along your inner thigh before he closes his lips around the sensitive skin there. The suction is soft at first, teasing warmth into you before the pressure deepens just enough to sting pleasantly.   

A new love bite starts to bloom, petal-soft and tender, like a flower kissed awake by rain. His mouth traces over it, soothing the flush of it back into softer color with gentle, unhurried pecks.

“So pretty,” he murmurs, pressing another kiss over the bruise-tinted skin. “My perfect girl.”

To be loved this intensely feels like it could swallow you whole.

Like the warmth of it could burn straight through you.

You don’t even realize you’ve started crying until your breath catches sharply in your chest, a raw, jagged gasp tearing from your lungs.

Steve’s head snaps up instantly.

You jerk your face away in horror, both hands flying to cover your eyes before he can see.

God.

Oh god.

Not now.

Why now?

“Baby, are you—”

His voice cuts off the second your breath stutters again, louder this time.

The mattress jolts beneath you as he pushes upright, fast enough that the bed frame gives a small protesting creak.

“Hey, hey—what’s wrong?”

You can feel him at your side immediately, his quick, uneven breaths brushing against your hands where they're pressed tight to your face.

“Baby, what happened?”

His fingers curl around your wrists, firm but impossibly gentle.

Always gentle.

“Did I hurt you? Did I do something?”

“N-no,” you choke out immediately.

“Then what?” His voice starts to break slightly, turning sharp with worry. “What is it? Honey, what’s wrong?”

You shake your head helplessly, unable to form the words, unable to explain.

The lamp clicks on beside you. Warm amber light spills across everything at once: rumpled sheets and discarded clothes, Steve kneeling beside you, shirt open at the collar, belt buckle undone and tie hanging loose around his neck.  

The flowers from dinner are on the dresser.

Slightly uneven in their vase, waterline crooked, the hydrangeas beginning to open wider in the warmth of your apartment.

Embarrassment crashes over you like a wave.

Perfect.

A night he’d planned so carefully—reservations at the candlelit Italian place downtown, your favorite wine already waiting at your table, flowers arranged before you’d even walked through the door—

And now you’re crying halfway through sex because your brain can’t handle something as simple as being loved.

You turn your face away again instinctively, shoulders curling inward, but the tears don’t stop. They come harder, messy and humiliating, gasps of air ripping through your chest no matter how hard you try to swallow them down.

You feel Steve’s hand slide up your spine.

Slow, slow passes between your shoulder blades, fingertips pressing gently.

“Hey,” he whispers. “Hey, it’s okay. You don’t have to hide, okay? You don’t have to hide from me.”

“I’m sorry,” you choke out, wiping at your face uselessly. “I-I don’t know w-why I’m—I’m sorry, fuck, I’m sorry—”  

“No, hey, don’t apologize, baby. Don’t say sorry.”

You resist him weakly when he tries to gather you in his arms.

You can’t look at him.

Can’t stand the thought of seeing the concern on his face after ruining this.

“I just—” You let out a shaky breath, voice cracking completely. “Fuck, I-I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

Steve stills at that.

Then slowly, carefully, he takes your wrists fully in both hands.

You let him this time. Arms trembling the entire way down as he lowers your hands into his lap. You still refuse to meet his eyes, staring instead at the heavy rise and fall of his chest. His crisp white shirt is wrinkled, open at the collar, a faint pink bite mark just above his collarbone where you kissed him during the taxi ride home.  

His gaze presses into you, heavy and intent, trying to read what you can’t say.

“I need you to look at me,” he says quietly.

“I can’t.”

“Yeah,” he answers immediately. “You can.”

Another tear slips down your cheek. He catches it without hesitation, wiping it away with the pad of his thumb.

“Please,” he whispers, softer now. “Look at me.”

You finally do.

Steve’s hair is a mess, chestnut strands falling across his forehead where your fingers had been tangled moments ago.

His eyes—warm honey and green and amber all blurred together beneath the low light—are pained, tight with worry and unbearably expressive.

“There's nothing wrong with you,” he says, unshakably certain. “Nothing.”

His lips are swollen from kissing you, parted slightly with how hard he’s breathing.

It’s so painfully clear, how panicked he is.

Steve’s face never hides anything

It doesn’t know how to.

When he’s happy, it shows in the soft wrinkles at the corners of his eyes.

When he’s worried, it gathers in his brows, in the tight set of his mouth.

