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Are You Now or Have You Ever Been Pt. 1

Summary: You’re the most popular girl in school, a 4.0 student, a fantastic cheerleader, and a force to be reckoned with. Eddie is…well, Eddie. When you two mix, it’s like oil and water. Spewing hateful insults one minute and hooking up the next, you and Eddie navigate the thin line between love and hate. Part 1 of 2.

Enemies with benefits, or more aptly put: enemies to situationship to enemies to lovers. She’s a doozy. Inspired by imgonnagetyouback by Taylor Swift, give it a listen!

WC: 25.4k

Warnings: 18+ mdni!!! Angst with a happy ending, fat shaming (once and not to reader), no use of Y/N, bullying, sex, PiV, unprotected sex, teasing, degradation, humiliation kink, Reader is mean to Eddie, Eddie is mean to Reader, semi-public sex, Eddie is 20 R is 18, groping, fingering, oral (m receiving), ball play, ball worship (I love bawls), body worship, pussy slapping, rough sex, name calling (dirty whore, slut–kinda, cumdump, whore, nasty bitch, desperate whore, bitch, hole), begging, dumbification kinda, ass slapping, dirty talk, mentions of drugs, teasing, mentions of cheating (hypothetical), breeding kink, spitting, cum eating, cream pie, gagging on dick, like a little face fucking but not really, innocence kink kinda if you squint but not really, Eddie hates Jason Carver, slut shaming, malicious attempt at getting someone alone (Jason), weed smoking, brief mention of student-teacher relations (not R or E, student is 18), arguments, angry name calling, insinuation of sex for money, insecurity about living situation, stereotypes of trailer park living, mentions of a gun (no usage just in a literary sense), reader’s parents died in a drunk driver incident and she talks about it crassly at one point, metaphorical addiction a la Nicotine by PATD type beat, small mention of hypothetical weight gain (eddie), mention of “felony sexual assault” but nothing happens it’s just used as a snark against Jason, physical violence (not E to R), punching, kicking, fighitng, I’m making Eddie tall in this so however tall you are he’s taller

A/N: Here, damn. Tumblr is making me split this up, I'm gonna post part 2 immediately. BTW, I feel like the second half is better than the first half in terms of what we see from them, so if you’re not into it–hold out, at least until the second half. The first half is good we just gotta set things up, you get it

Edit: I just remembered, huge thanks and smooches to @keeryhours for helping me brainstorm some stuff mwah mwah mwah

Masterlist

Part 2

Eddie couldn’t remember a memory in the recent past that wasn’t perfumed by your sweet scent, you’ve been on his mind and in his bed for a while now. It felt like you subtly creeped into his orbit, like a world-ending meteor seen decades before it’s expected to hit. But looking back, you were already well-within range by the time he noticed you.

It was like he never thought of you until he randomly recognized your Audi Quattro outside a trailer two doors down from his. Then he started seeing you everywhere.

You were at school in your cheer uniform sitting with the other jocks and cheerleaders while they picked poor unsuspecting victims to be the muse for their shit talking entertainment during lunch. You were at Family Video browsing the rows of movies, hovering in the horror section, even going so far as to rent one. The film Eddie was after on that trip, matter of fact. You were at the 24-hour diner every Friday night after the basketball games–the same diner he goes to with the boys after every Hellfire meeting.

It was like a spotlight was suddenly on you. You did all these things before, certainly. He remembers talking over the loud hoots and hollers of the amped up jocks at their post-game dinner at his diner. He remembers rolling his eyes at the way your friend and fellow cheerleader, Holly Hannigan, made some poor sophomore girl run out of the lunch room crying because she compliment sandwich’d her.

“That’s such a cute top, I could never wear something like that if I weighed as much as you, you’re so brave for wearing it!”

He remembers seeing your Audi outside Family Video, the same one he recognized from the trailer park, but he never made the connection. Now it’s like the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon, but in every aspect of his life. You’re omnipresent to his world.

You were even at the Hideout behind the bar serving old, creepy men their usuals. Your car at Forest Hills made him wonder, but it was seeing you at the Hideout that really had him thrown. He first caught sight of you leaving what looked like a shift behind the bar when he showed up an hour early for his set at 10 PM. You were leaving Joe’s office looking pleased.

Joe’s the owner of the Hideout, he’s a decent enough guy. He lets Eddie’s band play on Tuesday nights in return for his barback labor at a half-rate. Seeing the older guy with you made him suspicious, though. Eddie couldn’t remember if he ever mentioned having a family, or a wife.

Usually Eddie shows up to his ‘gigs’—if one could even call performing for a handful of drunk guys a gig—with fifteen minutes to spare. All fifteen of those minutes are spent setting up the instruments and amps with Gareth, Jeff, and Doug, so he never ventured off the stage really.

But that day he had nothing better to do so he figured he’d go early and try to convince Joe to let him have a drink. He’s 20-years-old for christ’s sake, one more year isn’t gonna save any more brain cells. But instead of Joe at the bar, he saw you. You were wiping down the counter top and joking with one of the regulars.

He felt like he had been transported to an alternate universe because why was the most beautiful, popular girl in school at his bar. Well, not his, but it might as well be. He spends enough time there, just like the diner he goes to after Hellfire. He doesn’t show up randomly to your cheer practices acting like he’s been there the whole time, what gives?

He couldn’t hear what you were saying, the jukebox music playing throughout the bar was too loud. He was vaguely aware of Uptown Girl by Billy Joel playing which felt awfully on-the-nose for the situation at hand. He saw you playfully hit the old regular with your rag as if chastising him, but your face was lit up with a dazzling smile.

The same smile he sees at school. The one you always seemed to be wearing any time he saw you in passing, whether it was gossiping with your girlfriends, joking with Lucas Sinclair in between classes, or the few times he passed by the doors into the gym during basketball games. He’d see you shaking those stupid pom-poms and giving your best heartstopping smile to the crowd.

He was pulled from his thoughts of your intoxicating smile when he saw you heading to the door just left of the bar, the office Joe resides in when he’s not working up front serving drinks. You disappeared before he could make his presence known, he was almost in a trance-like state looking at the closed door.

Gareth walked up beside him, seemingly having just gotten there for their set, he bumped his shoulder with Eddie’s.

“What are you looking at?” He positioned himself to mimic Eddie’s stance as if that would help him understand why his friend was just standing like an idiot in the middle of the mostly empty bar.

Eddie considered telling Gareth who he just saw behind the bar. Seeing the most popular girl in school seemingly working at a rundown dive like the Hideout is not something one sees every day. Especially when that girl is the most rich, prissy, stuck-up, high-maintenance girl he’s ever seen in his life.

The girl who boasts about her summer vacations to Ibiza while simultaneously complaining that the room service was subpar—works in this shithole. The girl who drives a luxury German-made car to school everyday probably smells like smoke from the second hand puffs she gets right to the face as she pours refills every other night. The girl who has enough money and influence to marry rich and never have to work a day in her life is…working.

The dichotomy between the rich persona you always display and the fact that Eddie’s pretty sure you live in Forest Hills Trailer Park is throwing him for a loop. For all the nice clothes, yearly summer vacation stories, and the expensive car—you don’t appear to live wealthy, you just act like it. If you really were as rich as you acted, he doubts you’d live where you do.

The pure irony of it all lends the perfect opportunity to tear down that reputation you’ve built. If your friends knew where you were working, where you lived, everything would disappear. You’d be cast out like the dissenter they’d see you as. Not good enough to run with them, not wealthy enough to care about.

But for some reason–he’s not sure why–he doesn’t want Gareth to know what he saw. He doesn’t want Gareth to see you the way he just saw you. Why? He genuinely doesn’t know, it’s not like you were particularly nice. You were a bitch to him, laughing at the jokes your posse made about him, adding snide comments to get more laughs. He heard them all. But he still won’t tell.

Instead of answering Gareth’s question, he asked him to go get his songwriting notebook, it was just something to get Gareth out of the area for when you came back out.

And out you came, that same smile on your face, money in your hand. Joe murmured something to you before kissing your cheek and rubbing your back, something Eddie does everything in his power to refrain from blanching at. Are you…fucking the owner? What was that interaction just now?

He watched as Joe turned back to his office and closed the door, you stuffed the money into your bra before fixing your low-cut shirt. You made eye contact with him for the first time outside of school, his eyes widened at being caught, in a second you turned back to the bar and grabbed your jacket from under it. You breezed right past him as if you didn’t see him, but you made eye contact with him, just now. He’s sure of it, he couldn’t have imagined that. But you acted like he wasn’t there, zero reaction to seeing him.

-

That was the day he realized you work at the Hideout, every other day from 5 PM-9 PM. He also confirmed that you live in Forest Hills Trailer Park. That Audi parked two doors down from his trailer, the very same Audi you hurried into after breezing past him and out the door of the bar. He didn’t know what he thought before, as if you’d have a boyfriend who lives in Forest Hills, always visiting him—even overnight. No, that’s ridiculous, you wouldn’t be caught dead dating somebody from the trailer park. But apparently you could be caught living in it…

Even upon learning all of that about you, he still never told a soul. Maybe he thought he could use it to cash in a favor later or something, he didn’t know. You never asked him to keep the secret, in fact, you acted like he didn’t exist. The only time you ever acknowledged his existence was when you were talking shit about him, or to him.

Although it's not like he’s a saint either, he goes out of his way to pick fights with the jocks and the preps. Mainly he just openly talks shit about their useless hobbies and if they bite the hook, well, he’s going fishing. It’s truly his favorite pastime and it certainly doesn’t change when you and he start hooking up.

If he were questioned by the CIA as to the sequence of events that led up to the first time you and he made out in the men’s room at the Hideout, he wouldn’t be able to answer. They couldn’t waterboard that information out of him because he didn’t know it, everything was a blur.

His life went from drug dealing, school, Hellfire, Hideout, and picking on you to drug dealing, school, Hellfire, Hideout, picking on you, and then fucking you in the empty janitor’s closet.

You’ve had this unspoken arrangement for months now, sometimes you’d go to his place—never yours, sometimes it’d be in the drama room before Hellfire and your games, sometimes it’d be in his van during your free period. Anything goes, except there was one thing: nobody could know about you two. You’d die if anybody knew you and the freak were getting it on. It would be just another reason on the long list of faults of yours that could cast you from that high horse you and the rest of your friends lived on.

That didn’t mean Eddie didn’t love to tease you though. He thinks it’s funny when you freak out over anybody knowing just how good he fucks you, the freak and the cheerleader, oh the rumors that would fly.

All the fighting and the bitching at each other in public is like foreplay for your private endeavors. It’s a lot of ‘never again’s post-sex and answering his suggestive comments in front of your friends about needing some extra tutoring alone with you with ‘in your fucking dreams, Munson.’ But it all ends the same way, you moaning and him grunting in your ear like a man possessed.

-

Today is no different from all the rest, Eddie is yelling in the busy hallway during the passing period. Students weave around his droning sermon, something about conformity and the death of creativity—you can’t be bothered to listen. You’re at your locker with your best friend—another fellow cheerleader, Sherry. She’s talking about some house party happening at the end of the month when you feel Jason Carver’s looming presence over your shoulder, his overused cologne giving him away.

He and Andy crowd you and Sherry, Andy throwing his arm around the shy girl. The proximity of the jock makes her nervously giggle, she’s not used to guys giving her attention, usually all the attention goes to you or Holly.

You give her a reprimanding look, distinctly remembering telling her she’s allowed to push Andy away when he invades her space like this. You’ve told her countless times before that Jason and Andy are idiots who probably only want one thing so it’s okay to stomp on their feet. But alas, you can lead a horse to water, you just can’t make the horse grow a pair long enough to set boundaries.

“You should definitely come to the party, it’s gonna be a rager. It’ll be at my place and if you’re extra sweet, I’ll let you in the VIP room.” Jason’s lifting his eyebrows suggestively at you, his piercing blue eyes look the same as the creepy, gross, old guys you serve at the Hideout, you do your best to hold in a shiver.

You know exactly what a membership to the VIP room entails and you’ll have to enthusiastically pass on that one. “Yeah, I’ll think about it,” is all you manage to impassively say before Eddie turns your group into an example for his sermon to the Hellfire freshman.

“Exhibit A) Here you can see the female species of the cheerleading variety puffing her tissue-stuffed chest out to attract a mate. Now the mate will of course be none other than brain dead meatheads who are two years out from balding—,” he’s gesturing to you and Jason as if you’re a museum exhibit he’s explaining the history of. The freshmen he’s talking to are looking nervous and seemingly trying to pretend like they’re not there.

“You want something, freak?” Jason immediately maneuvers himself in front of you as if he’s protecting you from the meaningless barbs Eddie is throwing your way. You can’t help but roll your eyes. You know what Eddie’s doing, he’s goading you. But you won’t give in, not yet at least, he needs to work a little harder if he wants you.

“Excuse me, I was talking,” Eddie reprimands Jason for the interruption, holding up his hand to the blond in an effort to silence him. “As I was saying, the male species courts the female by drenching himself in per-fume and prancing around like a show girl on The Price Is Right, showing off his cool car and expensive clothing in the hopes that she’ll be distracted by all the shininess and she won’t realize how small his dick is. Now—,” he’s smugly holding up a finger as if he’s about to make another point when Jason goes to move towards him.

You quickly grab the jock’s arm before he can get physical with Eddie, afterall, you don’t wanna make out with a guy who has a black eye. “Get lost, loser,” you grit out, your face shows nothing but contempt for Eddie. But he knows different.

Eddie grins, he knows he’s got you now. He’s staring at you like he’s gonna eat you up, a smug smirk permanently etched across his face. The bell rings signaling everybody to get to their next class, his no longer captive freshman scramble away. Jason grumbles out a quiet, “Whatever,” and jerks his head for Andy to follow him away from the scene.

You’re staring at Eddie, your gaze not lifting since your comment to him. Sherry looks between you and the curly haired metalhead before breaking your trance with a timid, “I’ll see you at lunch, okay?” She’s off down the hall and by the time you turn back to Eddie, he’s gone. But you know where he is. You take your time, finishing putting your books away and closing your locker.

You use your free period to leisurely make your way into the empty drama room where he hosts Hellfire every Friday night. You walk in, arms crossed, shaking your head at his actions. He’s sitting on his stupid throne, his feet are crossed as they rest on the table in front of him, his hands are clasped together in his lap. He looks like he’s been waiting for you as if he wasn’t just in the hall two minutes ago.

“You’re seriously pathetic, you know that?” You chide, starting off swinging as you walk right up to him, standing beside his relaxed body, looking down at him. “What part of, ‘don’t talk to me on school property’ do you not understand? Also, I don’t stuff my bra.” You bristled at the last part, he’s so stupid, you hate him.

