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Heats are the fucking worst, Steve decides the moment he regains consciousness. He had apparently passed out after throwing up all over Robin, which he’ll apologize profusely for later, when he’s not feeling like he’s been simultaneously run over by a truck and stuck in a deep fryer.
His eyes burn but when they finally adjust he sees that he’s in the back of an ambulance. It’s probably the same one he’d just been sitting in, shoulder pressed into Robin’s and watching through the open back doors as Starcourt burnt to the ground. Robin is still here, which Steve privately and profusely thanks God for, but also she won’t stop yapping nervously at the paramedics about bodily fluids which is probably the last thing they need. She’s way too loud. Everything is.
And also the lights are way too goddamn bright, and his clothes are itchy on his body, and everything is so hot. So fucking hot. It’s sweltering. It feels like it’s pushing down on him physically, that’s how hot it is.
He passed his mandatory health classes and he’s heard all about heats, and although he probably didn’t internalize the information as much as he should have, he knows that heats mean heat, literally. That’s the first symptom: a fever so sudden and vicious that it’s all-consuming.
He still finds himself thinking that his teachers definitely undersold the whole thing. It's way more intense than what they'd described. He’s never felt this hot. He feels it in the tips of his ears, in his toenails, in his arm hairs, probably. He’s drowning in it.
“Holy shit,” he mumbles, trying his best to sit up with every intention of removing his shirt.
The IV that he hadn’t noticed in his arm swings precariously, pulling taut. He goes to yank it out but his arms are like jelly. The paramedic to his right gently stops him. The world appears to tilt then remains at an angle. Okay.
Robin is frenzied at his bedside, running on fumes and pure adrenaline and little else. Her eyes are wide and bloodshot and her uniform is so fucking grody. It’s probably mostly his fault.
“Holy shit, Steve, you’re awake! Thank God. Oh, Christ. Oh my god, did you know you’re presenting?”
“It’s so fucking hot,” he tells her. It’s all he can think about.
“Yeah, Steve, you’re in heat. Your first heat! Which is great, right? It’s awesome. You’re the first male omega in Hawkins in years. That’s crazy!”
“I don’t care,” he tells her, throat sore and rasping. “Think I’m gonna throw up.”
“Not again, please, I just cleaned my shoes.”
“They were ugly anyway.”
“Steve. You’re about to go into heat and you’re telling me that my shoes are ugly?” she asks incredulously, even as tears gather in her eyes. “You’re insane. How can you even think about that right now?”
“I don’t know,” he says, and then he begins to cry, which is a terrible experience for the both of them; Robin is abjectly horrified. “I don’t know. Will you stay with me?”
“Of course, dingus. Please stop crying, though.”
“I can’t,” he whines, voice breaking. “It’s so hot.”
Through the haze of it all he can smell her, he realizes: beautiful blank beta, just a hint of something lingering near the surface, clean and fresh like bar soap, sweet lavender. Nice. Almost soothing, despite everything.
“I know, I know, it won’t be forever, okay? It’ll only last a little while. Then you’ll be okay. Okay?”
“Okay,” he says, and then it gets hot again and everything goes black and he succumbs once again to the blanket of presentation and heat; succumbs to omega.
It’s a welcome relief.
Steve has discovered that Robin is nothing if not true to her word: she stays at Steve’s bedside until her parents come to literally drag her away.
By then the heat has petered out into something moderately more manageable, its intensity dulled by medication and IV suppressants, so he doesn’t completely meltdown when she tells him she has to go. She does give him a big hug that he ends up resisting only because it makes him hot all over again.
He can’t take it. It’s unbearable. Stuffy, oppressive, overwhelming. Thankfully the whole ordeal doesn’t last long, maybe a little longer than a day, and mostly it’s just pure fever. No more vomiting or upset stomach. His body aches, and he still can’t shake this fucking migraine. But then he’s okay. Mostly.
Time crawls.
Hours later he’s officially discharged and he feels more than a little wrong-footed on account of his organs having literally shifted around inside of him, and also the fact that his parents don’t pick up when he calls from the hospital payphone. It’s typical, really, and he shouldn’t be surprised at all, but still. It smarts in a way he can’t quite express, the sting of it lumping somewhere beneath his throat.
He finds himself sitting alone in the lobby of Hawkins Memorial with a goodie bag full of oral suppressants, hygiene products, and educational pamphlets that make him want to explode into a million little pieces.
Everything kind of does. The reality of everything that happened hits him like a freight train. Getting beat up, drugged, the Upside Down coming back, Hopper dying. He feels like he’s—falling, almost, with how fucking terrible it all is.
He sniffs. Shifts in his seat. He’d called Robin after his parents, but it’s too late in the night and she hadn’t picked up. The Hendersons did answer, thank God, although they were his last resort, mostly because Claudia Henderson is kind of like if anxiety was a person and Dustin cannot, for the life of him, keep a secret. Not that any of what Steve’s currently going through is a secret, but it’s just the principle of the thing.
He accepted the reality that he’ll just have to deal with being an omega and all of its accompanying struggles, and had done so to the soundtrack of Mrs. H loudly freaking out, then seemingly tossing the phone at Dustin’s big blockhead so that she could go get ready, and Dustin had yapped at him nervously until his mother needed his help finding her car keys.
It’s fine. It’ll be fine. He genuinely doesn’t care if the kids know. He doesn’t really care that anyone knows. He feels weirdly—detached from it all. He’s an omega. The first male one in Hawkins in who knows how long. And so what? He can’t find it within himself to care. Ultimately it won’t change anything: he’ll still be out of a job, without a mate, missing his parents or missing the impression of them, the idea of who they should be.