And when he loves, it radiates from him so naturally it feels endless. Like sunlight.

You wonder what that must feel like.

To love someone without fear.

To offer tenderness without expectation, without the quiet dread that grows the more there is to lose.

He reaches up slowly, clearing tear-sticky strands away from your temples, thumb brushing beneath your eye. Still trying to read what hurts, the furrow in his brows asking without words.

You want to tell him.

For him, you’d try.

But the truth feels monstrous once it reaches your throat.

How do you explain that being loved by him feels unbearable sometimes?

That every touch lands somewhere deep inside you that still expects pain?

That he gives and gives and gives, asking for nothing in return, and yet some terrified part of you waits for the bill to come due?

How do you explain that it makes you feel broken, not knowing how to take something he gives so easily?

You part your lips, throat dry and aching.

Steve waits, thumb rubbing soothing circles into your wrists.

Patient.

Always so fucking patient with you.

“I just...” Your voice shakes. You stare at his mouth instead of his eyes, because it’s easier than being seen.

“...I just really love you.”

It rushes out so quickly.

And in a horrifyingly beautiful moment of clarity, you realize it’s the first time you’ve ever said it to anyone.

Ever.

Steve goes still. His brows soften, eyes drooping at the corners. His lips part soundlessly for a second.

“Oh,” he breathes.

You feel his hands twitch against yours, squeezing your fingers unconsciously.  

“I love you too,” he says, immediate and certain. “I... I love you so much it’s kind of insane.”

He watches you for a moment, thumb rubbing slow over your knuckles.

“Is that... is that why you're crying? 'Cause you love me a lot?”

A small, startled laugh breaks through your tears; it sounds so simple when he says it like that.   

It isn’t simple.

But maybe it also is.

So you nod, watching him visibly come back to himself, drawing out a shaky breath, shoulders dropping heavily like he’d been bracing too, just in a different way.

“Okay,” he murmurs. “Okay. C’mere.”

This time you don’t hesitate.

You fold into him, feeling his arm wrap securely around your back, the other cradling the back of your head.

And what you always used to brace against—tonight, you sink into willingly.

“I’ve got you,” he murmurs into your hair.

You let your eyes slip shut, burying your face in the crook of his neck, fingers crinkling his shirt as you hold on tight.

“I love you,” you whisper again, the words pressed softly against his skin.

Thank you, you mean.

Thank you for being gentle with me. Thank you for waiting. Thank you for loving me like it’s easy.

Thank you.

Steve loved naps as much as the next person. I mean, after a long day of unpaid babysitting, monster hunting and hours of dealing with irritating customers at his minimum wage job, he loved the idea of jumping into bed for a few hours of shut eye.

But he definitely didn’t love it as much as his beautiful girlfriend did.

He looked over at where you sat. It was early into the evening hours, you were curled in an adorable ball on the couch of the Squawk, wrapped in a handmade blanket he stole from Lucas to cover you with. Your hair was a little messy, pieces covering your face.

You’d fallen asleep barely a few minutes after Hopper ended the weekly meeting to discuss any new findings to get you closer to Vecna. It was pretty much all the same information as last week and at this point, it was more of a formality than anything else.

Everyone had quietly dispersed after his dismissal. Nancy and Jonathan went home together, El and Mike ran up to the roof hand-in-hand for some alone time, Dustin had quickly made his way to wherever he’s been spending all his time lately. That left himself, you, Robin and Lucas inside.

Steve was standing near the projector, cleaning up papers and blueprints left under the scope. Beside him, Robin helped clean up some of the snacks the kids left behind. It was quiet for the most part, only the sound of your sleepy breathing and the faint hum of the record Robin played for the radio.

Lucas was sitting across from you, and Steve noticed the way he kept glancing over at you. He was ready to ask what his deal was before Lucas spoke up.

“Should I like, wake her up or something?” Lucas asks, looking away from you and up at Steve.

His brows furrow, hands still moving papers into their folders. “What? No, she’s tired. Let her sleep,”

“Yeah, she’s sort of always tired,” Lucas mutters under his breath.

Steve can’t hear even an ounce of attitude in his tone but he’s also not understanding what Lucas is implying. Next to him, Robin huffs a laugh and he whips his head at her. He doesn’t like the idea of them having some sort of private conversation about you.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” He asks. The papers are long forgotten and he crosses his arms over his chest. His eyes flicker from his best friend and the young teen.

