#disabled!billy

Lucas joins them sometimes, only because if he doesn’t, he rarely gets to see Max at all. She’s taken to being his caretaker, even if Billy growls at her to knock it off some days, gritting his teeth around aches and pains.

Lucas gets to hang out with Max alone more when Steve takes up the mantle of keeping Billy company. He seems pretty huffy about it at first, but there’s a strange air around them as time goes by. Like they’re slowly melding into one person, one entity. Much like how Robin and Steve were RobinandSteve these days, joined at the hip, Billy and Steve were becoming BillyandSteve. One was rarely seen without the other.

Lucas was pretty sure Steve was the only one allowed to physically touch Billy when he was off in his own head or out of breath, whether from panic or physical exertion. Max would get her hand chewed off if she tried.

There’s a softer, heavier side to Billy Hargrove these days, and Lucas isn’t sure how to feel about it. There’s a big difference between the scary, looming shadow of Billy from that night at the Byers, or his time possessed, and this wounded, tired version. A Billy that wears cashmere sweaters to cover his scars and stay warm (I hate the fuckin’ winter, he spits once to Max, ignoring Lucas’ presence as per usual, I can’t stand the cold anymore.) and lives alone in an apartment paid for by the government to keep his mouth shut.

Lucas’ lungs burn as he steps off the court. It’s just practice, he’s still sitting on the bench, but he’s working towards getting off it. He’s praying for it.

The click of the cane is what alerts him of his presence. It’s a strangely familiar sound now, one that gets slotted into the Billy Sounds part of his brain, next to the grunt the guy makes that’s almost a laugh but not.

“You’re not half bad, Sinclair. Almost as good at Steve was.” It’s still weird, hearing Billy call Steve by his first name. Harrington had sounded like a taunt, a challenge, now…Steve sounded like a good natured tease. Fond, like he was talking about his favourite song.

Lucas really doesn’t get Billy Hargrove.

“I don’t know if Steve played dirty, but he told us you did, so I don’t think you can judge how good he was.” It’s not a jab so much as a defence on Steve’s behalf. Max loves her brother, a complicated kind of love that hurts some days and feels great others, but Lucas loves Steve.

He loves Max too. It’s the only reason he’s trying to see Billy the way she does.

Billy laughs at his words. In the past, he thinks the man may have scowled or sneered or laughed at him instead of what he said.

“He’s just mad I was better. It’s fine, he can beat me now.” He leaned heavily on his cane with a weary sigh and stares at Lucas a long moment. “Can we talk, Sinclair?”

His expression gives little away and it makes Lucas’ hackles rise subconsciously. He looked down at the basketball in his hands, fidgeting with it as he tossed it back and forth between his palms.

“Can this wait until after I’ve showered or…?” He placed the basketball in the trolley of other balls, wanting to put off the inevitable.

Billy sighed, reaching up to scratch at his brow.

“It’s a bad pain day, honestly, I just wanna sit and get this sorted so I can go back home and kick my feet up before someone hounds me about pushing my limits.” He rolled his eyes and Lucas had a good idea who that someone was.

He wiped his sweaty palms against his shorts and shrugged.

“Yeah, okay.” Billy manages a small smile, but it feels disingenuous with the way he tilts his chin down and turns around with it, hobbling his way over to the benches. Most of everyone had scattered to shower and head home.

Billy made to sit and gave a grunt, seeming to struggle for a moment. Lucas offered his hand out of habit and Billy scowled at it. With his lips tightly pursed and a tinge of sweat on his brow, he glared up at Lucas. Lucas thinned his own lips self consciously, prepared to drop his hand before Billy’s eyes softened and he huffed, clasping Lucas’ hand hard — his palm is clammy, a weird mix of cold sweat and hot skin — and lowering himself against the low bench with a grunt. He rested his cane across his lap and sighed heavily.

He looked worn thin already and it made Lucas feel guilty despite doing nothing wrong. Billy had made the decision to come all the way out here to talk. That wasn’t on Lucas. Billy could make his own decisions, could decide how much his body could take and how far he could go alone before needing a hand. Billy was as tough as nails as far as Max was concerned, even if Steve sometimes spoke of Billy as if he was fragile. Lucas didn’t know who was closer to the truth of it. Maybe they both were.

