To add to the never-ending list of surprises that Eddie had missed out on these past weeks, he found that Max's mother was already at his trailer fixing an early dinner when Steve dropped him and Max off. He didn't know how to make himself useful as he walked in to find her layering ingredients into a dish and prepping it for the oven. It had been too long since he remembered the things he used to do after school that now he was actually at a loss as to how he should spend the remaining hours before bedtime. Max filled the sink with soapy water and set about to washing dishes, tossing him a clean kitchen towel so he could dry and put them away once she had finished with them. It was methodical work, which helped to occupy his mind as he found that the inviting smell of the beef casserole in the oven actually made his underfed and long neglected stomach gurgle.
"I ironed both yours and Chrissy's gowns for tomorrow," said Mrs. Hargrove once Eddie and Max had finished tidying up the kitchen.
Gowns. The word wasn't processing with Eddie because of the two universes he had been in, he couldn't recall a single moment in either where he had expressed any desire to wear a gown.
"For graduation," Max reminded him.
That was right; he was going to leave high school behind tomorrow for good and start his life real doing…what, exactly?
Max seemed to be reading his thoughts and handed him a stack of papers and pamphlets from where they had been sitting atop the junk drawer. "I know you never had any plans for college and your uh, side job might not help cover expenses, so Robin and I collected applications for all of these local jobs and filled out most of them for you. You would just have to sign and submit whichever ones you'd like to apply for and then you can work around town for a while until…until you figure out what you'd like to do."
That was the million dollar question, wasn't it? What did Eddie want to do? He had never set any plans for his post-school life. After flunking for the second time, his goal had just been to get the hell out of the place with no set course on what to do once he escaped. Selling drugs had never been the ultimate goal, so what was left for him to do? What did he enjoy?
He had his band, but what were the chances in making it big enough to earn a living off of playing shows on the road every night? He couldn't see himself as bringing in the big bucks as a Dungeon Master. His hobbies and likes began and ended with those two interests, so he was in for a rude awakening if he wanted to work somewhere nearby with his limited skill set.
"I thought maybe you could take a look at the clerk opening at Melvald's," Max suggested. "He's had a hard time keeping a hold of anyone since Mrs. Byers left and it's just scanning and bagging items mostly. Or maybe at the diner, bussing tables?"
Eddie held eye contact with her for an uncomfortably long amount of time until she got the point. Both of them knew damn well that Eddie was not cut out for working in a diner with his less than approachable demeanor toward people. If he didn't scare the customers off based on his looks alone, the second he opened his mouth, he'd have them scrambling for the door on principle.
"Okay, maybe not the diner, but there's a good selection here, and it's not forever, just until you've got a better handle on things. And you don't have to choose tonight, but I wanted you to know that we've started the ball rolling for you."
Eddie mussed her hair appreciatively which put a small smile on her face.
Forty minutes later, Mrs. Hargrove had steered Eddie into a seat at the small dining table which seated three. She heaped a huge portion of casserole onto his plate before working his fingers around his fork to try and coax him to eat. Eddie couldn't remember ever having seen her in his trailer before and yet somehow, he knew that she had been here multiple times to check in on him at Max's insistence. He remembered vague instances of her curly red hair as she set out clean laundry for him, as she packed lunch for him for the next day, as she sat in the armchair across from the couch while Eddie stared into nothingness. He had missed out on the experience of having a mother genuinely care for his well being because he had been dead to the world.
Mrs. Hargrove poured Eddie a glass of water and set a paper napkin by his right hand. "Try to eat this time, Eddie," she invited, though she sounded weary as if she had said this hundreds of times before with no results.
"Thank you, Susan," said Eddie, though he couldn't remember where he had learned her name. Mrs. Hargrove placed one arm around his shoulders to hug him and the embarrassment he felt could only be a good thing when before today, he could not remember feeling anything since Isaac's death. He had taken his first bite and forgotten to blow on it first, resulting in him burning his tongue when Chrissy walked in, dumping her backpack by the front door.
"Sorry I'm late."
"I'd just set a plate aside for you," said Mrs. Hargrove, standing up from her place at the table so Chrissy could sit down.
"Oh, no, don't get up for me. I'll eat on the couch. You've done so much already," Chrissy insisted. She took the plate offered to her and replaced it with a twenty dollar bill in Mrs. Hargrove's hand.
"What's this for?" asked Mrs. Hargrove.
