#pentaposts

Exhausted after a double shift, Steve dragged himself past the threshold of his apartment on autopilot before he even registered that the door was already open.

There was a strange man standing in the middle of his living room.

Now, just because Steve had no furniture, that didn’t mean he had no weapons. He wasn’t a complete idiot. There weren’t any couch cushions to stash daggers underneath or whatever, but he'd stashed the nail bat behind the front door, a can of mace under the milk crate he sometimes sat on, and a housewarming gift from Nancy in the form of a revolver duct-taped to the underside of the wire spool he'd been using as a table.

He was mid-decision of which of his weapons to lunge for when the guy turned around to face him.

He was gorgeous— Steve cursed his survival instinct for that being the first and only thing he noticed— with dark hair pulled up to reveal the tattoos on every inch of his skin. He looked like he belonged in a punk band, or maybe prison.

To add insult to injury, he wasn’t concerned or even surprised to see Steve there, despite the empty muslin laundry sack thrown over his shoulder like Santa Claus's sketchy nephew, leaving no mystery of what he was there to do.

"This your place?" the guy asked dubiously, as if he had any right to ask questions. "Cuz I broke in to rob you, but shit, man, you got nothing." He laughed, casual as anything despite being caught red-handed. Steve could only stare, open-mouthed and stunned by the confession.

"Wait here," the man said, sauntering over and bracing an arm on Steve’s shoulder as if they were old friends.

Bizarrely, there were still no warning bells going off in Steve's head, even as he took in the stranger’s face: sharp features pulled into a hard line, with tattoos creeping up his neck, onto his jaw and cheekbones. 

He looked like the kind of guy that Steve's mother would cross the street to avoid, clutching her purse tightly and refusing to make eye contact. 

But Steve held his gaze without fear, caught up in the warmth of his beautiful brown eyes, made only more striking by the scar slicing through one eyebrow. There was something soft there that caught Steve off guard and left him wanting to know more, a gentle curiosity even as Steve's eyes darted down, drawn to the movement of the man skillfully flipping a butterfly knife shut with one hand and slipping it into his pocket. 

The man gave him an apologetic smile. Steve studied it, told himself he was analysing it for signs of danger, trying to suss out the likelihood he was about to be stabbed.

But the truth was, all he could focus on was the plush curve of the stranger’s lips, pulled taut into a perfect cupid’s bow.

The gentle curiosity was back in full force as the man's hand slid up from Steve's shoulder to the side of his neck, a far more intimate touch that had Steve frozen, unable to think of anything but his own pulse hammering away under the pads of the stranger's gentle fingers.

"I'll be right back," the man promised with a soft, reassuring squeeze to his neck. And with a wink and a reckless grin, he turned and slipped out the door.

Steve stood there stunned, only sitting down on his milk crate when the world went dark around the edges and he realized he was hyperventilating, and in real danger of passing out.

The man was not right back. By the time Steve fell asleep hours later, comforted only by a single pillow and blanket on the floor of his lonely apartment, he still wasn't sure if his a reaction was to the danger, or to the stab of desire he felt the moment the man touched him.

Steve was awoken the next morning by a knock on the door. He crept over to look through the peephole with his hand hovering over his nailbat in the corner, but let his hand fall to his side when he saw that the man from yesterday, his burglar, was back— and he'd brought friends. Even while mentally berating himself for his own stupid naivety, Steve opened the door. 

Not a second later, somebody pushed past him to enter the apartment. Or tried to, anyway. Two new strangers stood in the doorway, holding a heavy wooden dining room table, bickering and ignoring him completely as they attempted to angle it this way and that to get it through the doorway without snagging the legs.

"Manners, gentlemen, where are your manners?" the man from yesterday called loudly from behind them, obviously irritated. "Sorry to intrude, pretty boy. We come bearing gifts,” he said with a mischievous smile that sent a shiver down Steve’s spine. “This here is Jeff and Gareth," the man announced, pointing to them each in turn: Jeff was dressed all in black, with thick locs covered by a slouchy black beanie, with a heavy padlock and matching key around his neck, and Gareth, in red plaid pants, a Mohawk and a noise piercing. "And this is Freak," the man continued, gesturing at the heavy-set one with curly hair, dressed in more leather than seasonally appropriate, carrying a television— with a built-in VCR, no less.

