You guys! Why am I the last person on Earth to know that the Munson trailer is a one bedroom? As if I needed one more reason to be Wayne Munson's number one fan? We stan a reluctant caretaker with a gruff exterior but a heart of gold.
What was supposed to be a couple's day trip to Indianapolis, turned into a threesome, and Eddie had so much anxiety about it. He'd been wanting to head that way for a while; there was a really good music store, offering gear and records and anything even remotely related to music. He'd asked Casey to go with him, because she loved a road trip, big or small. And he loved having her riding shotgun. They'd make a day of it, get lunch at the good pizza place down the road from the shop, maybe hit up the good thrift stores thad always had a great selection of vintage band tees. But then Eddie fucked up and mentioned it to Gareth.
"Oh, hell yeah! When are we going?" Gareth asked immediately. Somehow, whatever Eddie had said, sounded like an invitation. And he forgot to mention that Casey was coming. But surely neither one would mind, right? Or he could correct Gareth and tell him he couldn't come? But he hardly spent any time with him these days, and he wanted to hang out with his friend. So he could disinvite Casey, maybe? They saw each other all the time. But that seemed mean, that wasn't an option.
"Uh, well, we are going on Saturday, before Casey works," Eddie replied slowly after a bit of thought, hoping maybe Gareth would pick up on the subtlety. Though, if the roles were reversed, Eddie didn't think he'd pick up on it, either.
"So the girlfriend's coming?" Gareth's tone was unimpressed, and Eddie frowned.
"Yeah, I kind of already told her, and she wanted to," Eddie lied.
"That's fine, she's cool," Gareth said, though he didn't sound the least bit enthusiastic. So now Eddie only had to tell Casey. Maybe if she knew Gareth was coming, she would back out. He didn't want her to, though.
Eddie didn't know how to blend friends with the girlfriend. She'd brought him around her friends plenty of times now, and she never seemed to question how to go about it, didn't seem to have anxiety about it. If she did, she hid it well. And it wasn't that he was self-conscious about his friends, because that would be shitty. His friends were hard-won and precious. It was hard to find someone that wanted to be his friend, and that then stuck around once they got to know him even more. Eddie knew he had been neglecting other parts of his life in favor of Casey, and that was nobody's fault but his own. He just loved being with her, and how he felt when he was with her. He loved her. And that was a hard thing to just set aside, even just briefly. But he loved his friends, too, and they were here first, technically. So Eddie told himself, that maybe, if their trip to Indianapolis went well, that if Casey and Gareth got along, then it would be easier. He wouldn't feel so weird about bringing the two halves of his life together.
Once he was home later that night, Eddie called Casey. He couldn't remember if she was working or not, or if she was out. Her schedule was hard to keep up with, between different shifts from his own, babysitting, and her social life. The phone continued to ring, and he was starting to think that she wasn't home, and tried to think of what to say on the voicemail.
"Hello?" She picked up before he had to worry about rambling on and on in his message.
"Hey, angel, it's me," he said, standing up straight at the sudden sound of her voice, when he had been expecting the machine. His anxiety about leaving a message that made sense and didn't sound too harsh or get him into an even bigger mess, was now replaced with anxiety about telling her in real time.
"Eddie? Hi! How are you?" She asked him so nicely, that he smiled.
"Good," he lied. "Listen, I gotta tell you something." Shit, that sounded super serious.
"Oh, what's up?" She asked, trying not to sound worried. Trying not to get worried. She didn't like when guys called and said that. Usually when she got calls like this, it was the last time she'd speak to the guy. She was desperately trying to remember if there had been any warning signs, going over every single interaction for the past two weeks. While Eddie was just trying to pluck up the courage to tell her that his best friend was going to third-wheel their day together.
"So, I was talking to Gareth," Eddie started. That seemed like a good place to start. "I was telling him about Indianapolis. And he asked if he could go, because that's a really good music store, and I said yes." It was a rushed admission, but Casey was used to deciphering Eddie's chaos.
Casey wanted to laugh, and she let a bit of a giggle slip out before she could tear the phone away from her face, holding it an arms length to choke back the rest of the laugh.
"I can tell him no! I can go with him another time, he won't mind," Eddie was bargaining when Casey brought the phone back to her ear. Eddie had mistaken the sounds of her laughter for sounds of outrage.
"Oh my god, baby! No! That's fine!" Casey pleaded. Of course Gareth could come. She'd never tell Eddie that one of his friends wasn't welcome. In fact, she was happy to have him. A lot of Eddie's friends were significantly younger, and she'd been their former babysitters, so it would be weird if she hung out with them, but she wanted to get to know Gareth more. If Jeff hadn't been at school, she'd ask Eddie to invite him, too. Gareth had never spoken to her at the Hideout, nor had Jeff. It had always been Eddie.
"You're sure?" Eddie asked, sounding unsure himself.
"He'll appreciate it a lot more than I will, I'm sure. Maybe you guys just go without me, and come by the Hideout after and tell me about it?" She suggested. She didn't want to be the annoying, clingy girlfriend that annoyed all of Eddie's friends.
There it was, an out. A solution to fix everything. And Casey sounded so sincere, so genuine in the offer that Eddie believed that she wouldn't mind one bit if he took her up on it. But he didn't want that. He'd been excited for their plans together. That was a role she played once before, and it had been both humiliating and miserable.
"If you don't come, then I can't impress you with my musical prowess," he argued. Casey laughed, amused whenever he used words like prowess.
"Gareth won't mind?" Casey questioned.
"Gareth? Who gives a shit. Are you sure you don't mind?" Eddie retorted. It was another lie. He gave a shit. And he had a feeling that Gareth kind of did mind, but was too polite to say anything directly about it. Well, maybe not polite. But worried that he'd piss off his friend and start a fight.
"Of course not," she answered. Because she really didn't. She would never dream of making Eddie choose between her or his friends. She liked his friends, they seemed like good people. She'd had boyfriends with shitty friends before. Enough of them to know that usually, if their friends were shitty, then they were also shitty. Something about the company you keep.