His smile creeps up one side of his face, he lifts his feet off the table bringing them to the ground in a thud, he spreads his knees, pulling you to stand in between them.

“I know, honey, you’re too proud. You already got the prettiest tits in school anyway.” He’s got you so close he’s looking directly up your body to make eye contact. His hands graze your bare thighs as they travel up your figure, catching your pleated cheer skirt as it lifts, showing your pretty pink panties. His hands continue their way up to your ‘HHS’-clad chest, causing the green skirt to fall back down, covering your modesty once again.

Your breathing picks up as he gropes your breasts while maintaining devious eye contact. You do your best to play off the effect he has on you, snorting at his comment, “Yeah, the only tits in school you’ve seen.”

He grins amusedly as his head comes off your body a bit, still looking at you with those damn eyes. “Hey, not true! I played hide the zucchini with Angela Sanders in Home Ec last year,” he boasts, proud of himself at the memory. His hands slide back down your body to inch up your skirt, palms resting on the tops of your thighs, his right thumb gently smoothing over your quickly dampening panties.

Your chest burns with jealousy at the thought of him with Angela, the now-graduated co-editor of the yearbook. So that’s why Hellfire had such a good spread last year, fuck her, you think.

“Whatever, you’re such a loser.” Strong words that would sound better if you weren’t A) jealous over said loser and B) letting him grope you as you speak.

“Oh, I know. I heard. I’m such a loser aren’t I, honey?” He’s toying with you now, he loves this little dance you two have. He loves when you act like you’re above it all, just for him to make your breath catch when he moves his thumb under the seamed edge of your underwear, grazing your clit.

“T-That’s what I said.” You’re trying to keep up the harsh front, but it’s quickly crumbling like a sandcastle on the beach, with the tide—Eddie Munson—demolishing it.

Eddie’s already hard and ready to go. He was hard the moment you walked in the room with a disapproving glare. You’re his favorite toy, he likes to wind you up and watch you go. He snickers at your last ditch effort to appear unaffected before he removes his right hand from your wet panties, sliding it across your pelvis and turning you to face the table with a push of his other hand at your back. He forces your chest down onto the wooden surface, the arm at your pelvis causing you to bend at the waist.

You let out a stuttered breath at his quick movements, addicted to how he manhandles you. He’s standing up behind you now, his body pushing you against the edge of the table.

“Did you feel all big and brave calling me a loser in front of your friends earlier? Huh, baby?” He’s taunting you, rapt attention on every hitching breath of yours, his hands are running up your thighs flipping the green skirt onto your back.

You can only moan at his touch, it’s intoxicating, he’s leaving molten lava just underneath the surface of every bit of skin he touches.

“Did it make you feel all warm and tingly inside?” He’s so smug you wish you had more self-restraint so you could push him off of you and chew him out for the unearned confidence he always seems to display around you. But alas, you have none. So you just let him work your underwear down your thighs, not even taking them all the way off before he swipes his fingers through your folds, spreading your wetness with impatience.

“Do you wanna say it now?” It’s a dare, a trick.

You’re moaning at his messy touch, his left hand planted on your back keeping you down, his right covered in your arousal.

“Go ahead and say it, honey. In fact, I want you to.” He’s grinning with evil in his eye, your head is propped to the side, you can only see a bit of him behind you, your hands are spread out on the table, surely messing up his Hellfire papers, knocking over the figurines.

You’re mewling at the attention he’s giving you, but he’s impatient for your next move. He smacks your wet pussy, the most lewd sound you’ve ever heard rings out around the room, it’s like the sound of slapping jello.

“Say it!”

“You’re such a loser,” you breathe out, trying to muster up confidence so it doesn’t come out sounding as needy as you feel.

In zero to sixty he’s undoing his belt and unbuttoning his pants with one hand, shoving them down his thighs. His other hand still planted on your back, he’s thrusting his hard, thick cock into your waiting hole. The sound you make is music to his ears, it’s the mix of a whiny moan and a sigh at finally being filled by him.

He’s pistoning his hips in and out of you so fast your moans are getting interrupted by the huffing breaths you’re trying to catch. He’s so deep inside you it has you clawing at the table, you’re incapable of shutting up at this point, the force of his thrusts pressing noises out of you every time.

“If I’m a loser then you’re the dirty whore taking this loser dick, how does that make you feel, baby?” His question comes out loud and clear, his breath control is insane, damn singers. You’re wondering how he’s even able to talk with the way he’s pounding your pussy. His hands settle at the junction of your thighs and pelvis, he’s pulling you back to meet his thrusts, the force eliciting an embarrassing “unh, unh, unh, unh” from your panting mouth.

You answer his question with whiny babbles of incoherency. But that’s apparently not a good enough answer for him. He grabs a fistful of hair at the base of your head, pulling you up so your back is pressed against his chest. His other arm slides across your lower stomach to hold you to him, his cock still gliding in and out of your greedy cunt. He mouths at your neck with wet, messy open-mouth kisses, letting his teeth graze against your delicate skin.

“I said—,” a particularly hard thrust has you jerking forward, but not far with his arm pressing so good into that special place above your pelvis that has you seeing stars, “how does that make you feel, baby?” He’s panting in your ear, you can feel the wet heat of his breath, he’s crowding your senses, it’s the best kind of torture.

“Good! So fucking good, please, Eddie!” It all comes out in a jumble of moans and squeals, you’re not even sure what you’re pleading for, he’s already overwhelming you.

He laughs ruthlessly at your pitiful begging. Letting go of your hair, his arm still firm against your stomach, he presses his free hand between your shoulder blades sending you back down to the table again with a thudding, “Unh!”

You’re pretty sure you’re drooling onto his D&D notes now, but he doesn’t seem to care. You can’t close your mouth no matter how hard you try, his cock is knocking the air out of you consistently.

“Oh, we’re begging now, huh? I think calling you a dirty whore was too nice. What do you think, sweetheart?”

When you don’t answer he pulls out, leaving your needy hole pulsing and wet with desire. You whimper at the loss of feeling full of him, the loss of his touch.

He rests his arms on top of his head, his hard cock twitching with need, but he wants you to hear him. He’s gonna make you hear him.

“Hmm, what’s a better name for you then? Hm?” He’s watching your back move up and down with your breath, he sees you roll your pelvis forward in an unconscious, desperate attempt to let him see even more of your dripping, empty cunt. He huffs out a quick laugh, grin spreading across his face. He knows you don’t even know you’re doing it, your body just needs his cock so bad you're presenting to him like a bitch in heat.

“Nothing too sweet for you, so ‘slut’ is out of the question.” He’s so mean the way he degrades you, it has your hole clenching around nothing, missing his cock.

This time it’s on purpose when you tilt your pelvis down as you remain strewn over the table, you even wiggle your hips a little. You hope that if you don’t respond to his questions, if you just show him the easy access, the warm, wet, velvety hole presented to him for his consideration, maybe he’ll just slip back in, wanting to finish more over his desire to lecture you.

You should’ve known better, that’s never the case. His desire to torture you greatly outweighs his desire to fuck you. He continues his search for an answer.

“What do you call the girl who likes to pretend the freak’s beneath her when she’s around her friends, but begs for his cock when she’s alone with him?” He smacks your ass, watching the fat jiggle with a bite of his lip.

Your body jumps at the assault, you’re unable to stop the moan from leaving your mouth, it’s mortifying. What has he done to you, you used to be a good girl–well, for the most part. You used to thrive in the light, but now all you wanna do is be in the dark with him.

You’d never tell him, but you’ve turned your friends down on more than one occasion just at the chance that he might call you. You’ve rejected more guys these past few months than you ever have in your entire life. All so you can end up here, with him, in the dark. A secret only you two know.

Another smack.

“I’m talkin’ to you, honey.” Eddie’s hungry gaze roams over your shaking body.

You whimper in response.

“I want you to come up with a name for yourself because I think we both agree that ‘dirty whore’ is too nice.” He speaks in the tone of a principal talking down to a delinquent student, as if he’s trying to steer you toward new ideas for better use of your time. He’s speaking to you as if he wasn’t just fucking you raw two minute ago, as if your pussy is not on clear display for him.

He runs his fingers through your slit, your body vibrating with need. His touch causes another desperate moan to escape your open mouth, your brows are pinched in anguish. You feel like you’ll die if he’s not inside you again in the next twenty seconds. The room feels like it’s on fire, his eyes are burning ownership into your body.

He slaps your pussy for the second time in three minutes, you’re almost certain you’re so wet there was splashback on that one. You jolt with another pitiful whine.

“We’re not continuing until you come up with a name.” It’s like he’s reprimanding you, he’s a teacher telling you he’s not moving on with the lesson until you obey.

“Please, Eddie, please, I just–I need you, I nee—please cum inside me, oh god,” you slur out the last part, feeling like you’re out of your mind. You’d do anything for him right now, just as long as it doesn’t require you to think or use your brain. He’s shut that off for you, it’s as good as gone now.

You’re so sweet when you beg for his cock, so sweet when you’re not bitching at him. It’s like a siren call he can’t resist, he wants to get lost in your pussy. He could spend days just buried inside you, gladly shutting your brain off for you. He’s never getting over abusing your needy cunt, he lives off of making you leave these empty rooms walking all funny, trying your very best to act like you didn’t just get fucked raw by the school freak and his monster cock.

Because you begged so sweetly—so desperately—he’ll let you off the hook. Just this once.

“I’ll give you a pass today, but only because I have a name for you and you’re too cock-dumb to come up with one yourself—aren’t you, my little cumdump?” He sneers, your body shivers, your face feels like it’s on fire, this is so embarrassing. You whimper at the name, a feeling of shame spreads through your heart and mind because he’s right—you are a whore, you are a slut, you are a cumdump for him to use and abuse. He was like a drug and you were a junkie, willingly seeking out another fix even when it wrecks your body and puts your relationships at risk.

Your shameful thoughts are interrupted when he breaches your pulsing hole, thrusting all the way in, you can feel his balls slap your clit, the impact elicits your loudest moan thus far. But you’re still in school, and classes are still happening, so he slaps your ass hard, gritting out a harsh, “Shut the fuck up, cumdump.”

You whimper again at the name, you hope it doesn’t stick, it’s far too embarrassing, and it’s even worse that it makes you gush every time he says it.

He’s thrusting in at a breakneck pace, his body dispels so much force that it has the soft spot just above your pelvis repeatedly pushing into the hard edge of the table. But it doesn’t hurt—no, just the opposite, in fact. It makes you feel like you’re about to burst, the pressure is so good it brings tears to your eyes as your mouth stays permanently locked in an ‘O’ position, just allowing any noises to reign free in the empty room.

“That’s what you are, right? Just a cumdump for me, huh?” He’s holding onto your hips, holding you in place to let him have his way with you. You feel so good wrapped around him, if he could—he would keep you on his cock forever.

You mewl at his question, nodding your head vigorously. You want him to make you cum so bad you’ll agree to anything at this point, you need it like air. The pressure from the table and the pressure from his fat cock is getting you there expeditiously.

“You want my cum all deep in your pussy, huh? Yeah, you’re so needy, baby. What a fuckin’ whore, you wanna go skip back to your little friends with the freak’s cum in your panties, don’t you?” He’s rambling at this point, but he means every word. He’s saying it both for you and for him, feeling you clench with every dirty thing he says. “You get off on that shit, huh? You nasty bitch, well lucky for you, I do too, baby.” He’s speaking to you with such malice, but it only makes you moan louder. The sound of skin slapping fills the room, it’s so lewd it would make a prostitute blush.

He’s half-lidded, high on your pussy, just going off, “Now, I’ll let you cum if you do just one thing for me…” He breathes out when he finishes the sentence, grunting at the feel of you clenching around him at the mention of cumming.

“Yes, god—I’ll do anything! Anything—please! Please cum inside me, Eddie,” you’re pathetically whining, mewling out the words between obscene, ‘unh, unh, unh, unh’s.

He pulls you up again by the hair, his hot breath in your ears and his large hands spread on that delicious pressure point below your tummy. He presses in with each thrust, using your body as leverage.

“Listen to me close, baby, okay?” His words sound so sweet, but his tone is so condescending, it makes your walls pulse around him, causing a little smile to grace his lips next to your ear.

You nod eagerly, prepared to do anything.

“I’m gonna cum in your pretty, fucked out pussy, okay?” You’re immediately mewling again, that’s everything you want, you want to be so full of him it drips out for hours to come. “Then I’m gonna pull your pretty pink panties back over your used up cunt, okay?” Okay by you, you’re not about to let his cum trail freely down your legs for the rest of the school day, even though that thought makes you clench around him.

“And then I want you to go sit on Carver’s lap and stay there all lunch, you hear me?” You’re suddenly a little less cock-drunk.What the hell does Jason have to do with this and why does he want you to do this? You must’ve unintentionally made a questioning sound because he elaborates.

“I see the way he looks at you, how he tried to be your knight in shining armor earlier,” the chuckle he lets out is riddled with contempt and condescension. “I know he wants you, and I know you see it too.” His thrusts never cease, making his low, dangerous sounding tone all the more electrifying.

“Do you want him, honey?” He asks the question as if you’re not literally begging to cum on his cock this very moment.

You shake your head earnestly, brows pinched in desperation. You don’t want to talk about Jason Carver while you’re trying to cum—not exactly a turn-on.

“No,” he interprets your silent answer, “he can’t fuck you like I can, can he, baby?” He’s loving how he can ask anything at this point and you’d answer it honestly—the perks of making you cock-drunk.

He’s having far too much fun teasing you because he dares to continue, pushing the line. “Are you sure you don’t want him, honey? I mean you’re squeezin’ me real tight right now. Maybe you do wanna go fuck Carver. Pop out a couple’a babies, live in a nice neighborhood with a white picket fence. Huh, would you like that?”

“Eddie,’ you grit out, managing to find words in between the heaviness of your body, the pressure in your pussy every time he presses his hand harder into your abdomen.

“No that could never be you, could it? You’d go stir crazy, I know you, baby. Bet you’d find your way back to me, let me fuck you behind his back.” He’s having a ball imagining a fucked up little life with you, maybe he could breed your greedy cunt, make Carver question why your baby looks a little too much like the town freak. He grins manically when he feels your pussy clench at the mention of fucking Eddie behind Carver’s back.

“You wanna cum don’t you?” The question brings you back to the task at hand, nodding your head with a pleading moan.

“Yes, god—please, yes!”

“Then you’ll do what the fuck I’m telling you, got it?” He’s back to reality. Making demands like he’s got a gun to your head, but no gun, just his fat cock inside you. You can feel every vein, every ridge, every pulse—it’s actively driving you clinically insane.

“Yes—I will pl—please! J—Just let me cum!” You’re beyond desperate, he’s insane for dragging this out as long as he has.

