If Steve dreamt of anything as he'd slept, he couldn't remember any of it by the time he woke up. His mind was blank and mercifully clear of any recent memory, and yet, he still found himself responding to a curious feeling of dread as he slowly blinked his eyes open to reluctantly face the darkness of his room. He spent a minute trying to reflect on what dream he could've had that would have left him feeling so… apprehensive upon waking, but no subconscious recollections came forward.
In spite of his inability to remember if he'd had a night terror or not, he groggily came to realize that he had curled up into a ball sometime in his sleep and was currently clenched up in an incredibly tense position, his entire body uncomfortably seized up as though it was in anticipation of being hit. He bid his muscles to relax, momentarily afraid that he was caught in the throes of sleep paralysis and wouldn't be able to move at all, until he felt the strain gradually begin to leave, his muscles reluctantly letting go of the tension they'd been holding. Stretching out his sore legs, Steve sighed heavily and stuffed his face further into his pillow after a cursory glance around his room told him there was nothing for him to be afraid of.
Still, he thought, nuzzling his cheek into a fresh, cold patch of pillowcase, it was weird; given the nightmares he was used to waking up from (saturated in sweat, tangled in bedsheets, wheezing and on the cusp of screaming), it would have made sense for him to remember all the graphic details that left him feeling vulnerable. Too often he would wake in a fright and end up carrying the weight of his dreams around with him during the day, but this time there were no lingering memories to contend with. Regardless, there was still some dormant instinct within him that was demanding he react, though, in so far as he could tell, there wasn't anything for him to react to.
The sensation was both puzzling and irritating, bothering him like an itch in the middle of his back that he could only barely reach with the white tips of his fingernails. Anxiety slowly welled up within his chest as he tried to make sense of his circumstances, but without any perceivable immediate threat, Steve didn't know what his body expected him to do. He took a couple of deep, calming breaths to settle his nerves and closed his eyes, willing himself to simply fall back asleep so he could ignore whatever it was that was bothering him properly. Gradually over the span of several long seconds he began to calm down, languishing in the warm comforts of his bed when the sound that had originally woken him repeated itself: a distant, metallic sort of clanging, coming from down the stairs.
A cold chill washed over him as he snapped his eyes open, suddenly alert, the very last dredges of fatigue giving way to a sharp spike in adrenaline. There was nothing but still darkness in his room as he stared blindly forward, his unfounded apprehension finally finding something to latch onto and send his heart racing. The sound came again, louder, and he jerked upright in bed, staring towards his opened bedroom door. Had he left it open when he'd gone to sleep? He couldn't remember, and was frightened by that fact.
Still dressed in his clothes from the evening before, Steve got out of bed as quietly as he could and crept towards the yawning darkness of the hallway. He paused by the doorframe to listen, but couldn't hear anything specific over the pounding of his own heart as he strained his ears. Lamenting the fact that he'd left his bat in the trunk of his car, he slowly made his way to the head of the stairs and paused again to listen. This time, though, there was something to be heard.
The soft sound of someone walking around on the floorboards down in the kitchen immediately put his fears to rest as he remembered that Billy was still there, roaming through his home after spending the night on his couch. He must've gotten up sometime earlier and made some sort of commotion, which in turn woke Steve, and the suddenness of it had set him on edge in his sleep. Exhaling a deep, shaky sigh, Steve ran an uneasy hand through his unwashed hair and tried to force himself to laugh weakly at the situation.
He stayed at the top of the stairs just listening for a while, trying to discern what it was Billy was doing from the upstairs landing as he debated on whether or not he wanted to go back to bed. On the one hand, he could still feel that bone-deep exhaustion that had him collapsing into bed in the first place, but on the other, his heart hadn't yet calmed down and the adrenaline surge from before seemed to have warded off any remaining sleepiness. He wouldn't get rest if he laid back down now, but he'd be comfortable and warm.
Again the sound of something clanging reached his ears from below, only this time he was able to discern it as the sound of cookware being jostled around. It seemed so obvious now, given it was something he was used to hearing on a regular basis. He cooked so often for himself; how had he not recognized the sound? A mild wave of embarrassment came over him for not having been able to recognize the sound properly, but before he could give it much more thought, he felt his stomach clench and growl hungrily at the idea of food being prepared. After a moment's hesitation, he flicked the hallway light on and descended down the stairs casually, lured in by the hopes that whatever Billy was making, he'd have enough to share.
