"Valentines Day is a capitalistic scam made to sell chocolate and flowers!" Eddie Munson bellowed, leaping to the top of a cafeteria table not even ten minutes into lunch.
"Do you think he was born like this, or just dropped on his head as a baby?" Heather asked, rolling her eyes as the super senior began waving his arms around, getting way too into his annual “anti-valentines day” rant.
Steve, who'd tuned out the dramatics in favor of trying to figure out how he could ditch school, only heard her because she’d begun running her foot up his leg.
Directly in front of Patrick.
As if half the school didn’t know he planned on asking her out after school.
Long over being a part of these kinds of games, Steve kicked out, forcing Heather’s leg off his.
He did it harder than he intended and immediately winced, as if he hadn’t meant to do it at all. Aimed a sad little look at her, softening his eyes in the way he knew ladies loved while murmuring a quiet "sorry.”
A pudding cup was offered as an additional apology--which Heather, thankfully, accepted.
Crisis averted, Steve used the movement of handing the cup over to get his legs well out of Heather's range. He had other things to think about today, and getting drawn into whatever drama Heather was trying to brew wasn’t on the list.
Particularly given the basketball team as a unit had started snubbing him out.
"Newsflash ladies! Your man isn't taking you to some shitty restaurant because he loves you, he's doing it because he hopes you'll give it to him in your car!" Munson continued, voice growing impossibly louder.
A crude gesture followed, involving hip thrusts and hand jabs.
Several of the cheerleaders shot him disgusted looks as he did it.
"Definitely dropped on his head." Carol said, glaring at Munson as his little group of freaks and geeks cheered him. "More than once."
Steve hummed an agreement, more on automatic than from actually listening. He knew how to look like he was paying attention, even if his head was deep in possible escape plans.
If he dipped at the last minute to the bathroom on the way to fifth period, Tommy wouldn't have time to stop him and he could make a break for his car…
That just left making up a plausible enough excuse as to why thee Steve Harrington, whose single status was the current hot topic of the school, left school early on Valentines Day.
("Candy, sex, the overwhelming affection of all the ladies." Tommy drawled out that morning, practically preening. "Valentine's Day is the best holiday man. Just look at all this!"
He waved a hand at his locker, which was absolutely covered in paper hearts.
"The rally squad put hearts on the lockers of everyone on the basketball team, Tommy." Carol argued, rolling her eyes. "Steve’s is practically buried in them.”
Tommy opened his mouth to respond, no doubt with something else teasing and rude, but Carol’s elbow caught him in the gut first.
“If you keep acting like this you're not getting any sex." She warned.
"Aww baby, don't be like that. You know you're the only one for me." Tommy teased, with a wink that prompted Carol to smack him on the shoulder.
Laughing, he added: "Besides we can't fight or we'll miss our favorite game. Which poor gal thinks this year is the year Steve will take her out on a date!"
Carol allowed Tommy to put an arm over her shoulder, the two of them turning knowing grins on their friend as a singular unit.
Even if Steve hadn’t felt like their friend in a hot minute.
Not in the way he used to.
"I do love watching them stutter through their little confessions.” Carol admitted, like this wasn’t something they’d loved doing since middle school. “I wonder if anyone will ever top Cindy Komer."
Steve almost wasn't fast enough to cover his wince--that particular incident had been painful for him and Cindy.
Steve still had no idea what he'd said to make the then-freshman cry.
He thought he'd been nice about turning her down, but judging by Carol constantly quoting what he'd said, Steve had a feeling he'd accidentally been an asshole again.
Not that anyone ever thought it was accidental.
“Steve? Hel~lo? Are you listening?” Carol said, snapping to get his attention and God did Steve hate that.
Never realized just how much until Nancy but after she’d pointed out that Carol treated him and Tommy both like her dogs, well.
It was hard not to notice--and be a bit resentful.
“God you keep doing this, you’re turning into such a space case.” Carol continued, the edge back in her voice. The same one she’d been using for a while, like Steve was on her last nerve. “Please tell me you’re not still mooning over Nancy fucking Wheeler.”