“Nothing,” Lucas shakes his head quickly, scrambling to gather his things. Steve’s annoyance spikes: so they are having a private conversation about you. So what if you fall asleep sometimes? It’s not like you’re lazy – is that what they’re trying to say? That you’re lazy?

It’d be an insane implication considering how you’re almost always the first one out in the field during a crawl. El grew pretty attached to you after she closed the gate the first time and ever since then, she’s practically begged you to accompany her everywhere and now that includes the intense training she does with Hopper – not once have you missed a session. You tag along with Steve and Dustin in the van for the late night crawls, and you volunteer for stakeouts with Nancy when it comes to the military cordon.

The last damn thing you were was lazy and he wasn’t about to let anyone, his best friends included, imply otherwise.

Robin seemed to have sense his thoughts and quickly jumped to Lucas’ defense. She sets the bowls of half eaten snacks back on the table.

“That’s not what he means, Steve,” She assures and Lucas looks grateful. Still, he doesn’t soften but he lets her continue. “He’s kinda right though. I mean, I’m a little worried she’s got some underlying medical condition we don’t know about or something. She knocks out at the drop of a hat lately,”

“She does not,” He scoffs but his shoulders loosen. Just barely.

Lucas jumps back in. “I wasn’t trying to be a jerk, man. I’m just worried. What if she’s not just tired? Max still hasn’t woken up, it could be something like that,”

Finally, Steve softens. He sees the fear hidden behind Lucas’ eyes and he knows how hard his forced separation from Max has been. It’s been six months since that night at the Creel house and there was still no change for her. You and Steve have spent most of your free time with Lucas visiting her.

And no matter how scared Steve is of the possibility of you falling victim to Vecna’s curse, he knows this isn’t that. You don’t have visions, you don’t have nose bleeds and you very clearly have no issue sleeping. It’s been a rough few months and you’re tired. That’s all.

He hopes.

“She’s not Max, Lucas,” Steve says softly and watches the way his face falls. “She’s not going anywhere, she’s just napping, alright?”

The younger boy nods, and Steve knows despite his relent, he’s still worried. Robin gives Steve an empathetic smile and finishes cleaning up the dishes from the coffee table.

“Come on, I’ll drop you off at the hospital,”

Lucas smiles in return this time, happy to see his girlfriend even if she’s still unconscious. He quickly grabs his jacket and backpack, practically running out of the building. She turns towards Steve once he’s out of earshot.

“Maybe that’s all it is. But with our luck, it wouldn’t hurt to check in with her. I don’t think we can handle losing someone else,” She suggests with a shrug. Her words hit uncomfortably under his ribs, and he nods once before she’s turning to follow Lucas.

Steve turns back towards your sleeping frame, where you haven’t even twitched despite the entire conversation that took place around you. He leans down next to you, his hand raising to push the hair from your face. He watches your face and the way you look so peaceful.

The normal pinch between your brows is smoothed out, pretty pink lips slightly parted, there’s a tired flush covering your cheeks and your fingers are loosely gripping the blanket close to your chest.

He smiles to himself, but his mind begins to wander. Maybe they were right – you did fall asleep pretty often these past couple months. He’s not sure when it started but he knows there’s been times he’s noticed.

Whenever he lets you know it’s safe and just a waiting game now, you fall asleep in the passenger seat of the van during crawls. You fall asleep at normal group hangouts, head resting on his shoulder and both arms wrapped around his one. You fall asleep at times like now, after a meeting is over.

He shouldn’t be worried, he doesn’t have a true reason to be. When you’re awake, you’re here. You’re helping Nancy make plans, you’re helping El train, you’re helping keep the boys occupied when they get scared. You’re just a girl who likes extra sleep, that’s all.

Gently, his thumb glides across your cheek in a quiet way to rouse you awake. His other hand comes up and pulls the blanket from your skin. Slowly, your eyes flutter open and when they land on him, a sleepy smile covers your mouth.

“Hey, pretty girl,” He can’t help but wear his own matching smile. Your cheeks redden at his pet name, but he knows how much you love hearing it.

“Hi Steve,” You murmur. He’s pretty sure his heart just physically bursted in his chest – you always talk so softly, so sweetly to him. “Did I fall asleep?”

He hums and nods in response. His hand is still stroking your hair back. “Just for a bit. Everyone left, why don’t we go get somethin’ to eat before we go home, yeah?”

Almost immediately, you perk up. You’re pushing yourself off the couch, using his shoulders for balance. “Milkshakes too?”

