Chapter Text
The phone had been off the hook for a week and a half, he had turned off his walkie – even took the batteries out, just to be safe... The thing is, he’s being stupid. Steve knows he’s being stupid, but for some reason, he just can’t find it in himself to let it go. Sometimes it’s the smallest, most insignificant things that set him off. He carries around a baseball bat full of nails like it’s a fucked up mirror of who he was before. Like how sometimes the static silence that exists in this house when he’s alone feels a little bit too much like the walls are sound-proofed. He hates the way dirt feels under his fingernails; hates shitty magic tricks, hates scrambled eggs, hates himself. Steve hates and hates and hates- but mostly, he hates facing his best friend. Hates the guilt, because that’s his best friend, his platonic soulmate, and he loves her, God does he love her- but she’s not him . No one will ever be him-
Stop it.
He can’t follow that thread all the way down, he’s not sure he’ll make it back up again. It’s all so childish, the not letting go… For God’s sake, he’s supposed to be a man. Yet here he is, just plain pathetic, over absolutely nothing at all. A feeling, he was ready to blow up his life over a feeling. Steve knows that this isn’t like their Steve , he’s struggling to play his part and say his lines and that worries the party - it worries him too. They don’t understand what was happening but that’s fine, he doesn’t want them to. He’s always been over-dramatic, at least that’s what Richard says. He wouldn’t bother them with it. It doesn’t mean anything, anyways. He can't let himself read into every feeling, even if he feels the way Gwen dreams, the way their mom saw and heard and lived. Sometimes it just isn’t real. That’s what he tells himself, he has to tell himself that – It isn’t real.
He still felt something coming, though.
So he had steadfastly ignored every knock on his door, every pebble thrown at his window (like he’s some kind of shakespearean damsel in distress) and maybe he has mixed feelings about it. Maybe he felt sort of guilty for pushing them away, and maybe part of him needed them to be there. The loudest part of him, though, thinks that maybe… Maybe he is only capable of being loved from far away. Maybe they just haven’t realized it yet. So he keeps them far away; really, it’s his only option.
That was the thing about Steve Harrington, that for as long as he’s been Steve Harrington, he’s known the rules, he’s known this: keep your cards close to your chest; put on a show; make them believe you’re not damaged. And, God, could he put on a show. He was King Steve, after all. He drowned out all of the useless parts of himself that didn’t keep him safe, he adapted. He’s been the predator and he’s been the prey, he told himself only one of those pieces could survive. He let himself become the kind of person he hated most out of bitter fear and anger, he was set on a trajectory he had no idea how to change.
Then of course, there was Dustin Henderson, and that’s really where it started isn’t it? Dustin Henderson, who was full of snark and bad ideas, dragging Steve back into Hell because Dustin trusted him, and God if he didn’t know what to do with that .
It was Dustin Henderson, and then it was Dustin Henderson’s pack of nerd friends who were insane and were going to get themselves killed and Steve had to put on his big boy pants and wrangle these kids even though he was pretty sure his brain was leaking out of his ears. At the end of the night when he left them with Joyce and Hopper at the Byers’ house, he expected that to be it.
Except it wasn’t.
They kept coming around, as if they liked him or something, and he realized at some point that he, unfortunately, had started to really like them too. At some point “these kids” became “his kids” and that might just be the best thing that’s ever happened to him. That year at Christmas, his kids gifted him a walkie and told him he was officially a member of the party. He didn’t cry. He didn’t.
For the first time in his life he looked around and had a family that loved him. That wanted him. In a way that was full and complete, he didn’t have to fight to survive inside of it. He loved his sister and he always would, but it had always been just them. Joyce called him one of her boys, Hopper called him son, and it was good. It was really good. The world though was not so good, seeing as it kept trying to end. He hated it and he was also incredibly thankful for it when every year brought someone new and his family got just a little bit bigger. Steve Harrington loved, and now he was loved in return.
Half-loved, really. If he’s being honest with himself. He doesn’t think you can love someone you don’t really know. Loving a lie won’t make it real, no matter how hard you wish it were the truth, and Steve Harrington is a liar.
Steve Harrington is a lie. That was the most important rule, wasn’t it? Friends don’t lie.
But maybe half-loved was enough, he was okay with that, if it was the best he would get. Because maybe it was too late and too long and maybe he didn’t want them to know. He didn’t think that was wrong of him, either. To keep this one thing just for him… Can’t this one thing just belong to him? But sometimes he does think that maybe it’s unfair, that he’s selfish. He owes it to them, doesn’t he? The truth. For accepting all of the love they gave him, for accepting it even if he knows he’s not worthy. That’s the thing, Steve didn’t find a family because he is in any way easy to love, he was just lucky enough to find a group of people who have it in spades. Any of them would easily deny the assertion that Steve Harrington is unlovable, but it will always be a half truth.The party loves Steve like he’s a whole person, but he’s only half. He never deserved it.