"That's for the past two weeks of meals you've helped cook for Eddie and me. It's not much, but Mrs. Wheeler doesn't pay me much because she doesn't want me working for my keep while I'm staying there. And don't try to give it back to me because I'll stuff it under your doormat. I want you to take it. Please."
Eddie's mind was reeling that Chrissy helped clean the Wheeler house in exchange for room and board and decided to contribute that money to the woman who was keeping Eddie fed. He had severely dropped the ball and needed to find a job pronto to remedy that. Promising himself that he would submit his top five applications tomorrow after the ceremony, he slowly picked his way through the rest of his food, as his stomach had shrunk and now less nutrition was needed to sustain him. When he had cleared half of his plate, he took a small sheet of tin foil to cover the rest and placed it in the refrigerator.
"Do you want me to stay tonight?" Max asked as she and her mother rose to leave.
"No, you go home and get some sleep. I'll watch him tonight," said Chrissy. "Besides, we've both got to be up early tomorrow for graduation."
Max lingered at the door as if asking if Eddie needed what she thought he needed and he lifted his arms as an invitation for her to step into the embrace. If she was a hugger, these constant hugs would take some getting used to, but he knew she needed them and if he was being entirely honest with himself, he did too. He needed her for the days ahead and Isaac had known that somehow.
After dinner was a subdued affair, for Eddie almost didn't know how to act with just himself and Chrissy in the trailer. He felt sheepish that she had been kipping on the couch for weeks and he had been completely unaware of her presence most of the time. Before venturing into the Upside Down, he would have been ecstatic to have it be just the two of them, for some time alone at long last, but he hadn't cared about anything since losing his brother and his relationship with Chrissy had suffered for it, if one even still existed.
If she had been any other woman, she would have left him to his grief and become Nancy Wheeler's permanent roommate but Chrissy had an excess of empathy for the battered and beaten, which now included Eddie, so she had stayed with him if only to ensure that he woke up every morning. He didn't know where he stood with her at this point and frankly, he was too afraid to ask.
To combat his sudden anxiety, he picked up a pack of smokes his uncle had left on the coffee table and headed outside to light himself a cigarette. What he hadn't anticipated was that a month-long hiatus had turned him off to the comforting taste of ash and now he didn't even have nicotine to turn to as a crutch. He had promised himself he would try to quit, but he had not expected to be forcibly obligated to uphold that promise. He supposed his lungs would thank him down the road but for now, he was only pissed off.
"Eddie, could you come back here for a minute?"
Wondering what she was doing in his uncle's room, Eddie made his way to the back of the trailer and poked his head into the bedroom on the left but saw no one. He looked right and saw Chrissy standing with her hands behind her back in front of his closet, biting her lip with the effort of trying to contain her excitement.
"Surprise," she said with a nervous smile.
Eddie looked her up and down, nonplussed. "Um, what am I supposed to be surprised about?" He thought that maybe she was referring to the state of the room which looked like it had been deep cleaned and organized and that definitely qualified as a surprise since he hadn't been able to see his floor in years.
Chrissy patted the mattress and it took him a second to realize that this was not the old, stained pile of rags that he had thought it was, but something entirely new. New sheets, new pillows, new everything. His own bed, his first bed that was entirely his own. Running his hand over the navy blue comforter that now adorned the bed, he took in the appearance of the new features such as the updated box spring support, the under-bed storage, and the oak headboard. This was not a cheap purchase by any means and if twenty dollars was looking like a big paycheck for Chrissy, she had no business wasting her hard-earned cash just to make him more comfortable.
"Chris," he said slowly so as not to hurt her feelings, "It's great. It's wonderful, actually, but you shouldn't have spent money on me like that."
"I didn't–not entirely. Everyone pitched in. It's not much, but the springs on your old one gave out weeks ago. A good night's sleep can mean the difference between being able to face a new day or hiding from it and I felt that you deserved a good day. Mrs. Hargrove and Steve helped get it ready while you were at school and I made it up for you while you were out smoking. Do you like it? I picked out the sheets myself, figured you weren't a neon green or roses kind of guy."
She was bouncing slightly on the balls of her feet in anticipation of his verdict and the act was so innocently sweet that Eddie felt his long underused facial muscles crack slightly as he managed a partial grin. He welcomed her into his arms as he hugged her appreciatively and rested his chin on top of her head.
