Wait! Whats on fire ?!

By early afternoon, the sun had softened everything. The sand was hot beneath your towel, the air smelled like salt and coconut sunscreen, and Dick had abandoned his shirt somewhere near the cooler, as if he had never once considered the effect this might have on your ability to behave normally. He lay beside you on his back, sunglasses low on his nose, one knee bent and one arm folded under his head. He looked unfairly relaxed for a man who had ruined your concentration at least three times since you arrived, mostly by existing too close to you with bare shoulders and damp hair.

“You’re staring,” he said.

You looked away from the slow rise and fall of his chest. “I’m checking whether you’re asleep.”

“With your eyes glued to my abs?”

“I was looking for signs of life.”

Dick hummed, amused and lazy. “Find any?”

Unfortunately, yes.

You rolled onto your stomach before he could see too much of your face. Your bikini top shifted as you moved, the strings pressing into the back of your neck, and you grabbed the bottle of sunscreen from the corner of your towel. “Make yourself useful.”

“I’ve been useful all day.”

“You carried the cooler ten feet from the car and then asked me to praise you.”

“You did praise me.”

“You looked pathetic.”

“I looked strong and dependable.” His shadow fell over you before his voice did, and then the towel dipped near your hip as he sat beside you. “What am I making useful?”

“My back. I missed a spot.”

A quiet pause followed. You could feel him looking at you. It should not have mattered; he had seen you in swimsuits before. He had seen you in pajamas, in old shirts, in the kind of half-awake disarray reserved for people who had stopped pretending they were guests in each other’s lives. He had zipped dresses for you, untangled necklaces from your hair, carried you home once when you twisted your ankle and refused to admit it hurt. This was not new territory.

That was what you told yourself until his fingers brushed your shoulder.

“You did more than miss a spot,” he said, voice lower now, though still light enough to pass for teasing. “You missed half your back.”

“I can’t reach half my back.”

“That’s why you keep me around?”

“Among other reasons.”

“Good to know I have a purpose.”

The first cool line of sunscreen touched between your shoulder blades, and you bit the inside of your cheek. Dick’s hands followed, broad and warm, spreading it over your skin with slow, even pressure. He started at your shoulders, thumbs pressing into the tight muscles there with enough skill to pull an unwilling sigh from your throat. You felt his laugh more than heard it.

“Relax,” he said.

“I am relaxed.”

“You’re lying on a beach towel.”

“You’re taking too long.”

“I’m being thorough.” His palms slid down your back, smoothing sunscreen over the edge of your ribs and the dip of your spine. “You burn if someone looks at you wrong.”

“That happened one time.”

“It was memorable.”

“You’re memorable,” you muttered, then immediately wished the ocean would rise up and take you.

Dick’s hands paused for half a second. It was almost nothing. If you had not known him as well as you did, you might have missed it, but you knew every shift in his rhythm, every careful breath, every moment where he decided whether to let something pass or make it a problem.

He made it a problem.

“Am I?”

You turned your face into your folded arms. “Shut up.”

“That wasn’t an insult.”

“It’s going to become one.”

His fingers continued lower, and you stopped breathing when his thumbs reached the small of your back. He rubbed in a slow circle there, then moved outward, dragging more sunscreen across your waist. The edges of his thumbs slipped beneath the side strings of your bikini bottoms, not far, not enough to be indecent, but enough to make heat gather low in your stomach with humiliating speed.

“Dick.”

“Hm?”

“You are not applying sunscreen to my ass.”

“I’m making sure you don’t get weird little tan lines.”

“That is not a real concern you have ever had in your life.”

“You don’t know all my concerns.”

“I know too many of them.”

His hand settled briefly on your hip, fingers curving there as if they belonged. “Then you know I take care of my friends.”

Friends.

The word should have helped. Instead, it made everything worse.

You lifted your head just enough to look at him over your shoulder. His sunglasses had slid down his nose, leaving his eyes uncovered, blue and bright and entirely too pleased with himself. His smile was soft around the edges, but there was nothing innocent in it. Not really. He looked like he knew exactly what his hands were doing to you and was waiting to see whether you would be brave enough to say it.

“You done?” you asked.

His eyes flicked down your back, over his own hand still resting near your waist. “Almost.”

“You said that two minutes ago.”

“I lied.”

You laughed despite yourself, and the sound loosened something between you. Dick’s smile widened, warmer now, but his hand did not move away. His thumb stroked once against the curve of your hip, so small it could have been an accident if he were anyone else.

But he was Dick.

By the time you made it into the water, your skin felt too tight for your body.

The ocean was cold enough to make you gasp when the first wave broke around your thighs. Dick laughed at you from a few feet away, already waist-deep and gleaming with salt water, his hair pushed back from his face. You splashed him for it, which was how the afternoon inevitably tipped into a kind of war.

He let you win for about thirty seconds.

After that, he caught your wrist, spun you away from another wave, and pulled you back against his chest with the smooth, effortless strength that always irritated you most when you were trying not to be impressed. His arm wrapped around your waist. Your back hit warm muscle. The next wave rolled in before either of you moved, lifting you both, and your feet slipped on the sand beneath the water.

Dick tightened his hold. “Careful.”

“You grabbed me.”

“You were about to fall.”

“I was standing perfectly fine.”

“You looked fragile.”

“I’m going to drown you.”

“You’d miss me.”

Another wave moved through, smaller this time, but it pressed you back into him. The thin, wet fabric of your bikini clung to your body, every inch of it suddenly obvious. Dick’s hand was still on your stomach, fingers spread low enough to make your breath catch. Behind you, he went very still.

The shift was so immediate that your teasing died on your tongue.

He felt it. You knew he did because his breath changed, warm against the side of your neck. It was not just his hand or your back against his chest anymore. It was the hard line of him pressed against you through his swim trunks, unmistakable even with the water moving around your hips, and the knowledge of it made every thought in your head scatter.

“Dick,” you said again, but it did not sound like a warning this time.

His mouth hovered near your ear. “Tell me to move.”

He would. You knew that as well as you knew anything. Beneath all the teasing, all the charm, all the impossible confidence, Dick had always been careful with you where it mattered.

You swallowed. “Are you going to?”

His fingers flexed once against your stomach. “If you ask me to.”

You did not ask.

For a moment, neither of you moved except with the water. Then his other hand found your hip beneath the surface, slow enough that you could have stopped him, deliberate enough that he knew you would feel every second of the choice. He guided you back, just a fraction, until the hard ridge of him pressed more firmly against the globes of your ass.

Your knees almost failed you.

Dick’s breath left him in a quiet, controlled sound that did terrible things to you. “That okay?”

You nodded, then remembered he could not see it properly. “Yes.”

The word changed his grip.

It was still barely anything. That was the awful part. His hand on your hip, his chest at your back, the blunt pressure of him nudging against you through layers of wet fabric while the ocean covered the worst of it from view. It should not have been enough. It should have felt like a tease, like a joke gone too far, like something you could laugh off and bury beneath the years of things you and Dick had refused to discuss.

Instead, it felt like being split open by wanting.

He rocked once, shallow and restrained, giving you just enough pressure to make you bite back a sound. His mouth touched the edge of your ear, not quite a kiss. “You’re quiet.”

“You’re horrible.”

“I asked if it was okay.”

“It is. You’re still horrible.”

His laugh was low and breathless. “That’s fair.”

You turned your head, intending to glare at him, but the movement brought your mouth too close to his. The whole world narrowed to the space between you. Sunlight flashed over the water. Someone shouted far down the beach, distant enough to feel like another universe. Dick’s eyes dropped to your lips.

He did not kiss you.

Somehow, that felt worse.

The next wave broke gently against you both, and he released you before you could decide whether to close the distance yourself. His hands slid away from your body, leaving you cold in places the water had nothing to do with. He stepped back, smile returning with effort, though the flush high on his cheekbones betrayed him.

“You want ice cream?” he asked.

You stared at him. “You’re insane.”

Best friends bought each other ice cream.

That was what you told yourself while sitting beside him on the towel twenty minutes later, salt drying on your skin, your hair damp, your heartbeat still not entirely recovered. Dick had bought two soft-serve cones from the little boardwalk stand near the parking lot and returned as if he had not just pressed his hard cock against your ass in the ocean, his mouth at your ear and his hands on your hips. He sat close enough that your knees almost touched. His shoulder brushed yours whenever he moved.

He was doing it on purpose.

You hated him.

You wanted him so badly that every nerve in your body felt awake.

“You’re dripping,” he said.

You blinked. “What?”

His eyes were on your chest.

The ice cream had melted faster than you could eat it, a pale streak sliding over your fingers and down onto your skin before you noticed. It had traced a cold path along the upper curve of your breast and into the valley between them, disappearing beneath the flimsy edge of your bikini top.

You grabbed for a napkin. Dick caught your wrist.

“Let me.”

The words were soft. Almost polite.

Your mouth went dry.

“Dick.”

He leaned in, still holding your wrist, and dragged his thumb through the melting trail before it could run farther. His eyes lifted to yours as he brought his thumb to his mouth. It was shameless. He sucked the sweetness from his skin with the kind of slow attention that made your thighs press together under the edge of your towel.

“There’s still some more,” he said.

“I can get it.”

“I know.”

He waited.

You should have pulled away. You should have made a joke sharp enough to cut the tension and turned toward the ocean until your face cooled. You should have done any number of sensible things.

Instead, you stayed still.

Dick’s gaze held yours as he bent down. His mouth touched your skin where the ice cream had melted, tongue warm against the cold path it had left behind. Your breath hitched hard enough that his fingers tightened around your wrist. He followed the trail down, not rushing, his lips brushing the valley of your chest with such obscene patience that your hand curled uselessly in the towel beneath you.

“Dick,” you whispered.

He hummed against your skin. “You keep saying my name like that.”

“Like what?”

“Like you want me to feel guilty.”

His mouth moved lower, over the edge of your bikini top, and your pulse stumbled. “Do you?”

He looked up at you through his lashes. “Not even a little.”

Then he closed his mouth over your nipple through the wet fabric.

The sound you made was embarrassingly close to a whimper. Dick’s eyes darkened, and he sucked harder, the heat of his mouth soaking through the thin material while his free hand found your waist. Your fingers flew into his hair before you could stop yourself, and the groan that left him vibrated against you.

It was too much for the middle of the afternoon, too much for a beach towel and the open air and your best friend’s mouth on you like he had been thinking about it for years.

Maybe he had.

The thought made you pull his hair.

Dick lifted his head just enough to smile, lips damp and wicked. “That a complaint?”

“You are such a good friend,” you said, and your voice shook.

His smile shifted. For a second, something more honest moved across his face, desire threaded with something careful and almost tender. He kissed the place he had just sucked, softer this time, and let go of your wrist so his hand could slide to your knee.

“I’m trying really hard not to be.”

The afternoon changed after that.

It didn’t become less bright or less warm. The sun still glittered over the water. Seagulls still circled like thieves. Someone’s radio played too far away to make out the song. But the air between you and Dick had been named, if not directly, and every silence after that felt full of it.

You ate the rest of your ice cream badly. Dick watched you like he wanted to lick every stray drop from your fingers and was only restraining himself because he enjoyed seeing you squirm. He made casual conversation with the ease of a criminal. You answered with half your attention and spent the rest of it thinking about the way his mouth had felt through your bikini top.

By the time the sun started slipping lower, you were restless enough to crawl out of your skin.

“I’m changing,” you announced, because if you did not do something normal soon, you were going to do something reckless.

Dick glanced at the sundress folded neatly on top of your beach bag. “Need a towel?”

“You offering?”

“I’m a gentleman.”

“You’re a menace.”

“Gentlemen can multitask.”

He stood and shook out the larger towel, holding it up between both hands with exaggerated seriousness. It made a little wall between you and the rest of the beach, though the area around your chosen spot had mostly emptied as the day cooled. There were still people in the distance, but no one close enough to matter. It should have made the moment practical. Instead, the sight of Dick standing there with his arms raised, eyes fixed very carefully above your head, made your stomach flip.

“You’re not looking?” you asked.

His mouth curved. “I would never.”

“Liar.”

“Best friends trust each other.”

“Best friends don’t suck on each other’s nipples.”

His eyes dropped to yours over the top edge of the towel. “Some best friends are special.”

You hated how close you were to smiling.

You untied the top first. The wet fabric peeled away from your skin, and though the towel shielded you from the beach, it did not shield you from him. Not really. The space was too narrow. He was too close. You could see the outline of his hands gripping the corners of the towel, the tension in his forearms, the way his jaw flexed when you dropped the bikini top into your bag.

He was not looking.

That was almost worse.

You reached for your sundress and pulled it over your head. The light fabric settled over your body, soft and thin, clinging slightly where your skin was still damp. Your bikini bottoms remained on because changing them on a beach, even behind a towel, required more coordination than you currently trusted yourself with.

“Done?” Dick asked.

You stepped closer, just enough for your breath to disturb the towel between you. “Mostly.”

His eyes met yours.

There it was again. That pause. That little held breath before one of you chose whether to keep pretending.

You lifted your hand and touched two fingers to the towel near his chest. “Are you going to drive me home?”

“If that’s what you want.”

His voice had gone quiet.

You pushed the towel down.

Dick lowered it slowly, and then there was nothing between you except sunlight and the years you had spent pretending this exact thing was not waiting for you.

You were the one who kissed him.

For half a second, he went still, as if even after everything, he had not quite let himself believe you would cross the final inch. Then the towel fell forgotten into the sand, and Dick’s hands were on your face, your waist, your back, everywhere at once. He kissed you like a man losing an argument he had started on purpose. It was deep and hungry, open-mouthed, nothing like the quick affectionate kisses he had pressed to your forehead or cheek over the years. This was not comfort. This was not friendship disguised as habit.

This was Dick licking into your mouth with a low sound that made heat pool between your thighs all over again.