He wipes at his face. He’s tired and miserable and all he wants is to go home. He doesn’t even know where home is. Everything smells too much. The hospital staff are required to wear blockers but they still scent of hand sanitizer and rubbing alcohol and it's way too strong. There’s cleaning solution and blood, distantly, and then suddenly an acrid chemical-y scent that almost makes Steve gag, that’s how potent it is.
He turns his head and catches sight of a guy standing at the front desk.
He knows, immediately, that the man is an alpha. For one thing, the bad scent trails right up to him, but also Steve just knows, like, in his bones. It’s weird. He’s not used to this kind of knowing, the hard-wired kind that had apparently been dormant in his DNA until now.
He’s also never had to take in an alpha scent without the smokescreen of beta undesignation before, and it’s—a lot. The density of it, the way it permeates the entire room, filling his lungs and actively affecting his mood. It makes him perk up in a way that he kind of immediately hates. That kind of instinctual responsiveness, the way he can feel himself almost wanting to drift toward the source of the smell despite its awfulness is already insufferable.
The guy looks like he’s in the process of leaving, too. He also has a goodie bag clutched in his hand so he must have just presented, same as Steve. He’s tall and skinny and his hair is a long frizzy nightmare; he’s wearing beat up white Reeboks and a torn up black shirt and Steve somehow instantly recognizes him. Something heavy seeps into his stomach. It must be dread.
Of course the first alpha Steve encounters after his presentation heat is Eddie Munson. There’s probably some kind of deep irony embedded into the whole situation, but he didn’t really pay attention to that unit of English, and even if he did he’s not sure he’d even be able to put it all into coherent words over the pounding of his head.
Munson, as if sensing the eyes drilling into the side of his face, turns and catches sight of him. He stares at Steve from across the hospital lobby with his comically large black eyes. Now they’re both staring at each other. Eddie’s nose twitches, his nostrils flaring.
Well shit. Steve wonders how far he can run before Eddie catches him. The thought is so bizarre and out of left field that he has to shake his head to try to shoo it away.
The answer apparently doesn’t matter anyway, because Eddie’s already redirected himself, abandoning what was probably an important conversation with the very kind woman at the front desk to make his way over to Steve.
As soon as he’s within earshot, Steve is snapping, “What.”
It comes out a little sharper than he meant it to. But in his defense, once again, he’s had a pretty shitty week.
Eddie stops in front of him, looking—for the first time for as long as Steve has known of him—unsure of himself. He scratches at the back of his neck. “Jeez, Harrington, what’s got your panties in a twist? I just wanted to say hi.”
“Yeah, right. Sure you did.”
He draws his knees up to his chest, the balls of his feet resting on the edge of the chair. Kind of to protect himself. He never used to do that before. Christ.
Eddie nods. “Yeah, I did. Hi.”
“Hi,” Steve replies.
“Hi.”
“Okay, so we said hi. Did you need something else?”
“Yeah. Um, yeah. Well, not really, just—hey, what’s with the get-up?”
Steve’s still in his stupid sailor uniform. It’s tacky with dried blood.
“I worked at Scoops Ahoy in the mall,” he says bluntly.
Eddie processes this. “Well, shit.”
“Shit,” Steve echoes.
Eddie rocks back on his heels. Steve remains silent, which appears to make him nervous. He seems to be incredibly awkward, at least in Steve’s presence. It’s almost gratifying.
“You, uh, you mind if I join you?”
Steve’s head still hurts and he’d honestly rather just sit in silence for however long it takes for the Hendersons to get here. “Yes. Please don’t do that.”
“Cool.” Eddie sits anyway. He’s not very good at doing what he’s told. “I’ve had a pretty shitty past couple of days, too.”
“I can tell,” Steve says.
Beyond the scent of him, acridly alpha and unripe, he looks disheveled, unkempt. His hair’s a mess; his eyes are shadowed, smudged with dark purple circles, and his skin is pallid, peaked. His hands kind of tremble a little bit where they rest on his thighs. His legs are spread, encroaching on Steve’s space. It’s not good etiquette. What did Steve expect?
Eddie laughs. “What gave it away?”
“Everything.”
“Yeah, yeah. I must look rough, huh?”
The way he talks is kind of self-deprecating, and his eyes have gone far away like he’s reliving some unpleasant memory. Steve doesn’t like it. He unfurls his body a bit, scooches closer to Eddie even though it goes against his best judgment.
“Just a little,” he allows. “But so do I.”
Eddie turns to him, smiling guilelessly. His eyes, though, are probing. “Yeah, uh. You’re kinda bruised up there, huh?”
“Not sure it’s any of your business.”
Eddie is apparently way too perceptive. And just plain nosey. “You get into another fight?”
“Something like that.” His eyes skirt away to the greying linoleum flooring. “You should see the other guy.”
“He as fucked up as you?”
“Maybe.”
Eddie shifts, and then he makes a short, low noise, almost a grumble. It sends a shiver up Steve’s spine. Stupid omega instincts.
“I don’t think I like that,” Eddie says.
Steve turns back to him, confused. “What?”
Eddie opens his mouth and closes it. “Nothing. Nevermind. It’s—it’s none of my business. Whatever. It’s fine.”
“You’re so fucking weird,” Steve tells him.
He’s not even trying to be mean. He hopes his voice doesn't make it sound that way. He’s more—in awe, really. Eddie reminds him so much of the kids with the way he talks, the way he says whatever comes to his mind totally unfiltered, his utter lack of boundaries. Steve thinks they’d probably get along like a house on fire. It’s a terrifying thought.