He reached the first floor landing and rounded his way into the kitchen, where he saw a pot filled with water that had been set up on the stove to heat. There were a few pans that had been set to the side of the stove's slowly warming eye from where Billy had set them aside in his search for the pot, but Billy wasn't there to tend to them. Taking a quick look into the pot to see if Billy had started making anything yet, Steve drifted into the living room in search of him.
"What, the bologna pancakes weren't good enough for you, Hargrove?" he asked in lieu of a greeting when he finally laid eyes on him standing by the couch. He'd thought to be cheeky, but the way Billy was standing- stock still, rigid, muscles tense with his back facing Steve- had that old familiar feeling of unease resurfacing within him.
If Billy heard him, he didn't respond. His focus was trained entirely on the large, sliding glass doors that led out to the pool deck in the backyard. Unnerved and hesitant to do so, Steve turned to follow his gaze, afraid of what he might see, but couldn't see anything outwardly suspicious that warranted such devout attention. It wasn't until the motion-activated lights on the deck turned off that he realized that it'd been unusual for them to have been on to begin with.
Something big enough for the lights to have turned on had been out there recently, and Billy must've seen it.
That icy form of dread he'd felt earlier came filtering through his veins again as he stilled uneasily.
"Did you see something?" he asked, unwilling to raise his voice above that of a quiet murmur now that he understood they were at risk. His eyes flicked back to Billy, but he didn't respond, his attention fixed wholly on the windowed doors like a dog on high alert. He looked as tense as Steve had felt when he'd woken up not too long ago, but there was some far-away look glossing over his eyes.
Steve didn't know what he should be afraid of more in that instant: Billy's lapse into silence, or the unknown thing lurking around outside. Was it possible, he wondered, for a werewolf to be affected by a moon that wasn't quite full? What stopped a werewolf from going mad anytime he saw a moon at all?
There was entirely too much that he had yet to understand, but it would have to wait until Dustin got back to him on what he'd managed to learn. Hesitantly turning his attention away from Billy and back towards the dark panes of glass, Steve strained his eyes against the darkness and tried to perceive if any of the shadows out there had any sort of a determinate form. But all the darknesses of the night coalesced together, fusing into nothing but unrecognizable blocks of shadow that the nearly-full moon couldn't touch. There were no red glinting eyes watching them from over the fence, no tall, grotesquely stretched forms hidden in the darker recesses of the back yard, but still something had come close.
Just as Steve began to feel as though it was safe enough to divert his attention back to trying to figure out what was going on with Billy, the lights outside abruptly flicked back on. Light suddenly flooded the back deck and seeped into the living room like stage lights being turned on after a show.
In the span of a few seconds that felt more like hours, a form at last made itself known. Emerging from the ominous veil of shadows crept a sizable raccoon, standing up on its rear legs as it slunk onto the back deck. It turned its nose up into the air and sniffed for a moment before turning to look in at the two of them through the glass in much the same way that they were staring out at it.
The tension in the air went slack in an instant as Steve released a shuddery breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding.
"Jesus," he exclaimed after a moment, forcing himself to laugh for a second time that night as the raccoon dropped to all fours and trundled out of sight. "I'm way too young to be on the verge of a heart attack like this; you could've said it was just a raccoon, man."
"Didn't see it before," Billy muttered, blinking the far-away look out of his eyes slowly. He shot Steve a sidelong look of annoyance before rubbing the stiffness out of his arms. "I was in the kitchen and the lights just came on. The hell was I supposed to think?"
"Well my dad'll be pleased to know they work, at least," Steve said as the outdoor lights eventually turned off, dousing them in the natural gloom. "What're you making in there, anyway?"
"Wouldn't you like to know?" Billy said tersely, turning round and leaving Steve to stare out at his backyard.
"I mean, yeah? That's kinda why I asked."
Steve wanted to follow after him, but remained where he was, temporarily entranced by the night. Questions filled his mind as he wondered where the creature was, and if it was possible that Billy had ended up killing it after they'd been separated, but that would have to be something he'd have to ask directly, he supposed.
But what if he hadn't? However terrible it made him feel to think about, he didn't want to imagine it still prowling around out there. Unbidden, Billy's words from what seemed like years ago repeated themselves in his mind:
'Wouldn't it just end up following you home?' If it was still out there, why hadn't it come here yet?
Anxiety boiled up inside him again as he shook himself free from that line of thinking. Steve glanced out the glass doors once more (just to be sure, just to be safe) before following after him, mentally urging his nerves to settle down.
He walked in on Billy standing at the stovetop, minding the pot of heating water. Billy glanced over his shoulder at him and wrinkled his nose at him as he came in.