You grabbed his shoulders. He pulled you against him, one hand sliding down to your ass beneath the hem of your sundress, and when his fingers found the damp edge of your bikini bottoms, he groaned into your mouth.

“You’re still wearing these.”

“I didn’t have many options.”

“Poor planning on my part.”

“You planned this?”

Dick kissed the corner of your mouth, then your jaw. “I planned to behave.”

“That went well.”

“I was doing fine until you let me touch you.”

“You offered.”

“You asked.”

“You took too long.”

His mouth found your neck, and your eyes fluttered shut. “I was being thorough.”

You laughed breathlessly, and he kissed you again, swallowing the sound as if he could not help himself. The beach was too open, even with distance. The towel at your feet did not make a private room, and the remaining line of cars in the lot sat just beyond the dunes, promising shelter without promising patience.

Dick seemed to reach the same conclusion at the same time.

“Car,” he said against your mouth.

“Yes.”

The walk back should have been awkward. It was not. It was charged and quiet, the kind of quiet that made every brush of his hand against yours feel like a filthy secret. Dick carried the cooler and both bags with insulting ease, while you clutched the loose towel to your chest as if that could hide what he had already done to you. His car sat near the far end of the lot, shaded slightly by a wind-bent tree, with no one parked close on either side.

He opened the back door and looked at you.

That should not have been as hot as it was.

“You sure?” he asked.

Your answer came without hesitation. “Yes.”

His expression softened, desire still burning through it, but held back by something steadier. “I need words for this.”

You stepped closer and set your hands on his chest. “I want you, Dick.”

His breath left him sharply.

“I wanted you when you had your hands all over my back,” you continued, braver now because he looked like you were killing him. “I wanted you in the water. I wanted you when you put your mouth on me through my bikini. I want you now.”

Dick stared at you for one more second, then ducked his head and kissed you so hard you stumbled back against the open car door.

“Get in,” he said.

You got in.

He followed, pulling the door shut behind him, and the small space filled instantly with heat. The seats were warm from the day. Sand clung to your legs. Your sundress rode up as Dick dragged you into his lap, his hands firm on your hips, and you kissed him like you had been waiting all your life to find out whether he tasted like salt and sugar and desire.

He did.

His hands slid under your dress, pushing it higher until the fabric bunched around your waist. When he saw the bikini bottoms still on you, damp and clinging, he laughed under his breath in a way that made you want to bite him.

“What?” you demanded.

He hooked one finger beneath the fabric at your hip and pulled it lightly away from your skin before letting it snap back. “I’ve been thinking about these all afternoon.”

“You’ve been thinking loudly.”

“I’m usually better at hiding it.”

“You were terrible today.”

“I wanted you to notice.”

The confession landed somewhere deep. You looked at him, really looked, taking in the flush on his face, the kiss-swollen curve of his mouth, the way his chest rose and fell beneath your palms.

This was Dick, your best friend, the person who knew you better than almost anyone. He had held your hand in hospitals, stolen your fries, remembered things you forgot telling him, and now he was sitting beneath you in the backseat of his car with his fingers under the edges of your bikini bottoms, watching you like he had finally gotten his hands on something he was terrified to lose.

You touched his cheek.

His expression changed.

“Hey,” he murmured.

“Hi.”

“You okay?”

You nodded. “Very okay.”

“Good.” He turned his head and kissed your palm. “Because I’m about to be so much worse.”

The laugh barely made it out of your mouth before he shifted you off his lap and onto the seat beside him. He leaned over you, one hand braced near your shoulder, the other sliding up your thigh. Your dress was already a lost cause, twisted around your hips. Dick kissed down your throat, over your collarbone, then lower, shoving the neckline down just enough to get his mouth on your breast.

This time, there was no bikini top between you.

You arched into him with a broken sound, and he groaned like he felt it in his own body. His mouth closed around your nipple, hot and wet, tongue circling before he sucked. Your fingers buried in his hair again, pulling harder than before, and his hand slid between your thighs.

The first touch over your bikini bottoms made you jerk.

“Oh,” he breathed, lifting his head. His fingers pressed against the wet fabric, finding the shape of you through it. “You’re soaked.”

“Don’t sound so pleased with yourself.”

“I’m incredibly pleased with myself.”

“Dick.”

“I know.” His mouth brushed yours. “I’ve got you.”

He rubbed you slowly through the bikini, and your hips lifted into his hand before you could pretend they would not. The fabric was slick from the ocean and from you, rough enough to make every stroke a tease. He watched your face as he touched you, eyes bright and focused, as if he were memorizing every tiny reaction.

“You were this wet on the beach?” he asked.

You clenched around nothing.

“Answer me.”

“Yes.”

His smile turned devastating. “From the sunscreen?”

“From you being annoying.”

“From me being thorough,” he corrected, and slipped his fingers beneath the side of your bikini bottoms.

The first direct touch made you gasp. Dick swallowed it with a kiss, fingers sliding through you with slow, filthy appreciation. He circled your clit once, twice, learning how you liked it with the same unfair competence he brought to everything, and when your thighs trembled, he pressed his forehead to yours.

“There,” he whispered. “That’s it.”

You tried to answer, but he slid one finger inside you, and the words disappeared.

The stretch was not enough and still somehow too much after the entire afternoon of teasing. You clutched at his shoulders, nails digging in, and he kissed your jaw, your cheek, the corner of your mouth.

“You can take another,” he said.

It wasn’t a question, but he waited anyway.

You nodded quickly. “Yes.”

A second finger joined the first, curling slowly, and your body went hot and loose beneath him. The angle was awkward in the backseat, one of your knees pressed against the seatback and the other hooked around his hip, but Dick made it work because of course he did. He moved like he knew exactly how to turn a cramped space into something intimate and obscene, his body sheltering yours while his fingers fucked you open.

“You know what’s been driving me crazy?” he asked.

“Everything, apparently.”

He laughed against your throat. “Your dress.”

“My dress?”

“You put it on like it was going to save you.” His fingers curled again, and your head fell back against the seat. “Like I wasn’t going to end up with it around your waist the second you let me get you alone.”

The sound that left you was not a word.

Dick kissed down your chest, over your stomach, lowering himself carefully between your legs. His shoulders pushed your thighs wider. The car suddenly felt smaller, hotter, the windows fogging faintly at the edges. He hooked his fingers in your bikini bottoms and looked up at you.

“Can I?”

“Yes,” you said, too fast.

His grin flashed. “Eager.”

“I swear to God, Grayson—”

He pulled the fabric aside and put his mouth on you.

Your threat broke into a moan.

Dick ate you out like he had all the time in the world and no intention of being forgiven. His tongue licked into you first, slow and deep, before dragging up to your clit. He sucked there with the same focused hunger he had used through your bikini top, only now there was nothing between you, no flimsy excuse, no wet fabric, no plausible deniability left to hide behind. You grabbed at the seat beneath you, then at his hair, and he moaned when you pulled.

The vibration nearly sent you over the edge.

“Dick,” you gasped.

He lifted his head only enough to speak, mouth shining. “That’s my name.”

“You’re so smug.”

“You’re so pretty when you’re about to come.”

Your whole body clenched.

He smiled like he felt it, then lowered his mouth again and slid two fingers back inside you. This time, he did not tease. He licked your clit in steady, deliberate strokes while his fingers curled into the spot that made your thighs shake around his head. The world narrowed to the heat of his mouth, the press of his shoulders, the slick sound of his fingers working inside you, and the impossible fact that this was Dick between your legs, Dick making you fall apart, Dick groaning like your pleasure was doing something to him too.

You came with his name in your mouth.

He worked you through it gently, not stopping until you pushed weakly at his forehead and made a sound that was almost a laugh and almost a sob. He kissed the inside of your thigh, then the place where your bikini bottoms had dug into your hip, then climbed back up your body with a satisfied, dazed expression that should have been illegal.

“You good?” he asked.

You blinked at him. “You’re asking now?”

“I asked before.”

“You’re very proud of that.”

“I’m proud of a few things right now.”

You reached between you and found him hard through his swim trunks. His breath caught, the cocky expression slipping just enough to make your pulse kick again.

“This one of them?” you asked.

Dick’s laugh sounded strained. “Careful.”

You squeezed him lightly. “You said that in the water.”

“And you didn’t listen then either.”

“I listened. I just didn’t obey.”

His eyes darkened.

The shift was immediate, and your body answered it before your mind could catch up. Dick kissed you, dirtier this time, letting you taste yourself on his mouth while he pushed his trunks down just enough to free himself. Your hand wrapped around him, and he groaned into your mouth, hips twitching up into your grip.

He was hot and heavy in your palm, already slick at the tip. You stroked him once, then again, slow enough to make his fingers tighten on your waist.

“Don’t tease,” he said.

You smiled against his mouth. “You hate that?”

“I hate it from you.”

He kissed you harder for that, biting gently at your lower lip before pulling back just enough to breathe. “Condom?”

The question was practical, but his voice was wrecked enough that it still made your stomach tighten.

“I have an IUD,” you said.

Dick’s eyes flicked back to yours, sharper now, focused in the way he got when something mattered. He knew that already, technically. He had been there for the complaints, the cramps, the dramatic texts after the appointment, the relief of not having to remember a pill every morning like you were trying to pass some impossible test. But knowing was not the same as asking here, with your dress around your waist and his hands on your hips.

“You sure?” he asked.

“Yes.” You swallowed, suddenly more exposed by the words than by your clothes. “And I haven’t been with anyone since my last test. Everything was clear.”

His thumb moved once over your hip, gentle enough to make your chest ache. “Same.”

“You’re sure?”

“Completely.” His gaze did not leave yours. “Last test was clear, and there hasn’t been anyone since.”

The air between you changed again, not cooling, exactly, but settling into something steadier. You had known each other for years. You knew too much, probably. His bad habits. Your worse ones. The names of old almosts and failed dates and people who had never lasted long enough to matter. Still, hearing him say it made the choice feel real in a way the teasing had not.

Dick lifted one hand to your face, brushing his thumb along your cheek. “We don’t have to skip it.”

“I know.”

“I mean it.”

“I know,” you said, softer this time. Then you leaned in and kissed him. “I want to feel you.”

His breath caught.

For a second, all the careful control left his face.

“Okay,” he said, and the word sounded like it cost him something.

Then he pulled you back into his lap.

Your dress stayed bunched around your waist. Your bikini bottoms were still pulled to one side. Dick’s hands settled on your hips, and for a moment, the urgency softened into something that made your chest ache. His eyes searched yours, and you understood the question without him saying it.

“Yes,” you whispered.

He kissed you once, gentle and brief. “Tell me if you need me to stop.”

“I will.”

Then you sank down onto him.

The stretch stole your breath. Dick’s head tipped back against the seat, his throat working, his hands tight on your hips but not forcing you. He let you take him slowly, inch by inch, his control visibly fraying with every second. When you finally settled fully in his lap, your thighs trembling around his, he exhaled your name like it hurt.

You pressed your forehead to his. “You okay?”

He laughed, rough and breathless. “I’m trying very hard not to embarrass myself.”

“Good.”

His hands slid up your back beneath the dress. “You’re enjoying this.”

“You’ve been smug all day.”

“I earned it.”

“You earned suffering.”

Dick looked up at you, eyes dark and bright at once. “Then move.”

So you did.

The first roll of your hips made both of you groan. He filled you perfectly, deep enough that every movement dragged pleasure up your spine and left you dizzy with it. His hands guided you but did not control you, palms sliding over your waist, your hips, your thighs, like he could not decide where he wanted to touch most. You braced one hand against the seat and the other on his shoulder, riding him in slow, uneven strokes while the car grew hotter around you.

Outside, the sun slipped lower.

Inside, Dick fell apart beautifully.

He kissed whatever part of you he could reach, your mouth, your jaw, the top of your breast where the dress had slipped down again. His hands grew less patient as you moved faster, fingers digging into your hips to help lift you, then pull you down again. Every thrust pressed him deeper, and when he shifted beneath you, changing the angle, your mouth fell open.

“There?” he asked, voice wrecked.

You nodded helplessly.

He did it again.

“Words, sweetheart.”

The pet name hit you hard enough to make you clench around him.

Dick noticed. Of course he did.

“Oh,” he said, breathless and delighted. “You liked that.”

“Don’t start.”

“I’m absolutely starting.”

You tried to glare at him, but he thrust up into you at the same time, and your expression collapsed. His smile went soft with hunger.

“There she is,” he murmured. “Taking me so well.”

The praise went straight through you. You rode him harder, chasing the friction, the fullness, the look on his face as he watched you use him. His thumb found your clit again, rubbing tight circles that made pleasure flare hot and sharp in your stomach.

“Dick.”

“I know.” He kissed you. “I’ve got you. Come for me again.”

It should not have been that easy.

After years of friendship, years of restraint, years of pretending his hands did not linger and your eyes did not follow, the command broke something open. Your second orgasm rolled through you slower than the first, deeper, your body clenching around him as you buried your face against his neck and shook in his lap.

Dick swore softly, hips jerking.

“That’s it,” he said, voice strained. “God, you feel so good.”

You tightened around him deliberately.

His control snapped.

He grabbed your hips and fucked up into you, short and desperate and careful even at the edge. You held onto him through it, mouth against his throat, feeling every shudder as he came. His groan was low and broken, his arms wrapping around you so tightly that for a moment you could barely move.

Neither of you spoke.

The car was quiet except for your breathing. Your dress was wrinkled beyond saving. Sand stuck to your calves. Dick’s hand moved slowly up and down your back, soothing now, the way it had during late nights and bad days and all the ordinary moments that had somehow led you here.

Eventually, you lifted your head.

His hair was a mess. His mouth was swollen. He looked dazed in a way you had never seen before, and when his eyes met yours, he smiled.

It was not smug this time.

“Well,” you said.

Dick laughed, and the sound eased the last tight thing in your chest. “Yeah.”