Eddie nods. He digs a sharp canine into his lip, accidentally drawing blood and wincing. “Yeah. I am. So I’m just gonna ask. You’re an omega now?”
“Yup,” Steve confirms. No point in hiding it. “You?”
“Alpha.”
“I know,” Steve says stupidly. Obviously he knows. They both know each other’s designations. It’s clear as day with the way their scents are actively dampening the air. It’s dumb that they’re even having this conversation. “I don’t know why I asked.”
“Gotta say it out loud, I guess.”
“Yeah. Maybe.”
“Am I the first person you’ve seen since your presentation?”
“I mean, kind of.” Robin doesn’t count because she’d smelled normal, and she’s a beta, and she’s also, like, his Person—after everything they’ve been through together, he doesn’t think there’s a single thing about her that could throw him off. “You?”
“Yeah. I mean, my uncle was here for a bit but he had to run to work, so I haven’t really seen him since I’ve come out of it. Even then he’s a beta, so it’s not like he has much of a scent.”
“Right.”
It must be nice to have family like that. Family to visit you in the hospital when you experience what is essentially a second puberty, only this one happens all at once and is painful as hell. He has the Hendersons and he loves them but it's different. He hates that it’s different, but is just is.
Maybe Eddie can read the subtle shift in his scent, the way it falters, shading blue. That has to be why he asks, “You got someone coming?”
“Yes,” Steve says. “Soon, probably.”
“Oh. Cool.” Eddie kind of rubs at his nose a little, leans in, and sniffs rudely in Steve’s direction.
Steve huffs. “Um, excuse you.”
“Sorry,” Eddie says, not looking very sorry. “Not used to all this yet. You smell really good.”
Steve’s face heats. “You can’t just say that, weirdo.”
“Why not?”
“It’s rude.”
“I don’t really care about that. Unless it makes you uncomfortable. Then I’ll stop.”
How bizarrely considerate of him. Steve didn’t expect it. He’s only ever known Eddie to antagonize people and spout absolute nonsense while stomping along cafeteria tables. He expected the same treatment. He didn't know Eddie could be thoughtful like that. He can’t fathom why that thoughtfulness would extend to him.
“I’m not uncomfortable,” he admits.
“Good. You smell like maple syrup.”
“Jesus. Okay. That’s—that’s nice, I guess?”
He would be lying if he said he wasn’t curious about it from the moment he came out of his heat. But now he feels like he has to return the favor. He sniffs the air, scenting it a little. It’s still a lot. But Eddie’s scent is right there, and it’s strong as hell and it seems like maybe some of its unpleasantness is wearing off, fading into something that could be next to nice.
“You smell like—uh.” He hesitates.
Eddie laughs. “Don’t hurt yourself, Harrington.”
“New car smell, I think,” Steve mumbles. “Like vinyl and chemicals and leather. Or whatever. And my name is Steve.”
“I know,” Eddie says, and his voice is softer now, and so are his eyes, despite the tiredness. “Is it a good smell?”
Not really. Maybe. “Sure.”
“Cool. I’m Eddie.”
Steve just looks at him. Has he lost his mind? “I know who you are, Munson. You don’t think I know that? Think I’ve just been sitting here this whole time without knowing your name?”
“I don’t know,” Eddie says. “Didn’t want to assume.”
“It’s a small town.”
“Still.”
“We’re the same age, basically. I see you around all the time.”
“I’m a year older than you.”
“You keeping track?”
Eddie ignores this. “And we’ve never really talked before.”
“Yes we have,” Steve protests. “We talked all the time.”
“When?”
“We had fourth period chemistry together, like, a year ago,” Steve asserts. “When you showed up to class you sat directly behind me. I’d pass back your tests.”
He doesn’t know why he recalls that specific detail, that image: turning around with a stack full of C-average quizzes and handing them off to Eddie, who, depending on the day, would look either delightfully deranged or deeply depressed, and their fingertips would brush and regardless of whatever mood Eddie would be in, he’d still grin like a wolf and blow a kiss.
“Sheesh, alright,” Eddie says, cowed. “I know. I don’t know why I pretended like that didn’t happen.”
Steve sighs. “I think I get it. I don’t know. Everything’s weird, now.”
“Yeah.” Eddie shifts a little bit in his seat, sinking down low until his legs splay out. His sneakers scuff up the floor, squeaking loudly. He kind of cringes. It’s kind of funny.
He’s cute, Steve thinks absently. Objectively. He has a cute little button nose and dark deepset eyes, and he’s growing out what Steve vaguely remembers to be an unfortunate haircut, his hair kind of bouncing in frizzy curls around his face, a little bit like Nancy’s, only wilder. He wears long black jeans stubbornly in the midst of a particularly oppressive midwestern summer, his knees knobby where they peak out through the rips, and he’s got chunky silver rings sitting snugly against the base of each of his knuckles.
His fingers are nice. They’d feel nice, probably, pressed to Steve's skin, or—or—
Steve looks away from his hands and hopes his scent isn’t spiking too warm.
“Why’d you come talk to me?” he asks.
“Huh?”
“I really can’t imagine why. I look terrible,” Steve says. “I just had the worst week of my life and I’ve never treated you well.”
“Not like you treated me shitty. You were real nice passing back my tests.”
“I kind of ignored you, mostly. That’s not very nice.”
“You’re clearly in the midst of some serious character development, Harrington, I’m not holding it against you.”