But the party is loyal, and kind, and stubborn ,
So, in the end, the timeline of events didn’t exactly surprise him. He figured it took them a day or two to realize his self made isolation, and allotted him an entire business week to work himself out, but by day six they had come knocking.
The first to show was Rob, he was almost sure of it, she knocks like she’s perpetually nervous she’s got the wrong house no matter how many times she comes over. He didn’t open the door. She left. The next day no one came, and he wasn’t sure how he felt about that. The knocking returned, however, the day after, and it returned three-fold. People cycled through and tried to get him to open the door, the lock remained safely in place despite their best efforts. Over the course of those two days, with the near constant knocking, every member of the party tried to get him to open the door. Even Mike showed up. That very much was a surprise.
But on day ten, it was quiet.
On day ten, no one came.
It was day eleven and Steve had just gotten out of the shower. He did that a lot when he was in a bad place, showering two or three times a day until the skin of his hands was cracked and drying. It reminded him that he could, that he had that choice. That not for another moment in his life did he have to be greasy, caked with dirt and drying sweat (it had happened a few times, obviously, when Hawkins took it’s yearly nose-dive, but that was different. It wasn’t like the basement.) He was wearing a pair of sweats that definitely needed a wash and an old, worn-out Metallica shirt. It was too big, and it was Eddie’s (he had left it after the last movie night) but it was soft and it was clean and Steve hadn’t done his laundry. Sue him. If maybe the shirt smelled like Eddie, and Eddie smelled safe, then it was no one’s business but his own.
He didn’t bother doing his whole hair thing, it just wasn’t really worth it when he’d probably wash it back out again in a couple hours, but he hated having his hair in his face. It reminded him of… it just reminded him. He pushed it back with an old, folded up bandana and tied it with a topknot like a headband. It was faded and soft, it had been a gift so many years ago, he kept it close to him all the time. It was a memento, a reminder that a man never leaves a friend behind.
He made his way down the stairs and into his kitchen with a novelty rocket flashlight tucked safely in his palm. It was still stained with blood and dirt, no matter how many times he had tried to remove it, it had been changed forever just the same as he had. It’s okay that it’s damaged, that it’s stained. Sometimes it’s better that things can’t change. It reminds him that it’s over, that he’s alive. It grounds him, it keeps him here. It was real, he was real. It was like his little rocket and him were two things that would float away if they hadn’t had each other to tie them to the ground. He glanced at the numbers displayed over the oven. At 11:24 on a Monday morning, Steve Harrington poured himself a bowl of cornflakes and cracked open a beer. He was an adult (that might be debatable), he could drink before noon if he wanted. He wasn’t entirely sure what he wanted, really, but drinking was something he was at least sure he knew how to do. Small victories.
It was 11:36 on a Monday morning, Steve Harrington had a half empty bottle of beer and was staring into a soggy bowl of cornflakes like it had grievously offended him.
It was 11:37 on a Monday morning and the lock on his front door twisted out of place, the door pushed open into his aunt’s foyer.
Steve probably should have been more alarmed by the person breaking into his home, but honestly he was too tired. There was a pause, the too stale air that filled the house was still, then the sound of heavy boots taking slow steps. A voice.
“Steve?” And yeah, that adds up.
Of course it was him.
He took a few more steps until they were in each other’s eyeline through the doorway to the kitchen, there Eddie paused.
“Oh, uh-” he stood like he didn’t know what to do with himself, “Hey…” He sounded as if he was surprised to find Steve in the place where he lived.
“Hi?” Steve started, because what else can he say? “What are you-”
Eddie raised the walkie in his hand, then pushed the button and spoke into the receiver.
“Yeah he’s,” he eyed Steve warily, “he’s alive… Over.” He promptly switched it off, dropping it on the front table.
Eddie made his way into the kitchen, strolling casually, like he hadn’t just broken into someone’s home, and sat down across from Steve, kicking his feet up.
“Stevie!” He clapped, the sound jarring the house out of it’s silence, “Thought you could pull a disappearing act on me, huh? I’ll have you know that I am nothing if not persistent.” He smirked as he said it, that bastard.
“Ed, what are you doing-” Steve’s eyes glanced wildly from Eddie to the hallway, then back again. Eddie sighed, levity fading. There was a long moment of silence and a deep sigh, his smile falling away as he lowered his feet to the floor.