“I’m not done yet!” He scolds you for trying to speed things along, “God, you are a desperate whore.” All you can do is whine at that, he’s absolutely right, no denying it.

“I want you to sit on his lap, give those evil hips of yours a wiggle,” he swats at the side of your hip, “Really let my cum soak through your panties, got it? I better see a wet spot on that jackass’s leg by the time lunch is over or else we’re doing this all again tomorrow, you hear me?”

“Yes—please,” you draw out the word, whining, pleading, begging for him to release you from this horrible limbo between pleasure and climax.

“Good girl.” He slams you back down on the table, another soft, ‘unh,’ emphasizing your fall. His hips set a bruising pace, he slaps your ass before reaching around your front and speedily rubbing your clit, your dripping arousal is lubricant enough. You’re coming undone with a squeal, simultaneously pushing back into him for more and jerking forward to get away from him. He holds you steady while he empties his heavy balls into your greedy cunt, your velvety walls sucking him in over and over again, making a welcome home for his cum.

“S—So tight, yeah, fuckin’ take it, bitch.” His mouth is no longer attached to his brain at this point, his eyes are rolling back at the feel of your hot, wet pussy pulsing around him.

He pulls out of you slowly, wishing he didn’t have to. You’re heavy breathing on the table as he gingerly slides your panties up your thighs, making sure they cover your swollen, puffy folds. He firmly taps your used pussy three times for good measure, making sure to press the cloth inward so the cum seeps through the fabric faster.

Once he catches his breath after running his hand up and down your spine, soothingly, he reaches up to grab your hair again to stand you up. He slides his hand to your jaw, twisting your head towards him—your body following—as he practically shoves his tongue down your throat. The kiss is wet, sloppy, and needy. Just what you needed after he abused your cunt, it makes your heart flutter.

He pulls away suddenly, you’re panting for air after he stole every breath from you. He takes your open mouth as an opportunity and spits into it before shoving you down onto your knees and bullying his cock into your mouth. The abrupt entrance causes you to gag.

“Clean my cock off like a good hole,” he demands.

You do exactly as you’re told, bobbing up and down on his half-hard cock, tasting the combination of your juices and his cum. He's pulling out a cigarette and lighting it before taking a big inhale and blowing it down into your face. Your eyes wide and watering from his cock’s intrusion and the smoke in your eyes, you can feel the cum slowly inching out of you into your underwear—an uncomfortable feeling that adds to the humiliation of the situation.

Your constant gagging is like music to his ears, even half-hard he’s still too big for you. You pull off of him, breathing raggedly, your hands grabbing tightly onto his thighs, fingers groping the muscle there. He takes your head and forces your mouth back onto his cock saying, “You missed a spot,” obnoxiously. He doesn’t let go though, instead, he keeps his hand on the back crown of your head, helping you suck him off.

Suddenly he pulls you off with enough force that you’re rearing backwards, needing to put your arm down to stop yourself from falling off your knees. He adjusts his now–hard dick back into the waistband of his briefs and zips up his jeans.

“Good girl,” he praises, stubbing the cigarette out on the table, he pulls you up to your full height. He grabs your head to pull you into a gentle kiss, not fully soft—it’s still him and you’re still you—but much softer than the abuse from his tongue earlier. He pulls away, a string of spit connecting you before it breaks. You're stuck in a trance looking at him, all swollen lips and soft puffing breaths.

He takes the quiet moment between you–a rarity amidst the burning insults—to let his eyes roam over your face unabashedly. You stare at his pink lips, plump from ravishing yours. He wipes a leftover tear from your cheek with his thumb, a remembrance of the intense pleasure he gave to you. His heart stirs at how innocent and sweet you look, how kind you can be when you don’t open your mouth.

He pats your hair down and straightens your skirt, making you look as presentable as possible given all that just transpired. Your eyes have a glaze over them, both satiated and horny at the same time from the thorough fucking to the messy blowjob. He grabs your head on both sides, gentle, but firm. He guides your eyes to meet his, pausing to stare into your soul before he speaks, “You remember what I told you to do?”

His lips are in a firm line, an expectant look in his eyes. The spell is broken, your eyebrows furrow before questioning, “Do I really have to do it?” You didn’t think he was serious, you just thought it was weirdly specific dirty talk. Your pulse picks up at the thought of doing something like that so publicly, it’ll be humiliating when Jason notices the wet spot you’ll certainly leave on him.

Eddie gives you a look saying, ‘try me.’ You don’t.

“Fine, I’ll do it. But you owe me!” You point an accusing finger into his chest, your eyes looking up into his, not very convincing in their efforts to appear hardened.

His hands drop down your body and around your waist, “No, this is you owing me. I let you cum.” He says it simply with no room for argument.

Your attitude comes back fully now, “Ugh, god, you’re such an ass!”

In response, he smacks your ass so hard that it causes you to jerk forward into him, your hands landing on the expanse of his chest to catch yourself. You look up at him with narrowed eyes wanting to rip him a new one, but he speaks before you.

“Be sweet,” he scolds, the tone he uses has you fighting not to shrink into submission. “I did something nice for you, now you do something nice for me. Call it reciprocity.” He’s so condescending, tilting his head to the side, watching for your next move.

“Fine, whatever,” you sneer, pushing him away just in time for the bell to ring calling all students to lunch. You bend down to pick your backpack up off the floor—he watches you like a hunter watching its prey—tilting his head to the side to get a look up your skirt as you bend at the hips. He can see the wet spot on your underwear already, he grins, this’ll be good.

You leave without another word, heading to the bustling cafeteria.

-

You walk into the room, trying to move as inconspicuously as possible despite your ass hurting from Eddie’s rough hands and the cum currently pooling in your panties. The table you usually sit at is quickly filling up with all your friends. It consists of the cheerleaders and the basketball players, you usually sit on the end of the table that allows you to watch the whole cafeteria. Usually preferring to people-watch when listening to Sherry complain about whatever gross flirtation Andy sent her way that day.

You spot Jason at the table and make a beeline to him, luckily he’s sitting right next to your usual spot, most likely another attempt to get close to you. This stunt you’re about to pull is going to set you way back. You’ve been dodging his requests for dates and attempts at flirting for a year now. When you do this, his stupid boy brain is probably going to forget every ‘no’ you ever told him and rewire him to think he’s got a real chance. Damn you, Eddie.

Sherry has her bookbag on your seat, presumably saving it for you. You walk right up to Jason and the empty seat—no plan for what to say, just throwing yourself into the deep end. Flirting is your specialty; you just never wanted to use your powers on Carver, of all people.

“Is this seat taken,” you breathe out, batting your eyelashes. You’ve decided to go full Jessica Rabbit for this.

Jason’s eyes light up at your sultry gaze, “Go ahead,” he smirks.

Instead of sitting on the seat when Sherry takes her bag off—eyeing you, confused with your newfound affection towards Jason despite the many complaints about him she’s heard from you—you sit right on Jason’s lap. With your ass firmly planted on his thigh and legs between his, you face the side as you wrap your arms around his neck.

“This okay?” You pout your lips and furrow your brow, putting on a display of innocence. His eyes are wide and shocked, but he quickly recovers for fear of you getting off of him.

He puts on his best smolder, it makes you want to gag—and not in a good way, not in the way Eddie makes you gag. “It’s perfect.” His arm wraps around your waist, you pointedly ignore Sherry’s shocked eyes and questioning look.

He looks over your shoulder at Patrick and Andy who share the same shocked expression, they’re nodding in respect at him. Their best friend is finally pulling the most sought after girl in school, that’s a huge win.

You dodge any flirtations Jason sends your way, he eventually gives up and starts up a stilted conversation with his friends. He doesn’t want to cause you to leave his lap, not after waiting for you to come around.

You’re completely dissociating, your underwear feels incredibly wet and not from Jason. You’re sure a wet patch is already developing on his jeans beneath your cum soaked pussy. You’re thinking about how Eddie is insane for making you do this.

If he wasn’t such a perv who knows the amount of girls he could get—but you don’t like that thought as soon as it arises. Two reasons:

1) It reflects poorly on you because you’re the one sleeping with him, similar to his point earlier.

2) Your heart constricts with jealousy at the thought of him being able to pull another girl. You don’t even like knowing he saw Angela Sanders’s boobs, that bitch.

You hate him for what he’s done to you. You used to be so normal. Now you’re sitting on Jason Carver’s lap—arguably the most popular guy in school—with Edde ‘The Freak’ Munson’s cum in your underwear.

Eddie watches from across the lunch room, his eyes pinned to your form as he slowly munches on pretzels. He’s enthralled at his fantasy coming to fruition right before his very eyes. He’s completely ignoring Hellfire squabbling about something or other. The campaign? A new comic book release? He couldn’t care less, he’s watching his favorite, evil girl make his dreams come true.

He only bristles a little at Jason’s hand rubbing your back, but then he notices how stiff you are at the touch and he remembers it’s his cum in your panties right now. He feels better after that.

The lunch period goes smoothly, Jason is shooting the shit with his friends, an arm wrapped around you. Anytime he tries to flirt with you, you give him zero energy—just a smile, just enough to keep him on the hook. But even Eddie—from across the lunchroom—can tell it’s more of a grimace. It makes him feel a weird free falling feeling in his heart. You never grimace when he touches you. You only ever make pretty noises, always asking for more from him, never less.

Jason is relishing in the warmth of the girl he’s been wanting on his lap, smug like you’re a trophy to be shown off. When the bell rings you’re the first at the table to jump up and gather your things to leave.

“Catch ya later, guys,” and you’re off. You practically run out of the cafeteria, backpack haphazardly slung across one shoulder. Sherry gets up to follow you, attempting to find you at what she knows is your next class. Jason looks shocked at the speed with which you’re leaving, that is until he looks down and sees a big wet spot on his jeans about the size of your pussy.

“Holy shit! Guys, look!” He grabs the attention of Andy and Patrick, needing them to see the evidence you left on his jean clad thigh. They’re in awe, Andy is practically drooling when he says, “That’s so fucking hot.”

Eddie takes his time leisurely tossing a plastic bag into the garbage nearest the boys so he can hear what they’re saying.

Jason’s eyes are wide, eating up the sight of your wet imprint. “I fucking knew she wanted me, got all wet just from sitting on my lap, this is gonna be easy,” he sneers. He’s ready to go full-throttle in pursuing you now that he knows you’re hot for him.

Eddie is smirking to himself, he can’t believe how stupid Carver sounds. He can’t wait to watch you spit in his face the minute he tries anything with you, his girl. You may say you’re not his girl—often smacking his shoulder with a snide, ‘Don’t call me that,’ when he says it—but compared to Carver’s chances? You’re definitely his girl.

As Eddie turns around to leave the cafeteria, he catches a glimpse of Jason brushing his finger on the wet spot with desire burning in his eyes. He can’t help but laugh his ass off knowing Jason is getting all horny over a mix of your juices and his cum. He strolls through the hall on cloud nine over this whole thing when, suddenly, you come barreling out of the girls’ bathroom toward him. He doesn’t have a chance to react before you’re quickly shoving him into an empty classroom. You glance around the hall, making sure no students saw you with him, before closing and locking the door.

He leans against the teacher’s desk, arms crossed, looking smug as hell when you finally turn around.

“You’re a fucking pervert, you know that? You are in serious need of a psych evaluation,” you step towards him with an accusatory finger pointed at his chest.

His smirk only widens, looking even more wicked as he closes the little space between you. You back up, not wanting him near you. You know your limits, you recognize your weaknesses, and he’s one of them. He can so easily charm you with his doe eyes, his smoky scent, his deft, and large hands. The ones that are folded behind his back innocently as he follows your backstep until you hit the wall by the door. He looks like he’s got evil on his mind and you know you’re first in line to play the victim.

The long vertical window on the door shows students passing through the busy hall. The passing period is only a span of five minutes, just enough time for everybody to get to their classes.

Enough time for Eddie to commit the evil on his mind. You’re next to the window, back against the wall; you know some overachiever students will start arriving in a minute or so. You were just like them once, always early to your class, never dilly-dallying.

Your heart is beating out of your chest, the thump thump thump like a bass booming in your ears, your whole body warming up with his attention. You’re thankful you had half a mind to lock the door, it would all be over if anybody walked in and caught you against the wall with the freak, you’d never live it down.

He’s in your space, his whole being consuming you. His head moves with yours like a slithering snake as you try to avoid his rapt gaze. Suddenly, he grabs your jaw to secure your eyes on him, you’re expecting him to say something—you just called him a pervert, usually he has a retort to everything. Instead of words. he just uses his other hand to glide up your skirt with such learned ease. He knows your body like the back of his hand at this point.

Your breath quickens as his fingers maneuver into your underwear, you have the strangest case of deja vu as his hand pulls the wet cloth away, enough for two fingers to glide through your wet folds. He starts at your aching hole before moving to your clit, fingers lifting up quickly to catch it, making you yelp at the jolt of electricity he sends through your nervous system.

Your eyes are downcast as he pulls his fingers out of your panties, following them up as he holds them in front of you, glistening with your juices in the light. You let out a shaky breath at the heady sight, his hand still securely on your jaw—not letting you shy away. He wants you to see what you’ve done.

“What do you think this will taste like?” He’s toying with you, whether you answer or not, you know he’s going to continue talking.

He looks at his fingers, then at your face. Your mouth is slightly parted, huffing out desperate breaths by this point. You’re trying—and failing—to contain how much of a hold he has on you, waiting with excitement and fear for what he says next.

“See, I think it’ll taste like you, not me. You. What do you think?” He looks deep into your eyes as if trying to read your mind. You’re unsure why this is the thing he decided to talk about, you don’t care what your juices taste like. You have no idea where he’s going with this, but you know he always has a point to make.

You can hear people outside the door jiggling the handle to get in. He doesn’t take his eyes off you, not even when some kid outside the door says, “It’s locked, somebody get the janitor.”

Your non-answer is answer enough for him, he looks at his fingers again, spreading them into a ‘V’, watching the string of your arousal hold on for dear life as he continues. “My theory is that all my cum soaked into your cute little panties and onto Carver’s thigh, and now this is all you, baby.” Likely theory, though you’re still unsure why he’s doing this, why now, why here.

The view of your own wetness, sticky and stringy between his fingers, him holding it up to your face, his perverted words, and the pet names are all enough to have you suck in a stuttering breath. Your brows are pinched as if he just entered your tight little hole, he’s got you wrapped around his finger, and all over it too. He’s got you reacting in pleasure at just his words, no touch needed.

You’re so close to the door that if anybody tried to look in the thin strip of window at the correct angle, they’d see Eddie’s wet fingers covered in your arousal. That thought sends a shock wave down your spine.