"Ok, good. Because I was kind of freaking out," Eddie confessed, and Casey laughed again.
"You should freak out. We might gang up on you," she teased. And honestly, that seemed like best case scenario to Eddie, because it would mean they were getting along.
Eddie's anxiety wasn't entirely gone. He still worried about how Casey and Gareth would get along with each other. He knew Casey could get along with anyone, but Gareth was stand-offish with new people, took a while to warm up. And Eddie had annoyed him on more than one occasion when he talked about Casey too much. He'd given Eddie shit when he'd invited her to Hellfire that one time. And maybe that was mostly because he hadn't given anyone besides Mike Wheeler a heads up, but maybe it was also because Gareth was seeing her as some interloper invading their world. Probably both.
With sweaty palms and anxiety in his gut, Eddie picked Gareth up first so that he could beg him to be nice to Casey. Gareth had no intentions of being anything, but certainly not mean. He'd defend himself if he needed to, but Gareth wasn't one for confrontation, unlike Eddie.
Casey was already locking up her front door when Eddie's van pulled up in front of her house, and she walked quickly down the walk, two bundled up paper towels in her hands. Without even asking him to, Gareth was opening his door to get out of the front seat.
"No! Stay! I'll sit in the back!" Casey told him, making him freeze, half out of his seat already, one foot on the ground, one still in the van. He turned to look to Eddie, unsure what to do. If he listened to Casey and stayed in his seat, would Eddie get mad at him? But Casey was already climbing into the backseat, settling in the middle of the bench.
"You heard the lady," Eddie said to Gareth, prompting him to finally unfreeze and get back in his seat.
"I brought you guys cinnamon rolls," Casey leaned forward across the center console, holding out the two bundled paper towels to Eddie and Gareth. Casey wasn't above using baked goods to curry favor.
"Holy shit," Gareth swore, taking the one closest to him. "It's warm."
"It's just from a can, but you gotta have snacks on a roadtrip," she said. Eddie grinned at her, taking his own, but setting it down in the cup holder. He twisted in his seat as best he could to lean over the console, smiling at Casey expectantly. She picked up on the hint quickly and leaned forward again to kiss him. It was a quick thing, mindful of Gareth sitting two inches away and not wanting to make him uncomfortable.
"You guys are gross," Gareth said around a bite of cinnamon roll. They'd already failed.
"Sorry! No PDA," Casey promised.
"Maybe a little PDA," Eddie amended, and Gareth rolled his eyes. It was weird for Gareth to see Eddie like this, with a girlfriend. He was softer with her around, and Eddie was not a soft person. He was all rough edges and loud noises, but with Casey now in the van, he was sweet smiles and loving glances at the rearview mirror every other minute just for a brief glimpse of her face. It was sweet, but gross. And weird.
It was hard for Casey to hear the conversation happening in the front seat, especially once they got on the highway. The music was loud and the van was loud. Eddie thought maybe she wasn't saying anything because he and Gareth were talking about D&D and she hardly knew anything about it, but when he called her name and she didn't answer, he realized she couldn't hear them. Eddie watched her through the rearview mirror and turned the volume knob down, calling her name again. This time she looked away from the window and met his gaze in the mirror.
"Did I accidentally drown you out?" Eddie asked, flicking his eyes back to the road, lest he kill them all then and there.
"No, it's fine. It's just hard to hear back here," she answered. She didn't want him to feel bad, she was glad to let him talk to Gareth.
"Did you ever read the Earthsea books?" Gareth asked her, turning in his seat a bit to address her. Apparently that's what they had been talking about.
"I read them to some kids I used to babysit before they moved, but we never got to finish them," Casey answered. "That was a few years ago, so I don't remember it very well."
"Well, what kind of books are you into?" Gareth asked again.
"She likes fuckin' scary books," Eddie interjected, chuckling to himself.
"Like Stephen King?" Gareth guessed.
"Yeah, I like him. I'll read anything, though. I'm not super into the high fantasy stuff like you guys," she continued, ignoring Eddie.
"She was reading some bodice ripper a couple of weeks ago, now she's reading Joan Didion," Eddie added.
"I finished that last night. And it wasn't a bodice ripper! It was a normal historical novel with a tiny bit of romantic subplot," Casey argued.
"Babe, a chick with huge tits in a corset, and a shirtless guy on a horse, were on the cover," Eddie reminded her.
"Marketing. That's just how they get you to buy the book," Casey defended.
"Is that why you bought it, then?" Gareth teased, making Eddie laugh.
"Ok, so, how come when I flipped to a random page I had to read, in great detail, some chick named Giselle getting totally railed by a French guy?" Eddie wasn't going to let it go.
"You didn't have to read it at all! You made that choice, Edward," Casey ignored him, knowing she wasn't going to win the argument. It totally was a bodice ripper.
"Yeah, Edward," Gareth laughed, earning a punch to the thigh from Eddie.
"Listen, if you leave your chick porn laying around, I'm gonna look at it. It's human nature," Eddie defended himself. He'd read a lot more of that book than he was caring to admit, so he knew firsthand that he was right. It was basically porn disguised as a novel.
"I don't look at the magazines poorly hidden under your bed," Casey countered. The fact that she even knew they existed, and where they were, proved that she was lying.
"Please don't fight about porn in front of me," Gareth pleaded, but he was grinning, and thoroughly amused by the exchange. He thought that Casey and Eddie had good chemistry together, and he liked that Casey wasn't afraid to challenge him. Eddie needed someone to challenge him.
Gareth was a shit navigator, and when Casey tried to take over and help, she accidentally had Eddie going the wrong way down a oneway street. She'd been to Indianapolis plenty of times, more than probably Eddie and Gareth combined, but she didn't have the streets memorized, not the way she did Hawkins. Gareth enjoyed watching the couple argue over directions; they were funny together, though never mean.
"Man, this is so weird," he commented, once Eddie finally got his bearings back.