“Come on, sit, I’m starting to feel self conscious here.” Billy joked with a low chuckle, patting the spot beside him. Lucas took the offer, keeping his limbs closer to his centre. Not wanting to touch Billy. Not wanting to appear bigger than him even if he had been given a significant growth spurt in the past few months.

He didn’t want to appear smaller either thought, so he let himself sit up straight, even with his hands tucked between his bouncing knees.

“So…let’s talk?” Lucas prompted and Billy chuckled once more.

“Shit, where to begin?” He scrubbed a hand over his face, wiping the sweat from his (pinched) brow, the movement subtle.

There was a long silence as Billy thought, and Lucas let him. He felt sticky and gross with sweat, mildly self conscious about how he might smell, but he wasn’t going to push Billy. Not just because he was volatile in the past, but because he looked like he really wanted to say this right. That he wanted Lucas to really hear him.

“…I’m sorry about last year.” Billy said finally and Lucas turned his head so quickly that he heard something in his neck crack.

“What?” Lucas furrowed his brows. “Last year?”

“A few months over a year, but close enough.” Billy shrugged, shifting in his seat to cross his arms over his chest and lay back against the benches above them. It doesn’t look comfortable, but Billy never looks comfortable. “That night. At the Byers place. I’m sorry.”

Lucas stared at him, unable to form a word. He never expected an apology, if he was honest. People rarely apologised to him in general. Especially about bullying or threats.

“Wow. This must be really for you to say. I’ve never heard you say sorry unless you were dying.” It’s snarkier than he wanted it to be and he immediately wants to hurl himself off a bridge for the comment. Billy’s gonna beat his ass with his cane for that.

Billy just laughs.

“You’re such a snarky shit, you’re just like Max.” He clicked his tongue and shook his head. “I mean it though, Sinclair. And I know…I should have should have said something sooner.”

“Why didn’t you then?” Lucas challenged and Billy huffed, looking frustrated.

“Because I didn’t realise back then what I did was wrong.” Billy’s scowl is only deepening and Lucas is prepared to be the one he punches to let out steam. “I don’t know how much Max told you…about my dad.”

Lucas’ stomach churned.

“Not a lot. Just that he…that he wasn’t a good dad.” He can’t look at him when he says it. It just makes him think of Patrick who rocked up to practice with a black eye last week. He hadn’t been able to say anything, voice stuck in his throat, heart hammering in his chest. He wasn’t sure if anything he said would even help. If Hopper were alive…

But he wasn’t. Billy’s revival had been a miracle in itself.

“Understatement of the year.” Billy huffed a soft, bitter laugh. He licked his dry lips and continued. “That night…He smacked me around because Max disappeared. And I knew, I knew you and your friends had something to do with it. I was angry, I was looking for a fight, kid. And you…you were an easy target.” Billy admitted, a thousand yard stare in his blue eyes.

“Cause I was black, right?” Billy huffed out though his nose and half nodded his head to the side, as if he wasn’t entirely sure himself.

“It was a lotta things, Sinclair. Partially, yeah, cause you were black. My dads never favoured your ‘kind’. Nothing visceral, just underhanded comments. Casual, normal.” He rolled his eyes and Lucas’ stomach squirmed. “I had friends of all different races, Sinclair, growing up. It was California. But I knew not to bring them home unlike Max. By the time I was your age, I avoided them all together to save my ass trouble.” He sucked on his teeth, like he was annoyed at his younger selves cowardice.

“I had a friend, anxious guy who really mellowed out after a little weed. So smart but so strange in how he applied it. He knew all kinds of tips and tricks…” His expression softened into something almost sad. “He was the closest thing to an actual friend I ever had. But he was Hispanic. I never let him near my house, and at fifteen…I dropped him. Because my dad found out, and threatened to blow his head off his shoulders because he thought I was in love with him. A dirty Mexican who was stealing peoples jobs.” Billy scoffed and shook his head. Lucas tried not to visibly wince.