Without warning, the burglar dove to kneel at Steve’s feet, puffing his chest out boastfully as he reached to take his hand. Maintaining eye contact all the while, the man placed a loud, deliberate kiss to the back of it.

He was, without a doubt, the strangest person Steve had ever met.

And all Steve could think about was tackling him to the ground and tasting every one of his piercings. 

He laughed at the thought, loudly and helplessly, which only seemed to encourage the man to press more kisses up and down Steve’s wrist. What a bizarre moment, he thought, to become fully cognizant of his own same-sex attraction.

"As for me," the man said with a dorky little bow, releasing Steve’s hand to place one on his own heart while throwing the other out in a theatrical flourish, “you can call me tomorrow.”

His friends all groaned, dragging dining chairs into Steve’s tragically empty living room and stacking them haphazardly next to the table.

“Sorry,” the man said, shaking his head as if just realizing he’d misspoken. “I meant to say, you can call me Eddie. But, you know, now that you mention it…” The man— Eddie, apparently— reached into his back pocket, pulled out a tattered piece of corrugated cardboard, and handed it to Steve. It was clearly a torn piece of a pizza box, roughly the size of an index card. There were unmistakable smears of dried sauce, and the edges looked as though they’d been aggressively torn by hand. Steve glanced up, brows raised in question.

Eddie just gave him a hopeful little nod.

Steve flipped it over and sure enough, there was a phone number there, scrawled in barely-legible Sharpie. He looked up again to find Eddie grinning at him shamelessly.

“Yeah, let us know how that works out for you,” Jeff sighed, pulling out a cigarette, sticking it behind his ear, and tossing the pack at the back of Eddie’s head. “If you’re not back at the van in five minutes, we’re leaving without you,” he called over his shoulder as the three of them filed out of Steve’s apartment.

Eddie scoffed, bending over to pick up the pack, taking one for himself and lighting it, right there in the middle of Steve’s living room.

“Oh, one more thing,” he said, all faux innocence. “I think I got you a bed too, but that might take a couple days.”

Eddie took a long, slow drag from his cigarette, exhaling heavily in deep satisfaction. Then, eyes half-lidded, he gave Steve a look so filthy, so openly wanting, leaving no room for doubt of what was on offer.

“When can I come… give it to you?”

Steve felt like the breath had been punched out of him. He choked, whether on the smoke or the implication, coughing as he scrambled to figure out what the hell to say to that.

Because despite all rational thought… the attention wasn’t unwelcome.

Was it a bad idea to flirt back within hours of his first inkling of being interested in men? Probably. 

Was it an even worse one to flirt with the guy who broke into his apartment and then did… whatever this was? Absolutely. 

But this guy seemed to know a thing or two about bad ideas, and Steve was feeling inclined to trust the expert.

“Do these lines actually work for you?” Steve asked teasingly, letting his voice fall into the lower register he had once reserved for sweet-talking cheerleaders under the bleachers.

“I don’t know, big boy,” Eddie shot back, brown eyes gleaming as he stepped in closer until their toes were almost touching. “You tell me. Is it working?”

Between the proximity and the secondhand smoke, his head was spinning once again. "Steve," he found himself saying despite his better judgment as he allowed his eyes to sweep over Eddie’s face, taking in every detail. Feeling emboldened by the shameless, hungry look Eddie was giving him, he reached out to pluck the cigarette from Eddie’s lips, took a long drag and exhaled through his nose before carefully placing it back. 

All the while, Eddie watched him, dark eyes tracking his every move like a shark drawn to blood in the water.

"My name,” he said, voice low and gravelly, “is Steve. So when I call you tomorrow, I won't have to introduce myself as the guy you reverse-burgled."

"Revurgled," all three of his friends supplied helpfully in unison from just beyond the door, out of sight.

Steve jumped back, startled, and just like that the moment was over.

Eddie whirled around and stormed out of the apartment, berating his friends for their poor timing, not even bothering to say goodbye or close the door on his way out.

Steve stepped out after him, watching as the four of them disappeared down the hall, still bickering the whole way. He reached into his pocket, reassuring himself that the phone number was still there. 

For Steve’s part, it was really more of an act he’d found himself obligated to keep up, on account of Eddie’s genuine hatred of him. They’d always hated each other. Or, at least, people like Steve had always hated people like Eddie. That was the natural order of the world, and despite Steve’s recent explorations into the unfamiliar, he wasn’t prepared to go against the laws of nature.

