Dying sucked.
And yeah, that wasn't a surprise. It wasn't like it sounded fun or anything, but Eddie had kind of thought there would be more to it than this. Thought maybe he'd get to see his mom again, or like, a flashback of the good parts of his life.
There hadn't been a lot, but there had been some. He wondered if anyone would even notice him gone. He thought of Wayne then, and guilt washed over him.
Fuck, Wayne would never know what happened. The old man would be alone again and grief rose like bile in the back of his throat. He hoped someone might speak to him, tell him-
Tell him what? That his nephew died in some shitty hell dimension, torn apart by demobats? His eyes burned.
The ground was hard and cold. Something sharp was digging into his shoulder blade, which didn't seem fair when the rest of his body felt like he'd gone a couple rounds with a blender and lost. He thought maybe he shouldn't be able to register something so low scale when he felt like his insides had become his outsides. And yet…
He chuckled, wincing at the gurgling burn of it in his sternum. What a fucking baby.
Above him, red lightning splintered the dark grey sky.
He thought back to when he and the others had separated, after they had gotten to the Upside Down but before his kickass rendition of Master of Puppets. He thinks of the moment in between all that, where he called Steve back, felt the connection between them pull taut, like a guitar string pulled too tightly.
He wishes he wasn't such a coward. Wishes he had just fucking told him how he felt, instead of running away like always.
Not always, he thought ruefully.
That was the real Munson way, wasn't it? Always a little too late, never able to do things right the first time around. Steve had looked at him like he was waiting for more, his firm nod a promise but also an agreement.
Accepting that they would have their moment when this was all over, maybe. When Eddie didn't feel like his fear would eat him alive.
Eddie closed his eyes. He couldn't feel much of anything now.
The next time he opens them, he's blinking up at Henderson's snotty visage. The boy looks terrible, tears streaming down his face and lip quivering above him. His eyes are frantic.
Something in Eddie's heart breaks at that. God, this kid is going to be fucked up.
He feels rather than hears himself speak, gritting out his last words like a prayer. Everything is slowing down. He feels like the world is coated in syrup, or something.
Light flashes across the backs of his eyelids. He blinks once, twice, until the blob warps and becomes a blurry Steve Harrington.
Eddie wants to say something but his throat isn't working. He opens his mouth anyway and chokes around what he thinks could have been Steve. Not Harrington, or any other stupid nicknames he'd given the other man. Just Steve.
The man is cradling his face. Eddie can't feel anything, but he thinks maybe Steve is running his thumbs over his cheeks. He wonders what that would have felt like.
His heart tumbles pathetically in his chest.
Eddie can't hear anything, but he thinks he can make out the shape of his name on Steve's lips. He wishes the man above wasn't crying, but some part of him is a little glad to see the tears, to see the evidence that he meant something more.
His vision swims, until the world becomes a blur of hazel and blue denim bleeding across a dark red sky. Eddie can't see anything, but he imagines Steve's face. Thinks of his smile, lips pulled up at the corners. Thinks of the feeling in his chest when he's the one who puts it there.
And then he is gone.
Or so he thought.
Eddie blinked and sat up. Everything was black, and his pants were wet.
"What the fuck?" He looked down, wondering if the other ghosts would make fun of him for pissing himself.
Dark water lapped against his legs and Eddie swallowed the hysterical giggle that threatened to bubble up. Because what the fuck even is his life. Death?
He put that train of thought in the nope pile and stumbled to his feet. He stood, his clothes still torn and tattered around him but no evidence of injury present.
Which is more than a little weird. Cautiously, he lifted the edge of his shirt. Smooth, unblemished skin. Definitely not the ground up mess his stomach had been last he checked.
"What the fuck?" He repeated.
The water shifted and rippled below, and he turns too sharply, almost landing back on his ass in the liquid all over again. Against all odds he smothered the shriek that threatened to bubble up.
A person. Or, a girl, he corrects.
Eddie gapes, and the girl stares.
When it doesn't seem like she is going to make any move to attack him he clears his throat. His thumb traces the edges of one of his rings, spinning the cold metal and willing the sensation to wake him up.
He'd seen enough horror movies with creepy ass little girls in them to know where this was going.
Alas, the girl is still there. Her lips are turned down in a frown and a line appears between her brows, an expression Eddie clocks as confusion.
And, okay. He can work with confusion. Maybe that means she isn't going to turn into some monster and eat him alive.
He spreads his palms in front of him. "I…have no idea what the fuck is happening right now, but I think I may have made a wrong turn somewhere?" Eddie winces. "Or maybe this is where I'm meant to be? Which, frankly, is a pretty big let down. Like, at least give me some Dante's inferno or cosmic horror Lovecraftian shit, you know?"