“So yeah. I did target you for being black. For being different. Because my dad doesn’t like different, and I grew to accept the same.” Billy shrugged. “I didn’t know any better back then, but I still did it. And it was shitty of me. You didn’t deserve that, you were a kid.” Lucas’s heart clenched, constricting tightly in his chest. He wasn’t going to cry, but he could feel the burn in the back of his eyes.

“Thanks.” Was all he could say, picking at his nails.

“And I…I was scared for Max when you kept getting so close to her, if I’m honest.”

“Scared? For Max?” Lucas furrowed his brows in confusion before huffing with a small scowl, looking away. “Let me guess, you assumed because I’m black, I’m aggressive, right? A hoodlum?”

“Surprisingly, that wasn’t why.” Billy chuckled, sardonic and rumbling low in his throat. “You know how my dads a dick?”

“Yeah…?”

Billy grinned but there was no humour in it.

“Whenever Max came back to me after talking to you, she was either upset or being secretive.” Billy reached for his pocket like he wanted a cigarette but he had been forced to quit and he looked annoyed by coming up empty handed, clicking his tongue.

“I learned pretty young, Sinclair, that boys who make girls upset, one day turn into men who will hurt those girls who have become women.” Billy turned his gaze to Lucas, his expression like steel. “You were my target that night because Max cared about you. I wanted you to stay away from her not just because you were black, but because Max, no matter how angry, can’t hurt someone she loves. And I thought, she might not fight back if you hurt her one day.” He was staring into Lucas’ very soul, the rims of his eyes growing pink as tears threatened to dampen his fierce gaze.

“I let her keep seeing you because she proved she could handle herself. But if I ever see her with a single bruise, ‘you’re dead’ won’t just be a phrase. It’ll be a promise.”

“I would never hurt Max.” Lucas can say it with intention, with purpose, because it’s true. There wasn’t a cruel bone in his body. He’d rather die than put a hand on Max. He loved her, and he wanted to make her happy, like how his father made his mother happy. He wanted Max to never want for anything. That much he knew.

“…I know.” Billy finally looked away, looking like he regretted even threatening the possibility. After a long moment of staring into nothing, Billy spoke once more.

“Max likes you. And…so does Steve. I didn’t wanna keep tip toeing around everything that happened between us. So I’m sorry. I…hope we can start fresh. Or keep doing whatever we’re doing to appease the people we care about.”

He offered Lucas his hand, an extension of — what? Friendship? Appeasement? New beginnings?

Lucas glanced at Billy, and all he saw on his face was exhaustion. He looked so much older than he was. But beneath the weariness was a sparkle of something. Like Billy truly meant this gesture, this fresh beginning, instead of feeling obliged.

Billy had to mean it, right? He wouldn’t have driven here just to talk to him, to apologise, on a bad pain day if it hadn’t been on his mind, guilt likely eating away at his inside every time he thought about their strained relationship.

Lucas hesitantly took his hand and shook it. It was still clammy and gross but Lucas smiled and Billy responded with his own lopsided one that was almost a smirk.

“Lucas Sinclair. And you are?” He offered and Billy laughed.

“Billy Hargrove. Does this mean I have to gatekeep my sister from you like a real brother now, or…?” His eyes crinkled at his own tease and Lucas laughed nervously.

“Please don’t?”

Billy only laughed again, slightly strained around the edges with his weak lungs, but it made Lucas’ muscles slowly relax. Tension seeping out of him.

For the first time, in a room with Billy Hargrove, he didn’t feel anxious.

He still didn’t understand him. Not really. He can’t put the words Steve and Max have used to describe him onto the blond, but he’s sure with time, Lucas will find his own descriptors.

Billy accepts his hand when he goes to stand, cane handling most of his weight, and Lucas feels weirdly younger than he is when he waves him goodbye.

Guys are piling out of the showers and Lucas turns to look at them, his eyes finding Patrick with ease. His bruise has mostly faded but it still twists Lucas’ gut to see.

“Hey, Patrick!” The older boy turns to look at him with surprise. Lucas wiped his sweaty palms of his shorts discreetly.