So there were no notes left in lockers, no pebbles thrown at bedroom windows. If he was being honest, Steve wouldn’t have minded leaving a note or two in Eddie’s locker. He had half a notebook of half-scribbled confessions that maybe he would have preferred to share, if not for the fact that his feelings were so obviously one-sided.

Instead, Steve’s only invitation was Eddie’s furious gaze catching him at school. Whenever Eddie glared at him like he was trying to burn him alive with sheer force of will, that’s how Steve knew he was being summoned to come by the trailer after school.

It was textbook hate-fucking. They didn’t kiss. They bit. There were no loving whispers in Steve’s ear, only curses.

You make me sick. I can't stand what you do to me. I can’t even stand to look at you. I only come back for this. I wish I could just forget you. Things were easier without you. You ruin everything. Why is it always you?

All of this to say, fuck me like you love me was not a sentence that belonged anywhere near the bed they shared more often than they should.

And yet.

Steve watched Eddie’ reaction in horror, mostly concerned that he might actually try to kill him this time. He panicked, mentally trying to recall where all his clothes had been flung to in his desperation to be pounded into the mattress. But to his surprise, Eddie’s face split into a grin, surprised and wicked, before falling headfirst into the character that Steve, against all logic, had asked for. 

And that character was beyond lovestruck, besotted to the point of being unrecognizable. For the first time, Eddie’s face was free of the tension that was always there when he looked at Steve. The pursed lips, the angry crease between his eyebrows, had all fallen away into slack-jawed adoration. Eddie looked up at him like he’d never seen him before, and the lurch of hope in Steve’s gut made it nearly impossible to remember the reality of the situation.

“But I do love you,” Eddie murmured hesitantly. “Didn’t you know that?”

And Steve Harrington was a weak, weak man. One well-placed lie from Eddie was more than enough to convince him to suspend his disbelief for a little while. A moan burst from his chest, beyond his ability to control, and before he knew what was happening they were kissing, kissing like he’d never kissed anybody before. And he really hadn’t, in retrospect, now that he knew this was what it could be like. It was all gnashing teeth, desperate hunger, clawing fingernails, a desperate fight to climb into the other’s body. Steve’s nose pushed into Eddie’s face hard enough to bruise, but he couldn’t even be embarrassed about it because Eddie pushed back even harder, inhaling Steve’s breath like he’d forgotten how to breath anything else.

The reality of the situation was never fully gone from Steve’s mind, of course. Eddie was only doing what he’d begged for, and Steve had no doubt he would pay for it later. He was sure that Eddie was only playing along so that next time, he could twist it into something humiliating and torture him with the knowledge that he was lonely enough to ask for something so pathetic. He knew this was a gift given with all the strings attached. On the other hand, he knew the opportunity to know what it might feel like to be loved by Eddie Munson was one he would probably never get again. So what could he really do other than give in?

Ironically, it wasn’t so unlike what they normally did, in the sense that Eddie was now doing everything in his power to tear him apart, as always. The intensity, the frenzied touches, the heat in his eyes was all the same. The only real difference was that now, Steve wanted to let him. He never gave up control so easily, normally playing the role of the sneering king well enough to trick anybody. But as Eddie manhandled him to crawl on top of him, instead of fighting back, Steve melted into it. Instead of biting, he pressed a line of kisses to Eddie’s skin, tasting every inch he could reach. Instead of sneering, he whimpered, a pathetic mewling sound he’d be truly mortified for the real Eddie to hear. 

But this Eddie was eating it up, whispering reassurances between desperate kisses pressed to Steve’s lips. “It’s okay. Gonna give you everything you want. Anything you want. Fuck,” Eddie swore, laughing against his lips. “If I knew you wanted this, I would have given this to you months ago.”

“Please,” Steve begged, dangerously close to tears. “I need it, need it so bad.”

Eddie’s hand slid down his stomach, reaching for him. “What do you need, Stevie?”

Unwelcome honesty had already escaped from him once. What was the worst that could happen if he let it loose again?

“You. Just need you.”

-_-_-_-_-_-

An enormous thank you to @beingmissbatty without whom this would have been lost to the internet forever because I accidentally deleted it!!