“You do this for all your best friends?”

His hands tightened around your waist. “Only my favorite one.”

“That’s terrible.”

“That’s honest.”

You studied him for a moment, letting the word settle. Honest. 

After all the flimsy excuses, all the teasing disguised as accidents, all the touches passed off as friendship because neither of you had known what would happen if you stopped pretending.

Outside, the sun was still setting.

Inside, Dick kissed you once, slow and sweet, with one hand warm at your back and the other smoothing your dress down as much as he could manage.

“Let me take you home,” he said against your mouth.

You raised an eyebrow. “Home?”

His smile returned, softer at the edges but no less dangerous. “Eventually.”

Best friends drove each other home.

Apparently, some best friends took the long way.

You stir in your seat for the fourth time, trying to get into a more comfortable position. Your belly is heavy and low since the baby dropped. So now your positions are limited—it’s either the left side, or the right side. 

Zuko glances over his shoulder at you, for the tenth time, physically bothered and uptight by the fact that you’re not comfortable. He wants nothing to do with the throne he currently sits on. You give him a tired, reassuring smile and shift your hips a little. Zuko sighs quietly, nostrils flaring as he looks directly into the Chamberlain's eyes. 

“Chamberlain.” Zuko interrupts the older man, a displeased look on his face. “Do you have anything urgent to address?” 

“Oh—well, no, Fire Lord Zuko.” He bows quickly.

“Dismissed.” Zuko affirms, being the first to stand and leave. 

He comes straight to you, helping you up out of your own overly padded ‘throne’, one hand under your elbow and the other on your hip. 

“Up we go.” Zuko waits for you to find your balance, supporting you, his hand shifting from your hip to your belly. “He’s low.” 

“How do you know he’s low? What if she’s low?” You reply, out of breath, feeling the pressure bud between your legs the longer you stand. You were hoping you wouldn’t have to waddle out of here in front of so many people. Zuko smiles, but it fades when he sees your face sour with discomfort. 

“Where does it hurt?” He asks, guiding you out of the throne room. “Take your time.” 

“My back.” You wince. Actually, your entire body aches. But you do your best not to show it. 

“A warm bath, shall we?” Zuko suggests and you nod. 

He mutters something like, ‘careful’, as he shifts and supports you down the stairs and into your living quarters. 

“The avatar arrives in less than an hour.” Zuko regretfully informs you as he draws you a full bath. “We have a meeting.” 

“Zuko…” You moan and lower yourself at a painfully slow rate onto the wooden chair in the bath room. You exhale slowly through pursed lips, a hand cradling underneath your bump. “I…I don’t think—I’m sorry, I can’t.” 

Zuko abandons the filling tub and comes over to help slip your robe off you, a remorseful expression tightening his face. The moment your belly is exposed, his hands find it, caressing and feeling, his lips pressing into the crown of your head. He pulls back and lowers himself level to you, gently hooking his arms under yours. 

“I know.” He mutters in a defeated way. He’s painfully aware that it’s unreasonable to expect you to accompany him everywhere he goes. Not when you’re so close to having the baby. “Come. It’s ready, darling.” 

Zuko carefully tugs you up and you allow his strength to do all the work. You follow his movement, throwing your leg over the tub to get inside. He quickly turns off the pipe. The water is so warm and you can’t help the noise that bubbles up your throat when he lowers the rest of your body in. Immediately all that weight, the pressure, the aches, they’re all relieved from the water. 

“Yeah? It’s that good?” Zuko chuckles softly, his eyes flicking down to your swollen breasts floating at the water's surface. 

His jaw clenches and his eyes trail further down. Just underneath them lays your belly, as big and as round as ever. He's done this to you. Zuko feels pride bloom in his chest. If you’d allow it, he’d keep you pregnant and full with his heir each year that passes. 

Perhaps he will. 

“A little hotter, please.” You growl the last word, spreading your legs wide enough for the pressure to release from your pelvis. Oh, that position does something to Zuko. His cheeks tinge pink and he has a hard time looking away as you spread. 

“Mhh—” He clears his throat and sits up straight, tugging his sleeves up his forearms. His hands dip into the bath, swirling in circular motions as the water heats up around you. You moan a sigh of relief. “It’s not good for you to have it any hotter than this, love.” 

“It’s good. This is good.” You whisper as you lean back, resting your head against the pillow on the side of the basin. Your protruding belly button breaks the water's surface, along with your dark, puckered nipples. 

Baths are becoming more frequent. They’re the only thing, aside from Zuko’s hands themselves, that are able to relieve some of these aches and pains. 

Zuko reaches for the cloth and begins at your shoulders, wiping you down with the warm water. He wipes the back of your neck, dipping the cloth back into the water when it’s gotten too cold. 

“Think he’s coming soon, Zuko.” You mumble mindlessly, focus on that little bit of pressure that never fades. The kind that makes you want to settle into a squat and stay there.  

“Yeah? He is?” Zuko responds with a similar tone, but then his expression shifts to something less calm. His eyes check you over, narrowing as they graze over your belly that hangs heavily between your legs. “Darling,” His tone hardens, “…how soon?”

“Don’t know.” You mutter, eyes closed, enjoying the feeling of him dragging the cloth across your chest. “Feels like—her—head is right there.”

Zuko’s jaw tightens. How can he leave you now that you’ve said that? 

“I’ll reschedule the meeting.” 

“No, no.” It takes too much energy to say that, but you think he’s just being silly at this point. “It’s the avatar, Zuko.” 

Zuko only laughs. The times that Aang has requested his presence or ‘help’ just for it to be a side quest or some air temple adventure—this is likely no different. 

“He’ll survive without me.” Zuko says, shifting behind you now, dragging the cloth down your arms. He feels the water, and reheats it slightly, keeping it at the temperature you like best. 

“Go, Zu. I’m going to be fine. I’ll probably be back in here when you’re finished.” 

“And who will help you with that?” Zuko asks in all seriousness, as if attendees didn’t garnish this palace like jewels on a crown. 

“Anyone.” You mumble, getting comfortable enough to doze off now. 

“I don’t want just ‘anyone’ to undress you and put you in this bath, darling.” Zuko speaks under his breath, his tone sharp and controlled. His voice lowers to a hushed whisper, and his soft lips press into the shell of your ear. “That sight…is only for me to see.” 

Your body breaks out into a shiver. You didn’t consider it like that. 

“Yes, Fire Lord Zuko.” You smile dopily, letting your eyes close all the way. “I expect you will be delivering the baby then.” 

There’s a pause, and silence. Zuko tenses behind you, the cloth stopping just on the back of your elbow. Then he answers sternly. “If I must, yes.” 

You keep your eyes closed, but give him a smile anyways. “Understood, Fire Lord.” 

“You make it sound like a joke.” He exhales harshly, dipping the cloth underwater now, wiping it gently between your breasts. “It isn’t.” 

“Mm—I know, but you act as if I’ll vanish if you leave me for an hour.” You say with as little effort you can, you’re tired. 

You feel his warm hands make their way over your tight nipples, and you moan softly. 

“And if you do?” Zuko asks through a clenched jaw. 

“You won’t lose me in an hour, Zuko.” You try to force as much finality into your voice, but your exhaustion settles deep in your bones. If you have to come out of this bath now, you’ll surely burst into tears. 

“Logically…but—” Zuko doesn’t finish his sentence. His hand drags further down, and your belly hardens against the cloth. He looks up at you expectantly, just to witness your face tighten with discomfort. “You’re in pain all the time now.” 

“It comes,” Your voice strains, and you breathe slowly through your mouth, feeling your body finally relax. “And goes.” 

“That doesn’t make me any less…any less—”

“Any less, what?” You peek at him, and see his expression bounce between restraint and panic. 

“Any less worried.” Zuko says, irritated with his own  inability to find the words to explain his feelings. “It kills me…that I cannot make this better.”

“My Zuko…” You begin, turning your head to look at him properly. He looks tense. Like he has the world and more resting on top of him. “I don’t need you to make it better, I just need you here.”

“I am here.” He says. But being here didn’t feel like enough. 

“Exactly.” You let your eyes slip shut, and as the word hangs in the air, he moves down to your thighs with the cloth. “Go meet with the avatar, Zuko.”

“I don’t want to leave you.” 

“And I don’t want to leave this bath.” 

Zuko almost chuckles, though it sounds more like a scoff.  He wrings out the cloth and hangs it on the edge of the basin. “I will go to the meeting.”

“Mm.” You hum lightly, already half drifting off somewhere else.

“But I’ll be back immediately after.” He states earnestly, his mouth partially open like he’s not quite finished talking. “And if anything changes…anything, y/n. Send for me.” 

“I’m in a bath, Zuko.” Your lips curl in your last attempt to reassure him. 

“I don’t care.” He insists, showing you exactly how serious he is. 

“Right. I will summon the Fire Lord from his meeting with the Avatar if my water gets too cold.” Now your smile is beaming, and you peek up at him again. 

He is, too, smiling softly, that sweet smile. “Good. And don’t stay here too long. Actually, it’s better if I stay until you're ready—”

“No, go. I can get out of the bath on my own, Zu. Okay?” 

Zuko leans in and presses his forehead against your temple. After a few long moments, he reluctantly pulls away. “Okay. I’ll be right back.”

Eventually, Zuko leaves after returning many times. Each time he’d get a little farther, he’d turn back. Say his goodbyes again, give you another kiss on the head. Rub your belly and tell his unborn wa that he’ll be back soon. 

By the time he walked through the doors of the throne room, Aang and Katara were already seated and waiting for his arrival. As Zuko walks in, all of the attendees and servants stand and bow. He walks past them, shoulders square and head straight, ready to end the meeting before it even starts. As Zuko approaches the long, narrow table, Aang rises to his feet and turns to Katara. Zuko immediately recognizes the movement, the way he hunches forward to provide his body as leverage, the positioning of his arms—the patience. 

So when he sees Katara clutching onto Aang for support with one hand, and the other under the swell of her stomach, Zuko intervenes. 

“Avatar Aang.” Zuko greets his long-time friend with a firm squeeze of his shoulder. 

“Fire Lord Zuko.” Aang addresses him properly as he helps Katara out of her seat. “Please, sit.” Zuko insists, resting his hand on Aang’s wrist to stop him. Katara sits back down with a warm smile, her small bump nestled high under her ribcage. Zuko notes that she doesn’t seem any further than six months. 

“Katara. You look well.” Zuko says respectfully. Has that much time really passed since he last saw them? 

Katara smiles, but the exhaustion is evident in the slight discoloration under her eyes. “Thank you, Zuko.” 

“Zuko.” Aang’s tone turns grave, and Zuko picks up on it right away. This isn’t going to be one of his fun adventures or side quests, he can sense that much in the pit of his already uneasy stomach. 

Zuko finally takes his seat, his eyes glancing over Katara’s bump, and then to the doors before landing back on Aang. He’s distracted. And it’s clear as day. 

“This must be very important for the both of you to make the journey here. Please, let’s begin.” 

But before the first document is presented, Zuko is already elsewhere mentally. His mind runs on you, how you’re probably—finally—struggling to step out of that bath on your own.

What if you slip? 

Or how you’re probably clutching your back as you shuffle into bed with your hair wet. 

What if you get sick? 

All of his intrusive thoughts drive him further away from where he is. It’s Aang’s voice, which seems to fade in and out as he outlines each concern, that forces Zuko out of his thoughts. 

Hours pass like days, and Zuko is more tormented than ever. Every point piles on top of him, like one boulder after the next—the weight of the world weighing heavier on his shoulders. 

And the cherry on top is you. 

—

You’re still in the bath, but the water's gone cold. And despite your promise, you refuse to call the Fire Lord to come reheat it. You know this meeting is of great importance, and your duty as Fire Lady in this moment is to ensure it goes uninterrupted. 

But you didn’t expect it to last for hours.

Another wave of fire floods your lower back and you grit your teeth and breathe through it. Your fingers clutch onto the edge of the tub as your knees settle into the floor of the basin. The pressure worsens each time your back flares up. 

The pains huddle closer together, less space and breaks between them. You get to the point where you start rocking side to side, contorting your body as best you can into whatever position that provides a bit of relief. 

But relief never comes. 

You glance over at the window—the sun is setting and the sky is a beautiful blood orange. Interrupting a diplomatic meeting to complain about back pain won’t be your proudest moment. But now that you’re trying to get out of the tub and can’t, it’s something you’re going to have to do. 

Because this might not be just back pain. 

“Guard!” You whimper out, voice shaky but strong. Metal footsteps hastily clink towards you and stop just outside of the door. 

“Fire Lady—”

“Get my husband! Oh—get Zuko, now!” 

“Yes, Fire Lady.”

—

Aang finally introduces the final point—the resistance of some of the fire nation colonies, and how that’s been a significant threat lately to the balance of things. Zuko just nods and glances over at the door once again. 

“…if we don’t approach this correctly, it could turn into a war that neither of us want…you do understand that?” Aang follows Zuko’s gaze to the door, “Zuko?” 

“Yes. I understand and I agree. We will need to approach it strategically.” Zuko begins, growing more tense as that feeling inside him starts ringing like a siren. “I apologize. My mind is in two places at once, today.” 

“If I have to be honest, Zuko. You look like you want to bolt out of your chair.” Katara jests carefully. 

Zuko looks away from the door, right at Aang and Katara. He didn’t think it was that obvious. He never wanted to come off as uninterested. He swallows quickly, huffing a sigh. 

“My wife is due any day.” Zuko admits, fixing his slightly curved posture. “She was very…uncomfortable when I left her.” 

Katara’s expression softens, and Aang goes rigid. 

“We understand.” Katara says as she looks over at Aang. 

Suddenly, the doors burst open, and a young, breathless attendee stumbles in and onto the carpeted floor. He scrambles to his feet and bows as low as he can. 