"What, my hand starting to smell again?" Steve asked as he leaned against the set of cabinets his mother had picked out when they'd remodeled their kitchen three years ago.
"Starting to, yeah," Billy responded. "You been cleaning it?"
"Not really," Steve answered truthfully, holding his hand up to inspect it. The motion made his arm sore, and he remembered that he'd have to go back to the hospital at some point to get his stitches fixed.
The back of his hand looked as normal to him as it ever did, though the butterfly bandages Billy had used to initially close up whatever wounds were there had begun to peel off.
"Not like it really bothers me, though," Steve said, speaking up again when Billy didn't respond to his previous comment. "Can't clean what I can't see."
"I'm not your fucking caretaker," Billy grunted, turning away from the stovetop to sneer at him. "How hard is it to just wash your damn hands every once in a while?"
"Your water's boiling," Steve commented dismissively as he pulled away from the cabinets to peek at whatever it was Billy was doing. To his surprise, he found that Billy had not only been rooting through his mother's cutlery, but had been through the pantry as well.
Laid out near the pot of boiling water were a few packets of black tea, something that Steve never really indulged in but his mom kept around for when she was home. Steve raised his brow in surprise as Billy scooped up the tea bags and pulled the water off the eye.
Scowling and turning a little red in the face, Billy brushed him aside as he set the hot pot on a trivet and began to go through the upper cabinets, ignoring him altogether.
"Didn't take you to be a tea drinker," Steve remarked as he retrieved the mugs he knew Billy was searching for, stepping up close beside him to reach up and pull them out. He set them down in front of the pot as Billy snapped one of the cabinet panels shut and awkwardly stepped back and away from him.
"Couldn't find any damn coffee," he said, once again wrinkling his nose.
Steve left him then to take a seat at the dining room table they'd met with Hopper at as Billy finished preparing. It didn't take long, and eventually he joined Steve in the room, still wearing a sour expression on his face as he set down two hot mugs with the tea already steeping.
It was a weird gesture, Steve thought as he pulled the cup he was offered closer to himself. With how curt Billy had been acting toward him lately, he really hadn't thought he'd be kept in mind when it came to stuff like this.
The silence that came with the tea wasn't awkward as it would have been in any other situation, at any other time. It was almost companionable, in a way. Sitting across from one another, Billy's gaze sometimes flicked from the table top to the large dining room window, to Steve, and to his cup of tea, while Steve found his attention mostly just drifted.
They drank and relaxed as much as they could, given their circumstances, and even though Steve had managed to sleep, he felt as though he hadn't. He was still incredibly tired, and judging from Billy's haggard appearance, he hadn't fared much better on the couch.
"So…" he began slowly, rubbing his thumb along the ceramic rim of his cup, "do you… remember anything? From when you were-? Last night?"
Part conversation starter, part genuine interest, Steve began to ask the questions he'd been sitting on since he'd woken up.
"No," Billy said curtly, as though he'd anticipated that Steve had been building up the courage to ask him the entire time they'd been sat there. "I blacked out after- when my eyes came out-" He paused to shudder, unable to repress the shiver of disgust he felt as he recalled what had happened to him. "When I came to, the sun was up and I was freezing my balls off in a snowdrift somewhere in the woods."
"Did you kill it?" Steve asked hopefully, but his hope was quickly dashed as Billy met his question with a shrug. "You don't know? There wasn't any… I don't know, evidence or anything?"
"There was a lot of blood. Most of it was probably mine." Billy took a deep drink of his tea and wiped the excess liquid off his upper lip. "Sticking around to search the area was the last goddamn thing on my mind since I was literally freezing my balls off. Never seen my dick look so fucking small," he muttered as an afterthought.
Steve couldn't help but laugh spontaneously at that, sympathizing for him even if Billy's answer managed to dredge up more anxieties within him.
"You sure it's not always like that?" he couldn't help but retort, smiling a bit as Billy scoffed and rolled his eyes.
"Oh, sorry, didn't realize you were such a size queen. Help yourself to it if that's what you want, Harrington," Billy said snidely, leaning back in his seat a bit to give him better access despite the length of table between them. "Come and see how big it is for yourself."
"Whatever, fuck off. How'd you even manage to make it back? To the cellar, I mean. I waited up for you," Steve said, then, realizing how that sounded, continued to say, "I mean, like, I didn't know what to do. We should've made emergency plans or something."
Again, Billy shrugged and sat upright, propping his elbows up onto the table. "I dunno. Followed the blood back mostly. That, and I could… smell you, I think."
