#stranger fics

‘I don’t want to risk what it is that we have.’ He concluded.

Steve’s eyes avoided yours, careful to avoid being caught in his own bullshit. He looked down at your hands and rubbed softly against the back of your knuckles, as though his touch burnt you pulled your hand from his grip.

‘Just say what you mean, Steve.’ Your voice was quiet, scared that if you spoke any louder the air -like glass- would smash and fall into a million tiny shards around you.

‘Y/N.’ His voice sounded desperate, he didn’t want to say those words.

Silently you puffed out your chest and raised your head, you wouldn’t show him the broken girl inside of you.

‘If you’re going to break my heart Harrington, then at least do it properly.’ Your voice was defiant of your inner turmoil, the gentle sniffle you gave was the only indication of your crumbling facade.

Finally his soft brown eyes found yours, his brow was furrowed and his lips downturned, he didn’t want any of this.

‘I don’t love you, Y/N.’ He whispered, forced to say it by the look in your eyes. ‘Not like that.’

Your bottom lip trembled at his words but you were determined not to fall, harshly you bit down on your lip and slowly nodded. You took in one final deep breath until you were sure you could hold your voice.

‘Goodnight, Steve.’ You muttered before turning on your heel and walking swiftly to your porch.

Steve called out behind you, his voice a mixture of desperation and anguish, you ignored his calls and slammed the door shut behind you.

In the safety of your house you crumbled and slid to the floor. You were thankful it was late and there was no-one around to witness the results of your first heartbreak.

Over the sound of your muffled sobs you listened out for the tell-tale signs of Steve leaving, it took a while but after around ten minutes they came. You listened as his car door slammed shut and shortly after the sound the engine came to life, for a brief moment his Queen cassette tape blared into the empty neighbourhood before quickly being shut off.

You listened on as you heard the soft hum of his engine continue to rattle on patiently outside, what was he waiting for?

A few more minutes had passed before you realised you were now sat in silence, the hum of the car was long gone and your stale tears had left a salty residue along your face. You wondered how pathetic you looked sat crumpled in front of your door, more than likely streams of mascara littered your face and your eyes were most certainly bloodshot.

You resigned yourself to the fact that frankly you didn’t give a shit.

You sat in the basement of the Wheeler’s house, you had your feet kicked up in the coffee table and the menacing sound of the Jaws soundtrack blared from the television in front of you.

From the ages of fourteen to seventeen, you regularly babysat a lot of the neighbourhood kids, and the money you earnt went to your vast collection of records and cassette tapes. You swore for your last year of high school you were going to take a break from the babysitting business and spend more time studying. However, just after Halloween, when the Byers kid had gotten sick again, you had a phone call from his mom Joyce. From now on she always wanted someone to babysit the kids, she knew in retrospect that the kids were old enough and smart enough to care for themselves but the thought of anything happening to Will again had her sat permanently on the edge. The other kids parents didn’t care enough to agree nor disagree with Joyce, so they readily let you into their houses without so much as a glance.

At eighteen years of age you agreed to do it for free, you couldn’t deny that part of you felt sorry Joyce and the pain she had suffered both when Will was briefly missing and now with the sudden death of her boyfriend Bob. You also knew the Byers family wasn’t the most financially stable of families and although Joyce would continuously try to push five dollars into your hand you’d always hand it back with a smile. Even though sometimes the kids were dipshits, they were also sometimes cool to hang out with.

Your foot tapped nervously against the wooden table, it wasn’t that the great white shark scared you, it was that you weren’t babysitting alone. You weren’t the only teen that regularly looked after the band of nerds sat in front of you, often Nancy and Jonathan would watch over them, but more often than not your partner in crime and best friend Steve Harrington would turn up and make the night a little less boring.

You just wish he hadn’t turned up tonight.

As far as you could gather, as the words ‘what is he doing here?’ tumbled from your lips before you could stop them, Dustin had practically begged Steve to come over with his copy of the VHS Jaws.

It was vital, apparently, for the kids to watch this film tonight.

You trained your eyes to focus solely on the television, the water, the shark, the cast, they were all just one blare of motions swimming across your eyes. You couldn’t shake the feeling of Steve’s eyes glancing over at you every minute or so.