“Fire Lord Zuko, I—I apologize.” The attendee heaves in a grating breath, and Zuko’s body primes to act, to do, to run. “Th-the Fire Lady—,” He gasps loudly and Zuko immediately stands, his chair screeching behind him, his hands gripping the corners of the table. 

“Speak!” Zuko commands.

“The Fire Lady requests your presence at once!” 

Zuko is already moving around the table, his voice thick with worry, “What happened?” 

“The Fire Lady said only to fetch you, Lord Zuko.” 

“My apologies.” Zuko huffs as he hastily passes Aang and Katara. 

“Go. We’ll stay here.” Aang projects his voice. Katara’s hand instinctively hovers over her spirit water pouch, like she wants to follow and help. 

— —

When Zuko bursts through the door to your living quarters he doesn’t see you in the bed with damp hair like he imagined. His heart slams into his ribcage, and he immediately rushes into the bath room. 

There he finds you perched on the edge of the tub, curved back heaving from heavy, uneven breaths, belly hanging tight underneath. It looks bad, worse than usual, actually. Your face is hidden in your crossed arms, and your hips wade side to side half submerged in the water. 

Zuko shouts your name, closing the distance between you in a few strides, adrenaline high. You raise your head from your arms, revealing a face screwed with pain, and Zuko sinks to a crouch in front of you. His fingers comb away your sweaty hair from your face. 

“You’re back in the bath, my love.” Zuko says it like a question as his eyes search yours, slightly confused and mostly concerned. His hand leaves your face, shaking slightly as it dips into the water. His pupils blow when the horrifying realization hits him the second the water registers as cold—

“This is the same bath I left you in.” Zuko’s voice shakes with restraint. 

He quickly strips himself of his robes and enters the tub behind you, water sloshing out the sides and onto the floor. Anger bubbles inside him, anger directed towards himself. 

“You’ve been in here for hours.” He growls. 

“Zuko…” You sob weakly as heat floods your pelvis in the most excruciating way, and the pressure makes your legs spread further.

“Okay, breathe. Breathe.” Zuko coos as he heats the water with his body as fast as he can without hurting you. “Talk to me darling, is it your back?” 

You nod your head desperately, and a deep, lengthy groan erupts from your throat. The sound of it makes Zuko grit his teeth. His hands move quickly to your back, pressing firmly against it, his thumbs massaging deep into the tissue. 

“You should have sent for me sooner.” He grinds out a tight jaw, careful and deliberate with his every movement. “How long has it been like this?” 

You shake your head, unable to speak during. Zuko waits patiently, massaging your back as he continues to heat the water. His eyes scan you like he’s trying to figure out what is about to happen next. These didn’t seem like the usual back pains you’ve been getting lately.   

“F-Few hours…haah, my back—oh, there’s pressure,” you cry softly the second it’s over, and Zuko embraces you from behind, pulling you gently into his chest. You allow your head to fall back onto his shoulder as you reestablish your breath. “I—I can’t get out…” 

The thought of you here, trapped and cold, makes his stomach twist. His hands instinctively slide over your belly, yearning to connect, fingers pressing softly as he checks the position of the baby. Much lower. 

“I’m here. Does the pain come and go?” 

Your eyes slam shut, and your breath catches in your throat. The pain is back, and the pressure is at an all time high. You begin groaning again, even louder this time. Zuko supports you in the water, his body hot against your back. But not even that helps you. Zuko’s fingers splay across your stomach as it pulls closer to you—tightening up. 

“Oh.” Zuko breathes, looking down into the warped water to see your stomach seized in a way he’s never seen before. “These are contractions.” 

And it hasn’t been long between this one and the last one.

How close are you exactly? 

“Wha—aah!” You’re cut off by the pressure morphing into something else entirely. You grab his forearm, using everything in you to hoist yourself up. “Zuko…I need the toilet!”

Zuko’s heart leaps into his throat and he tries to swallow it down. He’s only able to say your name before he finds himself holding you up, bringing you both to a standing position. 

Once the cold air hits your thighs, gravity comes into play and the pain concentrates in your pelvis now. The tightening crests, leaving you shaking as you slump back into Zuko entirely. 

“I’ve got you.” He says through a ragged breath, securing you properly in his hold. “Breathe darling, I have you.” 

Your body jolts against him and there’s a popping sensation inside your pelvis. Once cold thighs flood with warmth, and then there’s the distinct sound of water hitting water. Zuko looks down in awe, and so do you. 

“My water…My water broke.” You whisper shakily, that feeling intensifying by the second. 

“Yes.” Zuko breathes hard, his hand quickly slipping between your thighs. The world stops spinning when his fingertips catch something soft, yet firm. Instinct drives his hand, tugging your leg to the side as he maneuvers and looks, really looks. And what he sees makes his eyes bulge, confirming what he thought he felt.

A tuft of dark hair, just barely emerging. 

“Y/n. Thats—” He whispers breathlessly, staring wonderstruck, “That’s our baby, darling.” 

“Ohh—Zuko! Zuko! It hurts!” A scream erupts from you, and you give in to this feeling of push. 

Zuko acts quickly, lowering you back into the bath. You find yourself settling into a deep squat. Meanwhile, Zuko doesn’t have time to think, to call for the palace physician or even Katara—he only has time to act. He kneels behind you, hands instinctively moving into position between your legs. 

With a growl, your body bears down and you topple forward, gripping on to the edge of the basin. Zuko steadies you with one hand, keeping the other ready under the water. He watches as your body shakes and strains with effort, your finger tips white around the basin. 

“That’s it.” His voice is rough but raw with emotion, his baby’s head emerging a little further. Zuko feels as you stretch, his mouth agape at the sheer power you’re exhibiting. “Our baby’s coming, y/n. You’re so strong.” 

The contraction fades, leaving you utterly wrecked and your breath hitching repeatedly. Mere seconds pass before the next wave crashes over you, sucking you back into the blinding pain.

“I can’t do this.” You barely whimper before your body pushes again. You make a noise you didn’t know you were capable of making, something primal and sacred. 

“But you are.” Zuko murmurs, overcome with emotion. He feels the baby’s head transcend further, and your thighs begin to shake tremendously. “Darling, you’re doing it.” 

“It burns!” You yelp, trying to shift away from the blossoming fire. 

“I…I know.” Zuko grimaces, his instinct screaming protect. But this isn’t something he can protect you from. “Pant for me, baby. Small pushes.” 

You shake your head as you pant loudly and quickly, tears streaming down your red cheeks. 

“That’s good, I feel them.” Zuko’s voice cracks, eyes swelling. “They’re coming.”

With a guttural grunt you feel a sudden release, and Zuko gasps loudly behind you. “The head…the head is out, y/n.” 

Shock sputters from you in short gasps, and you reach into the water to feel the baby’s head. It’s the softest thing you’ve ever felt in your entire life— soft fuzzy hair, stuck to their skull. You burst into tears, snotty, sobbing sounds ripping from your chest. 

Zuko leans in to sprinkle haphazard kisses on your temple and cheek, and then he quickly settles back and readjusts how he supports the baby’s head. 

“One more push, darling. Please.” Zuko pants, and immediately you’re shaking your head. You want this baby out more than anything, but the thought of continuing is absolutely terrifying. 

It’s too much. 

“It’s almost over. And then we’ll have our baby, okay? Breathe.” Zuko quickly and carefully slides his finger around the baby’s neck, automatically checking for the cord. Relief flashes across his face when he finds nothing there—everything is going the way it should.

A low groan rumbles from you, and Zuko is already bracing himself, readying himself to catch. His stomach lurches when your groan ramps up to a bloodcurdling scream, and your body curves from strain. 

“That’s…that’s perfect…” Zuko mutters when he feels the head turn and drop further into his hands, and he begins guiding the shoulders free. “Push, push.” Zuko encourages you, and you do, helpless against the force of it.  

You push with everything you have left. 

In the next second, you feel a rush that's impossible to comprehend and the baby slips right into Zuko’s hands. You gasp hard for air and your body trembles violently from depletion. 

“Oh.” Zuko sucks in a broken, sharp breath, mesmerized by how tiny and delicate they feel in his hands. 

Zuko moves fast, purely off instinct, one hand firmly supporting and guiding the baby forward, through your shaking thighs, bringing them up against your chest. His other arm curls tightly around your middle, carefully pulling your exhausted body back against him before you can slump too far forward.

“Oh, Zuko.” The words break apart when you look down to see your baby’s scrunched, slightly blue face. Still. Not breathing. Horror blooms inside you and you panic. “Zuko?…Zuko!” 

“I know, come on.” Zuko whispers roughly, his hand rubbing the baby’s back vigorously. “Let us hear you, come on.” 

After a second that feels like an eternity, a wail pierces the air. Tiny, but strong. So strong. And loud. 

You sob as your body sags in relief and exhaustion, and Zuko lets out a breathy laugh before his own tears burst free like a dam. 

The baby slowly flushes to a healthy pink, and their bottom lip trembles. Zuko continues to rub her back, soaking in each moment like a sponge. And that’s when he notices.  

“There it is. She’s okay. She’s perfect. Strong like her mother.” Zuko huffs, turning his attention down at you against his chest. 

“She?” You barely whisper, smiling weakly. “She’s okay. She’s okay.” Each word comes out a little softer, a little more slurred. 

He analyzes every line in your expression, every bead of sweat budding from your forehead. You look exhausted. You had just given everything to bring his child into the world, and it was his honor to witness it. 

“You just…you did it, y/n.” Zuko watches as your eyes unfocus, and his chest tightens. “Hey. Stay with me.” 

Zuko’s distant voice echoes in your head, and you concentrate to look at him. The pain is constant, an aching throb that stings hotter than venom. 

“Tired…hurts.” You manage to mutter, glancing down at your baby squirming on your chest. 

“I know, baby.” Zuko whispers, desperately comforting himself with the reminder that the best healer in the water tribe is sitting in his palace now. “You’re okay—Guard!” Zuko shouts the last word, looking over at the door of the bath room. 

Hurried footsteps approach and stop just outside of the door. “Fire lord Zuko.” 

“Get the physician! Bring Katara!” Zuko gives the order and returns his attention to you. 

“At once, Fire Lord.” 

Zuko sees your eyes flutter, and jostles you to keep you awake. “Stay awake, darling.”  

You move against his chest, heavy eyes flicking down at the baby cooing against your chest. “Zuko. You…did it. Like you said.” 

Relief pulses through Zuko when it registers, you’re speaking of what he said earlier. That he’d deliver the baby if he needed to. He smiles down at you, adjusting the hold he has around his entire world. “Yes, my Fire Lady. As promised.”

A slow tightening breaks your concentration, and you find yourself seizing up against him. A soft groan rumbles from you, and your eyes squeeze shut. 

A contraction?

“What is it?” Zuko asks, panicked. 

“The afterbirth.”

Katara appears breathless in the doorway, one hand braced against the frame and the other resting beneath the swell of her stomach. Aang lingers quietly behind her, relief relaxing his face.

“You’re okay, you did so well,” Katara reassures gently, already moving closer. Her eyes flick briefly to the baby and soften. “She’s beautiful. Just a little more, okay? Then you’re all done.”

The physician follows quickly behind, bowing once before moving to assist. Everything overlaps into one big blur around you.

Katara’s calm voice. Zuko’s hand never leaving you. The tiny warmth of your daughter, squirming against your chest. The physician’s quiet reassurance that she is healthy—her congratulations. But everything feels distant.

Distant but safe.

You focus on Zuko’s touch, and the babe that he’s now fully supporting against your bare chest as your arms fall limp either side of you.

“It was a good thing you were here,” Aang says quietly from the doorway.

Zuko barely hears him, because his attention never leaves you. Nor the tiny babygirl tucked safely against you.

“Yes,” Zuko says softly, brushing sweaty strands from your forehead.

“I’m always here.”

You prop yourself a little higher on his chest, your stomach sliding against his, and let your hand wander. From the warm flat of his sternum, up over his collarbone, across the slope of his shoulder, until your fingertips find the curve of bone and ink. Billy makes a low, contented sound in the back of his throat, eyes half-closed, cigarette burning between the fingers of his other hand.

“Careful,” he drawls, a throaty rasp gliding like a hand down your spine. “Keep petting me like that, and I’m gonna start purring.”

“You already do,” you hum, your chin propping on his chest. “You just disguise it as a cough.”

He snorts, smoke curling from the corner of his mouth, lazy and crooked. Your finger traces the shape of it, and Billy leans into your touch, eyes hooded as he watches you. 

Then you do what you meant to do in the first place: let your fingertips trace the curve of the skull.

The ink is a little blurred at the edges now, softened by time, sun and pool chlorine. The skull’s jaws are half-open, flames licking up the back of his arm toward his shoulder, the whole thing wrapped in old-school black and shadow.

You trace your finger along the hollow of the bone, over the cracks, the flames. Your touch is slow, absent-minded. But it’s not really. You’re paying attention to everything—how Billy’s breath catches when you hit the tender spot near his collarbone, how his arm flexes just enough to make the image ripple.

“What,” he asks lazily, “never seen a tattoo before?”

“Seen plenty,” you reply. “Just never had a moment to ask what the hell you were thinking.”

He lifts his head a little, squinting at you. “That supposed to be an insult, sweetheart?” 

“Maybe a little bit.” You’ve never been the sheepish type, but your words almost come out like that now. “It’s very… ‘I’m fifteen and pissed at my dad.’”

He scoffs, his eyes rolling, head angling back slightly to bare the curve of his throat. You spot traces of your mouth and teeth marks across his skin, evidence of your greed laid bare like a roadmap, with a pang of feminine satisfaction. 

“I was sixteen, thank you,” he informs you with a chuckle that glides all the way down your body. “And I am pissed at my old man.”

“Shocking,” you say dryly, because the last thing you want right now is to bring Neil into this. “I never would’ve guessed from your sunny personality.”