"What?" Eddie questioned, eyes narrowed though never leaving the road. There were a lot of pedestrians and he was afraid of hitting someone.
"You with a girlfriend. It's just weird," Gareth clarified, though he only confused Eddie more.
"It's weird that I have a girlfriend? Gee, thanks," Eddie deadpanned, eyes rolling.
"As long as I've known him, he's never even dated anyone," Gareth turned in his seat to address Casey. She looked between Gareth and Eddie. Whatever Eddie did couldn't be classified as dating, but Gareth was right.
"It's not that weird," she started. "It's not like we're 40, or something." She tried to defend Eddie, but she wasn't sure how much he wanted that.
"You haven't even known me that long," Eddie interjected. They'd been friends for going on three years now. Eddie his first senior year was a lot different than Eddie in his third. He had a lot more game in the first four years, when he was relatively normal, but nobody wanted to touch the second and third time senior. And at that point, everyone around him had become too young.
"Ok, but she's your first girlfriend, though, right?" Gareth continued. Eddie sighed deeply in lieu of an answer. He didn't need to answer, everyone knew Gareth was right.
"Well, he's doing a good job," Casey said, leaning forward in her seat to pat Eddie's shoulder.
"He's not your first?" Gareth asked her.
"Oh, um, no," she answered, pulling her hand back into her lap. She'd hardly ever even gone over her dating history with Eddie, and she definitely didn't really want to with Gareth.
"How many?" Gareth asked, and Eddie punched him in the arm.
"Don't ask that!" He admonished. "Ignore him, Case," Eddie looked up into the rearview mirror, hoping to catch Casey's gaze, but frowned instead at the way she was looking down at her lap. She looked embarrassed.
"No, it's fine," she finally said, looking up. "I honestly haven't counted, but so far this is the second longest relationship I've been in."
The answer kind of surprised Eddie. Both in that he was surprised she couldn't just add them all up in her head, making him wonder just how many there were, if it was a lot. And also, that none of them had been very long. They'd only been together, officially, for two months. That wasn't a very long time, right?
"Ok, so, maybe you can help me," Gareth started, oblivious to the sudden crisis Eddie was facing, and the discomfort Casey was feeling. Eddie had never asked her direct questions about her history with guys. She would have told him if he asked, but the fact that he hadn't made her think he didn't want to know. He'd been more candid with his own, considering there wasn't all that much to tell. She considered his experience level to be perfectly reasonable for a guy his age. But when she compared herself to him, she felt, well, slutty was the wrong word. But she should have been choosier, should have had higher standards. She should have waited for guys like Eddie, instead of just saying yes to anyone that asked her out. If someone asked her out, made a move, that meant they wanted her. And to be wanted was an addictive feeling. But she'd never felt as wanted as the way Eddie made her feel wanted, and she felt stupid for all that wasted time and effort; that none of those guys had even been fucking worth it.
And even worse, not only did she feel bad when she thought about the number, she worried it would make Eddie feel bad. She knew him well enough by now to know that he would compare himself, that he'd internalize it and stew. Casey didn't want anything to change between them, because what they had was the best relationship she'd ever been in, and she'd die if things that happened before she even met Eddie ruined that. If they made Eddie feel bad; if they made him think less of her, too. And Eddie wasn't even a judgmental guy.
"I sit next to her every day, and we talk a lot, but I just can't figure out how to ask her? She had mono so she was out for, like, ever, and I don't know what to say without the excuse of homecoming, you know?" Gareth had been talking the whole time, telling Casey about his struggles with the flautist from Spanish class. She'd barely heard a word. She was suddenly having an identity crisis. Was she a slut? Casey considered herself a feminist and liked to think that there was no such thing, but goddamnit, maybe she was.
"I told you to just man up and do it," Eddie chided, attempting to parallel park. He wasn't very good at it; it wasn't necessary in Hawkins.
"Ok, but how?!" Gareth wailed. "What are the exact words I'm supposed to say?"
"Ask her to come to band practice or something," Casey suggested. She was good at hiding the tempest raging inside her chest.
"She'll freak out if she shows up to my garage and it's just me and Eddie. She'll think we're actually gonna sacrifice her to Satan," Gareth said, immediately shooting down the suggestion.
"What kind of music does she like? We get a lot of different acts at the Hideout, and under 21 gets in before 9," Casey tried again.
"Yeah, take her to see the James Taylor guy," Eddie chuckled. He hated James Taylor, and he liked to believe that everyone else did, too. But girls, including Casey, usually did like James Taylor.
"Actually, that's not terrible," Gareth reluctantly agreed.
Casey and Gareth got out of the van on the sidewalk, and followed Eddie across the street to the music store. They acted like it was a holy site at the end of a long pilgrimage, but to Casey it was just a store. But she smiled at the way the two boys grinned like little kids. Gareth immediately left the small group, walking quickly towards a sparkly, cherry red drum kit. Eddie reached out for Casey's hand, and she took it, letting him lead her in the opposite direction. She followed him down an aisle filled with packs of guitar strings, and she couldn't believe there were so many options. Eddie explained the differences between brass, steel, nylon, the different platings, trying not to get too technical and bogged down in the intricacies and sub-categories.
"Look, babe, they have a banjo!" Casey pointed to the lone banjo hanging on the wall, surrounded by pretty guitars.
"Please, say that a little louder," Eddie hissed, tucking his chin into his chest to hide his face, as if Casey had just jeopardized his street cred in a city he didn't live in, and knew nobody. Casey just laughed.
Eddie made his selection of strings, and left them at the counter, otherwise he'd leave them somewhere or accidentally put them in his pocket and forget they were there until he did laundry. He wasn't totally above shop lifting, but he liked this store, and he still worried about doing things that would make Casey think less of him. Gareth was long gone, but Eddie didn't care, he knew he'd show up eventually. So he took Casey's hand again and led her to the back of the store, the part he knew she would like. He led her through a large archway and down two steps, and into a large open room, row after row of vinyl filling it.