“Where have you been, man?”
“...Right here.” Steve replied, they both knew it was a non-answer.
“Ah yes, but with no one to observe it, who can say for sure? Schrodinger’s Steve” Eddie smiled wryly.
“That was the guy with the dogs? And- and the uh, the bell?” Steve didn’t know what they were talking about.
“What? No. No! That’s Pavlov, and it’s- well, that's not the point.” Eddie seemed exasperated, Steve privately thought that was a bit ridiculous, given the circumstances. “The point is, tonight’s movie night and everyone’s coming over. The whole party.”
Steve paused for a moment, restarting like one of those computers they’ve got at the public library.
“...what?”
“It’s movie night!” And that level of enthusiasm had to be forced, really.
“Movie night isn’t til friday,”
“Okay well now it’s not, keep up Stevie.” Eddie looked Steve up and down, towards the clock, at the table and said “Isn’t it a bit early to be drinking?” before picking up the other half of the beer and draining it, exiting to the family room.
__________
And come over they did, not that he had any doubts really, Steve had accepted his fate the moment Eddie had crossed the threshold. Eddie did not leave after his surprise appearance that morning, saying something about just “hanging out till then” but Steve felt distinctly as though he was being babysat. Like the moment Eddie left he would haul ass out of here to a place no one would ever find him. Which was ridiculous, quite frankly, because he was the babysitter and did not need anyone to watch him, but he kept that to himself.
After Eddie was Dustin, who showed up around 1:30pm and looked very much like he had something to say, but he bit his tongue, choosing instead to propose to Eddie the merits of a campaign centered around some evil dude called ‘The Bagman’. Robin got off her shift at the family video at 3:00, Steve is in the kitchen stress baking cookies (because apparently he’s going to have company) when she makes herself comfortable on the couch and switches the TV to some telenovela that only she can understand. Dustin and Eddie are still talking, but Steve doesn’t have a clue what about, honestly. Nancy came at 4:00 with Mike and Lucas who joined the fray in the other room right away, while Nancy stopped to fix Steve with her ‘I’m an investigative journalist’ look. The one she wears when she’s trying to puzzle something out, and not for the first time he wonders what she sees. Will came with Jonathan, El and Max with Hopper, followed by Joyce after her shift finished. She hugged him tight and called him ‘her boy’. His heart hurts. He misses his mom.
There was pizza and soda and all of his family together in one room and it was nice. It was really nice. Everyone was having conversations amongst themselves and yelling across the room and laughing and it was good. He wants it so badly sometimes it’s hard to believe it’s right in front of him.
“Hey so what are we watching, anyways?” Steve asked the room at large, he wasn’t sure who’s week it was to choose.
El got up from off the couch and pulled a tape from her backpack. She was excited, but almost nervous, bouncing on the balls of her feet as she held up a VHS with no cover.
“It is my turn to pick,” she smiled, “and I would like to watch this movie.”
“What movie is it though?” Lucas asked.
“I don’t know. That is what makes it fun. Like a surprise!” she spoke in that stilted but confident way that she does, pronouncing ‘surprise’ as two solid and separate syllables.
Everyone was a little caught off guard by the idea, but El seemed not to notice.
“Well, where did you get it?” Nancy prompted El into giving them more details,
“I found it.” El was grinning, proud of her discovery.
“What do you mean by that? You found it? Where?” Will’s question bordered somewhere between hesitance and amusement.
“In the cabin. Under the floor. My ring fell through the boards and when I went to get it back, I found this movie! I think it was very lucky.” El finished. The party was silent for a few beats, not quite sure what to do with the situation, before jonathan cleared his throat and shrugged, “I like surprises,”
“Alllllright? Um…sure, why not, I guess? Get the lights, park your ass somewhere, I'll grab the popcorn” Steve said, exiting the room as the kids all scrambled for their designated spots on the floor, on their mountain of blankets and pillows, arguing about who had dibs on the ‘prime viewing spot’ this week. Hopper took the recliner, Nancy and Jonathan on the loveseat, Steve came back with three bowls of popcorn to split between everyone, eyeing the spot between Joyce and Eddie in the middle of the couch, Joyce to his right, Eddie to his left, and Robin on the floor between his feet. Before he had a chance to sit down, Eddie kicked one leg up onto the empty seat and smirked playfully at Steve. And see, Steve was not one to back down from a challenge, so he made a split second decision that absolutely did not involve his brain and sat down on the sofa between Eddie’s legs, his back to Eddie’s chest before kicking his own feet up. One foot landing on Joyce’s lap, he went to pull back with an apology on the tip of his tongue when she dropped her hand onto his ankle, absentmindedly rubbing back and forth. Eddie, to his credit, recovered quickly, throwing an arm around Steve and relaxing back into the sofa.
