Author's Note: Thank you, thank you, thank you for the wonderful reviews for Chapter VIII. I loved writing it and I'm glad you all enjoyed reading it too. It finally happened, they kissed! A slower chapter this week after the excitement of the last one, but just as important in it's own way.


Chapter IX

I had kissed Eddie Munson.

That thought occupied my mind all evening and all night after it happened. Not only could I not believe it had happened, but I couldn't believe how much I had wanted it. Eddie Munson, the guy that everyone loved to hate. The outcast, the self-proclaimed misfit even, of Hawkins High. But the surprising thing wasn't that it was wrong, that it had felt bad, it was the opposite.

I laid awake that night, tossing and turning, and thinking about the kiss, playing it over in my head. I was half excitement, half fear.

The excitement was the easy part. All I could think about was kissing him again. If I closed my eyes tightly, I could remember his soft lips on mine, the warm, quiet strength of his hands on my waist, the need in his grip as his hand had wandered lower… I wanted more, I wanted to feel his body close to mine – a feeling that was entirely new to me, having always kept those around me at arm's length.

The fear – well, that was different. A secret friendship, hidden under the mask of our tutoring sessions, had felt safe, normal, easily explained away. But this was a whole other level, and now that we'd crossed that line, could things ever go back to how they were? The fear of that was what made sleep allude me that night. Was I ready to give up the life I had had before?

It seems silly, now that I look back, that this was the life-or-death question that kept me up. But that night, I felt like I was in a kind of limbo. A transient place where I was at once my former self – cheerleader, best friend of Hawkins High's Queen Bee, star student and all-around good girl – and this new self, the one that had kissed Eddie Munson. And the one that wanted to do it again – and again. The one that might lose her friends, her reputation, the life she'd known, all for a guy. The neat box I'd created for myself within the unwritten social rules of Hawkins High, the one where I knew exactly who I was, felt under threat. I didn't quite know yet whether that was a good or bad thing.

And that was if Eddie wanted to even do it again. I couldn't be sure that he still wanted to. Perhaps he would get bored once he knew he could have me. It had crossed my mind that his unpredictability might not work in my favour. This dance that we'd been doing for so many weeks might have reached its end now that we'd both given in.

I arrived in school the next morning, exhausted and on edge. I was nervous to see Eddie, even from a distance, and unsure how to act. If it sounds naïve, silly even, I'm not surprised. But I had next to no experience with guys – a few kisses and fumbles around in the dark with Chance, mostly at parties, that left me disappointed and dissatisfied, wondering if that was how it was with guys or if there was something missing. That was it.

If I'd have been honest with myself, I'd have admitted I was scared. Not to mention, my emotions were heightened by the pills I regularly took, like a TV with the brightness turned up too high. None of this occurred to me at the time, however. Instead of trying to overcome my initial reflex to pull away in face of vulnerability, I continued as normal. I tried to stay calm and cool as I met Chrissy and Jessica in the hallway that morning as school started.

"Hey."

I approached them, smiling brightly like always. They greeted me similarly. I listened while they chatted brightly and tried to forget about the fact that I might come face to face with Eddie and his friends at any moment.

After a few minutes, I spotted the unmistakeable, tall, messy-haired figure that was Eddie Munson. I didn't notice him until he was at his locker, distracted by my friends talking excitedly about an upcoming party. I had a clear view directly at him, but his back was to me. I watched as he rummaged in his locker. His signature leather jacket was draped over one arm. He wore a Black Sabbath t-shirt that showed black ink of his tattoos against the pale skin of his toned arms. I could see the muscles in his biceps tensing as he began stuffing books into his backpack.

As he turned, slinging his bag over one shoulder, I caught his eye for a brief moment. I looked away instantly, laughing in response to something Jessica was saying. Embarrassed at having been caught looking, I tried to calm the burning heat in my cheeks. I looked back a second later, but he was already gone.


My day was plenty full of things to distract me from Eddie. A pop quiz in Math, a presentation in English, a cello lesson that I struggled to focus on, and a particularly brutal girls volleyball match in phys. ed. I showered after P.E. and changed into my cheerleading outfit. I pulled my dark hair into a high ponytail, ready for practice after school. My second to last class before the end of the day was another study period, in which I finally gave myself a chance to breathe. I headed to the library, wishing for some place quiet to sit.

Instead of finding a desk and working on my next assignment, I browsed the bookshelves, locating the fiction section that I was all too familiar with and searching until I found the book I wanted. I'd given my only copy of Wuthering Heights to Eddie to read, knowing he was unlikely to have his own, and was eager to dip into it again for what was probably my third or fourth time. I grabbed a nearby stool for reaching up to the higher shelves and sat down, my bag at my feet. I flicked through the yellowed pages of the decades old copy for a while, reading snippets of my favourite chapters, until I heard footsteps stop in front of me in the otherwise quiet library.