“Like I said, it’s Steve. And you should. I just—I don’t get it.”
“You smell good,” Eddie says.
“You gotta stop saying that.”
“You smell like you’re meant to be in my life,” Eddie says anyway.
Steve actually laughs, that’s how crazy Eddie sounds.
“Right, sure, okay. Like fated mates?” He’s being sarcastic, but Eddie is silent, which is the opposite of reassuring. “Wait. Do you actually believe in all that?”
Eddie squirms. “Why’s that so surprising?”
“You just don’t really seem like the type. I figured you were more… you know.”
“Cynical?”
“Yeah.”
“I am. About most things. Are you saying you don’t believe in fated mates?”
Steve shrugs. “No, I’m not saying that,” he says. “I think I probably do.”
“Then why is it so crazy that I smelled you and came over here?”
“Because—because, Munson—“
“Eddie.”
“Eddie,” Steve says, and Eddie smiles wide and genuine, and Steve is starting to feel like a prey animal being backed into a trap. “I’m the first omega you met after your presentation, for one thing. I’m sure you’re still all hopped up on your crazy alpha hormones or whatever. I’m sure you’d feel this way about any omega you met.”
“Not sure if I should be offended by that. But anyway, nah, I don’t think so.”
“And also,” Steve continues, fired up, “I don’t think I can imagine a single world in which you and I are mates, much less fated mates.”
Eddie’s face twitches, then smoothes out. “Ouch. I’ll try not to take that one personally.”
“I didn’t mean—“ Frustrated, Steve huffs. “Not because of you, Munson. I don’t care about that. It’s because of me. Because of who I am.”
“Interesting,” Eddie says. “Hm. Continue.”
“No, this isn’t—we aren’t negotiating, right now.”
“Aren’t we?”
“No, Eddie. I don’t—you don’t get it. You wouldn’t want this.”
Eddie huffs a laugh, shaking his head. “How the hell would you know what I want?”
“I don’t, but I know what I want, and it’s all crazy. I want things.”
“Yeah. So do I. Who doesn’t?”
“I want ridiculous things.”
“Me too.”
“Listen. I want six pups.”
Here, Eddie pauses. “Come again?”
“You heard me.”
“Six?”
“Yeah.”
He whistles. “Well, it‘s a good thing you presented as an omega, huh? Now you can pop ‘em all out yourself instead of putting someone else through all that. Which—wait a minute, why am I assuming you’ll give birth to them? You could always adopt. There’s a ton of kids in foster care that need good parents.”
Steve has kind of lost track of the conversation. “Right.”
“Still, though, not exactly a dealbreaker. I’ll have you know that I happen to love kids.”
“You,” Steve says, giving him a once over, his eyes pausing on the stick-n-poke tattoos on his forearm and the belt he’s wearing with a creepy demon face etched into the buckle. “You, Eddie Munson, love kids.”
“Uh, yeah, Snooty, why’s that so hard to believe? I babysit all the time. Kids in the trailer park call me Mister Eddie, it’s the cutest thing.”
That is, much to Steve’s chagrin, unfairly cute. Steve pictures Eddie chasing kids around and then his cheeks get hot and something new happens in his belly which he will resolutely refuse to explore until he’s safely within the privacy of his own home.
“I make them PB&Js and we play board games together,” Eddie is saying. “It’s a good time.”
“Right, but would you ever want six of them?”
“Maybe,” Eddie says like a liar. “You don’t know my dreams.”
“Well, okay, so let’s assume that you do want just as many kids as I do. I think I also want to stay in Hawkins, probably. I’m gonna live here forever. Probably die here.”
“Yikes. Well, it’s a nice place once you get past all of the small town bullshit and bigotry. Not ideal, but, uh, I suppose I could see myself setting up shop here.”
“I come with a lot of strings attached, too. Like—my pack is a bunch of twelve year olds.”
“Getting a head start on the whole parenting thing, huh? I respect it.”
“Plus Robin Buckley now, I think?”
“Buckley from band? Nice. Love her. She’s a freaking weirdo.”
Steve laughs incredulously. “Coming from you?”
“Yeah, I’d know. King of the weirdos, right? Takes one to know one.” He pauses. “For the record, I must mention that you’re also a weirdo.”
He’s known that for at least two years now, so it’s not offensive in the slightest. “That’s exactly what I’m saying. Nothing about me,” he gestures to himself, his body, his stupid bloodied uniform and the essence of himself, now distinctly omega, “is at all normal. This—me—it just would never work out. And I don’t even know why I’m explaining myself to you, because I don’t even really know you—”
“Hey, Steve,” Eddie says, cutting him off completely. His voice is distinctly different now, a kind of calm and even that's actually honestly very hot in a way Steve doesn’t really want to examine. “Not that it’s a contest, but my dad’s in jail and I sell weed and I run the dorkiest club at school, probably, where we roleplay killing dragons and shit.”
Steve sniffs a little, wiping the beginnings of frustrated tears from his eyes. “I’m so fucking sick of D&D.”
“How can you—wait, how do you even know D&D? Have you played?” Eddie says, sitting up straight in his seat.
“Maybe. A little bit. You can’t tell anyone, though. Or else. Not that I have much of a reputation anymore, but still. I have my pride.”
Eddie doesn’t care about any of that. “There is no way you play.”
“I played like once, Eddie. It was whatever. Don’t need to do it again.”
“What class?”
“I don’t know," he lies, and then immediately caves. "Barbarian.”
Eddie’s eyes are basically sparkling. “Shit. Maybe we should get married. You wanna marry me?”