You had curled your body as closely as you could into the left corner of the sofa, Maxine and Jane sat cosily in between yourself and Steve, his arm was reached out across the sofa - fingertips almost grazing your right shoulder.

The tension in the room was almost palpable, you were sure the kids could feel the energy radiating from both of your bodies and slowly it was becoming too much. The twitch of your foot slowly moved into your hands and you wrung them together anxiously.

There was a burning in the back of your throat and a bubbling in your stomach and damn it - you couldn’t sit here any longer. Without a word you stood up from the couch, Jane and Max eyed you curiously, the boys attentions never wavered from the television and Steve finally fought against the urge to watch you.

His jaw tensed as he placed all of his focus into watching the bright screen.

With a wavering breath you ran up the basement stairs and into the dim kitchen, your heavy footsteps drew the boys out of their television induced coma, before the door shut behind you you heard Dustin ask:

‘What’s her problem?’

You had made it to your car before you were interrupted.

‘Y/N, wait!’ His voice called out and it stopped you in your tracks.

Your keys hung lamely in your hand, the soft blow of the wind made your keyrings chime.

‘Please don’t go.’ He begged. ‘We can fix this.’

You laughed mirthlessly, emptiness now filled the void that was once subjected to the butterflies and heart palpitations that Steve once upon a time gave you. Cautiously you turned to face him, your face unreadable.

‘I need some time, Steve.’ You explained, hoping he would understand.

‘Y/N.’ He said your name as though it was the most delicate item in his possession.

‘I thought I could do this.’ Your voice wavered. ‘But it’s too much, too soon.’

Steve took a step towards you, you held up your hand.

‘Don’t. Please.’ You begged, tears were beginning to pool at your eyes.

You fumbled blindly behind yourself and secured your grip on the door handle, swiftly you span around and shoved your key into the door unlocking it. You heard hurried steps making their way towards you but before they could you had made it safely into your car.

Steve was stood by your window, his arm rested on top of the roof of your car and his eyes desperately searched yours. It wasn’t fair that you had done this to him, thrusted your unsuspected love onto him and expected him to love you back. You had disrupted the careful balance of his life post-Nancy, wherein he still had a girl to rely on that wouldn’t break his heart, or so he thought.

You had broken his heart in the worst way, by forcing him to break yours.

Weeks seemed to pass slowly without Steve around you, empty lunch hours felt like they never ended, late nights without his phone calls seemed to feel endless, and babysitting the kids was almost torturous.

You still saw him in the hallways or at the supermarket, his tall physique and quiffed hair was hard to miss in and amongst the crowds, but you tried your hardest not to look at him. Each time you did, however, you would feel your heart swell at the sight of him only to deflate like a punctured balloon seconds later.

You missed him, it was hard to deny, but was it more torturous avoiding him than it was to have him back in your life - you couldn’t answer that.

That’s why when you turned up at the Henderson house for one of your routine babysitting gigs you were caught between flight and fight when Harrington opened the door. He let out a nervous breath upon seeing you, as though he had come prepared for this moment and then lost all nerve. You turned your head towards the street, Steve’s car was nowhere in sight, so what the hell was he doing here?

‘I parked a block over.’ He started to explain, his words were rushed as though he was expecting you to turn and run at any moment. ‘I thought if you saw my car outside you’d never come in.’

He was right.

‘Steve.’ His name fell from your mouth as though it was foreign, this was the longest you had avoided using his name since you had both been friends.

‘Please let me just explain, Y/N.’ He interrupted.

‘Where are the kids?’ You asked.

‘With Nancy and Jonathan at the arcade. Y/N, if you’ll just let me-’

‘So you’re just hanging out in the Henderson’s house?’

Steve groaned in frustration at your incessant questioning, he brought his hand up to rub over his features, clearing it of his annoyed expression. He smiled softly and it caught you off guard.

‘Would you believe me if I told you this was all Dustin’s idea?’ He asked quietly, his eyebrow raised.

You let out a breath that you hadn’t realised you’d been holding, with it nerves rolled into your body. You felt the tips of your fingers beginning to tremble and your knees becoming weak underneath your weight.