Billy reaches over and pinches your hip, just hard enough to make you yelp and slap his chest. Billy’s mouth curls into a satisfied little smirk, dragging his fingers across the bare skin and edge of his worn t-shirt, pooling obscenely around your hips and his hand.

“Watch it, sweetheart,” he murmurs, cigarette slotting at the edge of his lips, and you examine how the swell of that mouth curls around the filter, slow and suggestive. “You’re talking to a guy with a skull on his arm. I’m dangerous.”

“Oh yeah.” A soft laugh escapes you, and you feel his grip on you tighten, drinking in the sound. “Terrifying. Real Grim Reaper shit. I’m shaking.”

He grins, smug and too damn attractive, head dropping back onto the pillow as lazy billows of smoke curl past his swollen lips. You go back to tracing the ink, more deliberate now, letting your nail just barely graze the skin.

“Why a skull, though?” you ask curiously. “Were you trying to impress the world or just yourself?”

“Hey,” he protests, shooting you a mock-offended look. “I impressed you.”

You make a noncommittal noise. “Debatable.”

His gaze drags over your face—eyes, nose, mouth—in a way that makes you hyper-aware of all of you pressed against all of him. The little sliver of air between your lips and his throat feels charged. “Liked the way it looked,” he says. “That’s all.”

You arch a brow.

“That’s a lie,” you say immediately.

He tenses, just a fraction.

“Excuse you,” he protests with a roll of his eyes. “I can be shallow.”

“I know you can be shallow.” Your thumb traces the flames, creating a mental map of the shape. “You’re also weirdly sentimental for a guy who pretends he doesn’t have feelings. So. Try again.”

Billy flicks ash into the tray on the nightstand, jaw working. He makes an offended sound that’s mostly for show, then sighs, dragging a hand down his face. The movement makes his abs tighten under your ribs; you feel them shift, hard and warm beneath you, and your fingers tighten a little where they rest on his arm.

“Drop it, mechanic,” he warns.

You keep your hand where it is, stroking slowly over the ink.

“Or what?” you ask softly. “You’ll brood at me?”

His eyes cut to you, examining you for a beat. He’s known you long enough by now to know you’re not going to drop it. He takes another drag, the soft crinkle of his cigarette filling the quietness between you. 

Billy traces mindless patterns across your naked skin, and you try not to arch into it like a feline. “You’re real mouthy for someone currently using me as a mattress.”

“And you’re real evasive for someone who never shuts up,” you shoot back.

You hold his gaze.

It’s easy, now, this kind of pushing. In the early days, it would’ve ended in a shouting match, the two of you bouncing off each other’s sore spots until something cracked. Now it’s… familiar. A game with rules you’ve both quietly agreed on, safe and barbed, but only used to work each other up, rather than hurt.

He stares at you for a long moment. Then sighs, long and put-upon, like you’ve asked him to move mountains instead of talk about himself.

“Jesus,” he mutters. “Show a girl one tattoo…”

You smile, just a little, and wait. Billy drags one hand over his face, rubbing at his eyes, cigarette balanced carefully out of the way. When he speaks again, his voice has dropped half an octave, losing some of the lazy shine.

“Fine,” he begins reluctantly. “I was pissed off.”

“Obviously,” you deadpan, eyebrows rising slightly. “Skull, fire, I got that part.”

He ignores you. “It was the first summer in Cali after—” he waves the cigarette in a vague arc. “After Neil declared he wants to remarry.”

Your fingers still on his arm. He doesn’t look at you, peering over your head into the darkness beyond. This is still hard for him, an openness that can come with sharpness and acid if not threaded on gently.

“Mom was gone,” he continues, quieter now, and there’s still a crack to his voice whenever he mentions the woman who left him behind. “Neil was… Neil. I just figured out I was apparently indestructible enough to smoke, drink and drive like an asshole without dying yet. So my genius teenage brain goes: you know what would really drive the point home? Branding.”

There’s something bitter and fond tangled together in the way he speaks about it. You picture him at sixteen, smaller, angrier, sitting in a buzzing tattoo parlour and daring the needle to hurt more than his father’s fists. 

“Real nuance, y’know?” He snorts, tightening his grip on you a little bit, like he’s reminding himself he’s here now. “I’d just learned the word ‘mortality’ in English class and decided I was above it.”

You start moving your fingers again, gentler now, more purposeful. Following the line of flame. The pad of your thumb drags a slow line along the curve where ink fades into his freckled skin. Billy’s breath catches, barely audible.

“So you picked a skull,” you muse thoughtfully. “Like a walking warning label.”

“Something like that,” he agrees with a quiet, satisfied hum. Like he never doubted you would understand the choice, understand him. “Part of it was… I don’t know. Control, I guess. So I thought, fuck it. If I’m gonna have death and abandonment hanging over my shoulder, I might as well slap it on my arm and look it in the eye.”

For a second, you just lie there, breathing with him. In and out. The idea of him sitting in that chair, alone, trying to stare down something that big with nothing but ink and stubbornness, makes your chest ache. 

“You ever think about not tempting fate quite so aggressively?” you ask, but it comes out softer than you intended.

He finally looks at you again. The half-burned cigarette drops into the ashtray, his hand cupping your face, rough fingers and faint aroma of smoke still clinging to his hot skin. 

“Always,” he answers simply, thumb sweeping over the curve of your bottom lip. “Still do. Just… this helped.”

“How?” 

He rolls his shoulder under your hand, making the skull shift. “A reminder. That it’s there. That I’m not special. That it can bite me whenever it wants. Kept me from doing even dumber shit than I already was.”

You’re sure your expression portrays precisely how ironic you find those words. “Hard to imagine.” 

Billy snorts. He gives you a look that promises future retaliation, his thumb pressing just a fraction harder into that notch above your hip, making your toes curl.

“What, like I’m gonna tell you everything?” he poses, shaking his head. “You’d never let me live it down.”

“I already don’t let you live anything down,” you say sweetly, a biting edge to your smile. “Your crimes are being archived as we speak.”

You smooth your palm over the ink again, grazing the line where the flames curl around toward his tricep.

“Y’know,” you say after a brief lull, cigarette back between his fingers, while your tone stays deliberately casual, “for what it’s worth… I don’t think it makes you look cool.”

A laugh barks out of him, and your entire body vibrates with the sound of his amusement. You don’t chide him for disturbing you, because this is special, this is fragile. Genuine amusement still feels like a rare gift when it comes from him, like he’s learning to permit himself genuine happiness without a shadow of violence hanging over him. 

“Oh, thanks,” he drawls, still grinning. “Really boosting a guy’s self-esteem tonight.”

“It makes you look like a try-hard,” you continue, tone entirely deadpan, and Billy groans. “Like a kid who circled the biker tattoos in a magazine and went, ‘That one, because I’m a badass.’”

He opens his mouth, ready to protest. But before he can say anything, you lean down and kiss the skull before he can argue, lips warm on the ink, your nose brushing the sensitive inner line of his arm. You feel him shudder under you, just once, like you’ve hit some hidden switch.

“It’s also hot,” you add against his skin, stroking a greedy hand up the ridges of his muscles. “In a tragic, overdramatic way.”

Billy’s fingers flex on your hip, digging in with calculated slowness. When you look up, his eyes have gone heavy-lidded, pupils blown a little wider. You feel the way his stomach tightens under your ribs, rippling with want, the way his hand on your hip goes from resting to gripping you.

“You’re a menace,” he says, voice rougher now, hungry.

You hum, arching lazily into his body and grip. “You like it.”

He shifts, rolling onto his side to face you properly, forcing you onto your back as he stubs out his cigarette, teeth bared. One of his legs slides between yours, pinning you in place. He brackets your head with his arms, the skull right there by your cheek now, flames licking up toward your ear.

“You’re the only person alive,” he says slowly, close enough to speak against your parted lips, “who could call my tattoo try-hard and still get me this hard.”

“One of my many talents,” you say, trying not to laugh.

His head lowers further, breath teasing your lips.

“Seriously, though,” he murmurs. “You really think it’s stupid?”

You look at him. At the earnest flicker under all the bravado, the tiny crack in his usual armour he doesn’t permit anyone except you or Max see. Sixteen and burning still lives deep in his eyes, like a haunting hand reaching back in time to drag him under.

You slide your palm back to his arm, fingers curling around the ink, the muscle beneath.

“I think,” you begin, serious now, “it’s very you. Skeleton, fire, drama, ‘fuck the world, I’m not scared.’ Except you are scared, and instead of admitting it, you carved it into your skin and pretended you weren’t.”

He huffs a breath that might be a laugh, might be a sigh, or a strangled mix between the two.

“And I think,” you go on, “that if it helped you stick around long enough to wind up here, annoying me, then I’m… glad you got it.”

Billy studies you for a long while, eyes roaming over your face.

Then he kisses you.

It’s not greedy, not at first. His mouth moves over yours in a slow, careful press, like he’s tasting the words you just said. His chest is warm and heavy against your breasts; you can feel the exact moment his breathing hitches and kicks up, syncing with your own. One of his hands leaves the mattress, slides under your shirt from the side, palm hot as it skims the curve of your waist. His fingers leave a fire trail as he drags his hand up your ribs, thumb grazing the sensitive space just beneath.

Your stomach flutters so hard it almost hurts. When Billy finally pulls back, his forehead rests against yours. His nose bumps the side of yours with a soft, stupid intimacy that makes your heart ache again. His arm tightens around you. The skull presses briefly against your temple as he shifts, flames warming your skin, ribs brushing ribs.

“Y’know,” he says quietly, “I used to think it was gonna be the only thing left. If I went out in a wreck, or the ocean decided it was sick of my shit. Skull on a slab, like a punchline.”

You swallow, your thumb stroking down the back of his neck.

“But then?” he huffs. “Somehow, it’s… you.”

Your throat feels thick.

“Me what?” you breathe out.

He shrugs, one shoulder lifting, muscles shifting under your palm.

“You’re the thing that keeps showing up,” he explains with a sort of caution that hints at how often he’s thought about this. “In the hospital. In my car. In my stupid dreams. Skull’s just… decoration at this point.”

“You comparing me to a tattoo?” you ask, trying for lightness and not quite making it.

“Nah,” he says. “Tattoo is permanent.”

You elbow him in the ribs. Billy oofs, grinning a wicked little smile, eyes twinkling.

“I’m serious,” he goes on, wetting his bottom lip. “I got this thing ‘cause I thought it made me look like I didn’t give a shit if I died. Now I’ve got you tracing it every time we’re in bed, and it just makes me think about not wanting to go anywhere.”

Your fingers tighten in his hair, tangling in those messy curls.

“Wow,” you breathe out finally. “That was almost… sweet. Did the ink leak into your bloodstream?”

He groans and buries his face in your neck to hide his expression with an annoyed, quiet laugh. His lips find the spot just under your jaw without looking, teeth and tongue, and he laughs when you gasp at the sensation, the sound breathy and embarrassingly immediate. Followed by his smug, “Shut up.”

You laugh, hand sliding through his hair, the other still wrapped around his arm. Your thumb strokes over the skull one more time, gentler this time.

“Kind of like that it’s on your left,” you say idly.

Billy pulls back enough to look at you again.

“Why?” he wonders.

“Closer to your heart,” you say slowly, deliberately corny.

He groans loudly. “Fuck, you’re impossible.”

“You’re the one who fell for me,” you shoot back, wiggling against him, smugly noting the way his muscles coil at the sensation of you pressed against him. 

“‘Fell’ is a strong word,” he retorts, still grinning against your jaw. “Tripped, maybe. Got shoved, definitely.”

Your brows jump up. “By who?” 

Billy leans in until his lips brush your ear, teasing and brazen in a way that boils your blood.

“By a mouthy mechanic who won’t stop touching my tattoo and asking me how I feel,” he murmurs hotly.

A shiver crawls down your spine.

“That’s tragic,” you reply, breathless. “Really. My condolences.”

Billy chuckles, low and husky, and kisses you again, deeper this time, greedier if it were possible. His arm shifts, skull sliding against your cheek as he adjusts his weight, bracing himself so he doesn’t crush you. You angle into him, ravenous for the press of him everywhere—his thigh between yours, his chest, his ridiculous warm mouth, devouring yours.

Your hand slides back down to his arm, seeking the ink. Your thumb finds the curve of the skull almost blindly and stays there, like you’re grounding both of you through that old, stupid, meaningful mark.

It’s still a skull. Still fire. Still teenage stupidity needled into his skin.

But with his heart thudding hard against your ribs and his breath breaking against your mouth, with your fingers curled around that ink as if you can hold the boy who got it and the man he’s become in the same palm, it feels like more than that.

As she replayed their conversations, his emotions made sense - they all connected. The one that stuck out to her was his anger in the cafeteria. She didn’t see how he could go from hurt and his version of gentleness on Monday, to intense anger on Wednesday, to soft smiles and easy banter tonight. It didn’t make sense. But the more she thought about it, the more it clicked.

Billy hadn’t been angry at her in the lunch room - he had been angry that she had shut him out. She could understand that. He had done the same thing to her, throwing her words back at her, putting on a persona just to spite her. It made her angry. It fucked with her head. And by ignoring him and avoiding him, especially after he had been vulnerable, she had made him feel the same way.

But that wasn’t what was interesting. No matter how angry he was or how upset he was, as soon as he saw that she was upset, genuinely upset by something he didn’t even know the source of, he put his own emotions aside, and he made her feel better.

She never would have thought him capable of that. All of the talk about Billy around Hawkins portrayed him in two ways: depending on who you asked he was made out to be either hotheaded, angry, and selfish, or charming, allusive, and arrogant. But she didn’t see any of that. It was like she saw a completely different side to Billy than everyone else. And honestly, it confused her. She didn’t know what side of Billy she would see when she talked to him, didn’t know how he would react. It made her question what was real, which she hated.