Steve stares at him, feeling a bit like he’s losing his entire mind. “Are you actually insane? You come up to me saying that we might be fated mates and then you go and propose marriage just because I’m the first omega you saw after your presentation rut. You’re—you’re not thinking clearly.”
“You were the first omega I saw after my presentation rut who happened to talk about D&D,” Eddie corrects. "Very different situation, here."
“Jesus, no. This can’t be a thing, okay? You and me? There’s just too many reasons why we shouldn’t.”
“Look,” Eddie begins. “If there’s one thing I’ve learned it’s that there are always gonna be a million reasons not to do something. There’s always gonna be a million reasons as to why a relationship won’t work out. A million reasons why life won’t end up the way you think it should. But don’t you think it’s worth a shot, anyway? Like… what’s the harm in trying?”
Steve doesn’t know what to say to that. He’s stumbling for words. He keeps looking at Eddie. Crazy weirdo freak Eddie. His hair is way too long. He’s really cool. The kids would love him. He’s—he’s nice. He has good shoulders. Broad, but he’s still all willowy and lean. A bit unusual for an alpha. Steve decides he likes that about him. How unusual everything about him is.
“Maybe,” he says weakly.
“Definitely,” Eddie decides for him. “So, like, okay. You don’t have to marry me, Harrington.”
“Steve.”
“Steven.”
“Just Steve.”
“Snooty,” Eddie says instead. Christ, he’s such a pain in the ass. “But listen. I’d love to take you out.”
Steve is weak and his resolve is waning. “This is weird. Usually I'm the one taking people on dates.”
“Sorry, Charlie, my uncle taught me about chivalry and shit. No way am I letting you lift a finger. Unless, of course, this would make you uncomfortable or unhappy, in which case I am happy to negotiate the terms of this date and let you pay or whatever. We can deconstruct secondary gender roles as much as you’d like.”
Steve kind of does want to be taken on a date, though. Wined and dined, given a bouquet and left on his front doorstep, lips tingling from a chaste kiss. It’s so damn traditional that he hates that he wants it, but he does.
“I didn’t even agree,” Steve says weakly.
“I’m free this Friday,” Eddie says.
“I feel like I'm going crazy.”
“Join the club, sweetheart.”
“This is crazy, right? Am I hallucinating right now? Am I still in heat?”
“Nope. This is all very real.”
“Great,” Steve says, unsure if he means it. “Well, I don’t do seafood.”
Eddie blinks. “Okay?”
“It’s an allergy. I can’t eat it, Eddie.”
“Sure.”
“So if we’re gonna go out, it can’t be to eat seafood.”
“Ah. Copy. That probably wasn’t in my budget anyway. It’s all diner food and mac and cheese from the box with me, I fear. Shit, maybe I shouldn’t advertise that. You know what, forget I said anything.”
“I’m actually okay with that,” Steve says. “But I cook a lot, so I could always just cook for you.”
“Steve Harrington offering to cook for me. What the hell is my life?” Eddie says, grinning once again, this time showing off his slightly jagged and some extremely sharp teeth. “Cool.”
“Cool.” Steve pauses. “Wait—”
“Let’s figure it out, huh? Hey, you have a pen?” When Steve shakes his head, stunned silent, Eddie stands up and stumbles over to the front desk again. The nurse there begins to gently berate him. He pointedly ignores her in favor of leaning over the desk and snatching a pen.
The way he moves is wild, his limbs a little gangly, like he’s still growing into his full frame at what must be age 19. He looks like a muppet.
Oh no, Steve thinks, which is immediately followed by: Robin can never find out about this.
He kind of can’t wait to tell her, too. Having a best friend is weird.
“Hit me with your best shot, Stevie-evie,” Eddie says as he comes back, collapsing into his chair again. He gives Steve the pen and thrusts his arm in his face. “Your number, if you will, my liege.”
“Don’t call me that,” Steve grumbles.
He still writes the Hendersons’ phone number on Eddie’s forearm, though, pressing down kind of hard with the pen for the ink to transfer.
“Princess better?”
“No.”
“I can stick with Snooty if you like that.”
“Sure, and I can kick your ass.”
“Heard. We’ll workshop something.”
“I can’t believe this is happening,” Steve says.
Of course this is the moment that the front doors burst open and Dustin scrambles inside like a man possessed, a frantic Claudia not too far behind, both of them calling his name like he miraculously survived a life and death situation and not just suffered an embarrassingly late presentation heat.
“Jesus. Okay. I have to go.”
Eddie follows Steve’s gaze. “Huh. Didn’t know you had a little brother.”
“Guess there’s a lot we don’t know about each other,” Steve says.
He stands up. He’s suddenly very aware of the fact that his shorts are really short, even though there’s like a million more things he should care about, like the fact that there’s all kinds of incriminating stains down the front of his uniform; his hair is probably really flat and he probably smells terrible, beneath what is apparently the maple syrup omega-ness of it all.
Eddie doesn’t seem to care about any of that. He gazes up at Steve, his eyes all warm and dark and crinkled at the corners. Christ.
“See ya, Steve.”
“Yeah, uh. Bye.”
He walks away just as the Hendersons spot him and he can feel the weight of Eddie’s eyes on him, all heavy. He kind of hikes down his shorts a little which is stupid. Dustin is wide-eyed and whisper-yelling, “Holy shit Steve, you smell like pancakes!” and Mrs. Henderson is multitasking berating her son about his language and drawing Steve as close to her body as physically possible, fretting about his presentation and his bruised up face and a million other things, probably.