‘I’d believe that.’ You said shakily. ‘What-’

‘I missed you.’ He confessed. ‘A lot. More than a lot. A shit tonne of a lot.’

You stood motionlessly in front him, your silence implored him to continue.

‘It’s like you’re gone, but also, like you’re also right in front of me and just out of reach. Like a ghost and I can see you but I can’t ever speak to you or touch you again.’ His voice was quiet, as though this was a secret for just the two of you to share. ‘I’ve never missed anyone quite like this, Y/N.’

‘Steve-’ you didn’t trust your own voice to say much more.

‘I never expected this to be so hard, Y/N, I thought this was the- the better solution and it turns out I was wrong.’

Your brows knitted together, better solution to what?

‘I lied.’ He whispered. ‘I lied because I thought it would be better than disappointing you.’

‘I don’t understand.’ You muttered. ‘Lied about what, Steve?’

You watched as his Adam’s apple bobbed silently and he drew his bottom lip between his teeth.

‘I thought that, that in the long-run things would work out okay but now it’s been nearly two months and we’re both as miserable as ever.’ He sighed. ‘I’m not good enough for you, Y/N, I make a crappy boyfriend and Nancy showed me that.’

You began to feel the long-thought dead butterflies in your stomach rise from their pit at Steve’s words. What exactly was he trying to say, had Steve thought about being your boyfriend before?

‘But Dustin told me I should give this a chance if I was really serious about how I felt for you. And I am serious. And he said that maybe I just wasn’t a good fit for Nance and -goddamn it I can’t believe I’m taking relationship advice from a fourteen year old.’

You laughed breathlessly at his ramblings and Steve’s eyes zoned in on yours, the faint trace of a smirk graced his lips.

‘You know-’ you sniffled and took in one deep breath to regulate your breathing, ‘Dustin’s pretty wise - for a fourteen year old.’

You smiled at your own joke and was met with one to match, both soft and unsure but with the message that they were sorry and willing to forgive.  

‘I love you.’ He said with sincerity. ‘And I’m not saying that because I think it’s what you want to hear, I’m saying it because it’s true. I love you, Y/N L/N.’

The butterflies in your stomach were elated, they fluttered wildly and knocked the breath from your body.

You stepped towards each other tentatively as though walking on air, but then his warm palms reached out towards the side of your face and cupped either side, grounding you and pulling you towards his gravity. Your own hands curled around his neck and found their way into the mass of hair at the base of it, his soft curls laced your fingers.

Breathlessly you leant in and time seemed to stop, your lips met with a spark and molded together perfectly - as though these were the only lips you were ever supposed to kiss. Your noses brushed together as you sunk towards each other, closer than you’d ever been in your lives and at the same time the furthest away you were ever willing to be again.

‘I love you.’ He whispered once more against your lips.

‘Again?! I thought that feud was over.’ You grumbled, motioning for him to sit on your windowsill. 

‘Never over.’ Was his stubborn reply as he raised himself off the floor.

You sighed as you assessed the damage done to his face, a bruise had begun to blossom across his right eye, underlined with a deep red wound you guessed had come from one of Billy’s rings. 

His lip sported a similar cut, you noticed as he ran his tongue across it and swiped away the blood. 

‘You’re a stubborn ass.’ You muttered. ‘What am I supposed to do with you?’

Steve smiled despite the pain. 

‘Clean me up.’ His smile turns into a smirk as he runs his tongue over his lip once more. 

‘Gimmie a sec.’ You whisper, getting up to go and get the first aid kit from the bathroom.

Before you left the room you turned the radio up slightly to mask the sound of your voices, if your parents knew you had a boy in your room Harrington would have more than bruises on his face to worry about. 

Moments later you returned sporting the first aid kit. Steve was now lying in the middle of your bed with his eyes closed and look of pain etched on his face, his trainers and jacket discarded back by the window.

‘Harrington.’ You sighed in frustration. ‘Who said you could make yourself at home?’

‘I could swear you did.’ He smiled and cracked open an eye. ‘Take pity on me, please.’

He did look pretty pitiful. Cautiously you made your way over to the side of your bed, perching yourself next to him. 