"If there's something you've been wanting that's hard to find, it's gonna be here," he told her proudly. It was a huge collection of new and used vinyl records, and Casey believed him. She'd believe him if he'd said every record ever recorded was in that room. The racks were divided by genre, and Casey grabbed onto the chain hanging from Eddie's jeans, tugging him along as she made her way to the far end of the room, determined to look through every section. Her wide grin pleased him, and he laughed as he followed her. He loved when she pulled on the chain, he loved following her.
They sifted through records, shoulder to shoulder, laughing at funny band names and album covers, occasionally asking each other if they'd ever heard of this band or that. Eddie protested when they moved onto the country music section, but stayed by Casey's side anyway.
"I think you could pull this off," Casey giggled, holding up an old record featuring a man in a powder blue western-style suit, trimmed in fringe. Eddie scoffed and rolled his eyes.
"I'll wear that when you do your hair like this," he grabbed Stand By Your Man by Tammy Wynette. Casey actually liked that album, but the hair was an unfortunate puff of blonde that looked like a helmet, something that probably looked great in 1968.
"Bad hair, but that's a good song," Casey giggled.
"Sometimes I seriously question how we get along," Eddie said, putting the record back, his tone faux-serious. "You have the worst taste in music."
"I like variety," Casey said simply, grinning. She knew he was joking.
"I'll never get over that you own the Monkees," he continued. "That's like, a sin."
"Ok, you're not wrong on that one, but I listen to good music, too!" Casey tried to defend herself, laughing anyway.
"Sometimes I think you find stuff just to annoy me," Eddie accused. "You're lucky you're pretty."
"Me?! You made me listen to "Master of Puppets" sixteen times in a row! You're no saint, either," Casey argued. She wasn't going to go down without a fight. Eddie could be perfectly obnoxious with his music, too.
"Yeah, but that's a masterpiece," He countered, as if that justified making her listen to it on repeat, even if she exaggerated the number of times. "And now you're supposed to say that you let me get away with it because I'm so handsome," he blatantly fished for a compliment, no shame present.
Casey was feeling playful, and kept silent, pulling her lips between her teeth to keep herself from smiling. Eddie looked at her with raised eyebrows and an expectant expression, as if to say really? She had to turn away to keep from laughing.
"Oh, you're so in trouble now," Eddie said, and suddenly wrapped his arms around her waist from behind, pressing himself flat against her back, crowding her into the wooden bins of punk records. Casey was laughing now, pawing at his hands in a weak attempt to pry his hands off of her, but he'd locked his hands around his own wrists, grip firm. She squirmed and wriggled against him, laughing even harder when he got a mouthful of her hair and spluttered, trying to get it out without the use of his hands.
"Your hair doesn't taste as good as it smells, baby," Eddie complained.
"You think my hair smells good?" She asked, pleased.
"No, it's terrible," Eddie lied, still bitter that she didn't return the compliment. Casey laughed again. "Come on, we're going to the only section worth looking at," Eddie started walking backwards, dragging Casey along with him towards the metal section. She let him at first, then suddenly went slack, laughing at Eddie's grunted oof at the sudden dead weight. But to his credit, he didn't drop her. He just hiked her back up and continued to drag her, his arms now hooked under her armpits, the heels of her boots dragging on the terrazzo floor.
"You have to go back and get my records!" Casey cried when she realized she'd left her selections sitting on the bins now three rows over.
"You don't need them, they're no good," Eddie dismissed. He didn't have it in him to haul her back to her feet, and had to carefully lower her to the ground. To make up for it, he stepped around her and held out his hands, pulling her up to her feet once she put her hands in his. They weren't the only ones in the store, and plenty of people had watched Eddie drag Casey along the floor. But she didn't seem to care, and neither did he. She'd gone along with it, indulging in his game. It made Eddie feel warm. It felt good to make her laugh so much, knowing that he was the reason. It felt good to have a partner.
"Fine, I'll get them," she said, but before walking away, she leaned in for a quick kiss that had Eddie's lips following hers when she pulled away. He watched her go retrieve her Thin Lizzy, The Turtles, and Minnie Riperton, then get distracted and make a detour to a completely different aisle. He distracted himself by flipping through records, waiting for Casey to return.
Eddie distracted himself so well that he didn't realize she never came back. Instead, Gareth found him, dragging him off to mess around with different effects pedals. They talked about how if they had the money for a couple of them, if they had a full lineup again, if they could get a gig outside of the Hideout, how they could work on their sound, get even better gigs, end up on the cover of Rolling Stone. It was a pipe dream, but it was fun to talk about.
Casey showed back up, black plastic bag in hand, filled with now five records. She'd added some French chick and Graceland by Paul Simon. Eddie, of course, had to take the bag form her hands and inspect each record.
"My mom listens to Minnie Riperton when she does the dishes," Gareth scoffed. He didn't appreciate Casey's taste in music. Truthfully, Eddie didn't fully understand it either, but he appreciated that she gave everything a chance, even if he gave her shit for it.
"So your mom must be really fucking cool," Casey snarked back.
"Babe, you already own Graceland," Eddie interrupted, holding out the brand new album, still wrapped in plastic. It was the most expensive of her choices, and had only been out for a few months.
"Yeah, on cassette," Casey corrected him.
"Isn't one Paul Simon enough?" Gareth asked, still unimpressed.
"No," Casey said simply. She liked Paul Simon, and she wasn't going to be made ashamed of that.
"Ok, so who the hell is this chick?" Eddie had slipped Graceland back into the bag, now holding an album with a blonde woman on the front, and everything written in French.
"You guys are so uncultured. It's Brigitte Bardot," Casey informed.
"It's also on clearance," Gareth pointed to the big red sticker that had made the gamble seem worth it to Casey. If she didn't like it, at least she wouldn't be out much money. "Do you know French?" Gareth asked.
"Nope," Casey replied, like she didn't even care.