“No.” He snapped, only to know instantly that was the wrong move, and try to fix it before Carol blew up. “No--I’ve just already had to fend someone off today. Like first thing--I was barely out of my car.”
There, that should keep Carol and Tommy both off his back for being “angry” and it wasn’t even a lie. He really had been asked out earlier, though the girl had been gracious about his rejection.
Of course, this kind of instant redirection came with a price--and in this case, it was being absolutely hounded for more information.
“Oh shit who!? Was it that Buckley girl?” Carol perked up immediately, like a hunting dog scenting prey. “I swear she stares holes in your head, she’s so weird…” )
"This isn't about romance! It's about showing who has the most cash, gets the most sex! It's a pathetic social ritual you're all falling for!” Munson yelled, jolting Steve back into the present. “I bet none of you even enjoy it!”
"Tell that to all the girls Steve’s dated!” One of the younger basketball guys hollered, prompting a wave of laughter from the rest of the cafeteria. “They seem to enjoy it plenty!”
Steve couldn’t see who had said it, and should have felt the normal wave of smug warmth that the team had his back.
Except his team had already proven they didn’t.
Were in fact, siding more and more with Hargrove, just as Tommy was.
They were rapidly approaching a watershed moment. Steve could feel it, the same way he’d always been able to tell when a crowd was about to turn.
He was losing, but was still on top of Hawkins social spaces enough, had caught it early enough, that he could turn everyone’s favor--if he wanted.
Emphasis on ‘if.’
Munson spun to face his table, hair whipping to smack him in the face. The guy had clearly been trying to grow it out, but right now he looked like one of those poodles Carol's mom loved so much.
So said Carol, anyway.
"You sure about that?" Munson challenged, a crazed grin breaking across his face. "Rumor has it King Steve lost his groove ever since Wheeler dumped him!"
Steve grimaced, though he was secretly thankful Munson went with "dumped" instead of "cheated on" (or any of the other vile words Billy had flung around, spreading across the school in the sick, crawling way rumors moved.
Hargrove had been positively brutal about the whole Jonathan and Nancy thing, and the only reason he wasn't here now to spin this whole situation against Steve was because the guy always vanished at lunch.)
Tommy's face morphed into an affronted snarl, hands slapping down on the table. He turned expectantly to Steve, waiting for "The King" to get up and "handle" Munson.
Like Steve even cared about this dumb high school shit anymore.
It took him a moment to realize Steve wasn’t planning on doing anything. Was in fact, going to remain perfectly quiet, other than an eyeroll and half-assed middle finger in Munson’s direction.
Tommy let out a disgusted scoff in his direction and then decided to handle things himself.
(Like that had ever been a good idea.)
“Shut up, Freak. The only game you have is in the prison showers.” He snapped, half rising from the table. “Isn’t that why you keep your hair long? So all the boys will actually fuck you?!”
Whistles and yells lit the air, though Steve didn’t miss how the girls at the table looked taken aback at the sheer vitriol in Tommy’s voice.
Even Carol looked startled, eyes sliding to meet Steve’s as if to confirm she hadn’t just imagined it.
The three of them had always been good at this kind of mindless high school banter, but this over the top, crude shit?
It wasn’t Tommy’s style.
It was Hargrove’s.
(That was its own growing issue.
The way Tommy was gravitating towards Billy.
How Carol kept expecting Steve to act like he used to.
That she blamed his “outbursts” on Nancy, snidely mentioning that Steve had better have learned his lesson about “changing his personality for pussy.”
Even now Steve knew they were only defending him because Munson was the one saying it.)
“I didn’t realize Harrington still had his attack dog!”
Munson put a hand against his heart as though injured, staggering dramatically backwards.
“I thought you were too busy putting your tongue up Hargrove’s ass to bark at people!”
Tommy immediately fired back, letting loose an uninspired string of curse words and something about Eddie being queer again. Steve didn’t hear the specifics--didn’t care to hear it, even as things started to spiral out of control.