“Because I don’t think this is all for Carver, unless of course, you have something to tell me. Do you, honey?” He looks down at you with a daring look, just hoping you’ll run your mouth like you’ve done so many times before.

But his eyes are like a muddy puddle on a rainy spring day—you’re enthralled, hoping to splash into his soul with your yellow rain boots. You simply shake your head, a dumb look on your face as you rake your eyes over his beautiful features.

You understand now, you called him a pervert for what he made you do. Now he’s showing you that you liked it just as much as he did. You’re just like him, you belong in the dark just like him. Two sides of the same coin.

“What’s going on here?” You hear the gruff voice of the overworked janitor outside the door. The students complain about the locked door, your eyes widen and the blood rushes into your ears. You’re once again reminded that a paper thin wall and a wooden door are the only things that separate you from mass scrutiny and exposure.

Eddie smirks slowly before stuffing his fingers in his mouth, closing his eyes and moaning, relishing in the flavor of you. You’re thankful the chatter of the students waiting outside is loud enough to cover his groans.

“Mmm, just as I suspected. That’s all you, baby. Wanna taste?” He’s looking at you like he could eat you up right then and there, class time be damned.

You would say yes to anything he asked at this point, if he asked you to go halfsies on a timeshare you’d be rummaging your bag for a pen.

He pulls your jaw into him, shoving his filthy tongue into your mouth—not waiting for your answer. You moan at the taste of yourself on his deft tongue. The key enters the lock and turns as Eddie lets you go.

“You did good, baby. I think you do deserve a treat for that,” he praises your performance earlier. You almost preen at the affection, something that is few and far between when you and him come together.

He let’s go of you, your body sways forward, an unconscious attempt to follow his warmth. He walks to the first desk at the front of the classroom, sitting down just as the door is opened and a bunch of kids file in.

Some are looking at Eddie confused at how he got in the classroom and why he didn’t open the door for them. Most of them miss you as you’re pressed against the wall by the door. They’re flooding in like fish from a net, one of the guys you recognize as Eddie’s Hellfire friend and band member speaks up.

“Munson, what the hell are you doing here? Why didn’t you let us in?” He’s hovering by Eddie’s chosen desk.

Before he can answer, a fellow cheerleader you recognize as Stacy Kramer walks right up to the desk he’s in, clearly waiting for him to get out of her seat. He smoothly stands up, stretching his arm out to the now-empty desk and bowing. She giggles at his overly-formal display before sliding into his—her—seat. He smiles at the reaction he got out of her.

You feel your hackles raise at the interaction, not liking that she giggled at him, not like that he did what he did. It’s not even like he’s yours—you don’t want him, you’ve told him that to his face.

-

One time you were at his trailer, post-sex. You were both riding the high of it as he was lighting up a joint.

Sitting on the side of the mattress holding the lighter to the end of the blunt, he peeks back at you lying unabashedly naked on his bed. Your breasts moving up and down with the breaths leaving your soft lips, one arm reached behind your head clutching the one pillow he had on his bed. You had scolded him earlier for being such a boy, only having sheets and a—one—pillow.

“Why, you planning on sleeping over?” He had said, an eyebrow raised expectantly.

“As if,” you sneered. Staying over was for boyfriends and girlfriends—and you two weren’t that, you told him as much.

He takes the time you seem spaced out to admire your place in his bed. The place he sleeps at night, the place where he dreams about you. The fire of your touch, the taste of your lips, the feel of your hair, the smell of your perfumed body. He’s thankful there are no witnesses to his behavior when you leave, when the night comes and his face is buried in the pillow doused with your scent, grabbing onto it like you were his to hold.

He has no idea why he says it—it’s like his mind is too busy living in a fantasy land to watch his mouth. A land where you don’t hate him and he doesn’t piss you off. It’s a land where you drop your walls and he puts down his verbal weapons. A land where you don’t care about status and the social stratification doesn’t put him at the bottom of the barrel. A land where he can figure out what these confusing feelings are, a land where you would know just how to help him with a chaste kiss and a bare heart.

But his mind should’ve been paying attention or else his heart wouldn’t hurt. “Isn’t it kind of weird how we’ve seen so much of each other, but we’ve never gone on like—a date or something?” He says it light heartedly like it’s just an observation he made, like it doesn’t require an answer, like he knows he wouldn’t like what you had to say.

You frown at his comment, looking over at him to read his body language. He hides his nerves well, all you see is him looking back at you. You chalk his strange question up to being high, surely he knows that would never happen. You and him aren’t a thing, nor will you ever be.

“Nah, it’s not weird. Dates are for people who like each other, and I don’t like you.” It’s matter-of-fact the way it comes out. You’re looking at him as if you could be looking through him, like you see nothing of substance, nothing worth seeing.

He snorts at your comment, thorns growing over his heart as he speaks. “You sure seemed to like me a whole lot earlier.”

It’s crass and vulgar—the type of comments that make you angry. He’s caught onto that with you. He’s noticed you seem to despise any comments or flirtations, outside of your sexual endeavors, that allude to those sexual endeavors. It’s like you're disgusted at yourself for being with him, wanting to draw a mental line in the sand. So, of course he has to cross it. He wants to remind you just who you were laying with before.

“Whatever,” your lip curls in contempt, “the point is I’ll never go on a date with you.” That’s that.

“Okay,” he says simply, fighting to conceal the pain of rejection, “and I believe you believe that.” His comment rubs you the wrong way. He looks at you like you’re a child who told him you can jump seven feet into the air. He believes you believe that.

-

You’re broken out of your thoughts as you hear his lie to his friend. “‘Scuse me for trying to do you a favor, I figured you’d get to skip if the teacher couldn’t get into the classroom.”

His friend chuckles, a quick, “Hey, worth a shot,” before he’s clapping Eddie on the shoulder and heading to his seat in the back.

Eddie eyes your body still against the wall, the teacher steps in and calls your last name, asking why you’re in her classroom. You know her, you realize, you had her last year. Your staring contest with Eddie is broken as you look at her, then around the classroom as you realize you’re in Mrs. Gonzalez’s Spanish class.

Some of the other kids have noticed you now, Stacy sends you a soft smile that you struggle to return. The playback of Eddie’s interaction with her running through your mind, creating sour feelings. You stammer out a lie about having a question as Eddie slips past you and out the door. You feel the soft brush of air as he passes so close to your body, your skin hums for him. You’re tempted to walk out with him, following him mindlessly. But you stay to hear Mrs. G’s answer to your bullshit question.

-

You’re generally a nice girl, a bit stuck-up, but nice all the same. You don’t go out of your way to antagonize people–not the way Eddie does—but you also don’t let people walk all over you. That usually leads to Eddie and you trading verbal lashings in front of your friends.

He loves it because it pushes the boundaries of your ‘relationship,’ he loves to see how scared you get behind the facade you display for your posse. Scared at the possibility of being tied to the town freak. Any other guy would probably take great offense to that, but he doesn’t care how you see him. You don’t pretend to understand him and he’ll continue to make assumptions about you. Neither of you will lower your walls enough to let the truth in.

He’ll often invade your personal space in school, just to get close to you, but more importantly, he knows it pisses you off. And who is he, if not put on this earth specifically to piss you off.

It’s been a few days since the lunchroom incident, you’ve been giving him death glares any chance you get. He only sends a toothy grin back, loving the attention you’re giving him. Any attention from you is good attention, that’s his motto.

He sees you in the hall talking to Sherry and some other cheerleaders. They’re surrounding you like you’re the second coming of Jesus Christ, latched onto your every word. It’s moments like these where he relishes in the thought of what you and him do in the shadows. Would your friends idolize you the way they do if they knew what you let the freak do to you? Your friends—a group of airhead girls drawing ambiguous lines to differentiate who they deem worthy of breathing from those they don’t.

You’re too busy going on about the unfairness of the Sadie Hawkins dance last month, the cruelty with which women were subjected to asking the guys to the dance, instead of the other way around. Too busy with your sermon to notice how much of the hallway your girlfriends are taking up—shoulder-checking poor students trying to squeeze by, how Holly takes the unopened Tootsie Pop right out of another girl’s hands, ripping the wrapper off and plopping it into her mouth.

There’s nothing Eddie hates more than entitled people—aka your entire friend group. That’s when he decides to have a little fun. He comes up behind you effectively breaking up the group when he throws his arms around your and Sherry’s shoulders, placing himself right in the middle of everything.

“Ugh, I know! Life is so awful for you! Doesn’t it just make you wanna run away, join a convent, and start anew? But of course, you can’t. There’s that pesky rule about purity,” he grins, leaning close to you, but still loud enough for the other girls to hear. “No,” he says dejectedly, “that won’t work for you, plus I heard they have a picture of you on the wall of every church. Right next to the snake that tricked Eve.”

Your lip curls in disgust at his proximity and his words. You shrug him off, noticing that Sherry doesn’t seem to be in a hurry to disavow the male’s attention. It makes you roll your eyes. You’re stopped in the middle of the hallway, turning on him ferociously. “All that talk about purity is rich coming from you, freak,” you sneer. “God, do you take pills to get this annoying? Are they even FDA approved?”

He finally releases Sherry from under his arm, straightening up to his full height to go toe-to-toe with you. “Nope! This is all natur–al,” he says as he runs his hands down his chest, giving you a salacious look.

Your fiery gaze falters for a moment as you watch his hands glide down his fit body, recalling what he looks like with his shirt off—his pretty black tattoos perfectly contrasting with his milky white skin. You hesitate too long in answering, only encouraging him further.

“You should know though, right? I mean we’re practically the same! You’re a bitch and I’m annoying! Hey, we could have the most unstoppable kids!” He’s having the time of his life doing this in front of your friends, his eyes are alight as he eats up every slight reaction you give to his words. “They could grow up to be lawyers or surgeons!”

In an unforeseen turn of events, despite his point being an insult, your heart skips a beat at the mention of you and him having kids. It throws you for such a loop that you’re knocked off the cliff of sanity, wondering why the idea of a life together with the guy you hate stirs such confusing feelings.

You hate him. He’s annoying, he’s vulgar, he’s rude, he chain smokes, he sells drugs for money, he’s a wannabe rockstar, he’s weird, he pushes your boundaries, and he’s mean to you. Those aren’t usually attributes people find attractive. And yet, the vague idea of creating life with a little bit of him and a little bit of you makes you feel all melty inside

You never hear couples answer the famous, ‘How’d you meet,’ question with, ‘Well it all started when he called me a stuck-up bitch senior year…” That’s not exactly rom-com material, and you know it. It’s like your brain is constantly fighting with your heart when you’re around him and you’re getting pretty sick of it.

You push the feelings into a small compact box, locking the key and throwing it over your shoulder. They’re better locked up, or else they’ll eat and eat at you until they need a bigger box–feelings too large to control, too wild to lasso.

“Ew! As if I would ever fuck you!” You say it with the utmost confidence of someone who wasn’t just begging for his cock a few days ago.

And he seems to have the same thought because the way his smile grows manic, his eyes dancing with delight at your amazing ability to separate parts of yourself at a whim. The power of your cognitive dissonance would make a congressman jealous.

He tilts his head to the side, eyes raking up and down your body, doing it just to watch you squirm in front of all your girlfriends—who, up to this point, have scoffed in disgust at his comments and nodded enthusiastically at yours.

He brings his lower lip between his teeth, grinning before letting it go. “Well, you don’t have to fuck me, I could just fuck you.” He says it like it’s an option you hadn’t considered yet.

Your eyes widen for a split second before masking your shock at his brazen words. Holly decides to butt in on your behalf, “News flash, brain-trust, it’s never gonna happen. Get lost before I call Jason over here, I’m sure he would love to have a talk with the freak who’s going all stalker-boy on his girl.”

You roll your eyes at the mention of Jason. Holly has been encouraging you to give Jason a chance since last year, saying, ‘Have you seen the car he drives? His dad is apparently some CEO for a huge company and his mom is literally assistant to the mayor!’ As if any of that could give him a crumb of personality.

Eddie eyes her—fire red hair, freckles covering her face, a permanent pinch to her over-plucked brows, as if she’s always smelling something awful. He throws his hands up in defeat, suddenly over this interaction when it’s no longer just you and him. “Ooo, wouldn’t want that.” His tone is facetious and mocking as he watches one of her thin eyebrows raise in a challenge.

He turns back to you—a much prettier face for his eyes to rest at. “Catch ya later, sweetheart.” He walks away, feeling your eyes trail his disappearing figure among the students hurrying to class.

You hear another friend speak up—your lab partner and one of the bases on the team, Jackie Davis. Her nasally voice rips you out of your trance, “Ugh, god! He’s such a freak!”

“Yeah and he’s like going full Friday the 13th on you,” Stacy snarks.

Your brows pinch as you remember the movie you watched with Eddie at his trailer. It was a rare moment of truce, where he heated up a shitty TV Dinner for you, a sheet from his bed covering you while you clung to the one lone pillow on the couch. A supposed ‘decorative’ pillow, flattened from decades of use, its pattern faded and colors distorted from years of smoking indoors.

You remember being so captured by the bathroom scene with the girl in the green raincoat. The lights out from the storm raging outside, her brushing her teeth, the ch-ch-ch-ch ah-ah-ah-ah of the background music as the camera closes in on her. You remember yelling, “Oh my god! Turn around,” as you saw the hand peek out from behind the shower curtain.

You remember jumping with a shriek when Eddie sat down beside you. You can hear his laugh echo in your mind, it wasn’t mean or malicious. He was sorry for scaring you, not realizing you were so enthralled in the film he forced you to watch. It was his challenge to you after you claimed to never get scared by horror movies—a conversation that came up, a weird type of pillow talk, but it felt so normal for you two.

You remember how he fed you a bite of the turkey pot pie–unfortunately, the only thing he could find in his and Wayne’s freezer—so you wouldn’t have to untangle your limbs from the blanket and let go of the pillow that was your lifeline. He watched you frown as you slowly chewed, eyes never straying from the small box-television. He took a spoonful to his mouth, the same frown on his face as he tasted the shitty excuse for a meal.

You remember the sound of disgust he made, you recall how you turned to look at his pouting face, a smile pulling at your lips. “I’m gonna order a pizza,” he said, shaking his head at the terrible taste still in his mouth.

You huffed a laugh in response to the clear distress on his face for subjecting you to that frozen dinner. “Yeah, that’d be good.”

You remember how he ended up holding you as you leaned into his chest, you recall ignoring the flutter in your heart at feeling him try to covertly sniff your hair. Instead of separating and calling him ‘weird’ or a ‘pervert’ like you usually would, you just smiled as you kept your gaze attached to the film.

You also remember how you two never spoke about that weird lapse in behavior, you just remember him flipping your skirt up during lunch the following Monday.