In the passenger seat of Mrs. H’s car, he breathes in the leather-vinyl-chemicals of it all and thinks about Eddie.
Steve caves not even a full twenty-four hours later because he is ridiculously weak and the Hendersons' phone remains utterly silent. He has no right to feel as betrayed as he does, and yet. The rage is what fuels him to punch Robin's number in.
“Where does Eddie Munson live?” he grits into the phone, trying to think about anything but muppets, or muppet-like people, or Eddie flailing around the hospital lobby like Kermit the Frog.
“Please tell me you’re not buying drugs,” Robin replies. “Let me at least go with you and also do them with you.”
“I’m not buying drugs.”
“Oh, thank God. I really didn’t want to do any of that again.”
“Then why did you offer?”
“We’re in this together, Harrington, whether you like it or not. If you do drugs then I do drugs,” Robin says. “Wait, if you’re not buying drugs then why the hell do you need to know where Eddie Munson lives?”
“It’s nothing,” he tells her, aiming for casual and falling pathetically short. “It’s just that I think I probably have to kiss him.”
There’s a brief pause. Robin is, like, heavy-breathing into the receiver, like she’s trying to process this concept all and having a very difficult time. Steve can very much picture her at this moment, forehead completely pressed into the nearest available flat surface.
“Steve. What?”
“I met him last night at the hospital,” Steve says. He leans back against the kitchen counter. “He also presented. Turns out he’s an alpha. And, I don’t know, we kind of got to talking a little bit, and I gave him my phone number but he still hasn't called which is ridiculous, so I guess I have to take matters into my own hands or whatever.”
“So, like, just because you’re an omega doesn’t mean you have to end up with an alpha, much less the first alpha you met post-presentation—”
“I know that, Robin. It’s not—look. He’s annoying and he definitely has a lot of issues, right, but I think we’re probably a lot more similar than we originally thought and he was—you know.”
“I truly do not.”
“He was nice. And he’s cute, right? Like. Objectively.”
“Well, no.”
“I’m telling you he is.”
“Okay. And I’m telling you that you could do better. Like, way better.”
“What, like Tammy Thompson better?”
She sputters. “Low blow, Steven.”
“The thing is, I don’t think I want better, Robin,” Steve says.
It is an insanely liberating thought that he hasn’t really had the courage to confront until this very moment, for some reason, camped out in the Hendersons’ kitchen and commandeering their phone while wearing an old pajama set that is probably honestly one of Claudia’s, if he thinks about it. He feels a little hysterical and somehow also incredibly calm, and he’s so tired beneath it all, but there’s a clarity, almost, accompanying this very real possibility, the possibility of finding someone who somehow matches his crazy perfectly.
He confesses, “I don’t want someone better. I thought I did and then I had no idea what I wanted but I think I realized after last night that I might need someone just as fucked up as me. That’s the only way I’ll feel—I don’t know, normal, and, uh, okay with myself.”
“Right,” Robin says. She still sounds so skeptical, God. “Sure. Okay. And you think that the person who will make you feel better is… Eddie Munson?”
“Eddie Munson told me I smelled good! Eddie Munson offered to take me out on a date!” Steve bursts, hissing into the phone at what is totally a normal volume. “Eddie Munson asked for my number and hasn’t called me yet and it hasn't even been a day so I shouldn't be so fucked up about it but I am!”
“Who’s Eddie Munson?” Dustin asks, popping up out of nowhere and scaring the bejeesus out of Steve.
Steve clutches the phone to his chest. “Nobody. Nothing. What do you want? Don’t you have stuff you need to be doing?”
Dustin squints, his nerd senses working overtime. “Is he the alpha from the hospital last night? The one who checked out your butt as we were leaving?”
“He checked out my—no, you know what, nevermind. You wanna compare our dating lives, Dusty-bun? Let’s discuss the performance you gave a few nights ago to your little girlfriend,” Steve says.
Robin begins to croon Neverending Story through the phone, loudly enough that they both can hear it; Dustin’s face goes beet red and he gives Steve the middle finger but takes his leave, thank God.
“When did these shitheads all get so nosey?” he mutters to Robin, after he’s convinced Dustin has truly disappeared.
“Beats me. They’re your children, dingus, not mine. Except for Erica, I will claim Erica. Anyway. It’s nice that Eddie said all that and whatever, but I don’t know, Steve. I just don’t know about all this. He’s kind of—you know.”
“I do,” he says, because he does. “He’s… A lot. And it might just be the heat hormones talking but I’m tired of trying to do what I think other people think is the right thing all of the time. I just want to do what I want to do. Not what people expect of me. And I don't know how or why or any of that, but I like him. I really do. I want to see him again. Is that so wrong?"
Robin pauses, thinking loudly. Then she sighs, ultimately defeated. “Forest Hills.”
“Huh?”
“Forest Hills. The trailer park. Don’t ask me why I know, but I just do. Don’t remember the number for his place but he should be pretty easy to find if you ask around.”
Steve grins like a maniac and is very glad that she isn’t actually there to see it. “You’re the best and I love you. Have I told you that yet? ‘Cause I do.”
“Yeah, yeah. I know. Go get your alpha, weirdo.”
Eddie answers the door in blue plaid boxers and nothing else. He’s not wearing a shirt. He’s skinny, a little spindly, and he has a lot more tattoos than Steve had previously thought. They’re all kind of horrendously ugly.
The sight of them settles the last loose little uncertainty rattling around in the pit of Steve’s stomach. Eddie is an actual, veritable mess. He’s perfect.