There’s that adorable glint in your eyes and he knows for certain if you asked him to bring you the moon, he’d create a plan to have it in the palm of your hands within two hours.

“Of course we can get milkshakes, baby,” He promises. You gleam up at him, more than pleased, and rush to clean up the evidence of your nap. Once you’re satisfied, you’re slipping your hand in his and letting him lead you towards the car.

Steve feels content now that you’re awake and talking his ear off about basically nothing, but there’s still something that tugs at his chest. Part of him that thinks he should bring up your excessive napping, like Robin said, but you seem so happy. If it’s truly nothing, like he knows it is, why risk upsetting you and make you feel like everyone’s talking about your sleeping habits?

He glances down at you, and nods at the random piece of information you throw his way, and he’s made his decision. He’ll keep a better eye on you, but he won’t bring it up to you unless he’s left with no choice.

Later that night, Steve has you wrapped in his arms in your shared bed. The house is dark and quiet, only the sound of your favorite movie playing from the TV. You’d had dinner together at his favorite diner, with two milkshakes of course, and came straight home.

Your head lays on his chest, legs tangled with his and your fingers trace little shapes – Steve is pretty sure they’re hearts – across the skin of his arm that rests on his stomach. His other hand sits comfortably in your hair, gently running his fingers through it. He feels his exhaustion catching up to him and his eyes slowly begin to flutter.

He’s not sure when he finally falls asleep but he’s sure you’re bound to follow right after him.

One minute, Steve is laying comfortably with his beautiful girlfriend and the next, he’s laying in a pool of his own blood. His eyes are turned upwards, staring at the swarm of Demobats flying in the dark sky, flashes of red lighting are striking every few seconds and the light it offers shows him the amount of bats multiply as they get closer.

His breathing is uneven, he can feel the terror already carved into his stomach. His heart is racing and the sound fills his ears like ringing. He takes a quick glance beside him and sees he’s surrounded by dead bodies.

Robin’s body is covered in blood, her eyes open but lifeless – her blonde hair is stained red from the blood spilling from every injury on her body. Nancy is next to her in an almost identical manner. He feels his own face wet with tears, and it only worsens when his eyes move to the other side of him and he sees Dustin’s body. He has his homemade spear clutched between his fingers, like he was fighting to the last second. Lucas is next to him, blood staining his clothes and he’s gripping Max’s hand in his. Steve sees how all her limbs are broken, blood seeping from her eyes.

He wants to scream. It all happened so fast, but he was right there. How could he have let this happen? He’s supposed to protect them, and now they’re all gone. Brutally murdered right in front of him and he couldn’t stop it. He couldn’t save them.

He hears the bats screeching and the Demogorgons roaring get closer and he knows he has to find a way out but does he even want to? All his friends are dead.

Suddenly, your face appears in his memory. He looks around around and you’re not here. You could be alive, somewhere out here alone.

Steve forces himself to sit up and nearly cries at the painful sensation that shoots up from his abdomen to his chest. He glances down at himself, sees how his shirt is torn so bad it’s basically ripped in two. He has angry red slashes he can only assume are from Demogorgons across his ribs. There’s smaller cuts, like bites from the bats on his arms and chest. His arms are scratched up, spilling blood all across his skin.

Despite all the pain, he has to get to you. He couldn’t save everyone else but he can save you. He has to.

Ignoring the echos of the monsters getting closer to him, he forces himself to stand – pushing down the pain spiking in his feet and up his spine from the sharp ground of the Upside Down. He tries his best to run further into the forest, but all he can manage is a limp. Still, he moves as fast as he can.

It’s so dark down there, he’s relying on the terrifying flashes of red lighting to give him some sort of light. He moves further and further into the trees, careful to avoid any moving vines, in search of you. He ignores the burning in his weakened legs and the sharp pain from his stomach injuries.

He doesn’t know how long he’s been looking for you when he finally hears it. It’s distant and quiet but he knows it’s your voice screaming for help. His stomach drops at the way you sound so scared. So weak and broken, but you’re trying. You’re fighting to hold on. It pushes him to move faster.

He forces himself to run towards your voice. He’s shouting your name, begging you to keep talking to him. He’s promising you he’s close, that he’s gonna find you and protect you.

“Steve!” He can hear your voice clearer now and he knows he’s closer to you. There’s a waver in your voice and he has to fight back tears. He walks a few more yards and finally, he finds you. His heart drops at the sight.