El flicked off all the lights, put the tape in the player and pushed start, settling down on the floor between Will and Max. Steve started fidgeting with Eddie’s fingers as the screen flicked to life, though he didn’t seem to realize he was doing it.
A distorted image appears on screen, audio flickers in and out, when the picture clears a woman stands in front of the camera holding a microphone with a scrolling news banner at the bottom that reads “Another Local Boy Grabbed.” The woman is speaking, the audio can be heard steadily now though the pitch is distorted at some points
[Woman]: “The nightmare of our community continues tonight with the abduction of North Denver student Finney Blake. Officials say-
The hand that was playing with the rings on Eddie’s fingers stilled, just holding it. Steve wasn’t looking at the screen, his whole body tensing slightly, he keeps staring down at the hand in his lap.
The rest of the woman’s statement is drowned out by the broken repetition of the name ‘Finney Blake’ as static grows louder and louder until the image on the screen freezes, jumping back and forth between several frames before glitching out entirely, leaving the screen black.
Black screen still displayed, a whisper echoes over and over, getting louder each time, it’s the voice of a little boy.
[little boy]: “You. Don’t. Have. Much. Time.”
“Oh hell yeah, it’s a horror movie! Nice choice, supergirl” Eddie said
“Steve never lets us pick horror movies!” Dustin said with an excited grin that Lucas mirrored across from him
Steve flinched slightly at the comment, though no one but Eddie had noticed. Steve was sitting stiffly in front of him, his breathing becoming more shallow, as if he was afraid of moving at all. With Steve’s back pressed against Eddie’s chest, he could feel the other boy begin to shake. He was slightly concerned, but also confused, so he laced his fingers through the hand Steve was holding and gave it a comforting squeeze.
There’s multiple quick flashes of images on the screen, black balloons caught in telephone wires, a forgotten missing child poster on the ground, knuckles covered in blood, a young girls sits bolt upright in bed screaming for the boy named Finney.
“Gwenny,” He whispered it like a prayer. He wasn’t sure when his eyes had finally made it to the screen, but it didn’t matter because he could picture it all in his mind perfectly anyways. No one but Eddie had heard him, so he hummed a small response and looked down at Steve with mounting concern. It seemed like Steve could focus on nothing but the screen in front of them.
Several seconds of blackness before more images flash across the screen, a rosary in a dollhouse, a public school bathroom, a bandana laying in a gutter, a black van, an empty spray canister, the flashes pause on a close up picture of a small toy rocket in a boy’s hand, splaying out his fingers and curling them back in repeatedly, someone takes a deep breath in and with the exhale the screen goes black once again.
He could feel that same rocket, granted older and dirtier, burning a hole through the front left pocket of his sweats right now. He doesn’t understand what’s happening, or why, or how- but he knows he needs to remember how to come back, away from his head, away from the basement, and exist in his family room at the same time as his body. He felt Eddie pull him closer and tighten his arms around him, and vaguely wondered if him and his rocket ship had finally failed to keep each other on the ground
The scene clicks through two frames like a view master caught between two slides, from a girl being pulled away from a boy kicking and screaming while the boy fights to get to her, there are police lights rolling in the background, it’s night time, to the boy sitting alone at the end of an ambulance wrapped in a shock blanket, he stares forward unseeingly. The screaming of the girl and boy are heard but not distinguishable, a ringing steadily increases until it stops abruptly on the image of the boy.
[Cop O.S]: “Finney? Finney! Hey, kid! Did you hear me? Your dad’s not coming.”
The boy blinked up in the direction of the man off screen before continuing to stare ahead of him. Five faces flash one after the other on the screen, all young boys covered in blood. Black screen, inhale, exhale. Five more flashes, a basement with concrete walls, a dirty mattress, a window with bars covering it, an old black phone mounted on the wall, a man in a mask tilting his head leeringly. Harsh static, through the static a man’s voice crackles like a phone line.
Steve’s eyes screw up tight at the sight of the man on the TV, he was never supposed to see him again. No one was ever supposed to see him again, least of all his family.
[Voice]: “You’re going to go stay with your aunt and uncle, I don’t know, some place in Indiana, your mom’s sister.”