Everything goes back to normal again, leaving that memory where it belongs—twirling around in your head, safe in a snow globe of intimacy, placed reverently on a shelf in your mind. Something to pick up, shake, and watch as he pets your hair and nuzzles your neck when you jump at the scary movie.

Just a memory. Far away, in your mind, locked in a box down a hallway, through a door, on a mantle over the fireplace—a fire that always burns for him, a warmth you won’t allow yourself to stand near. The trek too far to reach, the risk too great to bear.

“Well, he’s no Voorhees…” It’s a half-hearted addition to the conversation between your friends. Your mind is elsewhere, too busy thinking about how to make the trek simpler, how to feel the warmth of the fire without getting burned.

“What?” Holly says it, a valley-girl lilt to her voice despite being born and raised in Hawkins, Indiana. She, Stacy, Sherry, and Jackie look at you like you just spoke another language, confused by what you just said. Clearly, they’ve never seen the film and are just using the first horror movie they could think of as an insult to Eddie.

Your eyes go wide, not meaning to let the comment slip. Girls like you don’t watch horror movies; girls like you have sleepovers and watch Footloose, dreaming about Kevin Bacon. Girls like you have posters of David Bowie as Ziggy Stardust, not posters of David Bowie as the Goblin King.

“N—Nothing, uh, yeah, I don’t know what his problem is.” Your answer seems to soothe them as Holly wraps her arms around you, motioning for the group to continue walking to the locker room to change for practice.

-

Eddie keeps you on your toes. One moment, he’s tormenting you in the hallway, goading you into a battle of wits. The next, he’s weirdly sweet—like the time you stormed into his trailer to yell at him for calling Holly a ‘half-wit,’ even though she called him a ‘freak’ first.

He can call you any name in the book, but he can’t harass Holly. She’s like a bloodhound— piss her off enough, and she’ll find whatever she can to ruin his life, turning every day into hell for him. One time, when she got a B- on her English report sophomore year, she snooped through Mr. Lloyd’s desk during lunch and found notes he’d been passing with a senior girl. That same day, she brought them to Principal Higgins and got him fired.

Granted, it was fucking creepy and horrible that Mr. Lloyd was getting it on with a student—legal adult or not, she was still a student. But the point is Holly will rain hellfire onto his life if provoked, and you are begrudgingly part of his life. So you showed up at his palace to lecture him on not poking the bear.

When you burst through the door and storm straight to his bedroom, your fury falters at the sight before you. He’s sitting on the bed, shirtless, an acoustic guitar resting in his lap as he tunes it. The pick necklace he never takes off dangles from his neck, catching the light.

He looks up with raised eyebrows, an amused expression on his face. “I didn’t know the strip club delivers. I’m all out of cash at the moment, but I can give you a different tip.” He’s grinning at you, looking you up and down, enjoying the sight of the offended huff you give him.

You’re wearing your high waisted denim shorts, rolled at the thighs, your white tank top is tucked into your shorts. Your waist is cinched with a thin brown belt through the loops of your bottoms, it’s the perfect outfit for the weather. The wet Springtime is fading into what will soon be an Indian Summer.

“Shut up, I came here to yell at you, not have sex with you.” Hands are on your hips, your ‘don’t fuck with me’ attitude on full blast.

“Really? I thought you came here to profess your undying love for me and ask me to run away with you into the sunset. The yelling part is so unlike you,” he sasses, a smirk gracing his features, eyes twinkling with mirth.

“Ugh, you wish.” You fold your arms across your chest, guiding his eyes to one of his favorite things about you, your tits. That, and your gentle tone and ever-so charming personality, the same things you never use on him. Except the few times you have.

Those times sent him reeling, always catching him off-guard.

Times like the accidental movie night you had, or the time he caught you looking at his acoustic guitar when he was supposed to be in the shower.

You had looked at him with no animosity in that moment, seemingly lost in a memory as you softly said, “My dad used to play.”

The sweetest smile gracing your face as you looked from him to the guitar, softly strumming the un-tuned strings. “Every Sunday he’d pull it out to practice and I’d beg him to play Brand New Key by Melanie,” ruefully smiling at the memory.

“My mom and I would dance and sing along, she’d twirl me around,” a wet chuckle, “I’d try to twirl her, but I wasn’t tall enough so she’d have to bend like it was limbo.”

He remembers how he just watched you, listened to the memory you painted in his vision. He imagined a little you, laughing, crinkling your nose the same way you do to this day.

He doesn’t know what happened to your parents, you always speak about them in the past tense. He doesn’t ask, especially not when he sees the wetness disappear from your eyes as you right your face again, back to neutral, back to the mask. The walls around your heart sturdy as ever, the drawbridge lifted.

He stores that memory away, not dissecting why you shared that story with him, he couldn’t let it affect him the way it so badly wanted to. He lets the memory wash away in the sands of his mind.

“What can I do for you then?” Straight to the point—if you’re not here to use him, he’d rather you leave, lest you tangle his heart in more knots than you already have.

“I just came here to tell you to lay off Holly. She knows almost everything about everyone and isn’t afraid to use it. She could find out about us—about me.” You don’t look at him as you say the last part, suddenly finding the floor of his room far more interesting.

His thumb brushes against a taut string, the sound emanating around the empty trailer. “Ah, but you mistake me for someone who cares,” he says confidently.

That confidence soon falters as he watches your gaze still refuse to meet him, no response to his comment. His heart feels like it’s free falling, his brain feels like it took a ride on the Gravitron at the Hawkins Fourth of July carnival. “But you care…”

“You don’t understand how much I’ll lose. They’ll never look at me the same, they won’t wanna be my friends.” Your tone is one step away from pleading, not exactly that desperate yet. You’re looking at him, but he’s the one who refuses to meet your eyes now.

He bristles at your comment, his gaze resting on his guitar, fingers starting to pluck the strings as an unconscious outlet for his inner turmoil. “Yeah, well, maybe you should get better friends.” It’s harsh—it’s not the worst thing he’s ever said to you, but it weighs more in this earnest conversation.

“That’s easy for you to say. You don’t care what people say about you,” you bite back, he notes how your voice distinctly lacks its natural anger you reserve for him. It makes him feel a little more steady in this uneasy confrontation—an exploration of the things unspoken, the things neither of you brought up unless it was used to taunt the other.

Like how he reminds you constantly about what your friends would think if they knew how he touched you, but that was just dirty talk. Shame creeps up your spine at the thought of how you let him speak to you, the acknowledgement that you get off on the idea of dipping your toe into his world, hiding in the shadows with him.

But when he touches you so softly afterwards—fixing your hair and your clothes, it has you relishing in the feeling of pretending you, too, don’t care what the town thinks of you.

Not when he touches you like he does, not when he tells you how good you are for him. When he’s sweet to you, you feel like you could run the world. Like the possibility of never having what you have now—your friends, your popularity—could leave you unfazed.

You know he’d let you into his world—show you his favorite horror movies, the ones you haven’t already seen. He’d play you his music, run song lyrics by you, he’d take you out to see your favorite bands even if they’re not his speed.

Any motivation to continue the conversation melts. His nonresponse to your last comment taking the wind from beneath your wings. Your face softens as you tilt your head, recognizing the particular notes he’s strumming idly on his guitar.

You recognize the melody as a very choppy, rough version of the instrumental to Brand New Key. Your heart beats like the thump of a rabbit’s foot, you didn’t realize he remembered what you had said that one time your mask cracked.

You know he’s unaware of his stuttered strumming, unaware that it’s jackhammering the base of your tallest watchtower, a jagged crack travelling up the brick at the speed of light.

You move to sit down in front of him, your back to the door. His eyes lift at your closeness, finally meeting yours again—an observant gaze that sets your chest ablaze.

“I like your necklace.” It’s soft, not timid. You’re not nervous. You’re not lying.

He acknowledges the olive branch—something you’ve never dared to extend before. He doesn’t have any fight in him, too busy falling victim to your saccharine voice.

He nods, his strumming fingers falling still. He reaches for the guitar pick around his neck, holding the smooth plastic between his index finger and his thumb. “It was the only thing I brought from my home when Wayne got custody of me. The only thing that was actually mine.”

You know very little about his home life, but you’ve gathered it was not good and Wayne practically saved him. You met Wayne once when he was leaving for his night shift at the plant. He was sweet to you, and you pretended to ignore Eddie’s eyeroll at his uncle’s comment, “She’s pretty, don’t break her heart.”

Navigating a conversation with him without insults or being on guard is like learning to ice skate. You wobble, and sometimes you fall. But if you just go slow, it’s not that dangerous.

You decide to match his vulnerability—offering a glimpse inside your own walls.

“I used to have one like it, but it was a keychain,” you point out. “It was a gift from my dad, but I lost it freshman year.”

You’re not sure why you tell him the last part, the admission feels almost too personal, but it just came out. It makes you feel like your skin is made of a cellophane and he can see your heart beating in your chest.

He watches you quietly for a minute, not debating his next move, but rather letting your truth hang in the air with reverence.

What he does next, he does because he wants to. He does it because he thinks you should have it. He doesn’t do it to have any sort of claim over you. He’s not marking you as his, despite the flush of warmth he feels in his heart at the thought.

He lifts the pick necklace gently over his head and leans over to you. You’re admiring the glossy lacquer of his guitar, amused by the painted words—‘This machine slays dragons’—when you suddenly feel the cool metal settling around your neck. Startled, you look up to find him already easing back into his spot on the edge of the bed.

You reach up to feel the plastic dangling against your sternum, he watches your fingers daintily hold it. You’re looking down, admiring the small token from him. His body warms as he sees where the pick falls when you let it go, he averts his eyes as it disappears between your cleavage.

You hold back the intense desire to tell him, ‘You don’t have to do that.’ The gift is far too heartfelt, but you withhold that reaction. You know—god, you know—he doesn’t do anything he doesn’t want to do.

All you allow yourself to say is a quiet, “Are you sure?”

He nods, “It looks better on you anyway.” He cracks a smile, finally letting the mood lighten.

“I don’t know…it does bring out your pecs,” you tease.

You truly always keep him guessing…he’s utterly baffled at your response. A compliment, a joke, and a smile. They’re all rarities. Oddities he’s dying to collect.

“Was that—? Did you just compliment me?”

He’s teasing you, eyes alight, shining bright like the summer sun. You find yourself wanting to bathe in it, let his sunshine warm your skin. You want his rays to leave their mark on you. Darken, freckle, or burn—you don’t care which.

“Yeah, well—don’t get used to it.” You try to gather any semblance of your usual snide tone—the one reserved for him—but it’s like water through the cracks between your fingers. You can’t be mean if you tried right now.

-

After that day when you barged into his trailer—eyes ablaze with fury and a single name on your hit list—after he was spared by emotional secrets and meaningful gifts, your interactions with him have been incredibly tame.

Both of your walls are crumbling, the jackhammer he took to your watchtower is doing its job. The lingering glances you steal when you think he’s not looking—the sight of you in nothing but his necklace…the curves of your body propose a contract for the demolition of his barriers.

A week after that moment in his bedroom, he’s searching for you in the halls—ready to ignite the TNT himself.

That’s when he hears your voice meshed with the grating atrocity that is Holly Hannigan’s voice.

He wasn’t able to get you alone during school hours, so he thought he’d wait for after school where he knew you’d be preparing for cheer practice.

The school is empty save for the other cheerleaders already warming up. He watches from the end of the hall as you and Holly exit the locker room just outside the gym.

He had strutted there from the drama room with such confidence, but it’s quickly leaving him now. He doesn’t bother to round the corner when he hears it.

“Are you sure? I mean, you’ve been looking at him weird lately—,” he immediately knows Holly’s talking about him, the disgruntled tone she speaks with gives her away.

“No—yeah! Of course, I’m sure,” you nervously laugh. “Are you kidding? You know I wouldn’t be caught dead with him.” There’s a smile on your face as you say it. It’s an earnest attempt at convincing Holly that her suspicions of fraternization between you and Eddie are ludicrous—a non-starter.

Eddie’s heart constricts. It feels like you just shoved your hand through his chest and squeezed the organ ‘til it popped with your perfectly manicured nails.

He doesn’t know why your comment affects him so much—it’s nothing he hasn’t heard before.

You’d say it to his face for crying out loud. But he thought he felt something change between you and him.

He thought you felt it too. No, he didn’t think—he was sure of it. That’s why he wanted to find you—needed to find you.

He came to find you to pour his heart out to you.

He woke up today realizing he can’t keep doing this. He can’t keep loving you in secret—pretending to have you in the shadows, pretending to go to sleep at night as yours.

He’s seen the best and the worst of you and he wants to walk into the light with you. He wants to show you off. Not because you’re his, but because he’s yours.

He wants to ask you if your feet are tired from running through his mind.

He wants to ask you to sit down and stay a while.

He wants to suggest maybe moving to his heart to put some roots down, maybe start a life there with him.

But he doesn’t get the chance to do any of that.

Instead, he’s too busy clutching the painted brick—the stupid school colors garish and tasteless. He doesn’t get to say any of that because he’s too busy having an out-of-body experience in the hallways of his high school.

Holly studies you for a moment, as if trying to read your mind. All the blood in your body is rushing in your ears like the Grand Rapids.

You wouldn’t be surprised if she could read your mind. She’s known you since freshman year, and you’ve known her long enough to know she can sniff out a lie from miles away.

“...Okay…,” she says slowly, her beady eyed gaze still watching you.

You discreetly exhale, the realization that you narrowly avoided your life being blown to bits sending your heart into a frenzy.

She perks back up, as if she was never questioning your loyalty to the upper social class she runs like the navy.

“Good! Because Lord knows you don’t need trailer trash like that mucking up your life.” She grabs your hand to pull you through the doors of the gym.

The last thing Eddie hears before the gym doors close is her nasally voice saying, “He’s probably gonna wind up dead or in jail in like five years anyway.”

He doesn’t get to see the way you frown at her words, your heart dropping at the idea of him going away—in any capacity.

Eddie’s eyes water as he turns around, storming back to the drama room.

He’s seething—hot tears running down his cheeks freely in the privacy of his D&D decorated space. He can’t stop pacing, harshly wiping the streams of wetness from his face. He’s pissed, he’s livid, he’s upset, he’s sad, he feels like he’s dying.

He’s angry at himself for thinking you felt anything—angry that he got his own hopes up.

He’s pissed at being confronted with who you are once again. He should’ve known you wouldn’t change, after all, a tiger can’t change its stripes.

He humorlessly laughs at the fact that he held out hope you’d tell Holly off for the way she spoke about him. No, of course you wouldn’t. Why would he think that? That wasn’t you, that had never been you.