"I love it. Thank you."
"And you're not just saying that?"
"You bought me a bed. I'd be a douchebag and a half if I wasn't grateful. It's not an easy thing to admit that you're piss-poor, but it's how I grew up so I was used to it. I never considered how it would affect me later. I've never had a bed that didn't belong to someone else first. There's lots of things that I own that belonged to someone else first."
They broke apart and Chrissy pushed him to sit down on the edge of the mattress to test it out. The absence of a loud and unwelcome creak the instant his butt touched the sheets was a huge bonus since he had dealt with the noisy piece of shit he used to own for years and had woken himself up every time he turned over in his sleep. Chrissy sat down beside him and took his hand, playing absentmindedly with the rings she found there.
"It's good to hear your voice again," she said serenely.
He had half-wondered if his voice would even work after he had gone so long without using it, but it did him good to verbally communicate with people once again. He stared at her hand joined in his for a while but then noticed some deep red and purple marks on her knuckles. He worked his fingers out of hers and then brought her hand up to his face for a better look, gently passing his thumb over the bruised skin. "What happened here?"
"I hit somebody."
Not for the first time, he regretted how very long he had been mentally absent from everything happening around him. For Chrissy to get into an altercation with someone, he had definitely been gone for too long.
"Please tell me it was Jason."
"I wish it had been, then it would have felt better. No, it was a junior, Sean Beckland. He was standing behind us at our lunch table saying some pretty vulgar things about what he thought had happened to Isaac, trying to get a rise out of you. He just kept talking louder and louder, hoping to get you to react and no one was doing anything so I hit him. Not hard enough to break his nose, but I wish I'd swung harder, then that detention I got would have been worth it."
"You got detention?" asked Eddie in awe.
"That's why Nancy had to drop me off today. Last day of school ever and I had to sit in the naughty stool for one more hour."
The world had really turned on itself for Chrissy Cunningham to earn herself an hour-long detention on the last day of school for hitting a classmate in the middle of lunch. The Chrissy he had last remembered in school was the one who had jumped a mile at every tiny sound when he met her at the abandoned picnic table. Granted, she had proven herself to much more between then and now, but he would have thought that her demeanor at school wouldn't have changed one bit.
It saddened him to think that just as he was growing accustomed to having this spirited, wonderful woman around, she would be making plans to pack up and move out of town not only to get away from her parents, but also to kickstart her new life.
"Have you made plans for college?" he asked, dreading the answer. He didn't want to hear what sort of scholarships she had acquired, how far she would be moving to attend a university that met her needs.
"I'm going to Irving Community."
"But that's like, twenty minutes away."
"Yeah, and?"
"And they don't have a lot to offer, from what I hear."
"They have enough."
"You're not going there just to be close enough to keep an eye on me, are you?" he asked accusingly.
"Not everything is about you. Without my parents' support, I can't afford to go to many other places and it would save me a pretty penny if I could attend a local college and maintain my current living situation. Nancy will be heading off to Emerson in the fall and her parents offered me her room if I needed it but if it's okay with your uncle, I can just stay here with you. And I've taken a job as a librarian's assistant which I start on Wednesday, so there's that."
"You're putting your life on hold."
"What life? My mom's only goals for me were to be a cheerleader for whatever college would accept me and then raise a family. She wouldn't let me consider anything else, so I don't have plans for anything else and until I figure out what I'd like to do with all of this freedom, I'm going to bum around town with this guy I met. Five-ten, long, dark brown hair, kind of a Van Halen-looking type of guy. You'd like him."
She leaned over and planted a long, tender kiss on his cheek.
"Would it be okay if I stayed the night with you?"
"I mean, yeah, you kinda live here part time."
"No, I mean here, in your room, on your bed."
"Oh, well I, uh, I don't know if both of us will fit on here," he said distractedly with a nod at the mattress both of them were currently comfortably sitting on.
"I don't take up much space and lately, neither do you. If you don't want me to, I understand–"
"No, I'd like that," he said quickly, afraid of losing his chance to make amends. "I'd like the company."
"I don't want to rush you into anything," she said, and it was clear that she was offering just for his peace of mind. "I just want to be here for you so you can sleep."