‘This might sting.’ You warned before lifting an antiseptic wipe up to his face.

He hissed as you gently dabbed at the fierce cut.

‘I did warn you.’ You teased. 

Silently you mused to yourself as you petted Harrington’s face, when had this become a thing? Why was he here in your room, asking you to tend to his battle scars? Why did you so readily agree to do it? 

Steve’s face had begun to soften as he became used to the sting of the wipe, you studied his features, his bruised skin, his strong nose, the plumpness of his torn lip. The wipe swept gently across his lip as you thought of them, thought of how they usually looked and what they’d feel like against yours.

‘Done.’ You gasped lightly as you shook your head of the invasive thoughts. 

You gathered the damp wipes in one hand and threw them into your small trash can. Steve pushed himself further up your bed so that he was resting against your headboard, he folded his hands over his stomach and smiled softly at you.

Awkwardly you smiled back before averting your gaze to the softly buzzing radio.

‘You wanna know what we were fighting about?’ He asked, you turned back to look at him.

‘I don’t know, do I?’ You replied with snark. 

Steve’s eyes were soft, his face unsure yet revealing all you needed to know.

You.

‘Harrington.’ You groaned. ‘You don’t need to fight my battles, especially not against Billy Hargrove. Who gives a shit what that guy has to say?’

‘Listen,’ Steve sat up straight and stared you down intensely. ‘when he’s bad mouthing you, I especially give a shit.’ 

You rolled your eyes. 

‘A few months ago we weren’t even friends, Harrington. You’d be joining in with him if things were still the same.’

‘But things aren’t the same.’ Steve argued. ‘Things couldn’t be more different and you’re too scared to admit that.’ 

‘Harrington.’ You warned, he was running headfirst into dangerous territory.

‘Stop it with that bullshit, Harrington, we aren’t like that anymore!’ Steve all but shouted.

You sucked in a sharp breath and held your tongue, this wasn’t going to happen, you were not going to go there.

‘I think you should go before you wake up my parents.’ You muttered lamely.

‘You really want me to go?’ He asked in disbelief, you nodded. ‘Fine. Fine, I’ll go.’ 

Steve pushed himself from off your bed and took two long strides over to your windowsill. Silently he shoved his feet into his trainers and picked his jacket up from off the floor, you sat motionlessly on your bed your eyes trained on your hands. 

As he made his move to exit you quietly stood from your bed.

‘Steve.’ You muttered, he paused with his back to you, one foot already on the ledge of your window. You took the few steps to your window and grabbed the hand from his side, it was warm and calloused. 

You pulled on his arm until he was back facing you, the space between you was limited and you could smell a fragrance that was so distinctly Steve. He looked down at you through his dark lashes and you guessed he could practically feel the heat that radiated from your face.

With your free hand you reached to cradle his cheek, the pad of your thumb ran over the welt underneath his eye. Without thinking about it you slowly pulled his face down to meet yours, his lips were on top of yours before you could register it happening.

They were soft and plump, and you could still feel the scratchiness of his broken skin against yours. His large hands found the sides of your hips, absentmindedly he rubbed at them and swayed you under his touched. 

Here you were, in your room, kissing Steve Harrington.

You pulled back reluctantly.

‘Not kidding,’ you sighed, ‘but you do really have to go.’

Steve raised an eyebrow.

‘Seriously, after that?’ He asked in disbelief.

‘If my Dad walks in you’re gonna have to worry about more than a few cuts and bruises, we’re talking broken bones.’ You smiled softly as you pushed him closer to the window, Steve sighed.

‘Thanks for cleaning me up.’ He smiled as he looked down at you once more, now perched outside of your window. His head ducked down to peck at your lips, taking you by surprise at how natural it felt to do that. 

‘Don’t make it a regular thing, Steve.’ You sighed, knowing full well that this wouldn’t be the last time you tended to a bloody and bruised face. 

‘I’ll try not too.’ He lied, smirking and began to make his way down your drainpipe.

You continued to watch him until he had made his way down and was in your front yard waving at you from below, you smiled and gave him a small wave back before he turned and made his way down the street and to his car.