"Hey, I was gonna get these," Eddie had dropped the French album back in the bag, now holding his guitar strings he had left at the counter.
"You guys looked busy," Casey shrugged again. She didn't mind buying Eddie's strings. He bought her stuff all the time. He hadn't let her give him money for gas, so this was the next best thing.
Eddie looked like he wanted to argue, but dropped them back in the bag and kissed Casey's temple. "Thanks, babe," he said. Gareth pretended to gag.
"Before you start making out, can we go?" Gareth was eager to get moving before Eddie got distracted by Casey. Not that he could blame the guy; he was jealous. And confused. Eddie was one of his best friends, he loved the guy. But how he managed to get a girl like Casey, he had no clue. The girls in school would've picked an actual toad over Eddie Munson, but here he was with his arm around one of the prettier girls in Hawkins, and she was letting him do it. If she'd had so many boyfriends that she couldn't keep count, and Eddie was her second longest relationship, either Eddie was a better boyfriend than Gareth ever thought he could be, or Casey was scraping the bottom of the barrel, out of fresh stock.
Eddie could tell Gareth was losing patience, so he let him lead them to lunch. Casey insisted that they order whatever they wanted, she wasn't picky about toppings. She never ordered the same kind of pizza twice in a row, so Eddie believed her. But when the large pepperoni pizza was delivered to the table, and Casey started covertly picking the pepperoni off after the first few bites, Eddie knew what she was up to. He had a feeling she would sometimes insist she didn't have a preference so that he, or one of her friends, could get what they wanted. She put other people's wants over her own sometimes, just to be easy and accommodating, even when it wasn't a big deal. She didn't want to make a fuss, she didn't want to be difficult, or annoying.
"Gimme those," Eddie pinched the abandoned pepperonis off her plate for himself.
"Sorry," she muttered, and Eddie had to actively keep himself from rolling his eyes. She was apologizing for dumb shit less and less, but it still happened sometimes.
"I asked if you were OK with pepperoni!" Gareth exclaimed, watching Eddie eat the discarded pepperoni with wide, indignant eyes. He didn't get it.
"I am!" Casey was quick and careful to not sound defensive. "It's just greasier than I expected." Gareth huffed, but a glance at Eddie's face, his warning glare, had him backing down.
Gareth liked the girl from his Spanish class, he really did. He wanted to go out with her, or whatever. But sometimes he had little patience for girly shit like worrying about greasy pepperoni. He didn't get it. Just eat the pizza. And had she been eating the pizza at home, Casey would have endured the pepperoni, but she didn't want to risk a stomach ache so far from home.
Casey had been a little worried about getting to know Gareth better. She'd technically known him for a while now, as long as she'd known Eddie, but she'd never spent any real time with him, getting to know him. Things had been going well, but now she was worried again. She'd come off as high maintenance, or picky, or annoying, something. Casey knew that friends could have an influence, she'd seen it happen, been on both ends of it. She'd talked plenty of friends out of relationships with people she thought were high maintenance, picky, and annoying. They'd done the same for her. Friends of the guys she'd dated had done it, too. One bad conversation with a friend she'd been left alone with at a small party, and she was dumped over the phone the very next day. It happened all the time, it was a real fear.
Eddie took over the conversation, distracting Gareth with talk of joining their next campaign, not as a DM but maybe dusting off an old character. He distracted Casey with a gentle, covert, squeeze just above her knee underneath the table. His hand stayed there until they were done eating, and Casey got up to use the bathroom before they left.
"OK, you gotta chill out with her," Eddie immediately changed the subject once the bathroom door clicked shut, his voice low.
"Dude, I'm chill," Gareth argued back. Eddie was being defensive, and hypersensitive.
"Stop asking her weird questions," Eddie continued.
"I haven't asked her anything!" Gareth was refusing to match Eddie's hushed tone. He didn't care.
"Don't ask about old shit," Eddie clarified.
"Asking how many people someone has dated is a normal question, dude," Gareth defended his position. Maybe he hadn't done it delicately enough, but he hadn't sensed any discomfort from Casey. He didn't know her as well as Eddie did.
"It's not important," Eddie huffed.
"You don't wanna know?" Gareth couldn't believe it. "I would wanna know."
"I don't wanna talk about it with you in the car, dude! It's not a three person conversation," Eddie was really trying to say it wasn't any of his business.
"You need to chill. You're totally on edge," Gareth fixed Eddie with as withering a stare as he could manage. Eddie was better at that sort of thing, something about the lack of baby face. Eddie sighed deeply and dramatically, leaning back in his chair and crossing his arms. Gareth was right, he was. He just wanted everyone to love Casey as much as he did, and he wanted her to like his friends. He was putting too much pressure on himself, on Gareth, even on Casey.
"You guys," Eddie perked up at the sound of Casey's voice behind him. "There was a whole pizza in the trash can in there! Who takes a whole pizza into the bathroom?" She was grinning as she sat back down, telling them about her find.
"Like in a box?" Gareth asked.
"No! Just the pizza! It looked like sausage and peppers," Casey told him.
"What a waste," Gareth lamented.
"There's worse things to find in the bathroom," Eddie said.
"Like that squirrel in the women's at the bar?" Casey giggled. The women's bathroom at the Hideout had a small window that someone had left open one afternoon, letting in a squirrel that had been impossible to get out. Casey had called Eddie when she got home at 2 AM to tell him all about it.
"Someone put a bunch of frogs in the girls locker room last week," Gareth said. Both Eddie and Casey's eyes widened and they laughed loudly.
"Those poor frogs!" Casey cried through her laughter. Eddie didn't know how it happened, but suddenly the tension was gone. Casey seemed to be good at that, at making people comfortable. Eddie didn't share that trait, but he appreciated the fuck out of Casey for it. He needed to be balanced out.
