Chapter Text
It’s the middle of the night, a red glow is filtering through the curtains, and Nancy once again finds herself naked in Steve Harrington’s bed, watching him leave.
He’s sat at the end of the mattress, leaning to pull on his discarded socks, his shirt still missing in the rubble of the evening’s activities. If he knows she’s awake, he doesn’t acknowledge it, which leaves Nancy to stare at the expanse of his back- at the freckles she can spot even in the dark, and the angry marks she’s left against his shoulder blades.
The sight isn’t unfamiliar.
Steve never sticks around for long these days. And wishing he would stay is a solitary, selfish pastime of Nancy’s.
She sits up onto her forearms, and the crinkling of the sheets scrapes the quiet air. As a consequence of the ‘earthquake’ damages and a lack of staff at the power plant, they've all been encouraged to not run their power at night. So with nights comes a stagnant silence, the kind that makes Nancy’s thoughts yell just that much louder. Steve knows that; it’s why he’s spent the summer leaving the window open for her, letting the roaring buzz of the cicadas fill the dark corners.
But it’s nearing August now, the cicadas are gone, and that stagnant silence is creeping in.
Alerted by the rumpling of the bedsheets, Steve peers over his shoulder at her.
“Hey there.” He locates his shirt at last, and stands to face her as he pulls it on slowly, peacocking at any opportunity.
“Hey,” Nancy rises onto her palms and lets the covers fall around her waist, because she can play this game too. “Duty calls?”
“Yeah,” Steve answers, hands on hips. “Hop still wants eyes on the school.”
Nancy gives a faint nod, even though it’s bullshit. The high school is a dead end- if Sullivan’s men are operating out of there, they haven’t made any considerable moves in or out in the past three weeks. Or, at least, not while they’ve been watching. They’ve moved surely, but Hopper isn’t ready to give up the only lead they’ve had in weeks. And neither is Steve, it seems.
(If not simply for the excuse to get away from Nancy).
“What time is it?”
“Uhh,” he glances down at his watch. “Almost midnight. You should go back to sleep, I’ll drive you home in the morning.”
“I could come with you.”
She immediately regrets saying it as a strange look crosses Steve’s face.
“You want to join a stakeout?”
“I want to see you.”
Steve’s befuddled expression deepens and he gestures vaguely towards Nancy’s naked form. “I think we’re seeing plenty of each other lately.”
Discouraged, Nancy peels the covers away and goes in search of clothes- opting to walk right over her own discarded candy striper uniform and fetch a tee from Steve’s dresser.
Steve takes the action for what it is- a moody capitulation- and takes a step towards her, tutting as he starts, “Nance-“
“It’s fine, Steve.” She’s still rifling through the drawers, finding a pair of his boxers and pulling them on. “I know we don’t-” Nancy isn’t sure how to continue so she doesn’t, gives the dresser drawer a hearty shove instead.
As she does, she feels Steve’s arms circle her waist from behind, chin ducking to rest on her shoulder. Nancy melts into it instantly, like a mewling cat.
He doesn’t say anything, which is unlike him. She’s grown accustomed to his room-filling chattering, even aches for it now that he’s gone so miserably quiet. Maybe that’s just what the apocalypse does to a person.
(Maybe that’s what Nancy does to a person).
“Are we good?” Nancy practically whispers.
He plants a lingering kiss at the intersection of her neck and shoulder. “Of course we are. We’re always good.”
“It’s just-“ She’s all fits and starts tonight. None of her thoughts seem to stick with enough conviction to make it to the surface.
Are you good? That’s what she wants to ask him. Two months into this tryst of theirs, it’s probably naive of Nancy to say that it’s more than just physical between them. Maybe at first it was something different- something more intimate, more real. But just like the warm night air, just like this never ending war, Steve and Nancy have grown heavy and stagnant.
At her avoidance, Steve turns her around in his arms
“What are you thinkin’?”
(It’s ironic because it’s exactly what she wants to ask him).
Her hands have drifted unconsciously to the nape of his neck, tangling in his grown out hair. He sighs deeply as she tugs. As if in response, his hands creep under the hem of her shirt, settling on her waist and squeezing gently. Nancy gives a faint grin, hopes she isn’t completely ruining the moment as she asks, “What is this to you?”
“This?” Steve echoes.
“Us.”
He falters for a second, at a loss. But then his eyebrows draw together and he gives a little shake of his head.
“Nance, this is whatever you want it to be.”
It strikes a bitter chord.
“Don’t say that,” she admonishes quietly, turning her head away.
“What?”
“Don’t make it like.. like it’s all up to me. Like it’s all on my terms.”
“Isn’t it?”
He’s smirking as he says it. A joke, she knows, but a cold one nonetheless. She drops her hands to his chest, pushes just a little- enough that he knows she doesn’t really want him to let go.
“I’m sorry, I just… I didn’t know you wanted to discuss this.”
“Well we don’t need to hold a press conference or anything but a conversation would be nice.”
“You said you wanted to be quiet about it. Because of Jonathan and everything.”
That ‘and everything’ is doing a lot of heavy lifting. There are a lot of reasons as to why Steve and Nancy aren’t strolling hand in hand down the streets of Hawkins these days; her breakup with Jonathan lies about halfway down the list.
“I know. I know. I just-“ There it is again, the words that never seem to surface. The window is open but the cicadas aren’t buzzing and Nancy’s mind is fit to burst. “I just miss you.”
He softens, unwinds a hand from her waist and brings it up to cup her cheek, tilting her head up towards him. “I’m right here. I’m with you.”
He is, of course he is. She’s being silly. She's being selfish. She’s asking too much of him. He’s already giving her so much just by standing here, holding her like this. If she could learn to be satisfied for once-
“Come with me,” he’s saying with a grin. “Tonight. Pretend it was all my idea.”
Nancy hums. “I don’t know…” she teases. “You know how I feel about stakeouts.”
His juts out his bottom lip. “Then I’ll just have to beg.” And before she can even voice her protest, Nancy is being lifted up and deposited onto the bed, Steve descending down to tickle her sides and pepper her neck with sloppy kisses.
“Stop! Stop, Steve- I’ll go!” Nancy manages between breathless giggles. “I’ll go, I’ll go!”
“Good,” he breathes, balancing himself above her. He’s staring at her in that way he does, usually right before he says something gut-punchingly endearing. But he doesn’t say anything this time (he doesn’t anymore), he just kisses her. And it’s languid and deep and almost quiets the roaring in Nancy’s head. Almost.
They’ll pretend for another night. While they all sit and wait for the end of the world, Steve and Nancy can go on pretending.