You are famously the most stuck-up, backboneless, conformist he’s ever met. You are queen of the sheep-like cheerleaders who go out of their way to disparage everybody who isn’t rich and beautiful. And he felt something for you.

He fell for your disarming smile. You had him fooled that you could be anybody other than who you are. Who you’ve always been—for as long as he’s known you, at least.

He won’t let himself admit anything more than that. It’s easier to be angry—at you, at himself—than to grieve what could have been. What he thought you felt. He presses his head to his hands, fingers threading through his curls, sniffling. He’s remembering everything. It’s like his brain wants to torture him.

He remembers the way your eyes twinkled as you complimented how the pick laid on his chest, he remembers the weight of you in his arms as you pressed harder against him when you found out Jason Voorhees was at the bottom of Crystal Lake, he remembers the way you brought him extra food you had made one night.

A stern, “Don’t say anything, just accept it. You eat like shit, you have to have at least one normal meal a week,” while you shoved the tupperware full of lasagna into his hands. Your comments quickly halting any teasing he was planning to send your way.

He whips his head up quickly, hand swiping the papers and game pieces off the table. “FUCK!” He shouts the word as loud as he can, channeling all of his confusing feelings into it.

All of a sudden, he hears Gareth’s hesitant voice behind him. “Uhh, bad time?”

Eddie whips around, no anger falling from his face; he doesn’t care who sees him like this anymore.

A curt, “Yes,” is all he lets out before stomping past him, prepared to go home and get absolutely plastered. He hopes if he’s inebriated enough, his drunk brain won’t conjure you up, won’t make him think everything is fine.

“I–I actually came here to ask you something–,” Gareth calls after Eddie, following him out of the room. His eyes are wide with shock and worry, he’s never seen Eddie like this.

Eddie doesn’t stop at Gareth’s shout. He’s a man on a mission.

Gareth watches his retreating figure before turning around to pick up the mess Eddie made. He’s frozen in his spot, though, when he turns to see you five paces back. His eyebrows furrow at your presence, you’re in your workout clothes, sweaty and disheveled—clearly still in practice.

He’s wondering why you’re here; there’s a water fountain near the gym, so it can’t be that. He notices your eyes look stormy as you, too, watch Eddie’s retreating figure.

He looks between you and Eddie as the metalhead violently pushes open the school doors and heads to his van. In the end, Gareth decides it’s none of his business. Instead, he turns back into the drama room to pick up the pieces.

You heard Eddie shout all the way from the gym. You’ve listened to him speak for hours—probably more than anybody else in the school, including his Hellfire friends—you can pick his voice out of a crowd of a thousand people.

That being said, that was not the voice of a happy person. That was not the playful tone of one of his sermons.

None of the girls seem to hear the noise, though. You guess your ears are just tuned to his frequency after being with him for so long—well, not with him. The thought makes your heart skip a beat. Not the time.

You ask Coach Madison if you can go to the restroom. She waves you off, and you briskly walk toward the double doors, escaping the loud, humid gym. The moment they shut behind you, you break into a jog, heading straight to where you know he’d be—his sanctuary. But when you get there, you freeze, stopped in your tracks by the sheer rage radiating off him.

He doesn’t seem to notice you. Instead, making a beeline for the exit at the end of the hall. You’re breathing out huffs of air as you catch your breath. You feel something you haven’t felt with him before. Fear.

It’s not fear of him. It’s fear for him. You’ve never seen him so enraged.

You want to know what happened, you want to know if there’s anything you can do. When he’s finally out the doors, you turn to see the same Hellfire guy you saw that one day in the classroom. You watch him walk back into the drama room that you know doubles as Eddie’s Hellfire Club.

The boy doesn’t acknowledge your existence, just heading over to kneel down by the table. You look into the room and see a bunch of papers—and what looks to be little plastic toys—all over the ground.

You frown, hurrying in to help him pick up the mess. You wonder if Eddie made it. You don’t think he would, you’ve never seen him get particularly violent.

Eddie loves his belongings, he always treats them with reverence—almost to a humorous extent. You’ve caught him talking to his electric guitar—his Sweetheart—one too many times to believe he would do this. You smile softly at the memory of him ‘introducing’ you to ‘her.’

This didn’t seem like him, but everybody can be pushed to commit actions outside of their character, you suppose.

Kneeling down by Gareth, you choose to organize the papers into a neat pile. You work silently, shuffling on your knees to reach some that seemed to have caught air and floated further from the table. Gareth gathers the figurines the club uses for characters and villains, looking at you briefly. The two of you are working in silence to clean up Eddie’s mess.

Once you gather the last paper, you stand up with your hands on either side of the stack, tapping it on the table to get the papers to fall into place. It’s then that Gareth finally speaks.

“Thanks.” It’s a quiet, nervous mutter, like he’s concerned about your next move. “He can be a bit much sometimes.”

Your eyes are kind as they look at him, nothing but genuine interest in them. His comment confirms what you feared, Eddie did do this. And if he did this, then he must be far angrier than his already radioactive energy gave off.

“I’m Gareth,” he nods as he says it, feeling awkward that the most popular girl in school is in his space, picking up his ‘nerdy’ papers.

You tell him your name, extending your hand to shake his—something your dad taught you to do at a young age. ‘It’s proper. And no flimsy hand–no, it’s gotta be a firm shake. You gotta show people you respect them,’ he said.

Gareth stares at your hand with wide eyes. The queen–no, the ringleader of the highest social class—the students who have made his and his friend’s lives hell since middle school—is offering her hand to him.

He nods, uttering a soft, stilted, “I know who you are,” and shakes your hand. You feel your face heat at his comment, you’re ashamed at the way he probably knows you.

You know what your friends do. You don’t partake, though. Not feeling the need to criticize other people’s lives given how yours is going.

The place you live, the stories you retell about that trip to Ibiza in fourth grade—always tweaking a few details to keep it fresh. Summers out back behind your trailer, soaking up just enough sun to make it look like you really did spend your holiday in Europe, drifting on the water on a glorious yacht.

So no, you don’t throw the same barbs at the lower class students as your friends do, as Holly does—the worst offender of them all.

The only time you’re ever truly vile is when Eddie brings it out of you, something that has notably ceased in recent encounters.

The absence of your usual fights was what made Holly question you earlier—like you were on the stand, swearing under oath that you hate him. That you think he’s vulgar and gross, that you could never like somebody like him. If she only knew the truth, she’d hold you in contempt for the web of lies you’ve spun.

Speak of the devil and she doth appear.

You jump at her snide tone, “What are you doing in here? This is nerd domain.” With her hand on her hip, she’s got a look on her face like she’s sizing you up to send you flying out of the friend group with a swift kick to the ass.

Gareth sees her and practically shrinks. He backs up from you, choosing to focus on putting the characters back to their original spaces on the fantasy map.

“I-I was just–,” you could kick yourself for your lack of spine when it comes to her. You are fully aware of how awful she is, but for some reason she loves you and thinks you’re the best thing to happen since sliced bread.

“Looks like I was worried about the wrong freak,” she snickers at Gareth’s expense. “Is he the one you’ve been sneaking off to meet?”

Your heart drops, how does she know about your clandestine meetings? Has she been watching you longer than she’s let on?

In a flash, you’re running through every poor excuse you’ve given for canceling hangouts, every lame attempt to sneak away in school. You’re trying to find the leak in this quickly sinking ship.

You see Gareth’s reaction of genuine confusion—at least Eddie didn’t tell his friends.

But you can also see the hurt flicker in his eyes at her tasteless remark. You were already unsettled by his clear discomfort around you—even during something as mundane as helping him clean up. The sting fuels you, giving you a sliver of confidence; you grasp onto it, holding it tightly.

“Stop, Holly.” It’s more stern than you’ve been with her in months. You realize you’ve let her run her mouth far too much, distracted by your game of cat and mouse with Eddie. “Come on, let’s just go,” you’re walking out the door, grabbing her arm and pulling her along with you. You don’t bother looking back at Gareth—missing the relieved breath he lets out.

You and Holly return to practice. Your stern tone with her seems to have whipped her back into shape for the first time in months. You feel the confidence waning, though, as you think about how hurt Eddie seemed. You wish you knew why.

-

It’s 3:17 AM when you hear banging on your front door, the force shakes your whole trailer. It wakes you with a start, your heart beating out of your chest. Fight or flight kicks in as you grab the first thing you can swing. The makeshift weapon happens to be your dad’s old acoustic guitar, which you quickly set back down—not willing to risk it in a possible fight.

Instead, you opt for the heavy, corded landline on your night stand. Maybe not the smartest decision as you yank the machine from its tether to the wall, the power cord jumping at you with the force of your pull. It is your only way to call the police if need be, but you weren’t about to smash your dad’s guitar. It’s the only thing you have of his—besides the hand-me-down car.

The banging is sloppy and loud as you get closer. You wrench open the front door, the base of the machine held above your head in one hand—ready to come down on this creep’s head.

But all the fear drains from your body as you finally see who the creep is. It’s a very inebriated Eddie Munson, gripping the screen door for balance. As you pull the door open, he nearly topples over, barely catching himself against the outside of your trailer.

The fear is gone, but it’s replaced by simmering anger. You’re angry that he woke you up at three in the morning on a school night, his thunderous banging loud enough to rattle the thin trailer walls—loud enough to wake the neighbors if it had gone on any longer.

You’re angry at his obvious, sloppy drunkenness, the way he sways in the dim porch light. And most of all, you’re angry that he’s here, at your trailer.

You’ve spent your entire relationship dodging his self-invited visits. It’s bad enough he knows you live two doors down in a trailer park, you don’t need him seeing just how little you have, just how poor a home it really is.

You’re either at school, working, at practice, or at Friday night games. That schedule doesn’t leave a lot of room for upkeep, and unfortunately, you’re not exactly wealthy enough to have a maid service. Not like before, at least.

“What are you doing here,” you snap, your voice sharp. He sways slightly, seemingly ready to drop. His unsteady movements make you reach for his shoulders instinctively, a reflex you can’t quite control.

He quickly smacks your hands away at the first touch. You flinch back, shocked at his reaction.

“I came here to take my necklace back,” he slurs, brown eyes drunkenly trying to focus on you. Your eyebrows raise at his admission, you have no idea what’s driven him to this point.

First you saw him after school storming off, now he’s at your door—sloshed—in the middle of the night. You want to know so badly what happened, but you don’t want to draw any more of his ire your way.

“Wh–what?” Your tone is soft, if he was coherent, he would’ve seen the hurt flash across your eyes. You set the phone onto the table by the door.

“You heard me,” he leans forward through the doorway as he sneers, “Gimme my necklace back.”

“I thought it was a gift.” You’re trying so hard to read him, but his glazed eyes give nothing away.

“Yesterday it was a gift, today it’s trash on the next trip out to the Hawkins Landfill.”

He’s confident in his anger, looking at you like he doesn’t recognize you, but he knows he does. He sees you. The you from before. The Queen Bitch of Hawkins High, the one bragging about her fancy, rich vacations. The one constantly surrounded by mindless drones picking on students they deem less than.

“But it was yours first, why would you throw it out,” you ask. He’s not making any sense, you feel like you’re having a conversation in code.

His clear disdain for you has you quickly laying brick upon brick, building back your walls like you’re the overnight crew working on a billionaire’s new building—a promise of a huge bonus for how quickly you get the work done.

“I don’t want anything that’s touched you and since I can’t melt my skin off, the next best thing is sending everything to the trash heap,” he jeers, his eyes burning into you.

You feel so exposed. He’s being meaner than you’ve seen in a long time. it’s no longer teasing for your attention, poking you to get a rise. No, he really seems to hate you.

You don’t know what you did. You’re fighting tooth-and-nail to hold back tears at his comment about wanting to melt his skin off all because you touched him. You’ve never heard such vitriol, and you walk through the halls of Hawkins High next to your so-called-friends daily. You feel the stares, you’ve seen the bathroom graffiti.

“God, you’re pathetic. What’s next, are you gonna make me pay you back for that pizza you bought us?” You’re biting back—a lioness cornered, baring teeth to intimidate the threat.

He doesn’t answer so you continue. “It’s somewhere in my room,” you cross your arms over your chest, not making a move to look for it.

“I can wait,” he says, his tone defiant as he remains planted on the steps of your trailer—no attempt to come inside, no sign of leaving.

“Ugh fine!” You spin around, heading for your room down the hall. After your many stays at his trailer, you’ve noticed it’s almost identical to yours. Except it’s only you living here, so you freely get the singular bedroom and there’s much less furniture.

The door nearly swings shut with your absence against it, but he stops it with his hand. He doesn’t try to look into your place more than what he can see from the front steps.

He sees what’s supposed to be your living room, he thinks, but it’s just a singular lawn chair he presumes is facing a television set. If he were inside, though, he would see it’s just a radio with foil around the antennae—you couldn’t afford a TV.

He frowns at the sight, he thought your home would’ve at least looked like you lived there. There’s no pictures on the walls, no belongings strewn about, it honestly looks like you’ve been robbed. He still doesn’t know the deal with your parents, but he doesn’t think a high school student would be living alone…

When you arrive at your bedroom, you look back to make sure Eddie can’t see you. Luckily, his whole body is covered by the door that opens into the trailer, so you turn back around heading to the jewellery box on your crappily-built dresser. You really needed to get better tools, the Hawkins thrift store doesn’t exactly have the highest quality items.

You open the lid of the jewellery box—the one your mom owned. It has a mirror on the inside of the top, in the reflection you see yourself. You see the tear you feel running down your cheek.

Reaching under the collar of your sleep shirt, you pull the chain free, lifting it over your head. You look at the pick dangling in the combination of moonlight and the yellow-hued porch lights pouring in from your bedroom window. Quietly sniffling, you wipe the tear from your cheek. You’ll be damned if you let him see you cry.

You march back out to him, throwing the necklace at his chest, “Here!”

It falls to the ground with a metallic clatter, he reaches down to snatch it off your front steps. He hesitates for a moment, his eyes hold the same disgrace for you, but he doesn’t leave your front stoop.

You don’t know what he’s waiting for and you’d very much like to cry in peace. You shake your head, snarkily saying, “You didn’t give me anything else…”

Your front is holding strong, but his foundation cracks at your comment. “No…I didn’t.” He turns to leave, you don’t bother watching him go. Instead, you quickly slam the front door shut, leaning your forehead against the barrier as you let a sob loose.

You turn around, crying, looking at your practically empty home. The world is blurry as you shuffle back to your room, allowing yourself a well-deserved breakdown.

Eddie is walking back to his trailer when he looks down at the pick necklace in his hands, he feels like he’s sobered up from the pain of that interaction.

It felt awful, he just wants to go back and ask you why you are the way you are. He wants to ask you if you truly see nothing in him, if he’s truly just a loser to you. He wants to ask you if you genuinely believe he’s destined for nothing good—just like Holly said, just like when you didn’t come to his defense.