"How are you here?" She cuts in, and Eddie closes his mouth. Her shoulders were tilted back despite her tense stance. As if she didn't find him a threat.
Which was fair, really. Eddie 'The Freak' Munson didn't cut an intimidating figure. Something in the prey part of his brain was whispering to him, and the skin on the back of his neck stood on end.
"You were calling to me. How?" She repeats, and Eddie realises he probably should have said something. Her mouth is a wary line, small frame still and coiled.
It reminded him of the firecrackers he'd set off his Higgins' office one year. The space between lighting the fuse and the explosion, where you had seconds to get the hell out of dodge or you were losing a finger.
Part of him wondered if he had anything left to lose, and the thought tasted like ash at the back of his mouth.
"I…uh…" he rubbed a hand over the back of his neck, exhaustion flooding him. Because yeah, that's right. He'd fucking died.
This girl was like that firecracker, he could tell. Only more dangerous, and jaded, something in the steel of her gaze ringing a peal of familiarity within him. She couldn't be more than 15 or 16, but Eddie could make out the weight of the world in the lines of her face and the depths of her doe-like eyes.
Dangerous, sure. Metal as fuck. But also so, so tired. He'd recognise that look anywhere, had seen the same fatigue staring back at him in the mirror since Chrissy Cunningham had-
Yeah.
He cleared his throat and looked up. Tried again. "Look, pretty sure I'm dead right now, and I really hope this isn't some fucked up afterlife thing, because-" He swallowed, words jamming in his throat. "My, uh, my Uncle Wayne will be looking for me, and fucking Dustin and Steve are still probably stuck dragging my body back through the fucking Upside Down, or maybe they left it there which is," he cuts off again, burning behind his eyes and the back of his throat forcing him to blink and slow down. "I hope they did. Leave me, that is. Not like I need a body anymore I'm-"
Bare feet step into his vision, pale toes opposite the dirty off-white of his sneakers. A small hand grasps his chin, tilting his head back and Eddie can do nothing to resist.
The girl has a nice smile, he thinks.
"Dustin and Steve are your friends?"
The question throws him for a moment. She says nothing, content to wait.
He thinks of the last few days, the dark and shitty epilogue to his average life. It hadn't all been bad, though, had it? In a fucked up way, it had also been some of the best days of his life. And wasn't that the kicker? He thinks of Steve and Dustin, but also Robin and Nancy, and Max and Lucas-
"Yeah," he croaks, and the truth of it sends the tears he'd held back spilling down his cheeks, tangling in his eyelashes when he tries to blink them away.
"Not dead," she whispers, and Eddie closes his eyes, dizzy. "Just lost. If you are their friend, then you are mine also."
Her small hand is still pressed to his cheek.
"I look forward to meeting you."
Before Eddie can ask who she is, or how he got there, everything spins. The darkness beyond his eyelids fades to white, and again, Eddie is no more.
Eddie opens his eyes.
The first thing he notices is the ache. Bone-deep but dulled. Eddie would bet money that he was on the good shit right now, his mind slow and lazy.
His thoughts were murky. Blurred like the edges of a photograph that hadn't developed properly. His vision swam.
The dark place is gone, the strange girl with it. Instead, crisp white walls and ugly pastel printed curtains greet him. There is a bag hanging to his right, and yeah, okay, that would explain the lack of burning pain he should probably be feeling. He can hear a rhythmic beeping, sharp and irritating in his ear.
The smell is the last piece of the puzzle his tired mind had been putting together. Antiseptic and the uniquely clean smell that every hospital seems to have.
He freezes.
Hospital.
Heart in his throat, Eddie turns his head to the left, this time.
There, slumped forward and looking like absolute shit, was Steve Harrington. He was asleep, long eyelashes fanned out over pale skin, the dark bruising there making Eddie wince in sympathy.
His arm was outstretched, and Eddie followed the limb to where the other man was grasping his hand loosely. As if he'd fallen asleep holding it.
And that was something.
He licks his lips, hating the cracked feeling of them. "Steve," he tries, barely a whisper. The beeping picks up.
The boy sighs and shifts. Eddie can feel his fingers tighten for a moment, grip softening again. Warmth bubbles up, until Eddie feels giddy with it despite the way his whole body hurts.
Slowly, he turns his hand in the other man's grip, and squeezes. It's weak, a tightening of fingertips, but Eddie revels in it.
Steve scrunches his nose up, skin crinkling in a way that had no right to be so cute and blinking his eyes open. His hand squeezes Eddie's back on reflex.
