Chapter Text
I physically could not stop freaking out over the fact that Eddie fucking Munson had invited me to sit in on the Hellfire club tonight. Dustin had obviously clued in, and was using his ‘knowledge’ to check in on and make fun of me and complain every extra ten minutes that I was taking. At first it had been every five minutes, but my yelling had apparently made it clear that the more time he spent bothering me, the less I had to get ready. This just meant less time with his precious club.
“Oh yeah?! It’s my stupid club that you’ve been begging for an invite to! All because you have a crush on the dungeon master!”
“I have not been begging! I asked you once! Literally once, and haven’t mentioned it since then.”
“No, you just started sitting at our lunch table and throwing yourself at Eddie.”
“I abso-fucking-lately have not been throwing myself at Eddie. I literally sit on the other side of the fucking table, you little shit.”
“Oh yeah, space means nothing when you’re eye-screwing!”
“I’ve talked to him alone maybe twice! There is no eye-screwing happening.”
“Oh boo-how for you. You’d probably just die if he said you’re cool. God, girls are so fucking pathetic.”
“Get out! Now!” I’d started throwing things at him, and the mental spiral I immediately had set me another thirty minutes behind. I’d started getting ready two hours before the meeting, and it had now been an hour and exactly thirty-four minutes. The minute count was critical according to my shithead, annoying little brother.
I was looking in the mirror again, pulling my shirt and the jacket this way and that. My jeans had been decided on as soon as Eddie had asked me to sit in on the meeting. Well, it wasn’t as if he even asked me specifically.
-
Eddie was talking, and Dustin and his friends were hanging on every word, as always. I say at the end of the table, literally just on the outskirts of the group, finishing up the homework I had that was due the next period. It was simple enough, and it gave me an excuse to sit quietly and decidedly not pay attention to what Eddie was actually saying. Instead, only occasionally looking up and watching him talk, nodding and smiling along, until I remembered the assignment.
“Yes, this campaign is going to be fantastic, not one of you fuckers will know what’s coming.”
“Did you forget we’re down a player?” I love my little brother, sure, but I could have wrung his neck for the way Eddie’s smile flattened, a stern look taking over. Sure, my heart was pounding in my chest when I saw a muscle in his jaw flutter, but the news obviously wasn’t something Eddie, or any dungeon master, wanted to hear quite literally two days before the campaign starts.
“What the hell are you talking about, Henderson?”
“Will. He won’t be back for a while.”
“I was told he would be back for the second or third meeting.” Eddie’s voice was deathly serious, and this was the same man who made jokes about everything, even when it got his ass kicked.
“Maybe if we only had one meeting a month.”
“We need another player. The campaign is written, it’ll be easier to add a new character and I refuse to rewrite anything.”
“We already have everyone we know willing to play.” Eddie’s article on dungeons and dragons relating to x, y, z, had been passed out like a novelty by some of the preps when he left it in the cafeteria. Ever since then, pickings were slim, even I knew that.
Eddie caught me in one of my smile and nod phases, actually catching me staring that time. I have no idea how he doesn’t know that I’m literally in love with him, but that’s entirely beside the point.
“Hey Henderson, you play?”
Briefly glancing to my brother because I’m stupid and thought for sure he wasn’t talking to me. Dustin was looking at me, however, and he wouldn’t look away from “DM Eddie” for something unless he had a reason.
“No, she doesn’t.” I had stayed quiet too long, and Dustin spoke while I tried to form a normal answer.
“I’ve always wanted to try,” I spoke up, tucking my homework into my math book, I could take a zero on one assignment for all I care. And that was only if the teacher decided to actually check my homework, rather than glance and see stuff and decide that was good enough.
“Come by on Wednesday if you mean it. First night of the campaign is always the most relaxed. Well,” he took a moment, shrugging cockily in a way that made me clench my legs together, rolling his eyes, “I’ll make it relaxed for your first time, m’lady.”
I’m going to die at this lunch table, and it was going to be in front of Eddie and even dead I was going to die of embarrassment.
“I’ll be there.” That had been that, all of us going our separate ways. It wasn’t until we were on our way home that Dustin had anything to say about it. To be fair, I started it.
-
“Are we gonna talk about me joining your little club or…?”
“Are you fucking shitting me right now? I can’t have one thing. Not a single thing. You took Steve-“
“Steve and I are friends and not even great ones!”
“Now you’re going to take the Hellfire club from me-“
“How the hell am I going to steal an entire club from you?”
“With your- I don’t know! Girl powers!”
“Believe me, if those worked, I would not be about to embarrass myself by hanging out with my little brother and his nerd fucking friends.” Clearly, the mouth of a sailor was hereditary, and I was pretty sure it came from dad, considering mom rarely ever swore and always for a good reason. Dustin and I are quite the opposite.
“You literally don’t even talk to him, why would he invite you?”
“Maybe he senses latent talent?”
“Or maybe I’m such a great player that he thinks it’s genetic!”
A beat of silence, and I reached for the radio, slowly increasing the volume of the rock music, “sure, Dus, probably that one.”
-
I’d attended two entire school days since then, both including sitting and eating lunch while actively talking to the members of the Hellfire club, which I did, but not often. To do so two (possibly three) days in a row, was a bit of a miracle. Eddie had taken time out of his very busy schedule to help me write up a character sheet during my free period the first day.
I don’t know how he knew that I often spent my free period in the picnic table a walk away from the school, especially given that I rarely returned for my last class of the day. Headphones playing my music at a near painful volume, I’d shrieked when a hand closed over my shoulder, turning around with such a speed that I would have gotten whiplash if my neck hadn’t snapped up so quickly. Fear gave way to relief, and then shameful embarrassment when I saw that it was Eddie. Grabbing my Walkman off the floor of the forest, brushing off some damp dirt that had stuck, I straightened and slid the headphones off my head.
“Jesus Christ, Eddie, you scared me.”
“Didn’t mean to, I have a surprise for you.”
I looked at him curiously and only a little bit warily, I had never known him to be a gift giver, and I’d been watching and listening carefully for years at this point. “Yeah?”
“Yes.” And his hand slapped down on the mottled wood of the table, a piece of white paper trapped between his ringed fingers and the dirty picnic table.
“What’s this?” I grabbed it, attempting to pull it out from under his hand, which he allowed. “Oh, thank you! I’ll have to… uh… ask Dus to help me fill it out,” I was busy reading the paper, not even looking at Eddie for once. Too bad, I would have given a lot to see him nervous for once.
“Or I can help you fill it out? It’s not super hard but I want to make sure you have the best character possible, and as dungeon master, I write the best characters.”
“Isn’t this supposed to be my character?” I was teasing, surprising even myself with the lack of shaking in my voice. He must have been too distracted to catch my flirting, because by the time I met his eyes, he was looking at a tree behind me.
“Absolutely, but don’t you want your character to be cool?” I glanced behind me, maybe there was a bird or something, and looked back to Eddie to see him casually sitting at the table, hands fisted together in front of him.
“Yes, of course. What’s the point in playing if I can’t be cool as fuck.”
“See? That’s why I’m going to be the one to show you how to do it.”
I had spent far too long day-dreaming (and night-dreaming) about Eddie Munson and him saying those words, saying he would show me how to do it, that was going straight into the spank bank. In my own thoughts, I have no shame.
“Alright then, dungeon master. When do you plan on doing this?”
“Right now?”