But Billy had been honest with her, to an extent. He made it clear he liked her in more than just a sexual sense, and he’s made it very clear he thinks he’s better for her than Eddie. He had tried to make her jealous, and he made it seem that he moved on with girl after girl. At the very least, he had sex with them, whether that meant anything to him or not. And if she was honest with herself, she didn’t like that. If he did care about her, how could he move on so easily?

Billy made her happy when he tried. Hell, sometimes he made her happy without trying. He matched her witty challenges and kept pace with her. It was easy with him. But all the same, it made her uncomfortable how he just gave himself away, like he didn’t value himself. He was attractive. She knew it, he knew it, Hawkins knew it. But she wanted him to see himself as valuable, full of meaning that someone would treasure, rather than to give piece after piece of himself away to girls who only saw his flashy smile and smooth demeanor.

Eddie would never do that. He was sweet and purposeful. She had never seen him wonder even before they started dating. But she also knew that Billy had never looked at her with resentment like Eddie had. She had picked up that Billy’s home life wasn’t great either. Even though he wasn’t open to talking about it, he never lashed out at her like that. He never made her emotions feel worthless or disregarded. In one ten minute conversation, Eddie made her feel small, devalued. Even when Billy was flaunting girls in her face, she knew he was playing a game, his intentions clear. He had wanted her to feel jealous, to regret her words, but he never wanted to diminish her. Which was worse?

So here she was. A Friday night at the skate rink with her group of friends, her boyfriend who had crushed her spirit, and the man who she couldn’t get out of her head, the one who had built her back up. Her emotions were fried, her mind all over the place. She had no answers, more confused than ever.

Steve comes up to her then, skating behind her and putting his hands on her shoulders. “There  you are!” She jumps at the contact, lost in thought. He drops his arms and skates in front of her, turning to face her as he skates backward. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you.”

“Sorry. The clerk took a minute getting me another pair of skates.” She attempts a smile, trying to get herself out of her head. She has to pick up her pace to keep up with Steve.

He furrows his eyebrows. “Did Billy give you shit or something? Your mood is totally foul again.” He slows down a hair as he does a half circle to end up skating next to her.

“No, he was actually pleasant for once.” She chuckles, smiling at the memory. But when her eyes shift forward, locking onto Eddie and Robin, she frowns again. “Billy isn’t my problem. Eddie is.”

“Eddie? Holy shit.” Steve doesn’t hide the shock on his face. “I thought you all had moved past your problems.”

She scoffs. “So did I. Now there’s a new one. A big one.” She doesn’t hide the frustration in her tone.

“He looked mad when you all walked in. What happened?” He looks at her with concern in his eyes. Steve really was a good friend - her best friend.

“I don’t want to get into it too much, but our parents got brought up and he just lashed out at me. Saying how I needed to be grateful for what I have and how I don’t understand anything about having a hard life.” She throws her arms up. “I know I don’t have a terrible life, and I’m not trying to act like I do, but my parents can be shitty sometimes. Am I not allowed to rant about that or talk about my concerns?”

“Of course! That’s natural for any teen to do. We all know how distant my parents are. I don’t exactly have it bad, but it sucks, you know?” He offers her a smile of reassurance.

She smiles up at him, nodding. “Yeah. He just makes me feel like shit for complaining because of what happened to his parents. Every time I bring them up he gets angry, but tonight was bad, Steve. Like really bad.” She looks down at her skates. “He looked at me with resentment. Like I was wrong for being concerned for my parents.”

She feels Steve’s hand on her shoulder again. “Hey, you’re not wrong.” She looks up at him when he squeezes her shoulder. “He shouldn’t make you feel that way, and I’m sorry he did. You’re allowed to talk about your parents or any other concern you have.” He smiles softly again. “Maybe you need to sit down with him and tell him how it made you feel. I’m sure you all can work through it. If he cares about you, then he needs to be receptive to that. And if he’s not, then maybe you don’t need to be with him.” He shrugs a shoulder trying to keep the mood light even though he dropped a heavy truth bomb.

Her eyes widen slightly. The last thing she needed to hear when her mind was already so scrambled was that her and Eddie might not be compatible after all. If she was truly honest with herself, that thought had slipped through her mind more in the past month than it had their entire relationship. It was a nasty thought - one that scared her more than she wanted to admit.

“Maybe.” She looks after Eddie again, seeing he’s still smiling with Robin. “He just looks so fucking happy after he made me feel like I was worthless. I don’t get it.”

Steve blows out air, shaking his head. “What can I say? Men can be stupid sometimes.” He looks at her with the most genuine, serious look, which causes them to erupt in laughter. She leans toward him, grabbing his arm as they laugh.

In their bout of laughter she catches a flash of blonde hair whip past them, causing her eyes to shift in front of her. She watches Billy look between her and Steve, a quick flash of jealousy directed at Steve, as he passes them with his date. He tilts his head ever so subtly to her before turning forward again.

Steve and her recover from their spell of laughter, straightening as they keep skating. Steve blows out air as he catches his breath. “That wasn’t a very nice look from Hargrove. I thought you said he was being pleasant tonight.”

She catches her breath as well, nodding once, before putting her hands on her hips. “Oh that look wasn’t directed to me.”

Steve rolls his eyes. “Yeah, I caught that.” He frowns, shaking his head slightly. “I don’t know what his problem is with me. He’s been giving me shit ever since he got to Hawkins.”

She chuckles. “C’mon Steve. You practically owned Hawkins before Billy. He thinks he’s hot shit and wanted your spot. That’s it.” She shrugs, thinking it a simple answer.

He looks at her, unconvinced. “I don’t think it’s that simple. He’s ‘dethroned’ me.” He lowers his voice, muttering under his breath. “Whatever the fuck that means.” Shifting his gaze to Billy, he continues. “No, I think he has it out for me for some reason.”

She scoffs. “Why would he have something against you? That doesn’t make sense. It has to be some sort of alpha male bullshit.” She smiles as she speaks, not taking Steve too seriously.

The look Steve gives her wipes the smile off her face. “Do you remember when I didn’t come to school for a week last month?”

She nods. “Yeah, you said you were sick.”

He half rolls his eyes. “Yeah, I lied.” He pauses, almost like he was trying to gather his thoughts. “I didn’t come to school because I didn’t want anyone to see my face.”

She shakes her head, confused. “Steve, that doesn’t make any sense. What does that have to do with Billy?”

“He’s the reason my face was fucked up.” He looks at her, but when it’s clear she still isn’t following along, he continues. “Jesus, he beat the shit out of me! He came to the Byers’ house looking for Max, and when she didn’t want to go back with him, he got violent. I tried to stop him, but I got my ass kicked.” He pauses, grumbling. “As Dustin says.”

Her eyes widen. She knew Billy got involved in fights, but she didn’t know about his fight with Steve. She tore her eyes from Steve’s, processing. As she let her mind wonder, she began to put the pieces together.

“The first night we talked he was looking for Max. He showed up on Gareth’s doorstep during one of Eddie’s campaigns, and I sent him to the Byers’ house. I didn’t know-“ She meets Steve’s eyes again, her own wild, while his were open, letting her think on her own. “When I saw him at school the following Monday his knuckles and his cheek were bruised, but he didn’t say what they were from. But it was you?”

Steve nods. “Yeah.” Pausing, he looks between Billy and her. “So when he gave you shit in the parking lot that one day, I got concerned cause I didn’t want you to be dragged into his shit.” He sighs, pulling her closer to the wall so they could stop without disrupting the flow of the rink. “I don’t know what he’s capable of, but I know how violent he was that night. He was laughing every time I punched him.” His eyes widen in his typical Steve way. “Normal people don’t do that!”

She can’t help but laugh. “Well I never said anything about Billy was normal.” She pauses, thinking back on her interactions with him. “He’s never done anything to make me feel scared or unsafe.” She shrugs. “Even when he was a dick, I never felt like he was trying to hurt me.” She gazes past Steve to look at Billy, finding he was already looking her way. “I don’t know why, but he would never hurt me. I know it.” Tearing her eyes from Billy’s, she looks at Steve again, giving him her best reassuring look.

Steve holds her gaze, not appearing too happy, but conceding nonetheless. “Okay, okay.” He shrugs. “Maybe he just likes fighting attractive dudes.”

She laughs, pushing his shoulder. “Maybe.”

He laughs with her before getting more serious again. “Look, I don’t know what you two are doing, but promise me that you’ll be smart around him, that you’ll be safe.” He looks for Eddie, finding him still with Robin before turning back to her. “Whatever you decide, I just want you to be happy. I want you to make the right choice for you, Bunny.”

She inhales a quick breath, not expecting Steve to get so sentimental on her. She knew he was the only one who knew about her interactions with Billy, but it seemed like he had picked up on more than what she told him. It didn’t really surprise her. Steve was her best friend for a reason.

She lets her eyes drift from Steve, to Eddie, to Billy, lingering on him. Once more, Billy turned to look at her, offering her the smallest smile, the corner of his lips curving up so slightly anyone else would have missed it. Just then his words from earlier in the week when he confronted her in the locker room echoed in her mind.

“You went with the safe option.”

Billy’s words and Steve’s advice paired with her own racing emotions and thoughts struck her at once. She was so focused on stability, on aligning like she had always done, but what about what she wanted for once? Yes, Billy was a risk, a huge risk, but she got the feeling that he was risking his own personal code for her. He had done it over and over.

Every interaction, every glimpse of his eyes directly into her soul, every call out of what she hid from him was a risk of his own personal pillars. He knew she hid, knew she was scared, but he kept pushing the cracks in her mask to expose her. He saw her in the locker room. He looked at her with recognition and an acceptance of the parts of herself she didn’t even want to accept. No one else had seen her so deeply. No one else had fought for her, all of her, like he did. And as it all clicked - his outbursts, his confident facade, his hidden emotions that only she saw, that only he allowed her to see - she realized that she saw him too.

They had an unspoken understanding that no one else in Hawkins could come close to. They both hid, but they didn’t need to hide around each other. They were both scared - scared of letting people in to see who they really were - but they didn’t need to be scared around each other. They gravitated to each other because they were the only other person who could possibly understand the complexities of hiding and simultaneously being in the eyes of so many. Being scared but putting on a brave face to create the lives they deserved. He had sacrificed the crumbling of his own pillars to get her to open up to him, to build her up, to build her new pillars. Through it all, she realized he wasn’t a risk. Billy was safe.

She gasps, looking at Steve abruptly.

“I need you to do me a favor.”

He shakes his head, taken aback. “Yeah, sure. What is it?”

“I need to talk to Billy. If I pull him away from his date, could you distract her so she doesn’t miss him?” She looks over Steve’s shoulder, finding Billy’s date wasn’t paying attention to them like Billy was. She shifts back to Steve. “Oh, and if anyone asks where I am, don’t say I’m with Billy!”

Steve narrows his eyes for a fraction of a second before he nods. “Yeah, I can do that. Wait-“ He turns around before turning back to her. “Vicki Carmichael? Really?” He sighs dramatically. “She’s almost as conceited as Carol, and that’s really saying something.”

She grabs his hands in hers, holding them together. “Please, Stevie. You know I don’t ask much from you.” She gives him her best pleading expression.

He rolls his eyes. “I hope you know how much I love you. I wouldn’t distract Vicki Carmichael for anyone.” He gives her a dramatic look, hands on his hips and all.

“Mhmm. Sure Stevie.” She smirks at him.

“I’m serious!”

She laughs, skating to his side to make looking for Billy easier. Much to her luck, they were skating toward her and Steve. When she locks eyes with him, she tilts her head to the entrance quickly and raises her eyebrow. He nods once before turning to his date, Vicki. When she sees him skate away, leaving her alone, she looks at Steve quickly.

“There’s your cue!” She goes to skate off, but he grabs her arm, stopping her.

“Be careful, alright?” She looks up to his serious gaze, nodding. He nods in return. Before she leaves, she smiles at him.

“Thank you, Steve!” As she skates away, she hears his voice call out.

“You owe me!” She looks over her shoulder with a smile to see Steve approach Vicki, already turning on his charm. Vicki comes to a stop, smiling up at him. That was easier that I thought.

She makes quick work of leaving the rink, taking her skates off, and putting her sneakers back on. Giving the rink one last look to make sure none of her friends are looking after her, she quickly jogs to the entrance. The cool, December air hits her face as she looks on either side of the building for Billy. Thinking he must be on the more secluded side, she jogs over, finding him standing under the shadows.

Just like on Monday, he was biting his nails with wide eyes, but he was pacing and holding a lit cigarette. One hand held the cigarette, bringing it to his lips every so often, the other at his lips. His head snapped up when he heard the gravel shift under her feet. Dropping the mostly unsmoked cigarette to the ground, he walks toward her as she walks to him.

“What is it?”

“What are you really doing here, Billy? Do I just have really bad luck and you just happen to show up where I am, or is it something else?” When she finishes speaking, they stand face to face, both breathing heavily, their breath visible in the cold air.

He furrows his eyebrows, but he smiles. “I overheard you all talking about coming here when I passed your table in lunch. I figured you couldn’t ignore me on skates.”

She sucks in her breath. “You came to see me?”

He nods, putting his hands in his pockets. “Yeah.”

She shakes her head. “But why did you bring a date?”

He chuckles. “It’d be a little weird to show up by myself, wouldn’t it?” His gaze is relaxed, his eyes easy.

“I guess you’re right.” She looks down at her feet, trying to sort out her mind. He really did mean what he said on Monday. He wanted to show her attention, going out of his way and even bringing a date he wasn’t interested in just to see her. Meanwhile, Eddie had barely spoken to her. Her heart flutters at the realization. Billy’s voice interrupts her thoughts.

“Do you want me to leave?”

“No!” She jerks her eyes back to his, seeing a trace of shock. She sighs, shaking her head in an attempt to clear her mind. “I’m just trying to process my thoughts.” She lets out a half chuckle. “I’m more confused than ever.”