The image changes to the same boy sitting on a plush white couch, now showered and in clean clothing, none of the same dirt or blood from before. A man off screen speaks firmly,
[Richard (o.s)]: “You will not bring your damage into my home, I don’t want you or this family to be tied back to that nightmare you got yourself mixed up with, your stupidity is no one’s fault but your own and it will not color our reputation here! Finnegan is not the name of a respectable young man, you left that in Denver, do you understand? He does not exist in Hawkins!”
Hopper sits up straighter in his spot, where does he know that voice from? It can’t be-
Did he just say that they’re in Hawkins? Steve’s reaction… An uneasy feeling is making a home in Eddie’s stomach, and he thinks that there’s nothing he can do about it.
[Boy]: “My name’s not Finnegan, it’s just Finney. That’s the name my mom gave me. ”
[Richard (o.s)]: “Well, If there was one thing your mother was ever good at, it was making mistakes.”
Joyce scoffed at this, the sudden noise making Steve flinch away. She turns her eyes to him and takes in his demeanor before shooting a questioning glance towards Eddie, who gives a small shrug, meeting her eyes nervously.
A wounded noise comes from the direction behind the camera, the angle flips 180 ° to a mean looking man in a finely pressed suit and a woman perched delicately on an ottoman pressing a hand to her mouth,
Exactly four people in the room recognize these characters, Steve, Nancy, Joyce, and Hopper. The latter three feel the pieces start to fall into place, they’re on the verge of realizing something, but they didn’t even know there was a puzzle to piece together.
[Richard]: “I will be respected in my own home! Finney is DEAD! From now on you’re going to be someone worth respecting.”
Joyce gets it first, now that she thinks about it, the picture is becoming clearer. She’s seen Richard Harrington act like this, she’s seen this young boy before… But it couldn’t be, could it?
The scene changes to the boy stood in front of a classroom full of kids, introducing himself on his first day
[Boy]: “Hi, I'm…”
The boy says with a grimace, we see his mouth move around a different name but all we can hear is “Hi i’m Finney Blake” echoing over and over before a quick cut to a teenage boy in a tailored suit, the echo says “Hi, I’m-”
[Boy]: “Steve.”
“Wait,” Steve doesn’t know who’s talking
The voice comes out on top of the echo, which fades until we can only hear the sounds of the party happening around the boy, he gives a charming smile, offering his hand in introduction, a beat of silence
[Boy]: “Steve Harrington.”
“Wait…!” He doesn’t think it’s him, though.
Soundlessly, almost like a dream, a montage plays. Steve Harrington with his face pillowed in the crook of his elbow that rests on the granite countertop, fidgeting with a small toy rocket covered in blood stains, dirt, and chipping paint. Steve Harrington pacing back and forth talking to no one with a black bandana clutched in his hand. Steve Harrington pounding on the door of a small dark room, screaming and trying to twist the handle, the camera cuts through the door frame to Richard standing on the other side, key in hand, seemingly satisfied. Steve Harrington in the corner of the small dark room shaking and crying with blood coming from his nose. The scene fades out as he falls asleep.
Those with a headstart on the puzzle have figured it out by now, Eddie, Joyce, Nancy, Hopper, and Jonothan as well. He recognized that day in the classroom, he had been there.
The kids and Robin sit in stunned silence, mouths hanging open, starting to catch up one by one.
Everyone wants to turn and look at Steve, to understand, but they can’t tear their eyes from the screen.
The scene that fades onto the screen next is a ceiling shot of the whole party, mirroring their exact positions in real time, everyone but Steve is frozen. Steve looks from right to left and back again, exhaling slowly. The ringing of a phone cuts through the air and his head snaps towards it. His face is unsure. He stands up and slowly makes his way over to the phone, weaving around his motionless friends. He makes several aborted movements to pick it up before taking it off the hook and hesitantly holding it to his ear, someone breathes on the other side and the line crackles with it, after a few seconds a harsh voice grates out of the phone,
[Grabber]: “When were you going to tell them, Finney?”
[Steve]: “I wasn’t.”
The person on the other line giggles which turns into a manic laugh, the laughter, the ringing, the static, they all get louder and louder until the room starts to shake violently and then all at once the line clicks dead and it’s silent. Steve stares hollowly at the phone before hanging it up. The screen goes black.
The room is dead silent. No one is breathing. All trying to process what they’ve seen, no one quite understands what’s happening. The first to move is El, who turns around to look at Steve with wide, confused eyes. She says to him,
“I do not like this movie.”
He carefully lifts his hand to wipe it across the top of his lip, in a trance, and it comes back painted red. Steve Harrington looks up at his friends but also millions of miles away from them and says
“Fuck.”