“Steve Harrington?” he asks blearily. He must’ve just woken up; it is no earlier than three in the afternoon.
Steve genuinely means to be a little kinder about the whole thing, but also he just came out of his first ever heat and his hormones are still probably all fucked up and his body still hurts and he hasn’t gotten a good night’s sleep in what feels like forever, and everyone is in his business except for his parents who are God knows where, and he’s just so tired.
So what winds up happening is that he immediately snaps, “Why didn’t you call me?”
Eddie clearly has no earthly idea how he should respond to this. Steve wonders if he’s ever been in a relationship before. Not that it matters, but, well—Steve is kind of a lot of work, and he hates to admit it but he's definitely a little high maintenance, and what is probably a very toxic part of him hopes that Eddie doesn’t really have a standard or baseline to compare him to. Ignorance is bliss, and all.
“Um. Huh?” Eddie winds up mumbling.
“I was waiting.”
He huffs, scrubbing at his eyes. “You know, sweetheart, it hasn’t even been a full day.”
“So?”
“So?”
“So what?”
“Well,” he shifts on his feet. “I don’t know. I was gonna let it marinate a little. Give you some time to realize what a huge mistake you could’ve been making and all so you could back out. No harm, no foul and all that jazz.”
Steve is honestly a little offended by this line of logic. “That’s stupid,” he says, so fiercely that Eddie kind of rears back, looking a lot more awake than he had been a moment ago.
“Okay. Uh. Sorry.” He pauses. “How did you find out where I live?”
Steve had wandered through the trailer park until he found the playground and asked the kids there where exactly he could find their babysitter, Mister Eddie; saying so out loud might make him sound like an actual psychopath, so instead he just says, cryptically, “I have my ways.”
“Sure. Okay. You know, I thought you weren’t even that into me.”
“I’m not,” Steve protests hotly. “I’m into you, like, a normal amount.”
Eddie grins, lopsided. He leans up against the doorframe, his dumb skinny arms crossed over his dumb skinny chest. It’s unfairly hot. It shouldn’t be; maybe that’s why it is. “How much is that?”
“I don’t know.”
“Because it’s apparently enough to show up on my doorstep without any kind of warning and verbally accost me—”
“What does that even—I’m not accosting you—”
“So are you rethinking the whole marriage thing? Because I’m still down if you are. I mean I was kind of joking yesterday, but mostly I was serious. I know a guy who knows a guy who’s an officiant. We could actually knock this out right here, right now.”
“Holy shit, you’re so annoying.”
“Yeah, but you’re still pissed that I didn’t call the minute I got home from the hospital, Snooty.”
“Can you just—just—just—”
Steve grabs him by the shoulders and pushes him against the trailer’s front door and kisses him soundly on the mouth.
Eddie’s scent explodes into excitement. It’s hard to describe. His mouth is soft even though his lips are incredibly chapped. Steve will have to fix that. His big stupid hands fall down to Steve’s waist and squeeze and Steve can feel the coolness of the rings even through the cotton of his t-shirt.
He smells so good. Do cars usually smell this good? All warm and soft and leathery and welcoming, opening up as the seconds go by. He doesn’t think so. Maybe Eddie doesn’t even smell like new car smell, or anything in particular; maybe he just smells like himself, his own unique thing. It would make sense for him. He’s definitely one in a million.
He’s probably dated someone before, Steve thinks—with a bit more envy than he has any right to feel—as Eddie licks into his mouth in a way that can only be described as skillful. His hand is, like, fully under Steve’s shirt, pressed into the small of his back. His hair is loose. It tickles Steve’s face.
Steve pulls away to demand, “Push me up against the wall.”
“Holy shit,” Eddie laughs. “Am I dreaming?”
He still does it, though, passionate but not violent, kissing him over and over again with his hands now firmly planted on Steve’s ass. There’s something about him that Steve just likes. He likes the way Eddie’s way scrawnier than him but can still manhandle him as needed. He likes how wild-looking he is, unkempt hair and wrinkled underwear and the most random assortment of tattoos littered across his body. He likes that Eddie isn’t the most traditional alpha, that he doesn’t care that Steve isn’t the most traditional kind of omega.
Hell, he sought Steve out, didn’t he? He saw Steve yesterday, sitting all alone in the hospital lobby and looking a veritable mess with a bruised up face and a bruised up scent, and he still approached him. He saw a male omega scenting of rejection and loneliness and he still wanted to talk to him. He still thought that there might be something there.
He’s fucking crazy. Pot meets kettle, or whatever it is that Robin says.
Steve tells him, eventually, maybe, later, in the nebulous span of time that it takes to move from the front doorway to Eddie’s grody stained bed, “Hey, you know that you’re kind of weird?”
Eddie laughs again. He can’t stop laughing and it might be the best sound ever. “So you've said.”
“And, uh, so am I."
"Just a little."
"So maybe that’s a good thing,” Steve hedges. "You know. The way we're both weird."
“I’m inclined to think so, yeah,” Eddie says, his eyes all warm.
"Good."
"Good." In a moment of sudden stillness, he reaches up and brushes some of the hair away from Steve’s face, then lets his knuckles skate across the skin of Steve’s cheek, still a little mottled. “Ever gonna tell me why you’re all beat up?”
"Maybe," Steve says. "What about you? Will you tell me why the past week was so shitty for you before your presentation?"
"Maybe," Eddie echoes. "You know. Long story and all."
“So's mine. It'll take a long time to get through it,” Steve admits. “And probably a lot of alcohol.”
“Got plenty of both of those things,” Eddie says. “I’ll wait.”