You’re near what would be Lovers Lake in your world, lying on your back and a palm pressed tightly to your stomach. He doesn’t know where the strength comes from but all the pain in his body disappears and he’s running to you.

He falls to his knees beside you, hands ready to grab you but he halts when he finally takes in your state.

There’s so much fucking blood.

Your hair is already matted from the blood spilling from the wound on your head. The palm pressing to your stomach is soaked in blood from the slash covering the entire right side of your stomach. Your short covered legs are littered with slightly smaller but deep cuts. But the worst is the one on your neck. There’s a gash that tears open the skin from just under your ear, all the way out to the middle of your throat. The wound is pouring blood, staining your beautiful skin he loves.

Steve lets out a sob at the sight of you and he doesn’t even know what the fuck he’s supposed to do. You glance back at him and the only thing he can see in your eyes in pure fear.

“I-I’m here, baby, I’m here,” He cries. Frantically, he looks around for something – anything – to help him but there’s nothing. Only himself. There’s tears streaming down your cheeks and he watches you cough up blood when you try and respond. “Don’t talk, don’t talk,” He rushes out. Steve tears off a large piece of fabric from his own shirt and forces it into a ball, pushing it against the wound on your neck.

You cry out from the pain of the pressure and he feels his heart break.

“I know, I’m so sorry baby, I have – I have to stop the bleeding,” His cheeks begin to stain from his own tears as he watches you struggle.

“C-Can’t bre-breathe –“ You’re coughing out the words and more blood stains your lips. His head nods in understanding and he’s racking his brain to come up with a plan. A way to get you out of here alive.

But he doesn’t even know if that’s possible. You’re bleeding so much, and the pressure of his shaky hands is barely enough to cover the wound on your neck. There’s still the injury to your stomach, the cut on your head, and the deep cuts on your legs. You wouldn’t be able to walk because of them and if he somehow managed to get you up, he’d have to carry you out himself.

He wouldn’t even be thinking twice if he didn’t have his own injuries. The slash across his ribs is screaming in agony at him and the bites along his own legs make him weaker. What if he can’t get you out? He can’t let you die like this.

“I’m gonna get you out of here, okay? I promise. You’re not gonna die in this fucking place,” He swears, carefully taking your hands and replacing his own to hold the fabric to your neck. He glances around to make sure there’s no monsters near before sliding one arm under your knees and the other under the back of your neck and moves to lift you.

Almost immediately, you’re screaming in pain. He nearly drops you out of fear from the loud sound of your pain. Your body is shaking from pain and you’re shaking your head at him, wordlessly begging him to put you down. He knows the two of you are far from the gate and if you were in this much pain from him picking you up, you were going to feel like you were being tortured if he carried you the two mile run back to safety.

He has no choice. Quickly, he drops back down to his knees and eases you out of his arms and back onto the bloodied ground. His vision is almost completely blurred from his tears. You’re gonna die out here, and he feels so fucking helpless.

“Baby please, I have to get you out of here,”

“You can’t,” You suddenly sob and he doesn’t think he can take much more of that sound. His body is shaking – from fear, anger, anxiety, every terrible thing someone can feel. “You were supposed to protect me, how could you let this happen?”

Blood still covers your body and you’re crying as you speak, but your voice is suddenly clear – as if there’s not a ten inch cut covering your throat.

He feels a pang in his chest. You’re right, he’s supposed to protect you. He dragged you into this and now you’re going to die, just like all his friends, and it’s all his fault.

“I’m sorry baby, I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry,” Steve sobs, gently cradling your face in his bloody hands. Blood smears across your skin.

“You did this to me, Steve. Why didn’t you save me?”

From behind him, he hears the monsters screech and clamor again and he knows it’s only a matter of minutes before they get to you both.

“Please. Please don’t leave me,” He begs. His arms are still wrapped around you and he cradles you to his chest. His arms are covered in the blood leaking from your body and it feels like you’re beginning to slip out of his arms from the amount of blood but he holds on tight.

Until you go limp.

Right there in his arms, he feels the way your body stills and falls aimlessly into his chest. No, no, no. He pulls you from his chest and when he looks down at you, your eyes are shut and your chest is unmoving.

He calls your name helplessly, tries to shake you awake but you’re not asleep. You’re dead. His body shakes with sobs as he stares down at your emotionless face, stained with blood and all he can do is remember every time you smiled at him.