Eddie damn near forgot how pissed he was at Gareth as they left the pizza place, laughing at each other's stories of things found in bathrooms, of all things. Casey had seen a lot, in her almost year as a bartender. She'd seen things in house parties, and random gas stations, too. Animals, a bird nest full of peeping baby birds in the sink, undergarments, weird food items, a beach ball in the toilet, drug paraphernalia. Gareth told her about Eddie's propensity for bathroom stall graffiti, how his friend would draw weird little characters in sharpie on the walls, a lot of dicks, sometimes Satanic imagery, purposefully feeding into the rumors around him.
"Nobody ever vandalized our bathrooms, but some girl kept writing uplifting messages on the mirrors," Casey shared. "Dumb shit like "just keep smiling" or whatever. Nothing cool ever happens at Catholic school."
They'd walked a couple of blocks to a large thrift store, and Eddie held the door open for Gareth and Casey.
"This place always has the best shirts," Gareth told her over his shoulder, leading the way through the racks, knowing exactly where to go. They passed children's clothes, old lacey tablecloths and afghan blankets, poofy women's dresses, and stopped at a long rack of nothing but t-shirts. Did Eddie need another t-shirt? It was probably the last thing he needed. He could use a new pack of socks, but no, he needed more shirts like he needed a hole in the head. But he'd found some good shit at this particular store; original tour shirts from dates before he hit double digits, graphics that he'd never seen in any stores in Hawkins, a cool skull belt buckle that had a loose hinge that he never got around to fixing, so he never wore it, but it was still cool. He'd even found his favorite leather jacket in this place; it had been expensive even at a thrift store, but he wore it damn near every day, so the cost per wear had made it worth it.
"Hey, doesn't Wayne like Merle?" Casey held up a Merle Haggard t-shirt, standing a few feet down the aisle from Eddie.
"Yeah, but he won't wear shirts with things on them," Eddie replied. "I got him a Johnny Cash shirt one year for Christmas because he's hard as shit to get a gift for, and he's literally never worn it. Still in the bottom of a drawer somewhere." Wayne had appreciated the gift, touched that his nephew had tried to even give him a gift, though he wondered if it was stolen or purchased with ill-gotten gains. Still, shirts with graphics and words, advertisements and logos, weren't his thing. And Eddie appreciated that Casey saw something that reminded her of Wayne, that she paid enough attention to his uncle to think of him. He shouldn't be surprised, but Eddie is still in awe when she does nice things for him, no matter how small. It's not a feeling he's sure he'll ever get used to, someone caring enough to remember small, insignificant things.
"Baby, look," Eddie called out a few minutes later, holding up his own find. Casey had wandered further down the aisle, but looked up when she heard him. He was holding up a white shirt featuring Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem, grinning like he'd just struck gold. Casey's face lit up like a neon sign, and Eddie felt like he really did just find gold.
"Shit, that's awesome," Casey hurried over and inspected the shirt. White shirts were a gamble at thrift stores, usually stained in some way, usually around the pits or collar. But it looked almost pristine, except for a little splotch near the bottom. "I think I can get this stain out."
"Tie it up like you do and nobody will ever know," Eddie took the shirt from her and threw it over his shoulder to join the Zeppelin shirt he'd found earlier.
Casey was prone to wandering, much like Eddie was. His attention span was bad enough that he didn't notice she left most of the time, until he'd look up to ask her something or show her something, and she'd be on the opposite side of the store. He wanted to show her a cool Bauhaus shirt but she was yards away, going through flannel shirts with Gareth. She was holding up a black and red plaid one, telling Gareth something about it, though he couldn't tell what. Maybe giving him instructions on cutting off the sleeves, not that he needed help with that. Most of Gareth's clothes were well acquainted with DIY customization.
"Hey, do you like any of these?" Casey had a handful of flannel shirts that she shoved at Eddie as soon as he was close enough. He had plenty of his own already, so surely she meant for herself. It didn't even occur to Eddie that she would try to find anything for him. "I think I like this green one, though, so that's mine for sure." She was picking through the pile in his arms, and pulled out the one she had mentioned.
"Oh, uh, I think I'm good," Eddie sputtered.
"They're good for work in the winter. It gets cold in there," she said.
"Dude, just let her dress you," Gareth snickered. Eddie shot him a dirty look, and he would've flipped him off if he had a free hand.
"They're so cheap. And feel how soft!" Casey continued, ignoring Gareth. "If you don't end up wearing them, I will," she assured.
"Yeah, they're fine. Not the orange, though," Eddie finally relented. But he didn't like the looks of the burnt orange with navy and green accents. He didn't like orange; the colors made him think of a pumpkin patch. Casey took it out of the pile and put it back on the rack. She got Eddie to narrow it down even more, finally settling on two he would actually wear, and the green one she picked out for herself.
"You know you have pants in here, right?" Eddie asked once the pile of clothing in his arms had dwindled, exposing the dark blue denim.
"Yeah, you're a 29 right? I don't know your inseam, and these are a 32, but I can hem them if they're too long," she was pulling the jeans out of the pile, unfolding the legs. She stepped behind him and held the jeans up to his waist, pressing the waistband into his hips to determine if they'd fit or not. He hoped it'd been a play to just cop a feel, but it was purely utilitarian.
"Baby, I don't need pants," Eddie argued.
"You got paint on your only good pair," she reminded him.
"It's not that bad," he continued.
"You got white paint right on the crotch. It looks obscene," she was laughing so it didn't sound like a scolding. He'd scrubbed and washed most of it out, but there was still the ghost of the paint left in the fabric. If he just pulled his shirt down a little, nobody would ever know it was there, that he ever dropped the paintbrush while making a minifig.
"It's not that bad," he repeated.
"These are good jeans! Red label with a big E!" She said it like he should know what that means, like it was a good thing. "They're $6 and I'm buying them for you. Some day you'll need good pants and you'll be thanking me."