"Hi," Eddie whispers and Steve stares. He blinks once, and then the proverbial penny drops.
He launches out of his chair in a flurry of motion. "Eddie- oh my god, you're awake." He's smiling, wide enough that in any other circumstance, Eddie would have called him out on it, maybe said something smartassy that would have pulled the other man into a petty squabble for fun. It had always been back and forth with them, like the push and pull of waves.
Eddie pushed, and Steve pulled, until he wasn't sure where the space between them was. He thinks maybe it hadn't been there in a long time. He lets the feeling warm him.
Oops, Steve had been talking. Eddie can't bring himself to feel too bad, though. He's alive and so is Steve, who seems to not know where to put his hands. He's standing awkwardly above him, full mother hen mode activated.
Eddie grips the hand that isn't flailing around as tightly as he could.
"-know if you were even going to make it, the doctors were saying you died on the table, but fucking Henderson kept saying your campaigns always have close calls and this would be the same but life isn't a fucking game-"
Steve is babbling now, in a way that reminds Eddie of himself, and the thought makes him want to laugh. He flinches, the pain in his stomach putting an end to that.
"Fucking, ow," he groaned, and Steve cuts off.
He straightens, leaning over Eddie toward the call button. "Maybe I should-"
"No!" Eddie interjects, voice squeaking embarrassingly part-way. Steve freezes, hand extended above him.
"No?"
"Just," Eddie sighs, grips his fingertips as firmly as he can once more. He licks his lips and this time doesn't miss the way Steve's gaze flicks down to track the motion. His throat hurts like a bitch, but he gets the words out. "Just stay. With me."
Steve sags, like a marionette with the strings cut, Eddie thinks, and then rests his head against the blankets by Eddie's shoulder. He takes a deep breath and peeks his head up.
"If you promise to stay with me, too."
The words are low, heavy with meaning. Eddie stares into Steve's eyes and smiles.
"Yeah," he manages, ignores the prickling of tears building up a-fucking-gain. "As long as you'll have me."
And he means it. With every fibre of his being, every beat of his little queer heart. It just took dying to realise it.
He could never get things right the first time around, could he?
There's a beat and then Steve melts, eyes misty and lips quirking up. "What if I want you to stay forever?" He croaks out, and Eddie grins.
Eddie tugs once, weakly, on their hands, and Steve gets the message. The heart monitor speeds up incriminatingly as he leans forward. He hovers over Eddie, gaze reverent, like he's looking at something precious.
His spare hand brushes gently at Eddie's cheek, thumb tracing the skin of his cheek featherlight.
Eddie tips his head back like a prayer, thoughts a jumbled mess of alive, and this is what it feels like, and Steve.
Steve presses his lips to Eddie's.
It's barely a brush it's so chaste, and Eddie would feel embarrassed by how strongly his body reacts but he can't think above the lightning crackling beneath his skin and through his veins, as if someone had lit a sparkler and he was glowing from the inside out.
The heart monitor ratcheted up but it was easy to ignore in their own world. The kiss is warm, and sweet, and so heartbreakingly Steve that Eddie feels himself fall even further in love with this man.
Speaking of which-
They pull back, resting their foreheads together and noses brushing. Eddie feels like he's run a marathon, and immediately feels better when he notices Steve is as breathless as he is.
"I'm doing all the work," he teases and Eddie huffs in amusement, "what's your excuse?"
He thinks for a moment. He thinks how easy it would be to tease him back, pushing and pulling like the tide.
"There's something I wanted to say to you, back…back there," he says slowly. He whispers the words into the place where their breath mingles, hidden from the rest of the world.
Steve's eyes drift shut, and this close, Eddie can feel his jaw tense. The Upside Down goes without saying.
"I uh…I wanted to say it then, but it didn't feel right. Not in that hellscape. I wanted to wait until we were out of that place." Eddie chewed his lip. "Almost lost the chance."
Eddie lets go and slides his hand up. It feels like a Herculean task, sliding his fingertips across Steve's temple and catching the curve of his cheek.
His palm quivers with the effort, and Steve covers his hand with his own, supporting him.
Eddie smiles. "I love you, Steve Harrington."
Steve closes his eyes for a moment, presses his lips against the pulse point at the inside of Eddie's wrist. He opens his eyes, an impish gleam there.
"I know."
Eddie's grin widens, and if he wasn't strapped down to what feels like a million monitors, he would jump the other man so fast-
He settles for capturing the Steve's lips again, firmer than before. It's a little awkward because neither of them can quite stop grinning but it's perfect.
If this is what forever looks like, Eddie thinks in a daze, sign him the fuck up.