All he wanted to do was go home.
Ideally before Billy got back from lunch and decided to make a spectacle himself, because Steve could feel that coming just as he could everything else.
He was running out of time to come up with an excuse to get out of here without making a production out of it, and Munson wasn’t someone he wanted to piss off today, given he’d half hoped to buy weed off the guy before he ditched.
…Which was looking more and more unlikely given Tommy had just screeched some insult that had put Munson’s sights back on Steve.
“You sure? Cause Harrington looks like he’s just gonna sit there and take it, just like he takes everything Hargrove and Wheeler and anyone else throws at him.”
He leered, leaning forward as if to see into Steve’s very soul.
“I don’t know if anyone else has noticed, but our beloved King here hasn’t exactly been defending his crown. If anything, he’s abandoned it.”
The world stopped.
This was the first time someone actually called him out on the fact that he often let whatever crap Billy spewed go. That Nancy and him had a few awkward encounters publicly, with at least one of them starting a rumor that she’d told Steve to fuck off.
(She hadn’t of course, but Carol had stopped running damage control, and Steve was feeling the effects of her ire.)
Silence echoed, and Steve realized with a dawning sort of horror, that Munson was waiting for a response from him.
Just as the entire cafeteria was.
The catalyst was here, brought on early by one Edward Munson.
With a startling amount of clarity, Steve realized he was done.
With his so called friends, with the girls who’d tried corning him all morning, with Hargrove and just--everything.
He was over it.
If Billy wanted the crown so bad he could fucking have it.
(If Tommy wanted to pretend he was tougher than he was by mimicking the dick, then he could have that too.)
“This is stupid.” Steve announced, dropping the masks he so carefully wore. The ones he kept having to fix, because the Upside Down and its related demons (human and non) kept taking chunks out of it.
He stood, feeling the weight of the room press down on him as he faced them all down.
“Yeah--!” Tommy started to pile on, seeming to think Steve was about to unleash hell, and got the surprise of a lifetime when Steve turned and jammed a finger in his face.
“Shut up.” He snapped.
Knew instantly he only got away with it by the fact that he’d caught everyone off guard.
King Steve did a lot of things, but he rarely blew up.
“This is stupid.” He reiterated, voice booming across the lunch room, “ You wanna fight? Fine, but leave me out of it.”
“The King doesn’t want to play? Why I never thought we’d see the day!” Munson clucked his tongue, and without missing a beat Steve turned to him.
“For someone who is always screaming about nonconformity, you sure are happy to attack anyone who doesn’t do what you want.”
Steve’s voice was loud, but he wasn’t screaming. Wasn’t yelling or throwing his arms around.
He didn’t need to. Had never needed to.
“I heard you going off on that guy whose lunch you're standing on yesterday, because he wanted to watch the Colts play.” Steve continued, voice cold. “Half of your friends are terrified of you, because you’ll scream at them just like you accuse us of doing--and let’s be real here, Munson, you do it more.”
In a dramatic move that absolutely, 100% came from Dustin and his theatrics, Steve shrugged his letterman jacket off and bunched it into a ball.
“You might as well crown yourself King, because you’re the exact same as the rest of us. Here--you can start with this.”
Cocking back an arm, Steve let the jacket fly. Watched with everyone else as it landed neatly right at Eddie’s feet.
Shell shocked, Munson’s eyes drifted from Steve down to the letterman jacket and back. They were massive, those stupid eyes of his, but at least it meant Steve could see the realization wash over the guy in real time.
Steve should have felt smug about it. His past self would have.
Presently?
He just felt tired.
“You’re welcome to jam it up your ass.” He finished, before giving his own sarcastic half bow to the room.
The cafeteria was dead silent. Not a fork was scraped, or a loud piece of chip chewed. All eyes were on Steve, some waiting to see if Eddie would let him have the last word, others just shocked to see Steve lose his shit in front of them.
Idiot he was, he tried to rally anyway.
Even Tommy, who’d partly stood up, hands pressed against the lunch table looked shocked.