"Hey stranger," came a low voice. The black jeans, ripped at the knee with a chain swinging from the waist, were enough for me to know exactly who it was. I looked up from my seat to see Eddie grinning down at me. I was reminded of one of our first conversations at the start of term, when all of this had begun. We'd been in the library then too. It hadn't been that long ago but to me, it felt like my whole life had been turned upside down.

"Didn't see you at lunch…" he explained. I swallowed, looking up at him from my seated position, suddenly nervous around him.

"I made a decent guess as to where you might be. And ding, ding, ding," he made a noise like the winning bell on a gameshow. "I was right."

I rose from the stool, feeling tense.

"Hey," I replied, coolly. He appeared equally as nonchalant; bag slung over one shoulder. He fiddled absentmindedly with the edge of a book on one of the shelves beside us with one hand. There was a slight awkward silence between us. I clutched the book to my chest, arms folded.

"So…" he said, drawing out the sound. "You wanna be alone or something?"

He looked me up and down with uncertainty. My wall was up. I was anxious. My mind's commentary from the previous night was replaying, fast forwarding through the next few weeks like I knew exactly how it would go. I could see a new path laid out in front of me – one where the girls from the cheerleading team turned their backs on me, the guys laughed at me in the cafeteria, and where my mom berated me for supposedly throwing my life away to someone who she deemed beneath me. All I had to do was take another step – whether it be a kiss, or even just a smile, anything to let him in again – and I'd be on it. The thought paralysed me. For once, I couldn't find the right words to say to him.

"Yeh, sorry," I said lamely. "Super busy day. As always."

"Right," he nodded. His foot tapped rhythmically on the ground, never one to stay still. "You, er, still want me to come over on Thursday? For the next study session?"

"Of course," I said brightly, trying to sound normal. "Revising before we next meet."

I raised the book I was holding to show him the cover.

"'Course you are, nerd," he laughed, reaching out and ruffling my hair. It served to break the tension between us somewhat, as well as mess up my ponytail. I protested but he was already backing out of the row of bookshelves. "See ya, Hartley."

He left in the direction that he'd came, reminding me that he hadn't stumbled upon me in the library, he'd come to find me. I felt a pang of guilt. I fell back onto the stool with a heavy sigh, and I threw the book roughly to the ground in frustration.

Shit, I thought. This wasn't how I envisioned things going after our first kiss. I was an idiot.


I wasn't sure how you were supposed to act around someone you liked, but I'm pretty sure, I wasn't doing it right. I blamed Eddie's unpredictability, his inscrutable behaviour. I blamed my inexperience with guys, and my inability to read signs given to me or to communicate how I felt. Anything not to reflect on my own fear, the vulnerability I felt at being on the cusp of letting someone in.

I spent the next two days avoiding Eddie, even though we rarely encountered one another directly during school anyway. In the hallways between classes, I stayed close to Chrissy and Jessica, talking animatedly to distract myself from searching for Eddie in the crowds. In the cafeteria at lunch, I stopped myself from looking over at the Hellfire Club's table as I usually did, not wanting to catch his eye as I often did – even when I could hear him acting obnoxious, standing on his chair, and roaring with laughter with his friends. And after school, I went straight home from cheer practice, studying in my bedroom to avoid the chance of seeing him in the library.

By the time our tutoring session came around, I wondered if he'd even turn up, I'd given him such a cold shoulder. But he did. Right on time as always. There was every chance it had all been happening solely in my head.

We settled on the sofa in the den as usual. We'd long abandoned the table, preferring to sit comfortably instead. Our sessions had become increasingly informal, and mostly now consisted of us having long conversations about books and brainstorming essays. The session began as normal. I asked whether he'd read the chapters we'd agreed on the previous week and what he thought of them. He was almost at the end of the book now and soon we'd move onto something else. He gave a half-baked response but seemed distracted; he'd sighed heavily before replying and rubbed one eye wearily.

"But what did you think of Heathcliff in chapter 27? Don't you think he's pretty out of line?" I asked, scanning over the notes I'd written earlier that day in my notepad.

Instead of answering me, he closed the book he was holding in one hand with a sharp snap and dropped it down on the coffee table next to us. It hit the table with a dull thud. I looked at him expectantly.

"What happened two days ago?" he asked bluntly, jutting his pointed chin and looking at me sidelong.

"What?" I blinked, knowing full well what he was referring to. Every fibre of my body was telling me I didn't want to enter this conversation.

"We kissed, Hartley. That's what happened." The annoyance in his voice was unmistakeable. I'd yet to see Eddie angry, even after the incident in the cafeteria earlier that week. I flinched at his directness.

"I know that." I looked down at my notepad, fixating on the corner of the top page, which was curling slightly.