“I think I might’ve signed an NDA, though, so I don’t know how much I can say.”
Eddie’s eyes gleam. “Holy shit. Now you kinda have to tell me.”
“I don’t think that’s how it works." He's never wanted to violate an NDA more in his life. Somehow, inexplicably, he doesn't believe that Eddie will think he's crazy. He thinks Eddie will get it. Maybe he's the only person in their town that will, besides a pack of 12 year old nerds and his ex-girlfriend.
He doesn't want to think about them right now. At this moment, here and now, all that matters is this: Eddie's hands on him, Eddie's warm breath on his face, Eddie's smell, Eddie's lovely kind eyes.
"Anyway," he drawls, leaning in and in and in, the tip of his nose brushing Eddie's, "Weren’t we in the middle of something? Kiss me some more.”
“Apologies, my liege."
“Hey.”
“Right, right, sorry. You know, it’s hard to come up with any other nickname when you keep bossing me around like that.”
“Maybe you should just know exactly what I want so I don’t have to keep bossing you around.”
“Right,” Eddie repeats, eyes wide, wondrous. “Wow, you’re kind of—”
“Don’t say crazy.” Steve commands. He pauses. "Or high maintenance."
“I was actually gonna say beautiful.”
Steve’s face goes hot, which is stupid. Eddie's stupid. He's sappy. God. “Ugh. Shut up.”
"Is it too corny if I say make me?"
"God, yes," Steve answers, but he still meets Eddie halfway. Once again: he's weak like that.
Eddie's room is gross. His bedsheets are in desperate need of a wash. He puts on a condom before he fucks Steve because according to him, as appealing as the whole six-kid applie-pie-life fantasy may sound, they're both probably just a little too young to start on that whole situation. Steve only grouses about it a little bit—mostly because by then Eddie is pushing his way inside of him and he has to be quiet in order to process it all. It's so much: the feel of it, of him, so big that it feels like he's halfway to Steve's windpipe; the overwhelming warmth of it all, hot but not like heat because heat didn't feel nearly this good or nice or right.
The smell. New car but not really. Upholstery, paint, leather and a slew of other undefined things. He wants to live in this scent. He can't believe he'd hated it at first. From this moment on he'll be conditioned to gush slick any time he gets near a new car, which is unfortunate, but also mostly kind of great. It's hard to tell.
"Mm, I want pancakes now," Eddie says, mouthing at the back of Steve's neck, scraping his canines along the tender skin there. The threat of a bite is thrilling in the best way. Steve is practically melting back into him, that's how much his body wants it right now.
"Don't talk about pancakes while we're fucking," Steve tells him, like he has any of the power when Eddie's the one with a hand at the base of Steve's neck, teeth posed to sink into delicate skin, his dick carving out a space for himself inside Steve's body.
"Maybe I should call you Bossy," Eddie says with a particularly deep thrust of his hips. Steve lets out a noise he's literally never made in his life before.
"Maybe you should make me come," he replies with gasping breaths, already on the precipice.
"Easy," Eddie says, now with one hand thumbing at a sensitive nipple. The other reaches up and angles Steve's face back so he can press the sweetest, most chaste kiss to Steve's lips.
It's a shame, really, that this is what makes Steve come—for the first time that afternoon, anyway—because he knows from the minute he tightens around the width of Eddie and sees pure white and gasps, high and embarrassingly pitchy, that he will literally never hear the end of it. Eddie will mock him relentlessly for being so quick to come even though he'll follow literally seconds after, the hypocrite, and Steve will probably pretend to be put out by it but secretly covet this kind of knowing. Knowing someone else like this, being able to tease and make fun of something so intimate with one other person and know that it's something that only exists between the two of them.
Trust and exclusivity and closeness. It's beautiful, all of it.
He gives in to it.
Later still as afternoon fades into evening, they're eating pancakes made from a box mix Eddie found in the back of a cupboard somewhere, yet another craving he couldn't quite quash, and Steve asks, offhandedly, "How's an RV sound?"
Eddie doesn't even falter. "Sure. We could see the world. Six kids could come with."
"Sounds nice," Steve says. Then he hesitates, feeling a little bit stupid, like the way overexcited children feel when they're told to settle down. "Maybe we should take it easy, though."
"How so?"
"I don't know, we literally just met, like, yesterday, and we're already talking family and shit. That's kind of intense, right? It's too much. "
"Not really," Eddie says, shrugging easily. "We've known each other for a while. Talked all the time passing back those tests, right? And, well. As we've established. We're both kind of crazy. So who cares?"
"Yeah, I guess," Steve says, but he's settled now and the insecurity has abated.
"So plan away, barbarian of my heart. Tell me all about your dreams of six kids and white picket fence houses and the works."
He'll save that for next time. "Think I prefer you calling me Snooty, actually."
"Aw, don't be like that. I'll make an D&D player of you yet."
Eddie has syrup on his chin and he's back to wearing his wrinkled boxers. He talks through a mouthful of food and they probably both desperately need a shower. And yet, here with a guy that Steve hadn't even spared a second thought for just a mere few days ago, he feels more at home than he has possibly ever.
He must be wearing his thoughts plainly on his face. Eddie's grinning at him, wolfish all over again. All he has to do is blow a kiss and they'd be right back in chemistry with Kaminsky. What a shitshow.
Most of the time.
"Still don't believe we're fated mates?" Eddie asks.
Steve hums, thinking. Maybe they are. So what? "I don't think it matters."
"Yeah? How come?"
He hides a smile into the rim of his coffee mug. "Choosing is the best part."