“What the fuck Steve!?” He sputtered, and it wasn’t long before half the basketball team was muttering similar remarks.
They were ignored.
Whispers ripped across the room when Steve turned on his heel, striding towards the exit and making it clear things were over, but Tommy didn’t give up.
“Fuck you Harrington!” He hurled at his back, Carol now standing and placing a restraining hand on his arm. “You’re not fucking better than any of us!”
Steve didn’t even look back.
"That's my point Tommy." Steve said, loud enough to be heard. "No one is better than anyone else. You lot are all just buying into your own bullshit.”
Then he was slamming through the doors, and out into the sunlight.
xXx
He didn’t want to go home.
Not anymore, which was ironic in a way that made Steve’s face screw up in a grimace.
Here he’d been dying to go to his stupid house all day, and now, after losing his shit and undoubtedly, the last of his social standing, he just didn’t feel like being by himself.
All alone, in a house too big for him, full of nothing but dark corners and a phone that never rang.
So instead, he wandered, reminiscing on how Valentine's Day used to be his favorite day of the year.
Steve loved the gesture of it all--the romance, the wooing. The butterflies floating in one's stomach, mixing with fear of rejection and a burning kind of hope towards starting something new.
Of course, Steve also had always had a girl in mind, when he celebrated. Now, after Nancy…
He did not.
It felt weird to go to Skull Rock--the place he himself had made into Hawkins hottest makeout spots. Likewise all the local restaurants were off limits--too many adults knew how much he loved the holiday.
Steve didn’t want to face that. The expectations, the knowing winks that would slide into uncomfortable frowns. Any possible advice given wouldn’t be appreciated, and the last thing Steve wanted was to get the “everyone has an off season, son” speech.
So he’d stayed away from his usual haunts. Explored some storefronts instead, the Beamer parked in front of Family Video as he wandered.
Had an entirely too peaceful two hours, which of course, meant he had to bump into someone.
At least, Steve thought dully, whole body tensing in preparation, it was Munson.
Not Hargrove, or Tommy, or hell--the children, demanding he help them fight some other fucked up creature the government had accidentally summoned.
“Hey Harrington.” Munson said, and it took a moment for Steve to realize the guy was embarrassed. “I uh, I need to talk to you.”
Steve just stared at him.
“If you couldn’t tell from earlier,” He warned, “I’m a little done talking for today.”
Or any day, for the foreseeable future.
“Yeah no--I, I got that. I--okay.” Eddie stopped rocking on his heels, before giving his entire body a shake, like the guys sometimes did while prepping for a game. “Hear me out, and then you can deck me or leave or whatever makes you feel better.”
“I’m not going to deck you.” Steve said, exasperated and frazzled and not wanting to do this whole song and dance a second time.
Not that it mattered, because Munson had already launched right into whatever it was he needed to say.
“There’s this book right? My Uncle got it for me. It’s a fantasy book all about this big battle and there’s these wizards in it, and--” He stopped himself, shaking out his hands.
Like he realized he was rambling and needed the movement to get himself back on track.
“I always--I guess I saw myself as a Gandalf kinda guy? Like I was this shepherd herding these lost sheep. A person who intimately knew all the dark forces of the world and could be a shield for them. Do not pass and all that.”
He chuckled, but it was weak, and he killed it almost immediately.
“...Okay?” Steve said, knowing he was supposed to say something here, even if he had no idea what.
Maybe something about how Gandalf the Grey wasn’t exactly a shepard given he’d led the hobbits straight into Mordor, but saying that meant admitting Steve knew what Lord of the Rings was, which wasn’t a conversation he felt like getting into.
Particularly not because he’d only read the damn things after losing a bet to Dustin and Mike both.
Munson nodded, as if acknowledgement was all he needed.
“I thought that’s what I was doing. I wasn’t and I didn’t realize I wasn’t until you pointed it out. You shouldn’t have had to point it out. You shouldn’t have had to say any of what you did.” He rushed to add, oddly sincere.