Steve looked up in surprise, but Billy wouldn't meet his eye, as though admitting that he'd recognized his scent from out in the wilderness was somehow more embarrassing than talking about how the intense cold had made his dick shrink.
"What, you mean like my hand? You could smell that from all the way out there?"
"I don't know," Billy snapped, suddenly looking annoyed. His eyebrows furrowed together under the lip of the beanie he was still wearing, as though he were still trying to figure it out himself. "I could just smell something , and somehow I knew it was you, alright? None of this shit makes any sense to me, I don't know how you expect me to explain any of it."
"Oh," Steve said quietly, dropping the subject in order to keep Billy from getting any angrier with him. Billy sighed deeply and went back to drinking his tea.
The silence that followed then was awkward, both of them doing their best to keep their eyes from landing on each other, and while Steve knew Billy had answered his questions to the best of his ability, there was still so much left unknown, like, where was it? If Billy could smell him and track him down as easily as he had, then why hadn't 'it' done the same? He hoped the meeting with his kids would help to shed some light on the issues at hand, and if Dustin did as he'd requested, then maybe they could figure out more about what this meant for Billy, as well.
He was lost in those thoughts as he wondered about what the best way to bait Billy into attending the meeting was going to be, when Billy broke the silence.
"I need you to take me back," he said as he finished off his cup of tea. He met Steve's eyes sternly from across the table, the yellow-blue of them piercing in the dim light.
"Take you back?" Steve repeated dumbly, unsure of what he was referring to.
"To the basement."
"To the- whoa, what, why?" Steve didn't bother correcting him; he was too surprised that Billy would want to go back there at all, given everything that had happened.
"I left all my shit down there," Billy explained, sounding drained despite having just finished his drink. "My keys, my clothes; my hair," he added bitterly.
"Ah, shit," Steve muttered before finishing off his own cup. He set the mug aside as he remembered the absolute mess they'd left the Hendersons cellar in. "We do have to clean it up. Fuck, man."
Billy mutely seemed to agree with him. They'd left a plethora of evidence that something violent had taken place there, and Steve was pretty certain it counted as a biohazard in some regard, if the wild animals hadn't already been in there to pick at the shed skin.
"What time is it?" he asked, sounding resigned. He ran a hand through his hair, felt the grease that had built up and wanted nothing more than to just take a shower in that moment.
"Three-ish."
"In the morning? Jesus, I feel like I didn't even get any sleep," Steve moaned. He slumped down into his dining chair uncomfortably, wallowing in his state of tiredness before sitting back up, knowing that if he lingered there for too long he wouldn't want to leave at all. "Alright I guess. Let me... get some stuff together before we go."
Steve stood up, half-expecting Billy to follow suit. When he didn't, Steve shot him a look as he was taking his mug back into the kitchen to rinse it in the sink. "You coming?" he asked, running the water a little bit to clean it out.
Billy was silent for a moment before saying, "I need you to drop me off somewhere first before we get to the basement."
"Cellar," Steve found himself mumbling as he turned the faucet off. "Drop you off somewhere, where?"
There was another pause of silence before Billy finally stood up, the chair legs squealing as they were dragged across the floor.
"My place," Billy said as he set his own mug into the sink, and if Steve were a more perceptive person, he would have noticed the nervousness Billy exuded as he spoke. "I'm tired of wearing weird shit."
"I thought we were going to the cellar to get your clothes?" Steve questioned as Billy moved away to wait for him in the living room.
"Don't be a dumbass, Harrington," Billy drawled as he made himself comfortable on the sofa, the shirt he was wearing riding up his midriff a bit as he stretched out. "I know girls think that shit's cute when they pull that on me, but you're smarter than that. You know whatever's left down there is ruined."
"Shit, you're right, I didn't think about it," Steve admitted as he bustled around, gathering the supplies he thought they'd need to clear out Dustin's cellar.
He grabbed a few large trash bags his mom kept under the sink, and his famous pair of yellow rubber gloves, a mop from the pantry, and dropped a bottle of dish soap into a small bucket. When he felt he was ready, he collected Billy last and offered him one of his coats from the foyer closet. He picked the biggest one Steve had, and together they left the warm sanctuary of the Harrington house and rushed out to his car to escape the gently falling snow.
It took a moment for the Mercedes' heater to kick on, but when it did they were both grateful for it. Warm air gently blew over them as Steve pulled out the drive and began navigating his way towards Billy's home, trying to recall the route from memory but relying on vocal instructions when he needed them or seemed ready to take a wrong turn.