And how you’ll never do it again.

The monsters are so close now, probably only a few feet away and for the first time, he wants it to be for him. He wants them to kill him, force him to be with his dead friends .. with you.

His friends are gone, you are gone and he has nothing else to live for. His greatest nightmare just came true and there’s no waking up.

“Steve!”

Suddenly, Steve’s body is jolted upwards and he’s back in his bed.

He’s overwhelmed with the smell of your presence. The soft cashmere and vanilla scent that makes him feel like he’s wrapped up in his very own security blanket.

He can feel your hands across his skin, trying to bring him out of his dream and back to you. He can hear you murmuring soft comforts to him, even if he can’t fully grasp what you’re actually saying.

He tries his best to regain his bearings as fast as possible. His body is all but drenched in sweat, his clothes cling to his skin. There’s a distant ringing in his ears he can’t seem to get rid of but he looks around at his surroundings.

“Shh, it’s okay, it was just a dream,” Your gentle voice whispers comfortingly. You’ve managed to pull him into your arms, his face tucked under the crook of your neck and your hands slowly stroke his back.

He can’t help himself when his arms squeeze you tight, almost too tight. You don’t complain, you hold him just as close. He listens to the sound of your heart and does his best to use it to calm his own racing heart.

You’re here, you’re alive. It was just a dream.

“I’m here baby, I’m right here,”

He’s back on the verge of tears, this time out of relief instead of fear. His nightmares are something he’s dealt with since he fought the Demogorgon at the Byers house and it’s something he’s never gotten used to. He knows for sure it’s not something he ever will.

But you’re there every time, comforting him and reminding him none of it was real.

He buries himself further into you, and you can feel his nails digging into your skin but you don’t seem to care. You’ve dealt with your own share of nightmares but they never seem to be as bad as his.

You hold Steve in your arms for a long time before his breathing has returned to normal and he’s ready to talk about it. When the nightmares first started, he refused to tell you what they were about but it didn’t take long for you to realize it was because it was almost always centered around losing you.

Slowly, he pulls away from your neck and lays on his back, resting against the pillow but he keeps one hand holding yours. You’re still sitting upright, your free hand resting on his chest, just above his heart.

“D’you wanna talk about it?” You ask.

He takes a quick glance at you and sees the concerned look on your face. That pinch between your brows is back, and despite yourself, there’s a small frown on your lips. He takes a deep breath.

“It was the same dream,” He begins. “I woke up down there, dead bodies all around me and you’re screaming for me. And it ends the same way..” He hesitates for a second, looking back into your beautiful eyes he loves so much. “I can’t save you,”

He watches the way your eyes sadden and he hates it. He hates the way he feels like he’s burdening you with his stupid nightmares.

“It wasn’t real, Steve,” Your hand raises to cradle his jaw. “It’s never going to be real. You know why?”

Wordlessly, he waits for your response.

“Because you’ve saved me every single time. You saved me in the tunnels two years ago, you saved me from evil Russian soldiers, and you saved me from the bats down there last year,”

He feels his eyes burn but he lets you comfort him.

“You’re always going to save me, baby. There’s nobody else I feel safer with than you. Nobody,” You promise fiercely and it’s enough for him to let his tears fall.

There’s a faint voice in the back of his head that tells him he’s weak for crying like this in front of you but when you wrap him in your arms again and coo into his ear, he can’t seem to care.

Because he knows you’re right. He saved you all those times and he’d always do it. He’d rather die than let anything happen to you and even if he has to live with these nightmares for the rest of his life, he still wakes up to you every time.

It’s probably an hour by the time he’s completely calmed down from the nightmare and you’ve sat wrapped in each others arms the whole time. When you shift to lay more comfortably, Steve looks around the room again.

He notices the TV is still playing, but it’s no longer the movie he fell asleep to. Instead, it’s Friday the 13th. There’s two other VHS tapes beside the TV, ones that weren’t there before he fell asleep, and he also notices the array of snacks on your bedside table. When he glances at the clock, he sees it’s nearing 4:30AM and that’s well past when he’d fallen asleep but from the looks of it, you’d stayed up.

You don’t seem to notice his confusion until he shifts to lay on his side. Your head tilts up at him and he can physically see the sleepiness on your face.

“Have you been awake this whole time?” You blink up at him, but he notices the way you look almost guilty and that confirms what he’d been thinking.