"Is this…" Steve might be confused but catching on, an uptick at the corners of his mouth as the tiniest spark of amusement leaked through. "an apology? Are you trying to apologize right now?"
Eddie groaned, flinging his head back. "No!”
Then immediately;
“Actually yes, but--”
Which caught Steve off guard enough that he laughed, and had to hide it with a cough.
“I am sorry, man. I shouldn’t have said that shit about you, especially not about you and Wheeler. It's more than that though.” Munson swallowed, before squaring his shoulders. “It’s that you were right."
“I was right?” Steve repeated dumbly, because fuck, he couldn’t believe it either.
Not that Munson heard him. Eddie always had been hard to stop once he started, and Steve had been in enough classes with the guy to know the train had left the station.
"I did yell at Jeff because he wanted to watch that stupid football game.” He began, and Steve got a front row seat to watch as one Eddie Munson word vomited his way through a myriad of emotions.
“I fuckin’ lost it on Grant because he missed band practice to drive his sister to some thing. Gareth looked like I was going to hit him when I asked if I had really been that bad--same exact look he gave Hagan and those other assholes that cornered him in the bathroom two weeks ago!”
“Tommy did what?”
Steve was promptly ignored.
(Or more likely, Eddie simply didn’t hear him, too lost in his own voice to realize Steve had said something.)
There were a lot of mentions of the Gandalf guy. Where Eddie thought he’d gone wrong, and even something about a glowing eye thing that had Steve a little concerned until he realized Munson was talking about Sauron (and also made Steve realize that he’d been pronouncing Sauron in his head wrong, oops.)
“I called up this friend of mine who graduated. She’s always been no nonsense, so I asked her for her advice.” Munson said, finally seeming to slow down a little. “She told me I might as well eat my own doctrine because I sure wasn’t living by it, and that if I wanted to fix it then I should start by apologizing. To everyone but--to you, first.”
Eddie took a step back, winging out his hands as if to present himself.
“So here I am. Apologizing.”
A pause wherein neither of them did a thing, which caused him to awkwardly add; “To uh, you. Harrington.”
“Yeah I got that.” Steve said, because what else was he supposed to do here? “Good for you? I guess?”
“Most people either forgive a guy or tell him to fuck off.” Munson pouted, and mimicked like he was kicking at a rock.
It made Steve want to laugh again, though he shoved the urge down.
“Someone once told me,” He said instead, speaking slowly to make damn sure he didn’t let slip this piece of advice came from a middle schooler. “that apologies without actions don’t really mean anything. They’re a start--they let people know you’re aware you screwed up, but no one’s going to trust you if you don’t follow through. So I can forgive you, but I think you’re better off doing this with one of your friends.”
Someone who would hug it out, or at least tell Eddie how he could be better, at least.
Rather than argue, Munson just titled his head back, eyes to the sky. Like he was really thinking on the words, before giving a sort of accepting sounding noise.
“Trying too.” Steve admitted with a sigh.
“That’s what you’ve been doing, isn’t it?” He asked, head coming back down so he could stare at Steve.
“The thing in the cafeteria was a good start.”
“Yeah?”
Eddie grinned.
“Yeah. Don’t think Hagan’s gonna see it the same way though.”
“We were falling out anyway.” Steve admitted, and hated how easy it was to say.
That they really were just going through the motions of friendship. Had been, ever since Jonathan had punched Steve in the face.
“Think you lost more than just him as a friend, to be honest.”
“Pro tip about the actions thing, Munson?” Steve said with a snort, once again unsure of where this conversation was going, “Nice people don’t typically point out when someone’s turned into a social pariah.”
“No, I get that. Say,” Eddie’s grin had grown, which Steve would have taken poorly except he invaded Steve’s space with a goofy little hop. “I think you might be in need of some new ones!”
“New…friends?” Steve hesitated, very unsure of what was happening.
Munson promptly stuck his hand out. “Yup! So--hello, my name is Eddie Munson, and I am here to apply for the position as your friend!”
Steve snorted, but the harshness of it was taken away by the grin on his face.