Besides Billy occasionally speaking up to navigate, the drive was mostly silent. Steve had had the radio on, but when he realized he could only catch the signal of talk shows and gospel stations where people called in searching for long-distance salvation, he quickly turned it off.
The silence left him with his thoughts, and as he drove, the rhythm of the wind-shield wipers slowly batting back and forth against the slow, he could feel a weird sense of deja vu worming its way into his mind. It nagged at him as they rode, and the further he got from home the more the feeling advanced.
He found that he was gradually becoming more nervous as time went on. Driving through the slight flurry of snow reminded him of something, but he couldn't quite pin what it was until he spared a glance at Billy to see if he was feeling the same way and immediately remembered the dream.
Billy's profile, lined up against the snow-speckled black of the night. Angry red eyes keeping pace with the car, staying close enough that its panting breath fogged the window. The car door opening; Billy being taken.
His heart-rate spiked as his hands gripped the wheel tightly. Had the dream been a premonition? A warning? Of all the strange things to have happened to him as of late, developing a sixth sense wouldn't have surprised him at all. He felt both trapped and exposed all at once and anxiously pressed his foot a little harder on the gas.
To Steve, it seemed as though Billy hadn't noticed the sudden nosedive his psyche had taken. He looked bored and despondent, gazing out the passenger side window to read the street signs as they passed to let Steve know when to turn. Unbeknownst to him, Billy actually could tell that something was up, though he chose not to speak on it. He could tell whenever his pulse spiked, or his foot nudged the gas pedal a little harder, but didn't want to promote the idea that he cared. If it didn't affect him, he didn't want to be involved. A selfish way of thinking, but one he'd adapted to in order to survive as long as he had.
"Stop here," he said after they'd been driving for about ten minutes. Steve ignored him, white-knuckles gripping the wheel in a deadlock as he continued to drive. Frowning, Billy sat up in his seat and turned towards him, annoyed. "You deaf, Harrington? I said pull over ."
"Huh?" Steve said unfocused, his voice dull and eyes unwavering from the length of road ahead of them.
"Pull over!"
Steve blinked suddenly, as though he'd just then heard Billy's request. He took his foot off the gas and let his car decelerate naturally until it rolled to a gradual stop in the snow, pulling up along the curb to throw it in park.
He gazed around the area in confusion, anxiously biting at his lower lip as he checked to make sure nothing insidious had followed them. The street didn't look familiar to him, though, and he was quick to recognize that they weren't pulled up to Billy's house, or were even on his street at all.
"Where are we?" he asked in confusion, trying to deduce the nature of the stop.
Billy bluntly ignored him in favour of unbuckling his seatbelt and opening the door, the action of Billy leaving the car making Steve tense up subconsciously as the cold winter air whisked in.
"Wait, where are you going?" A little bit of his mental panic seeped out into his voice, and he hoped he didn't sound as fearful as he felt. "I thought you said you needed to go home?"
"I am," Billy said as he shut the door, burrowing down into the coat Steve had loaned him. "Just wait here. I'll be back."
"What? Why?" Afraid of the thought of Billy running around in the night and snow on his own, and being left alone in the night and snow, Steve hastily undid his seatbelt and scrambled for his door. "Are you going the rest of the way on foot? Dude, that's so stupid; I really think we should stick together here. Get back in the car and let me drive you."
"DON'T fucking follow me," Billy snarled, quickly whipping around on Steve when he stumbled out of the car and stepped forward to draw him back, baring his new, fearsome teeth angrily. "Just wait here like a good little bitch until I come back. Can you do that, Harrington? Can you be a good little bitch for me?"
The sudden aggression he was displaying was jarring for a moment, but Steve was able to see through what he was trying to do; had been around Billy when he'd been on the milder side of pleasant company long enough now to understand that his aggressive display was only a tactic of self-preservation. He was deflecting, trying to get Steve to back off the only way he knew how because it had worked in the past.
But not this time.
"It's not a question of whether or not I can follow your asinine orders, jackass! What if it comes around?" Steve questioned, nearly shouting as his anger and frustrations stoked him on, ignoring the way Billy was trying to deflect. "If it gets you while you're out there on your own being a 'tough guy' or whatever the hell it is you're trying to do here, I'd be none the wiser."
"Well I handled it once on my own already, didn't I?"
"That doesn't count if you can't even remember how you did it," Steve said icily.
"Oh, you're worried about me now?" Billy said through grit teeth, narrowing his eyes when Steve refused to back down.
