A/N: This was originally posted on my tumblr (in second person, but as ffn doesn't allow this I turned the reader into Kat, an OC), but I saw how little there was about my bby Steve Harrington here so thought I'd try to contribute. I hope you enjoy!

(let me know if you see anything still written in second person narrative, I did my best but I may have missed something).

"So…"

Katherine raises one eyebrow, looking over at Steve Harrington, who had just sat himself down in the vacant chair next to hers. "So…?"

While mostly confused by his presence – they weren't really friends, more friendly acquaintances – she was also a little annoyed. Some days she just wasn't in the mood to socialise, so she'd hang out in the library during lunch, often reading and rarely doing any work. Her friends were used to this by now and simply didn't question it on the days she didn't turn up in the cafeteria.

"What're you reading?" Steve seemed as confused as Katherine was when he spoke – clearly, he hadn't known what he was going to say until he'd already said it. Smiling a little, amused, Kat flips her book closed so that he can see the title on the front, keeping one finger in to hold her page.

He squints and leans a little closer to her to read it, though she knows damn well there's nothing wrong with his eyesight.

"Crime and Punishment. I've read that!" He grins at her and, though she highly doubts it given what she knows about him, she plays along because he has a nice smile and he's honestly not that bad a person.

"Oh, yeah? I wouldn't have taken you as a big reader, Harrington." She smiles and just knows that both of them are thinking back to that project they'd done together a couple of months ago. She'd thought the work was hard but, goddamn, forcing Steve to focus and read more than two lines of text at a time should be an Olympic-level sport.

Bringing his hand up to cup the back of his neck, Steve smiles, looking a little bashful. "Yeah, well… When it's something I'm interested in…" He shrugs, and she still only half believes him, but his ridiculously floppy hair and awkward manner (so different to the Steve who used to hang out with Tommy and Carol) are endearing so instead of calling him out, she smiles, folding over the corner of her page and putting the book down on the table.

"How did you find it?" He looks a little confused, and it's only then that Kat realises he'd been grinning widely at the closed book, obviously taking it as some big achievement that she'd shifted her attention to him. "The book, I mean. Did you think it was any good? I'm not too far in so no spoilers, okay?" She pokes him in the arm and tries to give him her best intimidating look.

"Oh, well, I mean… It was pretty good. I don't wanna say too much, y'know, if you haven't read that much."

Nodding her head, Kat raises her eyebrows, trying not to laugh at how entirely unconvincing he is.

They talk a little more, veering away from Crime and Punishment to the topic of books in general, and Katherine finds that she's pleasantly surprised by how insightful Steve can be when he's actually read the book in question. She'd known he was smart (they'd got a B+ on their partnered project), but it was nice to see it in a context where she didn't want to smack him over the head with a textbook because he wouldn't concentrate.

The bell rings not long after and they head their respective ways, Steve nearly walking into the library's doorframe because he was so focused on Katherine's in-depth description of The Great Gatsby, a book he openly admitted to never reading.

Kat finds that she still has a small smile on her face when Jonathan sits next to her in Biology and vaguely shrugs off his questions when he asks what has her so happy, because, honestly, she's not quite sure she understands that herself yet.

There are at least four more parts, three of which will be posted shortly.

I do take requests, for both headcanons and imagines/oneshots over on my tumblr (daryldamnson), but it's fine if anyone wants to send them in here too.