"Do you, Veronica? 'Cause I kind of feel like you're acting like nothing happened." I practically winced at the sound of my first name, which he so rarely ever used.

"I am not acting like nothing happened," I said childishly. He gave me a pointed look with raised eyebrows.

"Look, if you're regretting it, it's totally fine. But we can still be friends, right?" he said all at once, in an exasperated tone. He rubbed his face with one hand. "Besides, you're the only thing keeping me on track to actually graduating..."

He gave a dry chuckle, the corner of his mouth twitching upwards, in an attempt to break the tension.

This was it. This was the crossroads I had envisioned, the decision I had feared. I'd been acting like a coward and Eddie wasn't letting me get away with it. I shouldn't get away with it. I had to decide. Avoidance wasn't a solution. Did I want to go back to the way things were? Or did I want to take this risk with him? Perhaps everyone in my life to date would turn their backs on me, but perhaps doing this one thing for myself might actually bring me some joy.

"Friends?" I made myself look squarely at him. "I don't want to be friends."

He stared at me wide-eyed and for a moment, I saw the brown-eyed, pale-faced young boy that he once had been, before the long hair and tattoos. He might put on the bad boy persona, but I could see that he was vulnerable and human, just like I was.

"No?" he replied, looking down at his hands and then up at my face sheepishly.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to make you think…" I trailed off, nervous. I glanced at the staircase leading up to the rest of the house, double checking I'd shut the door to the den. I moved closer to Eddie on the sofa. My hands were wedged between my knees tightly in an effort to stop fidgeting. I took a breath, trying to steady my voice. "I definitely don't regret it."

"Oh yeah?" He broke into a grin at that, bashful but happy. Smiling for the first time since he'd arrived. There was an understandable hesitancy in his voice, however, that I wanted to fix. I nodded, too self-conscious for actual words in that moment.

"What was all that about then?" He gave a teasing smile. "It was like having the old Hartley back."

I laughed nervously, well aware of what our former relationship was like: non-existent.

"I don't know… I haven't really done this much before." I squirmed in my seat, feeling scrutinised.

"Done what?" I felt like he was toying with me now.

"This – flirting, making out at school, whatever it is that we are doing." I avoided defining things between us.

"What about your basketball dude?" he returned.

"That was different." I looked at him pointedly.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah." I shook my head and frowned like the thought didn't compute in my brain. Comparing Chance with Eddie was preposterous. "Totally different."

"Is that so?" he enquired, something teasing in his voice. "How's that then?"

"I know what you're doing, Eddie." My mouth twisted into an irrepressible smirk. I'd revealed enough for one day, he wasn't going to get anymore out of me just yet.

"Come here, Hartley."

Hearing him utter that command again was the stuff of my dreams. The tight knot that had been growing in my chest for the last two days eased somewhat.

He leaned towards me. Lifting a hand to my cheek, he pulled me into a kiss. Soft at first but turning deeper and more passionate. He placed his hand on my knee and a large part of me was glad I'd changed into high-waisted shorts after cheer practice. It slipped up to my thigh, raising goosebumps as the cold metal of the rings he wore trailed along my bare skin. I shifted closer to him and in a moment, he'd pulled my leg over his, so I was half on his lap. Breathing heavily, I pressed my chest against his. My hand made its way up to his unruly hair. Grabbing a handful on the back of his head, I gave it a small tug. He groaned against my lips and pulled away. To my surprise, he got up suddenly, disentangling our legs.

"You gotta be careful there, Hartley. Otherwise, I'm afraid I won't be focused on our lesson anymore."

He jumped on the spot a few times and shook his arms and legs, making an exasperated sound.

"Because you were so focused before?" I said sarcastically.

He laughed and lunged forward, grabbing a cushion from the sofa and throwing it at me. It hit me with a soft thump. I gasped in mock indignation, grasping at a second cushion and trying to aim it at him as he pranced around the den, trying not to collide with the table and chairs nearby.

Unable to hit a moving target, I leapt up from the sofa and made after him instead, hitting him from behind as he tried to run away. As I went to hit him again, he grabbed my arm, making me drop the cushion with a disgruntled cry. He pulled me to him. I let out a soft moan as he placed a slow kiss on my lips. A much better prize for me than winning the pillow fight.

This was it. I was all in. I had kissed Eddie Munson – again.

It was still there, the anxiety – the images of my friends turning away, my mom with her arms folded looking disapprovingly at me, a hundred shaming eyes burning into me as I walked down the hallway at school. But it felt small. Neatly folded and packed back into the recesses of my mind, there to be taken out and dealt with another day. Or hopefully, never.

In that moment, the only thing that mattered was the feel of Eddie's muscles flexing beneath his t-shirt as he clutched me to him, my hands raking through his long hair, and his tongue hot and wet on my lips.

Fuck, I thought. There's no going back now.