"Yeah, take her somewhere nice in your nice pants," Gareth backed her up, and she smiled at him appreciatively. Now all of a sudden they were friends and ganging up on Eddie, just like he hoped. Only now he didn't like it. He felt uncomfortable with Casey trying to pick clothes out for him. She wasn't trying to make him feel bad, she'd never said anything about the way he dressed, nothing negative anyway. She liked his style, she didn't dress dissimilarly. A lot of her jeans had rips and holes and frayed edges, too. But it was attention, nice attention, attention from someone that cared about him and wanted to take care of him. Wanted to do nice things for him. Eddie wasn't the kind of guy to have nice pants, nice clothes picked out by a nice person just for him, even if it was secondhand form a thrift store in Indianapolis.
"Fine," he relented. "But let me buy my own pants." Casey smiled and kissed his cheek as a reward. She was right, he should have one decent pair of pants. For court or a date or something, but he still felt the prickling of inadequacy creeping up the back of his neck. How he dressed was like armor, only he didn't need it so much these days.
Casey took each item of clothing from Eddie's arms one by one, folding them neatly; his Zeppelin shirt, her Muppets shirt, her green flannel and two for him, one dark red and one charcoal gray, and finally the dark wash Levi's. She was right; they were in great shape, they were nice pants. When everything was folded nicely, she put the neat stack back in Eddie's arms.
"I'm gonna take a quick spin through the shelves. Amber collects those little ceramic poodles and her birthday is coming up, and I always find really good ones in places like this," Casey supplied before walking off, disappearing behind tall shelves lined with junk.
"What kind of psycho collects ceramic poodles?" Gareth muttered before going back to perusing the flannel shirts. "Here, be a doll and hold these," he added his selections to the stack in Eddie's arms before Eddie could say anything or move out of the way.
"I'm not your fuckin' sherpa," Eddie complained.
"Yeah, but your her's, and what's a few extra shirts?" Gareth countered. Eddie rolled his eyes but had the good sense to not disagree. He was fine holding Casey's crap. She'd earned the right by being his girlfriend. If she let him play "Master of Puppets" sixteen times in a row, then he could carry her things. He'd carry her purse, even if it was something girly instead of that leather backpack, which he could probably pull off as his own if it weren't so tiny. He'd carry a big pink, glittery thing with flashing lights and ruffle trim, Eddie Munson is my bitch written in swirling cursive on the front. Luckily it didn't come to that. And if he could carry her things, then he could wear the pants she picked out for him, too. That was a good thing, wasn't it? Having a girlfriend that cared enough to do things like that.
Eddie had to track Casey down after twenty minutes. They were running out of time if he was going to get her to her shift on time. He didn't care about things like that, but he knew she did. She'd be anxious the entire drive back to Hawkins, and god forbid there's traffic or an accident. She'd never been mad at him before, blamed him for anything bad, but it was inevitable, and he really didn't want Gareth to be in the car when it happened.
"Hey, you find your creepy poodles yet?" Eddie found Casey in the far corner of the store. He'd startled her and grinned at the way she tried to pretend that he hadn't.
"I can't decide," she said, nodding her head to beckon him over. She'd found the creepy poodles, alright. There were four to choose from. One had a chip on the nose, so really only three.
"Baby, what are these?" He turned his gaze from the weird dog statues to the glasses she had gathered precariously in her arms. He wanted to take one, but they were barely just balanced, and if he did, one or all would surely drop to the floor.
"I found some of those naked chick glasses!" She turned from the poodles, excitement all over her face, her smile bright, brighter than it should have been for finding pornographic barware in a thrift store. She struggled to safely get her find onto the shelf to show him, and he caught one just before it slid off the edge of the shelf; a clear glass with a Dutch milkmaid painted on the front. A piece of paper had been taped on the inside to keep her modest.
"Look, there's a cowgirl, a Moulin Rouge girl, a bride, and a hula girl," she turned each one to face forward for Eddie to see, so proud of the find, just absolutely fucking beaming. She'd promised him she'd find him more ages ago. So long he'd almost forgotten about it, except for every time she brought him a drink in the pin-up girl glass he'd been gifted for his birthday.
Eddie inspected each one with an appreciative smile. "What about your poodle?" He asked, trying to prod her along.
"Oh, help me pick. This one has creepy dead eyes and I'm kind of leaning towards him," she held up the largest to show him, and she was right. The painted on expression of the spaghetti poodle was soulless and unnerving.
"You wanna get Amber a cursed poodle?" Eddie asked, failing to see the appeal.
"Yeah, I think it's funny," she shrugged. Casey's answer shouldn't have surprised him the way it did, but he laughed loudly. Of course she would think it was funny, of course she would gravitate to the weird and creepy. She picked Eddie, after all. He was as weird as they came.
"Then you gotta go with the cursed poodle," Eddie agreed. "Unless it's haunted and you become responsible for the evil spirit of a poodle possessing your friend."
"I'll risk it. I can ask our old headmaster to do an exorcism," Casey played along with a casual shrug and smile.
"Then get your nightmare dog and let's go. I gotta get you to work on time," Eddie took the creepy poodle from Casey's hands and tucked it under his arm while he carried the clothing, leaving the barware to Casey. He didn't trust himself to manage all five glasses without any casualties.
Casey had to make Gareth check out first while she and Eddie argued about who paid for what. She was ready to pay for all of it, she wanted to. She'd made him agree to the pants and flannels, and the t-shirt was only $2. The spaghetti poodle was a gift for her friend, so she absolutely refused to let anyone but herself pay for it, and she argued that the peak-a-boo glasses were a continuation of Eddie's birthday gift.
This wasn't her first time arguing with a boyfriend over who paid for stuff. She'd had boyfriends that paid for everything, boyfriends that paid for nothing, and everything in between. Guys that gave her expensive gifts, and took her to Enzo's more times than she can count. Casey had discovered that she didn't like being showered with gifts and money, that she liked feeling equal. She wasn't good at taking a compliment, and she wasn't good at accepting being taken care of in that way. She could let Eddie pay for pizza sometimes, or the occasional movie ticket, but she drew the line at frivolous spending. If she was going to get a Muppets shirt and pornographic glasses, she would get them herself. Eddie worked hard at the Hideout, and he didn't have a house and a car paid off the way she did. She knew she made way more in tips than he did, mostly because she had tits and he didn't, but she wasn't going to let him waste unnecessary money on her.