He takes his hand out of his pocket, grabbing hers to pull her toward a nearby bench. Sitting so close his knee brushes hers, he faces her.

“What’s going on?” He looks at her so intently - so clearly that she knows he’s trying to understand what she’s thinking. She flicks her eyes between his for a few beats before blurting out-

“You’re intense.”

He laughs at that, dropping his head, before looking at her again in amusement. “Hmm. Not used to that with Munson?”

“Not usually.” She pauses, voice becoming quieter. “Tonight was different though. He got angry in a way I’ve never seen before. It didn’t suit him. It was almost like he resented me.” The words came out before she could really stop them. She didn’t intend on telling him any of that, but she found the words just spilled out around him.

His eyes soften as his hand finds its way onto her thigh, squeezing gently. “Do you want to talk about it?”

Her eyes shift down to his hand before flicking back up to his eyes. Her own eyes widen slightly, realizing he had just unmasked another of her emotions without even trying. Everything was so easy with Billy - emotions, vulnerability, the way her body reacted to his, she felt she could just be with him, just like she realized in the rink. She didn’t have to hide around him.

Shaking her head, she places her hand on top of his. “No, I didn’t come out here to talk about Eddie.” He looks at her in confusion, but she speaks again before he can. “I want to understand you, Billy.”

He tilts his head. “What do you want to know, doll?”

She looks down at their hands again, tracing small patterns on the top of his hand with her index finger. “I don’t know what to do with you, Billy. You’re hot and cold. You’re sweet and cruel. You’re here and there. I can’t ever read you.” Her eyes meet his.

He chuckles, pulling his eyes from hers. “I have a lot going on in my head. All the time.” His voice gets quieter. “More than most people realize.”

She watches him intently. She knew there was a hidden meaning behind his statement, but she didn’t want to pry past what he was willing to talk about. She recognized her own secrets in the phrase and knew it was something he could only reveal when he was ready. She could at least ask him about something he could answer. Her voice lowers in volume as well.

“Can you tell me what your intentions are with me?”

His eyes quickly shift back to hers, searching her for any sarcasm, any remnant of the cat and mouse game they’ve been playing. When his eyes see her sincerity, his lips part.

“I want to be the one to make you smile.”

Her heart skips a beat. Such a simple answer, but she could see the intensity behind his meaning. Her eyes search his.

“Why?”

His eyes never leave hers as a soft smile spreads his lips. “Because you see me.” Her breath hitches. I was right. His tongue darts out to lick his lips. “You see past all the bullshit, you see past the persona. You see me for who I am at my core. You make me feel good, for once.”

Her brows draw in again. “But Billy you are good.”

He chuckles weakly, breaking their eye contact as he tilts his head down again. “No, Bunny. I’m not.”

She thinks back to Steve’s comment from earlier - I don’t know what he’s capable of, but I know how violent he was that night. There may be more to him than she knew, more than she maybe wanted to know. But she knew one thing to be true.

“I don’t know everything there is to know about you, but I do know how you make me feel.” His eyes meet hers once more. She can see the vulnerability in them, the pain he was holding onto. “I feel safe around you, Billy. Warm. Protected.” She smiles, showing him her reassurance. “You make me feel that way.” She chuckles, tilting her head a bit. “You might get a little angry sometimes.” She brings her other hand to squeeze his jaw, pushing his lips together as he had done to her earlier that week. “You definitely have a mean mouth on you.” She releases his jaw with a little shake, causing him to smile. “But you’re good, Billy Hargrove. You’re good to me.”

He holds her gaze for a moment, squeezing her thigh again. “Thank you, Bunny.”

She nods, a smile still on her face. “Can I ask you another question?”

He nods. “Always.”

She bites her lip as she ponders her phrasing, letting it snap back once she has it. “If you feel this way about me, why did you mess around with so many other girls?”

He shrugs, looking away again. “It was just a dumb ruse to try and get you jealous enough for you to admit how you really felt about me.” He chuckles. “It kind of worked.”

She sighs gently, a stream of her breath blowing in front of her. “But there were so many girls, Billy. You let them put their hands all over you, you kissed them, you slept with them.”

“It was a few kisses in public, that’s it. I wanted you to be jealous.” She sees him roll his eyes. “Not very good of me, I know. But kissing doesn’t mean anything.”

She shakes her head. “But it was more than kissing. They all said that you slept together.” She continues to watch him, but he keeps looking at their hands, busying himself by rubbing circles on her thigh.

“Because I told them to.”

She jerks back slightly. “What?”

“I told them to say they slept with me. They could all use the popularity from the rumor, and I could make you jealous. It was a win-win.” He shrugs again. “But I didn’t sleep with any of them. I didn’t touch them.”

“But you said-“ She pauses, trying to process what he was telling her. “You made all those comments.”

“I lied.”

“Why? They all practically threw themselves at you. You could’ve had anyone you wanted, so why didn’t you?” She tilts her head, trying to meet his eyes, but he keeps his head down.

“Because they weren’t you.”

Her heart flutters as she inhales sharply. No wonder seeing her with Eddie in his van had upset him so much. She had thought she was just doing what he had been doing with all of those girls when in reality he had just been putting on a front. All of that time had been about her. The realization had taken her breath away.

She shakes her head, once again trying to understand this new information. “I don’t- I don’t understand.”

He sits up then. “I like you! Goddamnit, I like you, Bunny.” His eyes finally meet hers with a desperation that captures her gaze. “And I don’t admit when I like someone. I don’t chase after someone. I don’t fucking let people see me how you do. But everything about you makes me want to go against my own rules.” His eyes switch between hers at a fast rate, almost matching his quick words. “You match me. You challenge me. You’re not intimidated by me. You see through it all. You make me want to let you in, and it scares the shit out of me because I don’t do that. I’ve never wanted to do that, but I’d do anything for you to see me, even if you hate me, just as long as you keep seeing me.” He swallows, taking a breath. His voice gets so quiet she almost doesn’t hear him. “I trust you.”

She sits in a trance - her hand still over his hand on her thigh, their legs touching, her eyes completely captured by his. Her lips part, her breath coming out in small puffs of steam between them. She was right. He had felt just as seen by her as she had by him, but his confession of trust went beyond anything she imagined. An overwhelming wave of sadness courses through her then, settling in her chest as her heart sinks and sinks. He must see it in her eyes.

“Why do you look so sad?” His voice is still quiet. His cheeks flushed from either his confession or the cold. He looked so soft, so vulnerable, and she knew she was the only one to see him this way.

“Why do we only ever talk like this when I’m fighting with Eddie?” Her voice comes out in a whisper as she finds herself unable to look away from his gaze. She feels her eyes well up with tears, a single tear falling down her cheek before she can stop it.

He tilts his head ever so slightly, his eyes tracing the tear falling down her cheek. “I don’t know.”

“I don’t want you to be just someone I fall back on when I’m mad at him.” She sniffles, trying to fight back the other tears - not wanting to ruin his confession by crying. His hand cups her cheek, wiping away the tear with a gentle swipe of his thumb. She swears his eyes hold the same sadness as hers.

“Then don’t let me be.”

She closes her eyes, letting the other tears fall. He immediately moves his hand behind her neck and pulls her against his chest. Her arms slide under his jacket to wrap around his waist. He completely envelopes her in a warm, secure hug. She feels his warmth seep through her clothes, warming up her body. She started shaking before she realized it, not aware of how cold she had gotten through their talk. His hand rubs along her back to calm her, the other swirling light circles on the back of her neck and into her hair.

“I’m sorry, Billy.”

He shushes her. “You don’t have anything to be sorry for.” His body vibrates with a low chuckle. “I’m the one who had to fall for a girl in a relationship.”

Her fingers mindlessly trace the outline of his side under his jacket. “Everything is so complicated. I don’t want to hurt Eddie, but I don’t want to fight how I feel about you anymore. It’s too hard.”

Just like he had in the movie theater, he rests his head against hers with a hum. “Is that you admitting you like me too?”

She giggles, a soft sound. “Yeah, Billy. I like you too.” Even though she can’t see it, she can feel his smile. She shifts closer to him, getting lost in his warmth. “I don’t know where to go from here. Eddie and I aren’t in a good place, but I can’t just leave when things are so tense.”

“I mean, you could, but you’re a good girl.”

She scoffs. “Billy…”

Their bodies shake from his laugh. “Sorry.” He nuzzles his head against hers. “You just need to do what you feel is right, whatever that is.” He squeezes her against him, his voice hitting that same quiet volume from earlier. “Just don’t shut me out again.”

“I won’t.”

They fall into a comfortable silence as they cling to each other, holding onto their newfound confessions just as much as they hold onto each other. After a few minutes, reluctantly, she pulls back.

“As much as I don’t want to, we should probably go back inside. We’ve been out here for a while.” She looks up at him to see he’s still smiling.

“You’re probably right. You look cold.” He cups her cheek, rubbing his thumb across her skin. Without meaning to she leans into his touch, a soft smile spreading her lips. “We shouldn’t go in at the same time. Wouldn’t want Munson and your friends to see us walk in together, right?” He raises an eyebrow, the familiar challenge present in the motion.

“I think I’d like to keep you as my little secret for now.” She winks, which makes him laugh.

“I’d love to be your secret, Bunny.” She fights the urge to get lost in his bright blue eyes - eyes that reflect a happiness she’s not sure she’s seen before.

She blinks, suddenly remembering. “Oh, I had Steve distract your date so we could have some privacy. They might still be together. I’m not sure.” She shrugs.

He tilts his head as he stands, holding his hand out for her. She accepts, letting him pull her off the bench. “I’m sure he’s having fun with that. She’ll go for anyone that looks in her direction.”

“You chose her as your date. You only have yourself to blame.”

He shrugs a shoulder, unbothered. “Whatever it takes to see you.” She smiles up at him, smug. “I’ll let you go first.” She nods, going to walk away, but his hand pulls her back against him. “One more thing.” He pulls her in for another hug.

One hand slides around her waist, while the other coils through her hair, holding her close. His fingers had pulled out some loose hair with how much he had played with her hair in the past few minutes, messing up the bottom of her ponytail. He buries his head in her neck, wrapping her completely with his presence. She melts into his touch, trying to memorize the feel of his back beneath her fingers, the muscles in his chest against her cheek. She inhaled his scent - cigarettes, cologne, and a natural pine scent that made her dizzy in the best way.

“I’ll see you soon, yeah?” She nods against him, and he hums in response. Shifting slightly, she feels his lips press against the top of her head in a sweet, gentle kiss. “Don’t want to let you go, but I know I’ve got to.” She hums in agreement, too lost in his scent and his warmth to think of a response. “You’re cold. I’d give you my jacket, but that would be too obvious.”

She tugs at his jacket, on the inside, against his back. “Would love your jacket one day, B.”

“You can have it, Bunny.” He kisses her head again before bringing his hands to cup her cheeks, pulling away slightly. He leans in, so she closes her eyes, thinking he’s going to kiss her. But her eyes pop open when his lips peck her nose quickly, softly. “Now go before I steal you away.”

He drops his hands, knowing if he didn’t she would let him steal her. And she would. Biting the inside of her cheek to bring her back to reality, she keeps his gaze as she backs away, smiling softly. She didn’t break eye contact until the wall of the building forced their eyes apart. She let out a breath, content as she walked to the entrance.

Making her way back in the rink, she looked around for her friends, finding them sitting at the same booth as earlier with a pizza on the table. Everyone was there, except Steve, who was sitting with Vicki where Billy had sat with her earlier. As soon as Steve saw her, he leaned into Vicki, likely to give her some excuse about how he had to leave. He was up and out of that booth before she could flash him a grin.

Nancy waves her over. “Bunny! There you are! You missed the pizza.” Steve makes it to the booth before her. Nancy turns to him. “You did too.”

She jogs over, sliding next to Nancy, still avoiding Eddie. “Sorry!”

Eddie watches her. “Where did you go?”

“I started feeling sick, so I went outside. I think I got too hot, but once I cooled down, I felt better.” He nods, moving on.

Her eyes dart to the door to see Billy walk back in just as Robin speaks. “Well there’s only two pieces left. You better hurry or Stevie boy’s going to take them both.” She turns to Steve, looking past Eddie who sits between them, with a smile.

“I will too.” Steve eyes the pizza, licking his lips.

“No way!” She grabs a slice, taking a bite before Steve can make a move. As soon as she grabs her slice, he grabs the last one, taking a bite just as quickly.

Nancy looks at Bunny. “So we know where you disappeared to.” She turns to Steve. “Did you enjoy your impromptu date instead of spending time with your friends?” She narrows her eyes lightheartedly.

Steve looks at Bunny before shifting to Nancy with a laugh. “What can I say? I saw a pretty girl all alone. I couldn’t let that stand could I?” Most of the table laughs at his comment. She was so thankful Steve was fast on his feet, able to cover for her with no hesitation.

“You really know how to pick them.” Robin dramatically widens her eyes, looking after Vicki. “Oh, I see her actual date has returned. Sorry, Stevie.” She feigns sympathy toward him.

Steve shrugs his shoulders. “I guess Billy wins again.” Little did he know.

Wiping her fingers from the pizza grease, Bunny throws her napkin on the pizza tray, signaling she was finished. Steve releases a content sigh, finishing his slice soon after her.

“That seems like a good place to call it, wouldn’t you agree?” Jonathan leans forward, his arm still around Nancy, as he looks at everyone else to gauge how they feel. Eddie and Robin nod at the same time.

“All that skating wore me out!” Robin stretches. “But it was fun! Good idea guys!” She smiles at Nancy and Jonathan who seem happy the night had gone well.

“Shall we take the skates back?” Eddie asks.