You nod hesitantly. “Yeah, I-I couldn’t sleep,”

When you nervously bite your lip, he knows you’re lying and you know you’re caught when you see the way he tracks the movement.

Steve would probably be more inclined to believe you if he didn’t have the conversation earlier about you falling asleep so often during the day. But he also can’t make sense of it – you’re choosing to stay up at night and nap at random times instead of getting decent sleep at night?

You moved in with him a few weeks ago and coincidentally, that’s around the same time you started napping more. Could it be his fault? Maybe he’s hogging the blankets, or maybe he moves too much in his sleep. He knows he runs too hot for a normal person, and maybe you’re too uncomfortable to fall asleep.

His mind races with possibilities.

“Alright, what’s going on?” He asks and watches the way you swallow.

“Hmm?”

“Babe, you’ve been falling asleep in the middle of the day and tonight, you’re up and having your own movie marathon till 4am. Somethin’s up,”

He tries his best to ignore the anxiety simmering in his stomach.

“It’s nothing,” You say softly, looking away from him. Gently, he raises his hand to cup your chin and pull you back to him.

“Hey, whatever it is, you can tell me,” He sounds so gentle that it breaks you almost instantly.

“I don’t like to fall asleep at night,” Steve’s brow furrow at your words, but you continue, your voice timid. “I want to be there if you have a nightmare. I don’t want you to wake up alone,”

Instantly, Steve is filled with guilt. You’ve been sacrificing your sleep to comfort him – but he’d never want you to do that. His nightmares don’t happen every night but he’s sure you’ve spent every night the past few weeks awake just in case. Probably busying yourself with movies, or a book, or just simply watching him as he slept.

He feels sick.

“Baby, I..” He sighs and he’s not even sure where to begin, and you look even more guilty. “I don’t want you to stay up like that for me,”

Steve watches the way you look away from him, and you’re nervously picking down at your fingers. “I know. I just – when you wake up, you look so scared, and you’re so confused until you see me and what if I fall asleep and you have to deal with it alone?”

When you finish, you look back up at him and he sees the tears lining your eyes. He feels his chest tighten uncomfortably, because he can hear the pure love in the voice, but also the fatigue. You’re exhausted.

Gently, he says your name and presses a kiss to your cheek. “You don’t need to be awake for me to realize where I am. When I wake up and I feel you next to me, your warmth and your breathing – that’s enough for me, baby,”

You raise your hand to hold onto his that rests against your cheek and you sink further into his hold. “I’m sorry,” You whisper and he immediately shakes his head. “I just don’t want you to feel like you’re alone,”  

“I know, and I love you so much for caring, but I need you to be okay too – not running yourself into the ground, trying to make me feel better,”

“I am okay,” You argue, but you both know it’s futile and when he tilts his head at you, you relent. “I’m sorry,”

He strokes the apple of your cheekbone. “It’s okay, sweet girl. I’m sorry I didn’t notice earlier,”

“It’s not y’fault,” You squeeze his hand once. “I wanted to do it. Being able to see you so peacefully when you sleep, where nothing can hurt you again .. After everything, it just makes me feel better too,”

Steve’s eyes soften even worse, because you love him so much more than he ever could’ve imagined. He knows the feeling, he’s overwhelmed with it every time he looks at you, but knowing you experience the same feeling – that intense need to protect and comfort him – every night, is enough to have him on the verge of crying again.

He leans down and presses his lips to your own. Every ounce of love and adoration coming from both of you is poured into the kiss. You’re both clinging to each other for the same reasons and he doesn’t ever want to let go.

When he pulls away for air, you have a dazed look in your eyes and he knows he looks the same way.

“I promise, I’m not going anywhere and definitely not while you’re sleeping, okay?” He murmurs against your mouth.

You nod, pecking his lips again. “Okay,”

“Promise me you won’t stay up anymore, yeah?”

You’re nodding again, arms wrapping around his middle. “I promise,”

Steve gathers you in his arms again, pulling you to lay on his chest while he settles on his back. “Good. Now let’s both fall asleep for the next twelve hours,”

You laugh softly into his skin. “It’s 5 in the morning. We probably have less than three hours before the kids are showing up on our doorstep with a new crisis,”

Steve huffs. “Let ‘em deal with it alone. You’ve got a lot of sleep to catch up on,” He smiles when he hears you laugh again, but you burrow yourself further into his arms. “Sleep, baby. I’ll be here when you wake up,”