They ended up agreeing on letting Casey get the glasses and poodle, and Eddie the clothing. Most of it was his anyway, he argued. Casey tried to argue that she'd end up wearing his flannel shirts anyway, but he shut her down by reminding her that she paid for his guitar strings already. And most important of all, he just wanted to. He wanted to be the kind of guy that could buy shit for his girlfriend, just because. He wanted to be the kind of guy to take her to nice places and do nice things. He'd never been that guy before. And if he couldn't buy her a stupid Muppets t-shirt and an old flannel button up from a thrift store, then what good was he?
Casey hadn't meant to make it an argument, she didn't mean to make it weird. She didn't want Eddie to feel bad or think she meant anything bad. But as they watched and waited for the cashier to wrap the breakables in last week's newspaper, Eddie took her hand and tangled his fingers with hers. He didn't want to fight about things. He didn't want to be one of those couples that argued about everything. He'd seen his parents fight about everything under the sun, but mostly about money. It was the number one cause of domestic disputes in the trailer park. It was one of the reasons his adolescence had been such hell, yet another thing that separated him from his peers, gave them ammunition to use against him. The poor kid with poor parents and a poor uncle, with clothes either too big or too small. It was just another thing to feel insecure about.
Gareth sat in the back on the way back to Hawkins, and Casey made sure to keep the volume of the music low so he could still participate in the conversation. It was mostly Eddie planning his next tattoos, bouncing ideas off of Gareth and Casey. Gareth showed off the stick and poke he'd given himself recently, hiking up his pant leg and thrusting his foot over the center console between the front seats to present the crooked sword above his ankle bone.
"Casey thinks I forgot that she promised to let me give her one," Eddie said, smirking proudly. Casey scoffed.
"I didn't promise shit! I said maybe," she corrected him.
"You guys gonna do matching ones?" Gareth teased, pulling his leg back.
"I think I'll get your name right here," Eddie patted himself on the chest, on his pec right next to the demon head and spider.
"You want my name on your tits?" Casey teased, making Gareth laugh loudly, and Eddie reach over to pinch her thigh.
"Only if you get mine on yours," he grinned like the Cheshire Cat.
"Names are bad luck," Casey told him. It was the number one rule of tattoos. Surely he knew that. Though, he probably didn't care. Eddie wasn't superstitious; he delighted in seeing black cats, he once purposefully walked under a ladder to make Dustin freak out. As an angry kid, he'd purposefully step on every crack in the sidewalk, going out of his way just in case the old rhyme was true. But nothing ever happened when he did those things. Did he believe in jinxing things? No, but he sure as fuck believed in luck, because how else could he explain Casey? The best thing to ever happen in his life thus far?
"You can't ever break up with him. He'll be completely insufferable," Gareth joked.
"Bite your tongue, asshole!" Eddie wanted to turn around in his seat and punch him, give him a dead leg, but they were on the highway and that was technically unsafe.
"You'll have to fight me off with a big stick if you want to get rid of me," Casey laughed. The idea of breaking up seemed so foreign, like she forgot the concept existed, because why the fuck would she want to? She could never see herself getting sick of Eddie, or growing apart. Something horrible would have to happen for her to call it over, and Casey liked to believe that Eddie wasn't capable of doing anything horrible. She'd been wrong before, she'd thought the best of guys who betrayed her trust like it was nothing. Her trust was maybe too easily given, but he'd never done anything to lose it, not even close.
Eddie took Casey's hand from her lap and brought it to his mouth, planing a big, loud kiss across her knuckles. "No sticks, promise."
Gareth wanted to hate the way Eddie and Casey were mooning at each other, but if he was being honest, it seemed nice. He'd never seen two people so down bad for each other, so in love with each other.
Eddie dropped Casey off at the Hideout as soon as they got back into Hawkins. There wasn't enough time to go by Gareth's house first and get her to work on time, even though he was going completely out of the way. He promised to keep her things safe, that he'd leave them in the van until he came over the next day so he didn't risk breaking anything.
Instead of going home after dropping off Gareth, Eddie just stayed. They smoked a joint in the basement and Gareth got out clean needles and ink. They'd talked about it too much in the car, and Eddie couldn't get it out of his mind. He was hyper fixated on getting a new tattoo as soon as fucking possible. He and Gareth tag-teamed the design while Gareth told him about how Casey talked to him more about his girl problems in the thrift store, how she gave good advice and how much he liked her. Eddie was beaming from the high, the rush of new ink, and most importantly, that his best friend liked his girlfriend.
When he went back to Casey's house the next day to hang out and help her make some kind of pasta with chicken and vegetables, he was eager to show off what he'd done. After a too quick kiss, he was rolling the sleeve up his new shirt to show her the spiderweb he'd poked into the flesh of his inner forearm, taking up the same space as the puppet master on his opposite arm. The skin was irritated and red, but he was proud of the lines, at least. She caught his arm as he was bringing it down to rest at his side when she caught sight of another piece of ink; a wonky star just under the base of his thumb.
"Now we match, so you don't have to get anything," he'd said proudly. Casey laughed, not that it was funny, but because she couldn't express the feeling from her body any differently; the joy and pleasure of having someone so deeply enamored with her to give himself a stick and poke tattoo just to match her, just to have a little tiny piece of her. It was a wet and bubbly laugh that had Eddie grinning proudly. He had been scared to show her the star, nervous that it was too much, nervous that it was a big fucking neon sign advertising how deeply in love he was with her.
Eddie didn't have it in him to care, though. Maybe it was a good thing to have that display of his feelings on his skin, to wear his heart on his sleeve. Because he did love Casey, and what the fuck was wrong with that? What was wrong with making that known? The wonky star may as well have just been block letters stating I love Casey Griffin.