So he does. He turns around, suddenly feeling very talkative. He wants to cry and beg to know why you look at him like he’s nothing.

His feelings are so big, he’s having trouble remembering all the times—especially recently—when you looked at him like he was everything to you. All he hears is Holly’s voice in his head, trailer trash, dead or in jail, loser, freak. All he sees is your embarrassment every time he dared to speak to you in public. All he feels is how his heart stopped when you said you wouldn’t be ‘caught dead’ with the likes of him.

Yeah, he feels very talkative.

When he makes it back to your trailer, ready to bang his fist against the door, that’s when he hears you. It’s immediate, the way his heart breaks at the sound of your cries. He’s never heard you so despondent.

Now all he hears is the plucky tune of Brand New Key, all he sees is how he imagined you dancing, all he feels is the flooding warmth of your teasing gaze. He hears the way you complimented his Sweetheart, the way the smile in your voice could be heard for a country mile.

He sees you in his bed, wearing his pick necklace. He feels the rays of your smile, burning his skin with its light. He feels the cool coconut-y sunscreen he applies before going back in for seconds, bending over backwards just to get you to show it to him again. Your blazing grin, the light from your eyes could burn through SPF 100.

He’s not feeling very talkative anymore.

He can’t stand your cries anymore, their volume echoing softly through the park.

He retreats back to his trailer, deciding he would rather live to fight another day. Tomorrow will be better. He’s confused, hurt, and angry, but his heart yearns for you, nonetheless. And he’s nothing if not at its service.

-

When he gets to school the next day he hovers a few feet down from your locker, waiting for you, but you don’t show. Instead he sees the one person he’s never wanted to see ever.

“She’s not here today, stalker-boy.” Holly’s standing in front of him, arms crossed, a hip jutted out, obnoxiously smacking her gum. She’s flanked by who he recognizes as a nervous looking Sherry, and a pissed off Jackie.

He kicks off of the lockers he was leaning against, “Get bent, Holly.”

It pours like acid from his tongue, his best sneer screwing up his face. He really hates your ‘friends.’ They’re all so useless, Sherry follows you around like a shaking, wet chihuahua with the backbone of a chocolate éclair, Stacy worships you with zero personality from what he can tell, Jackie follows Holly around like she’s the second coming of Jesus Christ, and Holly Hannigan has the strangest obsession with you. She’s far meaner than he’s ever seen you be, yet she yields to your power—he doesn’t get it.

Holly gasps dramatically, a hand flying to her chest, faux offense written all over her face, “Now is that any way to talk to a lady, freak?”

He snorts, “You’re no lady, you haven’t been a lady since eighth grade.” She scoffs in indignation at his insinuation, it only fuels him.

“Yeah, guys talk, Holly. Tommy H. said you threw up all over him at the mere notion of going down on him,” he grins, his eyes narrowed daring her to prolong the interaction. She wasn’t exactly pious, he could name a few other stories he’s heard if she chooses to stick around.

Her eyes are wide, her face a bright red. She’s going to kill Tommy for sharing that story, already thinking about how she’s going to go to her daddy and complain about the freckle-faced boy spreading rumors. Maybe she’ll have him draw up some cease and desist papers.

At the revelation, Sherry looks nauseated, turning to see if it’s true. Based on the look of a mortified Holly, wishing the floor would swallow her up—it’s true. Jackie lets out a small, judgmental, “ew,” at the thought of her idol puking all over a guy’s dick.

Holly huffs, turning to Jackie, “It’s a very normal reaction!” Her high pitched shout garners attention from surrounding students, that only leads her to freak out more, pointing a red polished nail into Eddie’s chest, “This isn’t over, freak!”

She’s gone, heading straight for the girl’s restroom. Most likely to stare into the mirror and make Jackie tell her twenty positive things about her. Her exit is timed right as the bell rings, alerting students to get to first period.

Sherry watches them leave, before letting her gaze meander back to Eddie. She can feel his eyes on her, he’s waiting for her to leave with them.

When she meets his gaze, he’s uninterested, he quirks an expectant eyebrow—a challenge. He’s anticipating a similar interaction to what he had with Holly, there’s no other reason Sherry would stick around.

“She’s at home…,” she says quietly, seemingly not in a rush to get to class—a rarity with her kind. Usually you and your girlfriends end each school year in the top ten of your class.

He nods slowly, simply watching her, trying to decipher why she’s still here—why she’s talking to him, especially about you.

“You made her happy, I could tell.” It’s simple. Seven words that tilt his entire world on its axis. How did Sherry know? Why didn’t she tell anybody? What exactly does she know? He knows you wouldn’t have told her.

If she knows about him, does she know about you? About where you live? He knew you and Sherry were closer than the rest, but you made it seem like no one on this earth knew your ‘darkest secret.’

She saw it? Sherry—a complete outsider—saw it? She saw what he thought he saw? She saw how you felt for him? If at least one other person can confirm it, it can’t be a hallucination, can it?

He has so many more questions, but nothing comes out. He doesn’t know if she’s safe. She obviously hasn’t spread the word thus far, but he doesn’t know her. He wishes you were here to help him navigate this—hell, he just wishes you were here. He wishes he could take back what he said last night, he wishes he could give you the pick necklace back—the one around his neck right now.

He lied about throwing it away, he’d never do that, especially not now. He put it on this morning as a pitiful attempt to feel close to you, like he could carry you with him. Maybe he could carry the soft version of you with him—the one he gave the pick to in the first place—and it would give him enough confidence to talk to the other version of you. But you never showed.

At his nonresponse, Sherry continues. “When you weren’t fighting, you made her happy. The insults you two throw at each other recently aren’t as cutting as they were before, that’s when I figured,” she nods understandingly—no look of disgust, just laying out the facts, plain and simple.

Eddie can’t take his eyes off her, his mouth slightly parted in awe, he wants to know more. He wants to know everything. It’s invigorating to have someone finally validate him, he thought he had truly gone crazy.

What a preposterous notion, that you—a popular cheerleader, 4.0 student, bound for a life of leisure—fall for him. A broke, nerdy, metal loving, drug dealing, three-peat senior. A D- student bound to a life of gas station attendant work—or god forbid—jail.

A random student carrying a plunger as a hall pass passes the two of them, it draws Sherry’s attention. He can tell she’s nervous to be seen with him, it makes him roll his eyes, no backbone.

“She called me last night. She didn’t say much, but I know something happened,” she says quickly, probably wanting the interaction to wrap up before anybody else sees her with the school freak.

He furrows his brows at her comment, he didn’t think you would’ve done that. Not unless you were pushed to it. It makes him feel awful all over again, he pushed you. He upset you so much that you exposed yourself to one of the people you specifically told him could never know. He made you feel that alone.

“She hasn’t been happy for a long time,” the nervous girl mutters, unsure of how much he knows.

He doesn’t like the way she says that, a bleak tone to her voice. He's starting to feel like he should’ve asked you more questions about your life, even if you bit his head off. Maybe he could’ve worn you down for some answers.

He’s starting to realize that despite your curious living arrangement and the unorthodox sight of you working at the Hideout, he’s been navigating this ‘relationship’ like he’s the worst off. As he runs through all the interactions you’ve had with him in the past couple of months, he realizes you never complained about your situation. You didn’t talk about your situation. Whatever the situation was. In fact, you acted like it was nonexistent.

He knew nobody living in a trailer park, thrifting clothing, is going on European summer vacations. But he was too worried about himself—constantly ruminating on the differences between you and him, the class divide—he didn’t realize you and him have a lot more in common than he’s allowed himself to see.

He could kick himself for how deep he drew the line in the sand, how constant his need to emphasize the ‘social stratification’ was. You only pretend to be like the rest, like the jocks and the other cheerleaders. But at the end of the day, you’re living almost the same life as him. The realization makes him want to die. He’s been so stupid.

Sherry seems to recognize the look of anguish on his face and takes pity. “She might kill me for this but,” she takes her backpack off her shoulder, opening it and pulling out a spiral notebook. She rips out a page before scribbling something with a pink pen that has a fuzzy poof on the end of it, “this is her address, go fix whatever the hell it is that you did.”

He looks down at the paper, in pink glitter pen is your address.

A few thoughts fly through his head, the first one is: this girl really doesn’t know anything about me. She doesn’t know that Eddie lives literally two doors down from you. The second thought warms his cold, dead heart just a bit, maybe she does have a backbone.

Sherry doesn’t seem fond of Eddie, but she knows you are. So she risks your fury—which is not for the weak, he, of all people, knows that—and gives him your address so he can fix it. She’s earned a sliver of his respect for this bold move.

“Thanks,” is all he can say, gripping the paper like a lifeline. She nods and hurriedly walks to her class.

-

Eddie spends the day thinking up what he’s going to say to you. As much as he wants to run to his van and break every traffic law to get to your place, he can’t just bust in guns blazing. Especially after how he treated you last night, he needs to get his words right this time.

He doesn’t care if you meet him with animosity, he knows enough—he’s been validated enough—that he believes he can storm the walls of your kingdom. And if he treats the maiden fair, perhaps she’ll accept his token of devotion back. Perhaps she’ll invite him in and kiss him like she used to, maybe she’ll bestow upon him her most glorious smile, the one that lights his fire.

The day flies by and he’s getting nervous as the clock ticks closer to his freedom. When the bell rings, he’s moving with the sea of students bursting to be free of the prison that is Hawkins High.

As Eddie passes the drama room, Gareth spots him while he’s dropping off a new D&D Monster Manual he got for his birthday. He runs out, his hand gripping the side jamb of the door as he shouts at Eddie, “Hey, Ed! I have a question for you!”

Eddie continues walking, wishing the flood of students would get out of his way so he could get to you faster.

“Eddie,” Gareth calls again.

This time Eddie turns his head, still walking, “Not now, I gotta do something.”

He’s a man on a mission and Gareth is not going to stop him.

“Is this about her?” Gareth calls out, knowing this will get Eddie’s attention—plus he’s been meaning to ask him about what happened the other day.

Eddie whips around to face his friend, causing a mild traffic jam. Annoyed students hurry to dodge him before they run into him completely, he moves to the wall of lockers, salmoning his way back up to Gareth.

“How do you know about her,” he questions Gareth, eyes sharp and scrutinizing.

Gareth raises his hands in surrender, not knowing you were such a touchy subject to him. “I don't know anything about her, just–that she seemed…really worried about you the other day.”

“What the hell are you talking about,” Eddie’s losing his patience, he needs to get home to you, or home—and to you. His heart jumps at the thought of you and home in the same sentence.

“When you freaked out…And stormed off…I don’t know, she looked really wigged.” Gareth has no idea what this information does for Eddie. He doesn’t know what Eddie has to do with the most popular girl in school, so he’s having trouble talking about something he knows nothing about. He decides to stick to his observations.

“She even helped me pick up the mess you made, thanks for that, by the way,” he sasses.

Eddie is reeling, you were worried about him. How did you know he was still in school? Did you leave practice to come see him? You met Gareth?

The last thought makes him huff out an amused breath through his nose, he hopes Gareth didn’t scare you off by talking about the big breasted Tiefling character he’s in love with.

“Did she say anything about me,” Eddie eagerly asks. He feels like a teenage girl, wanting to know every single detail about his friend’s interaction with his crush.

“Not in so many words,” Gareth quips, “We just hit the introduction stage when Horrible Holly Hannigan walked in as bitchy as ever. You know, I wonder if she’s got like–a quota or something–of how many days she can ruin.”

Eddie ignores Gareth’s comment, deflating at the useless information the boy seems to have. At least he got to hear that you were worried about him. That’s a good sign. Another person to validate his non-craziness.

“It was really cool, though, you should’ve seen the way she shut Holly down when she went after me! I’ve never seen anything like it,” Gareth’s eyes light up at the memory, giddy to tell his friend all about how the most popular girl in school stood up for him—more or less. “I felt like a damsel in distress,” he chuckles. “Who knew the Queen B would be my knight,” he mocks.

Eddie’s chest puffs up at Gareth’s compliments, “Yeah, she’s pretty cool.” He feels proud. This development feels like it brings good fortune to what he’s about to do, he feels like he’s on top of the world, batting a thousand. His heart inflates at the feeling that a win for you is a win for him.

“I gotta go, dude. I’ll catch ya later,” he pats Gareth’s shoulder before running down the hall.

“Wait, but I actually had a question!” Gareth calls out, arms up before dropping in defeat. He’s never going to get to ask his question.

-

Eddie arrives at his trailer intact, he’s surprised he wasn’t tailed by five state troopers for the speed he was going.

He parks his van slamming the door, looking over at your trailer, he sees another car parked next to yours. He frowns, the car doesn’t look familiar, but he can tell it’s really nice. You must have company, he’ll wait. He can wait.

He runs into his trailer, ignoring Wayne’s shout to slow down. He gets to his room and looks at himself in the mirror. Long curls a frizzy mess, he feels nervous sweat under his arms, and he stinks of the seven cigarettes he chain smoked during lunch out of nerves .

He wants to give you ample time with your guest so he decides a shower will take care of his problems. However, out of pure adrenaline, the shower only takes him ten minutes. Running down the hall, he’s got nothing but a towel wrapped around his waist and hair dripping wet. He opens the front door, poking his head out to see if that fancy car is still at your place—it is.

Wayne yells at him from the couch, shaking his head at his crazy nephew. “Ed! Get your ass back inside! You don’t need a public indecency charge and Mrs. Moretti doesn’t wanna see your bare ass!”

Wayne already has to listen to their neighbor, Mrs. Moretti, complain every time he heads out for his shifts. He started making Eddie stand watch when he’s there, just so he can let Wayne know if he needs to call the plant and say he’ll be late—always leaving out the reason. He doesn’t think they’d understand the importance of avoiding his 82-year-old neighbor.

When Eddie sees that the car is still there, he waddles back to his room. He can wait. It’s no big deal. It’s no big deal. He’ll just take his time getting dressed. It’s. no. big. deal.

Far too quickly, Eddie is dressed. He squeezes out as much water as he can from his curls as he puts in the cream you bought him that one time. You had tossed him the bottle saying, ‘Make yourself decent, will you, I hate looking at frizzy hair.’

He smiles at the recent memory. It was one of your weakened insults, your tone cutting, but the action showed a tremendous amount of care.

He scrunches the product in just like you showed him, his body bent at the waist, head turned upside down. Once he perfects his hair, he reaches for the expensive cologne Wayne bought him for his birthday when he was fifteen.

Wayne had told him that every young man needs a good cologne, he said it would help him with the ladies. Eddie remembers smelling it and thinking it smelled far too rich, he thanked Wayne all the same, and quietly returned to using his cheap Old Spice body spray.