"Of course I am!" Steve's voice raised well above the threshold for a shout as he hollered his affirmation, his regard for caution being thrown aside as his frustrations reached a boiling point. His words seemed to stun Billy into silence, a look of pure surprise crossing over his features as he stood there gaping. "Why the hell wouldn't I be worried about you?" Steve continued, lowering his voice once he realized he'd gotten the upper hand in the conversation. "This shit is scary , man. Stop trying to piss me off to the point where I can't stand you and just let me help you , dammit."
This was the second time in so many hours that he'd seen Billy look so vulnerable. The fabricated rage he'd used to turn Steve away from him only moments ago was gone, and in its place was something much softer, more unguarded. If Steve didn't know any better, he might've said that it looked as though Billy might begin to cry. His eyes were wide and his mouth was opened in a slight expression of surprise before he caught himself and turned away.
"Just, look," Billy said, awkwardly reaching for a strand of hair that was no longer there to twist his finger in. His hand floundered, unsure of what to do before he shoved it in his coat pocket and shivered. "I can't- It's- I just have to do it to this way. Don't question it, alright? Just let me go, and if it shows up, drive off without me or whatever it is you have to do. Don't think about me and just fuck out of here as fast as you can."
"I just, I don't understand," Steve said, blinking the snow out of his eyes. He'd known Billy to be stubborn in the past, but this was just exasperating on an entirely different level. He was clearly hiding something, and seemed to have come close to confiding in him about something before getting scared out of it. They'd been so close to breaking ground in their proximity-based friendship, only for Billy to recoil so hard he'd nearly shut down entirely. "You berate me all the time for being a dumbass, but this is some real stupid shit you're trying to pull here, Hargrove. I can drive you. Let me. Please."
They stood there at odds with one another under the dim light of a streetlamp while the motor of Steve's car rumbled quietly beside them. The winter's chill began to seep into each of them, making them shift around uncomfortably as they each tried to retain any amount of their own body heat that they could.
"I know," Billy said, eventually relenting. His voice almost cracked, and he had to clear his throat before he could continue, averting his eyes. "I know it's fucking stupid, so be smarter than me for once and just wait here, alright?"
"How long?" Steve demanded, squaring his jaw to prevent his teeth from chattering as he rubbed his hands over his arms to generate warmth.
"Twenty minutes."
"Tops?"
"Tops," Billy promised.
It was Steve's turn to sigh; he didn't' understand why Billy was being so adamant about traveling the rest of the way to his own home on foot, in the snow, in the dark , but if he'd been so willing to throw hands over it, then he must have had a reason for it. Whether it was a good reason though was yet to be determined.
"Alright," Steve said after a contemplative moment, letting the argument drop. "Twenty minutes. If you're not back by then I'm going straight to your place, got it?"
Billy scrunched up his face as he considered the deal, and looked disagreeable at first, but eventually nodded stiffly. "Fine. Whatever makes you happy. I'll be back."
And then he was gone, turning around before Steve could get the last word in as he began jogging off in the direction that must have led towards his home. Left alone, Steve watched his form until it blended in with the dark and the snow before getting back into his car to smack the steering wheel with his frozen fist.
It had caught Billy by surprise. Steve's blatant admissal of caring about him had thrown him for such a loop that he hadn't known how to comprehend any of it. He couldn't tell whether to be touched or hurt by his words and the intent behind them.
Either way, it had caused an unexpected lump into his throat that Billy had had to swallow down painfully. Steve claimed not to understand, but in Billy's experience, nobody ever really 'got it' with him. They either knew and ignored it, or remained blissfully ignorant of the fact that Billy lived in constant fear of his father's shadow, and he'd long grown tired of trying to find something strong enough to ward it away.
But Steve came close. He could acknowledge that. Steve was a lot braver than Billy would have ever given him proper credit for, and proved it over and over again with every new day that they were together. It was beginning to be troublesome, Billy thought; it was beginning to hurt.
These were the kinds of thoughts that circulated through Billy's head as he stiffly jogged home, each step he took that brought him closer bringing out the worst of his worries as he wondered if Neil would be up at this hour. He hoped not, but had learnt a long time ago that it was better not to hope at all.
He paused to catch his breath once he reached his backyard, having to cut through his neighbors yard in order to avoid coming in the front. Once he'd gotten control over his breathing, he retrieved the spare key Susan kept under the mat specifically for him to use. The only kind thing for him she'd ever done.
Mentally saying a prayer and wishing he had the protective weight of the pendant his mother had given him around his neck, he slipped the key into the doorknob as quietly as he could and slowly turned the lock.