He took Eddie’s hand, noting how doing so made the older teen’s smile widen.
“Nice to meet you Eddie, I’m Steve.”
Excited, Eddie waived their arms up and down, with far more enthusiasm than the gesture required.
“How about we cement our new friendship by renting a truly terrible horror movie and drowning our woes with my other good friend, Mary Jane?”
Then he waggled his eyebrows, like that was something scandalous.
“Tempting me along with weed, huh?” Steve mused back, sticking his hands in his pockets once Eddie let him go. “Guess you’re a little like Gandalf the Gray after all. Just don’t send me on any missions.”
“Steve Harrington.” Eddie gaped, pure delight spreading across his face. “Have you read Lord of the Rings!?”
He got a shrug and a sly; “Maybe.” in response.
It was worth the barrage of questions, even if the rapid fire pace of them nearly gave Steve a headache.
(Just as it was worth it several months later, when Steve was comfortable enough to instigate wrestling matches with Eddie over the dumbest of things.
One particularly semi-drunk tussle over the remote led to an interesting discovery when Eddie popped a boner, and then frantically tried to escape when it brushed against Steve’s leg.
Instead of panicking--or letting Eddie bolt in his panic, Steve just dropped his whole weight down, effectively pinning the slimmer man to the floor.
“Steve.”
Eddie said it so quietly he almost didn’t hear it, the word filled with desperation.
The kind of tone someone whispered a prayer in, a sort of pleading that Eddie did better with his eyes than his voice. Or would have, given his own were firmly scrunched closed the second he realized he’d been caught out.
Except--
“Not right now I’m thinking.” Steve told him absently.
Which he was. Speed thinking even, if that was a thing.
Because if two plus two equaled four (which it did) then feeling the exact same, fluttering excitement about Eddie’s boner as Steve had Nancy’s breasts, equaled…
“The fuck? Steve--”
Steve shushed him.
That pulled a frustrated, embarrassed groan from Eddie that went directly to Steve’s own dick, not that it needed much help waking up.
“I think I’m having one of those crisis’s Robin is always accusing the basketball team of having.” Steve informed Eddie dutifully, the dots done connecting.
Eddie, still refusing to open his eyes, snorted.
“Whatever man. Can you at least be decent and hurry up with the beating? This is embarrassing enough.”
“I’m not going to beat you up.” Steve said, thankful that his brain managed not to add some shitty comment about the entire town being awash in rumors of Eddie’s sexuality. That he’d confirmed it here wasn’t exactly a surprise.
“I’m going to try something. If you don’t like it, let me know.” Streve added, before screwing up his courage and leaning down.
That of course, got Eddie to open his eyes.
“Wha--” He managed, before Steve’s lips were on his.
For one single, blissful moment, Eddie Munson’s mouth was too busy to talk.
“Yeah?” Eddie said, voice wrecked, and oh, Steve liked that.
“Huh.” Steve muttered, when they broke for air. “Well that’s new.”
Liked the way Eddie looked at him more, hesitant, but with heat in his gaze.
Steve had always been good about knowing what to do with heat.
He leaned back down, pecking lightly at Eddie’s lips, and was delighted to find Eddie not only let him, but kissed back.
“Not bad, Munson, but I think I could give you a few pointers.” Steve muttered, nose ghosting alongside Eddie’s. “Let me show you…”
One boyfriend, several weeks, and another interdimensional monster later, Steve found himself socked in the arm by none other than his coworker, Robin Buckley.
In her defense, she’d confessed her love for Tammy Thompson, still somewhat drugged on the Starcourt bathroom floor, only for Steve to tease her that at least his boyfriend could actually sing.
“God you and Eddie Munson.” She muttered after, smile on her face. “How did that happen?”
Steve knocked his shoe into hers, returning the grin unabashedly.
“So remember last Valentines Day?” Steve started, all too eager to finally tell someone who understood about the best thing to ever happen to him.
Robin of course, would soon also be ranked in that same chart, but Eddie didn’t need to know that. )