“If you’re not busy, I thought maybe we could go hang out at the arcade…mind waiting five for me to shower?” Patrick still looks vaguely surprised but then a smile curls on his lips and there’s a flash of teeth that makes Lucas’ heart leap with hope.

“Sure, little man. Sounds good.” Lucas beams and is quick to get going.

- Steve has a cane for when he’s out and about. He likes to fall in public even after Billy warns him the floors slippery because it makes Billy laugh instinctively. And he’ll keep laughing even as Steve feigns offence, grasping as his arms more than a little indulgently as Billy is in near tears, helping him up.

“I can’t believe you’re laughing at the blind guy. You’re heartless, Hargrove.”

“Shut the fuck up, we both know you did on purpose, you’re making me look bad.” And he’ll get dirty looks from strangers who come up and ask Steve if he’s alright as Steve puts on the ‘woe is me, look at my awful friend who cares not for my safety as a poor, fragile thing’ act. Billy is going red in the face from both embarrassment and from holding back his laughter as ladies fall for Steve’s act.

- Steve is the perfect amount of deaf to tune out Billy’s ventilator when he sleepover (and eventually moves in). He can hear it a little if he’s sleeping on the left side of the bed instead of the right, but he finds it kind of soothing.

- Steve gives Billy’s mask kisses if he wakes up before him and no, Billy doesn’t know this for a long time and when he eventually finds out, he has to take a minute to try not to cry in front of his boyfriend.

- When Billy laughs too hard, he tends to break into coughing fits. Some days it’s fine and he can rub the pain away after, but on bad days Steve will help him sit back and make him tea, the honeyed one Billy likes. Just taking twenty minutes to calm down to be the difference between a good day and a shit one for Billy, and Steve tries his best to make it easier.

- Steve forgets people need the lights on when they go around the house. Billy realised this pretty early in. Steve’s got a few windows; one in the living room, another in the kitchen, a tiny one in the bathroom for steam to exit and a balcony attached to his bedroom. During the day, Billy doesn’t really need to turn the lights on anyway, so he doesn’t. He prefers it a bit dimmer anyway with his headaches.

Billy does invest in lamps tho; silly ones that look entirely out of place in Steve’s bare but posh apartment. Steve only realises the lamp next to their couch is a bright pink flamingo when Mike awkwardly points it out one day and Steve spends weeks giggling every time his hand brushes it while reaching for the remote (so he can listen to MTV). Eventually Billy asks what’s up and Steve goes hysterical with laughter, “THAT FLAMINGO LAMP HAS BEEN HERE FIVE MONTHS AND NOBODY SAID ANYTHING! NOT EVEN ROBIN!”

“Yeah, I told her not to say anything.”

“How many of the things you’ve brought for our place are like the flamingo?”

“…Like bird themed?”

“Anything that doesn’t suit the original design of this place.”

Billy is quiet a long time before he just starts listing off many, many things he’s brought home; a black Santa statue that made Lucas snort once, multiple cat themed mugs than Robin likes to steal when over, a Cookie Monster themed lamp in their bedroom, and half of their cushions? The ugliest designs he could think of were chosen as thrift stores. There’s also a birdbath on the balcony as of two days ago and Billy’s been waiting for Steve to put his hand in it by accident.

- Steve forgets to charge his hearing aids a lot. He doesn’t have to wear them as long as people speak up, but they’re handy in public when people don’t know he’s deaf, only blind. Billy usually ends up finding them somewhere in the apartment and charges them, but on occasion they’ll leave the house without them and Steve will have a server talk right at him, except he’s distracted so he’s not tuned in and well…

A hand touches his across the table and he jolted to attention.

“What’s up?”

“Steve,” Billy sounds like he wants to chuckle but is being polite. “The poor girls going red, what’re you having to eat?”

“Oh! Sorry!” Steve’s face burned as he fumbled, turning his head to the right.

“Left.” He turned left and smiled awkwardly, fidgeting with Billy’s fingers out of the habit.

“Just, uh, the chicken and avo special. Thanks.”

“Sorry! I didn’t realise!” She really does sound sorry, embarrassed, and Steve chuckles.