Stepping inside, the house was dark. A good sign that Neil had given up waiting for him to come home, but not a guarantee. Still, he couldn't help but feel a little relieved as he gently shut the door behind him and made his way inside. He would never resort to tip-toeing around in his own home, but had learnt and practiced a way to distribute his weight evenly in a way that let him walk lightly around without disturbing the floorboards that were more prone to groaning.
He reached the hallway to his bedroom without issue, but was caught the instant he rounded his way into it.
Max looked startled as she almost collided into him, having woken up sometime earlier to use the bathroom. Billy looked just as surprised, giving her the advantage to speak before him.
"What the hell are you doing here?" she hissed quietly, alertly looking around to their parents' bedroom. "Neil is pissed . I thought I told you to keep away!"
"I am," he whispered tersely, trying to step around her and get to his room, but she stood her ground and wouldn't let him pass.
"Sure doesn't look like it," Max muttered. She squared up to him- (a habit she'd gotten used to doing ever since she'd threatened his balls with a spiked bat)- and looked him over, a confused look creasing her features as she saw what he was wearing under Steve's coat, which was something she must have recognized, because the next words out of her mouth were, "What were you doing at Steve's house?"
He opened his mouth to begin to tell her that this wasn't time nor the place to talk about it, when he felt him. He came looming out of the shadows behind him, creeping up on him like the creature had in a nightmare long past. The expression on Max's face went wide in startled fear as her eyes drifted from Billy's face to Neil, who stood directly behind him, having silently stalked him from the living room. Billy closed his eyes and licked his lips nervously, not daring yet to turn around and face him.
"Steve?" Neil asked, his voice even and disturbingly calm despite the apparent disgust he seemed to speak with. "Not Steve Harrington; surely my son would know better than to associate with that queer ."
Billy swallowed hard. In his mind he was screaming; at Max for revealing him, at his father for abusing him, and at Steve for having done this to him. He opened his mouth to speak, desperate to come up with some sort of lie or half-truth that would spare him, but ultimately couldn't think of anything to say.
"Steph," Max said, quickly intervening. She spoke with self-assurance, even in the presence of his father's oppressive aura. Billy opened his eyes in surprise, looking down at her, but her gaze was fixed steadily on Neil. "I said Steph's house, not Steve."
A dreadful silence encapsulated them in the hallway as Billy and Max waited to see if the lie would take. It was hard to gauge with his back turned towards him (and Billy hoped, more than being caught, that his father wouldn't demand he turn around to face him to reveal himself in Steve's too-small clothing), but the pause was... hopeful.
"Steph," Neil repeated, testing the name on his lips as though he were judging a fine wine. Was it good, or was it spoiled? "This is the first I've heard of any Steph."
"Stephanie Baumgartner," Max said, again perplexing Billy with her readiness to come to his defense. There was no hesitation in her voice or posture, reminding him of how Steve had stood against him earlier. "She was in my science class. I… called her earlier to compare exam answers and thought I heard Billy."
Again, there was a long, drawn out pause as Neil compared the false facts Max had given him with what little he knew about Billy's connection to Steve, and the assumptions he'd already made about it. In the back of Billy's mind, he hoped Max was at least telling the truth about there being a Stephanie in her class. Knowing Neil meant knowing that he'd be going through Max's yearbook later to crosscheck what she'd said.
"Is that what she said, Billy?" Neil asked, taking a step closer towards him. At his sides, Billy's hands had begun to tremble as a dormant instinct began to awaken within him, triggering with his fight or flight reflex. "Did she say Steph or Steve , son?"
Billy licked his lips again, his eyes darting downwards to Max's, who seemed to be pleading with him to go with it. But lying to his father like that had consequences; consequences that Max would now take part in because it was she who had started the lie to begin with. If he didn't go along with it now, he'd be condemning her. He clenched his hands into fists to stop them from trembling, and felt something dreadfully familiar in his fingers as he did so.
They were going numb. The very tips of his fingers that grew into his fingernails were beginning to grow sore as he physically felt a reaction. Panicked by this and by how his father had rounded on him to tell the truth, Billy could only think to play along.
"Yes sir. I'm… dating her sister. Max heard me on the phone. I stayed over for dinner."
A look of relief briefly flashed across Max's face, too fast for it to be readily seen in the dark of the hallway. The tension held between them in the hallway was thicker than the fog in Inaba after it rained. Billy focused on taking deep, relaxing breaths as he tried to stave off whatever physical reaction his newfound lycanism was trying to act out on.
"Then explain to me why you're sneaking into the house at 4 in the morning," Neil demanded, the casual tone with which he'd been speaking earlier tossed aside in favor of a more stern and serious one.