He spritzes it onto his wrists before rubbing it onto his neck, following the actions you performed when he watched you apply your bottle of Obsession by Calvin Klein after you and he got particularly wild in the janitor’s closet at school.

He smiles at the clean smell of the cologne, it’s the same one you found on his dresser behind a stack of comic books. You had gone snooping while he was lazily strumming his guitar—a post-sex curiosity. You picked it up, brushing the dust off of the pretty glass bottle, and lifted the atomizer to your nose.

“Mmm, this smells really good…,” you pulled the bottle back to look at it, it was practically full. “Why don’t you use this?” You turned to show him the bottle, he stopped strumming and looked to see what you were talking about.

“Eh,” he shrugged passively, “it’s too fancy for me. I hear a more rugged scent is in, anyway. Gets you more women.” He smirked, eyes glinting with mischief as he looked at you expectantly.

You snorted at that, “Yeah, like you get women.” You turned around to put the cologne back where you found it.

“I got you, didn’t it?” He was so smug when he said it, batting a thousand—like he did a lot with you recently.

“Shut up,” you rolled your eyes, fighting the smile off your face. Another biting comeback that wasn’t very…biting. You had certainly lost your edge recently.

He relishes the memory—the good times—and looks forward to more after he talks to you. He pulls the waistband of his jeans forward, stretching them as far as the rough material will go before he spritzes some cologne down there, letting the waistband fall back into place.

Just in case. You did say you liked the smell.

He’s been fighting so hard to be respectful this entire time, trying to dilly-dally to allow you and whoever is at your place enough time to catch up and be done. He’s quickly losing that respect, though.

He’s got his dirty Reeboks on, the chain wallet tucked into his pants, he’s prepared to take you out to the diner for a first date once he’s done professing his feelings for you. He jogs out of his room shouting a quick, “Don’t wait up,” to Wayne before heading out the front door. Pointedly ignoring Wayne’s dismissive, grumbled response, “I don’t even know where the hell you’re going.”

He sees the car is still there, but he’s waited long enough. It’s now or never.

He’s walking on the gravel leading up to the front door when it opens, a wide grin stretches across his face immediately, he’s beyond ready to see you.

What he doesn’t expect to see is you walking Jason Carver out of your trailer. His smile is wiped from his face, happiness far from his mind.

His first thought is, ‘Okay, seriously, who all knows about your situation, because he’s starting to think that was just something you said to him.’

The next thought is a poignant, ‘Fuck.’

Your gaze lifts from Jason’s body in front of you on the stairs of your trailer to Eddie’s. He sees the shock written deep in your eyes, you almost look both sorry and scared at the same time. It makes him feel utterly sick to his stomach.

He’s now kicking himself for all the time he wasted getting here. It feels like his insides are outside his body, he feels so bare under your sorry gaze. His face must give it away because it only makes your brows furrow in pity.

“Freak,” Jason greets, “what are you doing at my girlfriend’s place of residence?” It’s taunting, a mocking hand gesturing to your trailer. Eddie’s eye twitches at the way he says it, clearly making fun of where you live.

Then it hits him. Girlfriend? Since-fucking-when?

All of a sudden nothing means anything, left is right, up is down, out is in. He can’t decipher words, his ears feel like he’s holding an empty conch shell to them, hearing a roaring ocean sound in the middle of Indiana.

He was so sure, he was almost positive. Of course, there was always a little doubt, but Sherry and Gareth made that doubt almost nonexistent.

How is the you resting your hand on Jason-fucking-Carver’s back, walking him to his car, the same you he spoke to yesterday? Sure, he was drunk and too busy making you cry, but you seemed normal enough. And now you’re taken? What the fuck.

He realizes he hasn’t moved from his spot, just staring at his plan going up in flames right in front of him, watching his evening flush down the shitter. This was the worst thing he could’ve imagined happening. In fact, if someone had asked him, ‘What is the most preposterous way this could go awry,’ he would describe this exact scenario.

You lightly push Jason to his car, just hoping to avoid an all out brawl. You shiver at his icy eyes when he turns to kiss you on the cheek, donning a smirk on his chapped lips. He’s one smug bastard. His eyes are on Eddie’s seething body as he delicately kisses you.

“I’ll see you tomorrow,” you mutter, not meeting his eyes. You just want him gone and far away from you, far away from Eddie—who’s looking more radioactive by the second.

He grabs your cheek to direct your gaze to his, “You better be there on Friday, you hear me?”

He’s stern. Not the type of stern Eddie would be—the kind that made your insides melt. No, his kind of stern makes you nauseous, but you nod nonetheless. You’ll go to his stupid fucking party, just as long as he never touches you like that ever again.

Eddie is reeling, he’s positively livid at the display of affection—more like dominance. It makes him sick, he’s pretty sure he could single handedly take down a small army with the ire running through his veins.

Jason gets in his car, quickly pulling out of your ‘driveway.’ The vehicle kicks up dust in your face as he pulls away, not wanting to be in the trailer park longer than he has to be.

You cough, clearing your lungs before you turn around to face Eddie’s fury. He’s shaking his head repeatedly, a deep frown on his face, the pinnacle of vexation.

You’re beyond nervous. Your last interaction with him felt like shit, then you woke up earlier to Jason at your door with a list of demands, having no idea how he found where you live. You’re not having a good day.

“Let me explain–,” placating hands raise in front of your body, you know they’ll do nothing. Eddie’s always been quick to anger, his words shoot to kill when he’s mad, and you’re being held at gunpoint right now.

“No. No. No,” he’s shaking his head repeatedly, looking at you as if his declaration will make the last two minutes wipe from existence, as if he can turn back time and get here before Carver. “Fuck no! There’s no explanation for this,” he angrily gestures to the empty space where Jason’s car once was, the tracks in the gravel he left on his race out of there.

“Please, just let me ex–,” you feel like you’re going to be sick, you can feel a lump in your throat, the foreboding feeling of a breakdown.

“No–,” he physically can’t stop shaking his head, it’s like he’s trying to rid his mind of the image of Carver’s hands on you.

He’s suddenly remembering everything again, his mind conveniently leaving out the good stuff.

Trailer trash, dead or in jail, loser, freak, wouldn’t be caught dead.

He’s starting to wonder if he made some huge cosmic mistake that caused karma to hunt his ass down with a 12-gauge shotgun, or did his great great grandfather piss off a witch causing his bloodline to be damned for eternity. Why is this happening to him? What did he do?

He’s the first to admit he’s not a saint, but he doesn’t remember committing federal-level crimes that would garner such punishment as this.

“If you just listen to me–,” you’re desperate at this point, you don’t want it to end like this. Even though he ripped your heart out yesterday, you recognize that he was coming over to your place just now. The dim light of hope in your heart wants to believe it was to right his wrong, or at least tell you what you did wrong.

“What’s on Friday?” He cuts you off firmly, tone sharp as a knife, clearly not wanting to hear anything but his questions answered.

“What?”

“You better be there Friday,” he recites the words Jason said to you before leaving, “What’s happening Friday? What are you, getting married? I wouldn’t be surprised, I know you like to skip a few steps” he spits mockingly, venom saturating every word.

Your bad day has upgraded to qualifying as the worst day now. He’s belligerent, he won’t listen to you, and he ripped your heart out last night, then he shows up here again today to what—do a double tap? Make sure your heart is good and dead?

So you lose your cool. You’re only human. And it’s so easy to fall back into old habits, especially when anger is easier to feel than sorrow.

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” Your hackles are raised, teeth bared, you’re stuck in that corner again.

He chuckles humorlessly, “Well it may be too far back for you to recall,” he bites, “but you and I fucked before we ever—oh wait, we’ve never even gone on a date!” He stops mid-sentence to correct himself, his eyes grow even more manic.

“That’s right, yeah—it’s coming back to me now,” he waves his finger in a tight circle near his head like he’s manually jogging his own memory. “You don’t wanna date me, you couldn’t be caught dead with trailer trash like me, right? But Carver–”

You frown at his wording, the emphasis confuses you. He says it like that’s something you’ve called him before—you’ve never called him that, you know better than that. Pot calling the kettle black and all that.

“Eddie-,” you try again but he cuts you off before you can continue, he’s feeling very talkative now.

“But you forget, honey, look where we’re standing,” he stretches his arms out drawing your gaze to your surroundings, a maniacal glint in his eyes. “You’re trailer trash just like me!”

You flinch at the nickname, pain furrowing your brow, you take a stuttering breath in, waiting for his next comment. You lay barbed wire around your walls while he gears up to send more cannonballs your way.

“What do you think your little friends would say about you if they knew? Oh god,” he laughs out, “what do you think they’d say if they knew I fucked you? Not only that, but that you liked it!” He lurches forward at the last comment, like the comment was a physical weapon he could throw at your walls.

You’ve decided you have nothing to say to him right now, he won’t hear you out so you'll let him throw his barbs. You’ll wait until he tires himself out.

“What would they say if they knew how much of a whore you are,” he redundantly asks, his lip curled in disgust, you flinch at the slur. Maybe letting him talk isn’t a good idea, but he’s not letting you get a word in edgewise.

“I mean you’re fucking me, you’re fucking Carver, who else? You’re probably fucking Joe for extra cash,” you reel back in disgust at his accusation. “Yeah, that’s right, I saw you leave his office stuffing that wad of cash into your bra.” He says it with a mocking tone, you don’t even know when he’s talking about.

You’ve never felt so small. “Fuck you,” you grit out, no longer having the willpower to hide the tears falling.

“Oh, you’re gonna cry now? Poor princess,” he mocks, “she has to work so hard to act like she’s not bottom of the food chain. Lying about summer vacations, playing pretend like she’s got money, upcycling hand-me-downs, skipping meals, working at the seediest dive bar in town just for a pretty penny. I know what your friends would say…”

You sniffle, his eyes burn your very soul. The once warm muddy pools are now as icy as Jason Carver’s.

“They'd call you a freak. Just like me. You know, you love to pretend like being with me is beneath you, but I think we’re perfect for each other, baby,” he mocks, his arms spread out like he’s king of the world, shaking his head as he goads you.

Old habits die screaming, to be sure.

“You’re such a fucking loser and you always will be!” You’ve changed your mind, he’s not going to get the floor the whole time. You’ve got some things to say.

He laughs humorlessly, both his hands covering his heart, “Oh you wound me, honey. Is that the best you got? You’re going soft on me, why don’t you go hang out with your little boyfriend!” He turns to walk away, he’s too angry, too heartbroken to look at you anymore.

You don’t bother to correct him, it’s not like he’s in a very trusting mood right now. “What was I supposed to do? You took your fucking necklace back! You said you wanted nothing to do with me!” You’re shaking your head, calling out to him, you’re not done with him yet.

He rears back around, your words give him a second wind. “Oh, I don’t know, maybe don’t fuck the first guy that comes your way! They’re gonna start calling you easy at school, you know,” he sneers, all of his words coming from a place of black, thick, steaming contempt.

That’s it. He’s gotten his turn, now it’s yours.

“You don’t know shit about me,” you grit out, challenging his eye contact. “You will always be beneath me because at least I see my life as worth living.”

He flinches at your words, you always did know how to cut deep.

“I’m not sitting on my ass pitying myself, getting pissed off at everybody else around me who has it better. No, I work for a better life, I make it happen for myself–I will make it happen for myself,” you correct.

“And I know for a fact, you can’t say the same,” you shake your head at him, teary eyes looking him up and down with nothing but disdain.

“I know what people would say if they knew, god,” you chuckle humorlessly, feeling the thick saliva coating your mouth—the kind that only comes when you cry. “I think about it every time I walk into that fucking building. But if they found out and ran me out of town, at least I would still like myself at the end of the day. I could still make something of myself. Could you say the same?”

If you had a mic you would drop it right about now, you’re so sick of men talking at you, telling you what you will and won’t do.

Eddie just stares at you, open mouthed and furrowed brow. He doesn’t even know how to begin to think about everything you just said. You simultaneously insulted him to his core and gave him something to think about. Who needs to pay for therapy when he could just wind you up and let your razor mouth attack him right at the problem center.

You turn around to head inside, looking forward to a night of crying your eyes out, drinking, and possibly dialing a hotline of some kind if you’re feeling real nasty.

But then you remember the comment he made about Joe. Disgust enveloping your body leads you to turn around, needing to set the record straight on that one. You’ll let Eddie think what he wants, you won’t let him think that.

When you turn back around, his eyes are cast downward, if you squinted you could see the watery gaze he directed at the ground. At the sound of your feet turning in the gravel he looks back up, preparing himself for what felt like another well-deserved verbal lashing.

“Not that it’s any of your fucking business,” you scorn, the classic popular cheerleader sneer coming out in your voice, “or that it would even make a difference since you seem to enjoy making up fantastical tales—Joe is my uncle. He took me in when I was thirteen.”

You could hear a pin drop with how quiet Eddie was, his eyes hazy with tears, simply taking in the information—playing back every interaction he ever saw you and Joe have at the Hideout.

You’re tired, your tears dry up. Any fight you have left is quickly depleting as you're sharing the most traumatic experience of your life. “Drunk driver accident, mom and dad were on the sidewalk, guy popped the curb, bye-bye mom and dad,” you finish crassly.

Flinching at the way you say it, he feels beyond awful for everything he said, but more than anything, he just wants to get down on his knees and beg for your forgiveness. He’s forgotten the entire Jason debacle, too hung up on the things he’s said since, the tale you're telling now. He never meant to make you tell such a traumatic story at what is probably the worst time in the history of the world.

“When I turned eighteen, Joe got me this trailer and I inherited my dad’s car. I don’t know what you saw, but I work at the Hideout for the same rate as every other employee there.” You gesture to the trailer behind you, “This is all I can afford, I work every single day to pay Joe back for the kindness he showed me when I thought I was alone in the world. I’m sorry that I like to think I’m worthy of more. And I’m sorry that you don’t think the same about yourself.”

Your voice is small and more broken than he’s ever heard it before. It makes him wish he could just blip out of existence. The pain of causing pain is too great.

You turn around to head into your trailer, locking the door, sliding down the face of it as you shakily hold in the sob dying to break free.

The fire in your heart is out. The flicker of flame was already waning when he let out one last puff of air, effectively leaving your land barren and cold. Your kingdom walls never higher, he’s scorched the earth and salted the ground with his words, ensuring nothing good will ever grow there again.

Part 2

A/N: Like, reblog, and comment if you enjoyed this!! I worked so fucking hard on it lmao please comment. 1 week of planning, 2 weeks of writing, 1.5 weeks of editing.

Tags (people who asked and/or people who seemed interested): @nagaytoe @justalotoffanfiction @hereforshmut @melvin333 @savybabyyy @anukulee