“It’s fine, at least he didn’t hear you.” Billy smirks at his own joke and Steve whacked him across the table, hitting his chest more than his arm.

“Don’t be a dick.” They’ll laugh about it later though when they get home.

- Billy has some bad scarring. It’s not smooth and seamless, it’s messy and bumpy, a mix of white tissue and spots darker than the rest of his skin even after years of healing. He still wore his shirts unbuttoned, but he usually wore singlets under them in public.

Steve can’t see the damage, but he likes to feel it sometimes. The skin is thinner and more sensitive in a strange way, and Billy will watch Steve’s hand travel along the ridges and bump while he reads to the brunet.

“It’s not pretty.” He mentions one day. “I don’t get why you like touching it so much. It’s ugly.”

“Well, pretty and ugly are descriptions people with sight use. I just…it proves you’re real. I can’t say pitch me if I’m seeing things I don’t believe are there. My mind couldn’t come up with a texture like this. That’s all. It proves you’re alive. That you’re here.”

Billy doesn’t ask again. He also denies the sniff he gives, blaming the book instead of his boyfriends words for his tears.

- Billy still has anxiety, but anxiety/panic attacks are Very Bad on his weak heart and lungs, so he eventually gets a service dog after a long discussion with Steve. Billy names her Donna and she’s a big fluffy retriever who is perfect for weighted pressure to ground him during attacks. That, and she can alert Steve if he needs medical attention due to the elevated heart rate or a coughing fit that’s going on much too long to be good.

- Hospital visits suck but are necessary. Billy has to have regular check ups for blood pressure, lung and heart health, his fatigue and chronic migraines. Steve gets his ears tested twice a year as well as a general check up - doctors are keeping a close on his head for trauma due to how much concussions he’s had in the past. Billy gets his eyes tested once a year, usually to change prescription.

- They pair always go together as support. Steve can be inclined towards PTSD-induced flashbacks when it comes to needles if he’s left alone and in the past Robin went with him, but she got antsy and would ramble a lot about things that really didn’t help Steve’s nerves. Billy will usually hold his hand through most appointments because doctors dress like scientists and scientists - they freak them all out. Steve doesn’t like their constant insistence on tests and Billy is not a fan either. They know they’re in safe hands, they have a favourite doctor they’re inclined towards, but it’s still scary, so they go together every time. They’ll move plans around just so they’re there for the other. (When they really can’t, Robin or Max can stand in but it’s not preferred. They refused to be separated during visits and it’s caused a few conflicts with doctors, but they’re willing to walk right out if not heard and find someone better. They know a good lawyer after all *cough* Nancy *cough*)

- They’ve disgusting in love and Steve forgets they’re not alone sometimes, which makes it very awkward for everyone when Billy’s been talking a long time in a group setting and Steve will just put a hand on his thigh and sigh. “Have I ever told you how hot your voice is? Cause it is. Wanna ruin mine?”

Any guest has learned to scream at the top of their lungs when this happens and Steve will always end up apologising profusely because he genuinely forgets other people are there sometimes, even when invited. Billy thinks it’s hilarious.

- Sex is a little harder for the both of them, but they’re learned to work around a lot of things in order to still fuck like they want to possess the other. It’s great. Plus, Steve gets to handcuff Billy to the bed frame most nights and just feel everything. It’s different from feeling someone’s face, relearning their expressions, the new lines on their face as they age. Billys sensitive all over, or maybe he’s just sensitive to Steve’s hand in general, but it’s intimate. Steve likes caressing him all over, likes to relearning his body every night, likes remembering the parts that haven’t changed.

It’s even more fun when Steve blindfolds him. Steve’s not used to people touching him outside of guiding him, and it makes him shiver all over when Billy explores his body with calloused hands, not just touching the parts that would entice a moan or a sigh, but all over. His neck, his shoulders, his arms and wrists. Down his torso and over his hips and along his calves and squeezing his knees. He memorises where his moles are after a few months, and makes Steve grin when he kisses them. Steve’s used to exploring other people, has to to see them through his hands, but there’s a feeling so special about being explored in return.