Billy blanked, trying to think up of a reason good enough that would satisfy Neil. He looked to Max for guidance, but she couldn't help him here.
"Car wouldn't start," he said lamely after a moment.
"Hm." Neil grunted, and Billy could feel the hot air of his father's breath hit his neck, making him shudder. "Then how'd you get home?"
"I got a ride." Billy's tongue felt thick in his mouth, like it'd grown in size and dried up, becoming useless.
"A ride," Neil repeated, sounding pleased that Billy couldn't come up with anything better. "I didn't hear a car come up the drive. Didn't see any headlights, either."
Gotcha , Neil wordlessly said.
"I had her drop me off down the street. Didn't want to wake anyone," Billy said, trying hard to keep his voice steady and composed. The claws that his hands were trying to grow bit into the skin of his palms as he kept his fists clenched. "I was just trying to be considerate, sir."
He could feel Neil sizing him up and waited for the moment when he would demand that Billy turn around and face him. He didn't know what would happen, or how his innate instincts would react when and if he ultimately decided to do so.
"Funny," Neil said. "I've never known you to be considerate ." He said the word hatefully, as though he were spitting out something rancid. "You wanna know what this sounds like to me, Billy?"
For every excuse he gave, Neil seemed to find a way to skirt around it in order to dig deeper into the lie to expose him.
Billy swallowed hard again. "What's that, sir?"
"It sounds like an excuse, Billy. It sounds like a lie , and if I find out that you've corrupted my only daughter-"
"He's telling the truth!" Max suddenly snapped, nearly shouting as she raised her voice over Neil's. "Why can't you just believe him? Why do you always have to think he's lying when he isn't?!"
It was the first time she'd ever spoken out against him, and the force with which she'd chosen her words had rendered Billy speechless. He stared down into the angry tempest that was her eyes, partly awe-struck and partly terrified. He knew Neil had never struck Max, not yet , but if anything were to spur him into it, this would have been it.
"Don't," Billy tried to whisper, but his warning was lost when Neil spoke over him.
"Go to bed Maxine," he commanded roughly.
"Only if you let Billy go too," she countered, crossing her arms defiantly.
Billy tried to convey the severity of her actions to her through his eyes, pleading with her to stop before she took things too far. She was in Neil's good graces now, but that could all change very quickly. Heedless of Billy's mute warning, she stood her ground and stared heatedly at her step-father who Billy could only imagine was staring back just as hard.
"We'll settle this in the morning, Billy," Neil said, sounding as though he were speaking through clenched teeth.
"Yes sir," Billy replied automatically, too stunned to say anything otherwise. He felt the weight in the floor panels shift as Neil turned away, conceding for the time being. Max drew in a deep breath and held it until they were both alone again.
She turned a triumphant look up at him, but her victory was short-lived as Billy began to move past her, muttering, "Move, shitbird," as he went.
"I just saved your ass," Max whispered angrily after him. "A little thanks would be nice."
"You didn't 'do' anything, only delayed the inevitable," Billy said quietly in retort as he went into his room, closing the door sharply (but not loudly) behind him, shutting her out before she could get anything else out. He heard her mumble something incoherent before she went into the bathroom, and from there into her room.
Billy breathed in a shaky sigh of relief as he flipped the lights on and stood there with his back pressed tightly against the door. He slid down the length of it and sat on the floor, examining his fingernails carefully. They had thickened and grown slightly, but otherwise seemed fine. He found slight traces of blood caked up underneath his nails and picked them clean before getting up to finding a suitable change of clothes.
The waiting was terrible. The minutes passed in agonizing slowness as Steve scanned uselessly through the radio to find something worth listening to in order to pass the time. As before though, nothing of worth came over the speakers, but listening to people calling in to the gospel station to complain or ask for help for their mundane problems was more interesting than nothing.
He kept the volume turned low and sat hunched over his steering wheel, nervously trying to pay attention to anything that seemed out of the ordinary. The engine's constant idling helped to keep his mind at ease, giving him something offhand to focus on, but his mind kept drifting back to the nightmare he'd had the day before, and what the apparition of Billy had told him:
'You can't save me.'
'I've been lied to before.'
Steve sighed, trying to understand what it all might have meant, or if it really had any relevance to his situation at all. It had only been a dream, after all. Regardless, he had no idea what to really make out of any of it.
He understood enough to not give up, though.
Checking the clock on the dashboard for the time, Steve sat and continued to wait, counting down the minutes, ready to jump to Billy's aid should he need it.