Everyone nods, shifting out of the booth. All of them had removed their skates already, so they picked them up off the floor. Nancy and Jonathan were the first to head to the counter. Robin took hers and offered to take Steve’s. Eddie looks after Bunny.

“I can take your skates for you.”

She smiles quickly. “Thanks, Eddie.”

He takes her skates, walking off with Robin. Steve turns to her as soon as they are out of earshot.

“What the hell took you so long? Do you know how hard it is to hold a conversation with someone who only wants to talk about herself?” His voice is quiet, but full of his dramatic flair.

“I’ll tell you later.” She smiles up at him, noticing Billy and Vicki walking toward them. They must have returned their skates already because she no longer saw them. “Thank you though. Seriously.” She gives him her best appreciative look.

As Billy passes them, leaving with his date, he makes it a point to show her he’s not touching Vicki, keeping space between his guiding hand and Vicki’s back. Her eyes shift from his to his hand and back to his eyes, lips parting in realization. He winks once she realizes before walking out the door. She lets out the tiniest chuckle under her breath.

“Well, you look happier.” Steve’s voice makes her turn her attention to him again, smiling wider.

“I am.” Their other four friends turn from the counter to join them again. She catches Eddie’s eyes as he walks toward her, lowering her voice. “At least until I have to drive home with Eddie.”

Steve turns to face the group as well, muttering under his breath. “Call me if you need me.” She nods ever so slightly.

“You ready to head back to yours?” Eddie asks her once he reaches her.

She nods. “Yeah, I’m feeling pretty tired too.”

He chuckles slightly. “Same, actually.”

They all say their goodbyes, reiterating how much they enjoyed the night and how they were looking forward to the party next week. Leaving the rink, she steps back out into the cold night air. She didn’t see Billy’s Camaro anymore, so she knew he had already left. She gave one last wave to Nancy and Jonathan before stepping into Eddie’s van.

As soon as he closed his door, tension from their earlier fight filled the space. They hadn’t spoken to each other at all at the rink. In fact, they had went out of their way to avoid each other, keeping as much distance between them as they could. She stared out the passenger window as he drove her back to her house, watching as buildings passed which eventually turned into trees.

The drive home turned out to be just like the rink - filled with silence - except they couldn’t avoid each other in his van. As Eddie pulled into her driveway, she unbuckles the seatbelt, preparing to get out. He clears his throat, which stops her. He looks at her timidly.

“Do you want me to come up with you? We could smoke a joint and talk about what happened earlier?” So he knows he went too far? The thought brought her a shred of comfort, but it wasn’t enough to replace the hurt that he had already caused. She couldn’t really get passed the fact Eddie had reacted that way, looked at her that way, in the first place.

“No.” She shakes her head, a soft smile spreading her lips. “I think I’d just like to be alone tonight.” She meets his eyes, seeing a trace of sadness from her comment. He looked hurt almost.

“Are you sure?”

She nods. No. “Yeah.”

She didn’t really want to be alone, especially at her house, but she didn’t want to be around Eddie either. He pulls his eyes from hers, nodding with a slump of his shoulders as he looks down at his lap.

“Okay. You can always call me if you change your mind.”

She turns her head to look at him. She didn’t want to feel bad for him. After all, it was his actions that caused this riff between them, but she didn’t like seeing him sad. It just wasn’t him. When he doesn’t meet her eyes again, she opens the van door, stepping out. Turning around, she offers him a smile.

“Thank you for driving me home, Eddie.”

He looks at her, nodding with a weak smile. “Anytime.”

She holds his gaze for a moment longer before closing the door and walking away. She knew she should have said “I love you,” but she just couldn’t bring herself to say it. She kept seeing that look he gave her on the way to the rink in her mind. Deep down, if she was really honest with herself, it didn’t feel right to say after her confession to Billy…

Stepping inside her house, she noticed her father still wasn’t home. He had left before she did and still wasn’t back. They were at the rink for a few hours too. She let her mind drift to Eddie’s earlier comments. Maybe I am overreacting. Maybe there is something wrong with the heat pump. But as soon as she thought that, she shook her head. No. He didn’t know anything about heat pumps. Why wouldn’t he have just called someone if that was the case? The same sinking feeling from earlier settled in her stomach as she climbed the stairs to get to her room.

Closing her door, she moves to her window, looking out to see Eddie had driven off. She walks to her bed, collapsing on it with a sigh. What a night. She swore she felt every emotion available to a human in the span of a few hours, and she was exhausted. Her eyes catch sight of her phone, and she felt her heart rate speed up.

Yes, she had been happy with Billy. He had made her happy, had made her forget about Eddie and her parents. But being back in her room, all she could think about was the phone call and what she heard and knew to be true. It made her sick.

Sitting up with a start, she opens the drawer of her bedside table, picking up a small slip of paper - Billy’s number. He had written it for her when he had dropped her off at her house one day, telling her he wanted her to have his number in case she might need it. She thinks it was the third time he had driven her home, back when they had first started getting to know each other and he had given her a glimpse into what he was like away from his persona.

She holds onto the paper, running her thumb across his writing. She debates what it would mean if she called him in her mind, running through the pros and cons. Of course she wanted to see him, but she didn’t want to make it a habit to go to him when she was upset with Eddie. Sighing, she picks up her phone, dialing a number. She puts the slip of paper back in her drawer before shutting it. Her leg shakes as she waits for the other line to pick up.

“Hello?” Steve’s voice comes through the line.

“Could I spend the night at yours?” She pauses, her voice lowering. “I really don’t want to be at mine tonight.”

“Of course. Be there in 15?” He doesn’t hesitate. She hears him ruffling around on the other end, no doubt getting up to leave.

“Thanks, Steve.” She smiles.

“See you soon.”

She hangs up the phone, sighing in relief. She quickly packs a small bag as she waits for him to get there, putting pajamas, a change of clothes, her brush, her toothbrush, toothpaste, deodorant, and moisturizer in the bag. If she needed anything else, Steve should have it. Making her way downstairs, she checks the clock on the wall, seeing ten minutes had passed. She quickly makes her way to the kitchen where she writes a note for her mom, telling her she came back home but decided to spend the night with Nancy. She didn’t want her to worry when she couldn’t find her in the morning.

Leaving the note in plain sight, she hears a car pull up. She quickly leaves the house, stepping outside in the same clothes she had on from earlier. Getting in Steve’s car, she saw he hadn’t changed either. He offers her a smile, which she mirrors, before he backs out of her driveway without a word. As they drive to Steve’s house, a comfortable silence falls between them. They don’t speak until they’ve made their way to his room even though neither of his parents are home.

She plops down on his bed, letting her bag fall to the floor. “Must be nice to have the house to yourself.”

Steve shrugs, leaning against his wall as he watches her. “Sometimes.” She nods, not saying anything. When she starts messing with her fingers, he speaks again, his tone gentle. “Is the reason you didn’t want to be at your house because of your parents or Eddie?”

She shrugs one shoulder, bending her index finger with her other fingers. “Maybe both?” Her eyes shift away from her fingers, but still don’t meet Steve’s. “More so my parents.”

Steve nods, which she doesn’t see. “Do you want to talk about it?”

She looks up at him then, eyes soft, worried. He tilts his head at her look, smiling in reassurance. Sighing, she tells him what had happened before Eddie picked her up - the phone call, what she heard, her suspicions, her concerns about her mom. She also tells him some more specifics about what Eddie said, wanting him to have the full picture.

“And he seemed sad when I told him I wanted to be alone, but he’s the one who made me want to be alone! Why would I want to spend time with someone who could say those things to me and then ignore me the rest of the night?” Her hands fall in her lap when she finishes speaking, her frustrations showing through her hand gestures.

Steve nods once she finishes, pushing himself off the wall to come sit on his bed with her. “No, that’s valid. He was an asshole.” He shrugs like it was simple. “From Eddie’s point of view, it might come across like your concerns aren’t that big of a deal, and he doesn’t understand why it affects you so much when you still have both of your parents in your life. He probably views it as an improvement from his own life.” She nods as she listens to him, his words making sense.

“But,” Steve’s eyes flick to hers. “From your perspective, something I get too as an only child, your parents are all you have. When they’ve been together your whole life and you’ve had this happy family, when that’s threatened, and by your own dad, you have every right to be upset. You have every right to worry, especially when you know what’s going on before your mom does. That’s a heavy weight to bear.”

“But he’s an only child too.” She furrows her eyebrows, clearly trying to understand better. “You would think he would see it in the same way. But maybe where his parents have been out of his life for so long, it’s different.”

Steve nods. “I would say so. I see it like you because I’m in a similar boat.” He scoffs. “Only my mom has started going with my dad on his business trips since she doesn’t trust him to be alone.” He motions around his room with his arms, an annoyed grimace on his face. “And that’s why I’m increasingly stuck here, alone.” His arms drop. “My dad is too concerned about chasing every young intern he sees, and my mom is too paranoid to leave his side for them to actually care about spending time with their son.”

“I’m sorry, Stevie.” She offers him a warm smile, which he returns.

“Our parents suck, but at least we have each other.” He pulls her in for a side hug, squeezing her shoulder with his hand.

“And your empty house that lets us spend the night together.” She chuckles.

“True that!” He stands then. “You can spend as much time here as you want while you work through everything.” He starts to head to his bedroom door, but turns back to her when he’s halfway there. “And if you want to keep talking through it, we can, but I’m going to go make us some popcorn. That one slice of pizza didn’t cut it.”

She laughs before standing as well. “I feel better now, so I’d rather not talk about my parents or Eddie.” Steve nods, turning to go make their popcorn.

She busies herself by getting ready for the night. Borrowing some of Steve’s face wash, she takes off her makeup. She makes quick work of brushing her teeth, moisturizing her face, taking her ponytail down, and brushing her hair out. She had just changed into her pajamas, a matching long sleeved pants set when she runs into Steve in the hallway. He was holding a large bowl of popcorn, several smaller bags of junk food, and two coca-colas. She laughs before grabbing some things to help him carry them into his bedroom.

Once they’re back in his bedroom, they settle on a movie and began digging into all the snacks he brought. After a period of quiet eating while the movie played in the background, Steve suddenly speaks.

“What about Billy?”

She turns to him, confused. “What?”

“You said you didn’t want to talk about your parents or Eddie, but what about Billy?” He picks up some popcorn, turning his head to hers. “I think you owe it to me to tell me if my sacrifice was worth it.” He stuffs his mouth with the popcorn he picked up as he waits for her response.

She laughs at his action, tilting her head in resign. “I guess I did say we would talk about it later.”

“Mhmm.” Steve makes the sound with his mouth closed, still chewing his popcorn.

She pauses, trying to decide how much she wanted to tell him. She told Billy she wanted to keep him a secret, and she did. If she told Steve what they confessed to each other, he wouldn’t be her secret.

“We just settled the animosity between us.” She shrugs simply. It wasn’t a lie. They had definitely done that.

Steve looks at her, unconvinced. “Really? That’s it?” She widens her eyes with a shake of her head. “You’ve got to give me more than that.”

She rolls her eyes, playfully. “Well, it turns out that he had kinda sorta been using those girls to make me jealous.” She risks a glance at Steve, finding he was listening to her intently. She elaborates. “All of those rumors turned out to be rumors. He hadn’t actually done anything with any of them.”

He furrows his brows. “And you believe that?”

She nods without hesitation. “I do.”

Steve looks up at his ceiling, his mouth open as he processes what she had said. “Why the hell would he do that?”

“Is it so hard to believe that he wanted to make me jealous?”

“No, but making up rumors? He’s not someone who seems like he keeps it in his pants very much.” Steve chuckles, looking at her once more.

She feels the back of her neck get hot as she starts to get defensive over Billy. “Well he did, Steve. And I believe him.” Her voice is sharp, making his eyes widen.

“Okay.” He puts a hand up as if surrendering. “I believe you.”

She sighs, her defensiveness easing off. “I’m sorry. I just think he shows me a different side of himself than he shows everyone else. I still don’t really know why.” She shrugs one shoulder with a light laugh. “But I know enough about him to know when he’s being honest. And he was tonight.” She can’t help the smile that spreads her lips. “He told me he trusts me, Steve.” She looks at him, the trace of her smile still on her lips, but her eyes hold a severity that conveys the weight of her words. “The way he said it, how quiet he was, I get the feeling that he doesn’t feel that way about a lot of people.”

Steve jerks his head back. “Holy shit.” He closes his eyes, moving his head to the side. “I had no idea you two had gotten so close.” His eyes open again, realization shining across them. “I get what you mean now when you said you knew he wouldn’t hurt you earlier. You all have this, I’ll say it,” He pauses, holding out a hand for emphasis with wide eyes. “Weird, bond. I don’t understand it, but I do know this.” He looks at her with more earnest intention, dropping his earlier playfulness. “The difference in your mannerisms, your body, your whole being, before and after you talked to Billy was night and day. Whatever he said, he made you happy, Bunny.” He tilts his head back and forth. “I may not like the guy, but as long as he makes you smile like he did tonight, I’ll tolerate him.”

She rolls her eyes, lightheartedly. “Thanks for your permission, Steve.”

He nods once, pleased with himself. “You’re so welcome.”

They turn their attention back to the movie, munching on more popcorn and sweet treats. As the movie plays, she thinks back to Billy’s confession. I trust you. She knew that phrase meant more to him than the average person. She didn’t know why - not yet - but she did know that to be a fact. The same warmth that she had come to associate with Billy filled her chest, squeezing her heart in the most satisfying way.

He trusted her. She might be the only girl in Hawkins who could say that. And she smiled at the thought. Big and uncontained. Steve’s words flashed through her mind then as her cheeks hurt from the persistence of her smile, and she realized they matched Billy’s.

I want to be the one to make you smile.

As she sat in Steve Harrington’s bed, watching a movie and trying to get her mind off of her parents and Eddie, she realized that Billy was already keeping his word.

She was smiling, and she was smiling because of him.