It was only seven o'clock but he had nothing better to do, and his talk with Max earlier had left him feeling drained, so he decided that turning in early couldn't hurt. He wasn't shy about undressing in front of her as he changed into a baggy nightshirt and left his boxer shorts in place. Though he had turned away as he switched into his pajamas, he had not heard her doing the same and turned back around to see her standing in a matching nightshirt that came down to her knees and nothing else, though he supposed she had underwear on underneath there somewhere. He had always taken her for the bright pink lacy shirt and shorts type of girl, but he was beginning to think that nothing would surprise him where she was concerned. She was not at all the girl she pretended to be for everyone but him and for the first time in ages, he had a yearning to know more.
She let him lay down first and then climbed in after him. He faced away from her but lifted the blankets so she could share some of his body warmth. Her head was nestled between his shoulder blades, her arms wrapped around him and joined across his stomach. The lull of her breathing sent him into a wave of calm that had been absent for so long in his life. It was a safe embrace with which she held onto him, nurturing and protective, but he didn't feel deserving of it without first apologizing to her.
He wiggled sideways until he lay on his back, head dropping down to look her in the face. He stroked the back of his knuckle against the apple of her cheek. "Thank you for staying with me through all of this. I'm sorry I haven't been here for you."
"You were there when it mattered most. You got me out of that house and I'm here because of you. I knew it would be a long road to recovery for both of us and that there would be times where I couldn't reach you, but I'm in it for the long haul, emotional baggage and all."
"Are you sure you still want me? That's some heavy duty emotional baggage to work through."
"You wanted me even after finding out what my life was like at home, so yeah, my mind is pretty made up. Besides," She shifted closer to him and her hand moved over him, coming to a rest upon his crotch and he involuntarily surged against her. "We had a deal."
He hadn't necessarily been waiting for an invitation but by God, that was an open invite if he ever saw one. He shouldn't have been ready for this tonight, of all nights, but he was experiencing a flood of emotions after he'd been denying them to his body for so long and he needed this. Lifting himself off of the mattress, he straddled her, feeling the heat at her core. She grabbed the back of his nightshirt and pulled it over his head where he tossed it across the room. Her fingers found the elastic waistband of his boxers and pushed them down to his ankles. He sucked in breath as he felt himself bared before her, open to her scrutiny. For the first time since earning it, he was aware of the laceration mark across his chest from where the vine had cut him as he attempted to save Max. It reminded him heavily of all the awful events he associated with that day and he tried to set them aside as he gazed down upon her, waiting for him.
She lifted her hips off the bed and slid her underwear down.
Every instinct was telling him to hurry, and so Eddie reached onto the bedside table for the stack of condoms in the ashtray that he now knew she had strategically placed for easy access.
"Should we maybe get a towel or something?" he asked as he ripped open the plastic wrapper with his teeth. "I know there's supposed to be a mess after a woman's first time."
"Actually, I-I already took care of that. Please, don't be upset but I didn't want there to be that mess for our first time so I sort of–practiced already. There won't be any blood."
He didn't know what that said about either of them or the situation that she wanted his first time to be focused entirely on him without having to worry about her discomfort, but he loved her for it. His erection was already achingly stiff and he had no trouble at all sliding the condom down his length.
Foreplay wasn't on the agenda tonight; his needs and wants were too immediate. Isaac had encouraged him to not forget to live in the aftermath. He had told Eddie to do something for himself, something that he felt he deserved and tonight, he deserved to forget.
He positioned himself before her, prodding at her entrance, but he faltered. It was torture, trying to block out the memories that were pounding against his skull while everything below his neck was begging him to give his body this long-awaited sensation.
"You don't have to do this right now for me if you don't want to," Chrissy reminded him hastily.
"I'm not. This is for me. I want to. I need this."
Asking her consent through expression alone, he propped himself up with one hand on either side of her head. She placed her hands on his waist, drawing him closer.
He pushed into her with one solid thrust and she arched forward off of the mattress to meet him. She pulled him down to her and claimed his lips in a searing, almost brutal kiss as he began to pulse inside of her. Already, his movements were frantic, his inexperienced hips trying to sink into a rhythm that he could sustain long enough for both of them to enjoy it.
It was nothing to be ashamed of in that he knew this would not be a lasting encounter. Both of them were too eager to have it drawn out long enough to thoroughly enjoy it. Not that he had anything to judge off of, but she was exquisitely tight and in her own exploration of finding what made him writhe, she clenched her inner muscles around him. He had not anticipated any sort of sensation like that and grasped the wooden headboard for stability.
Chrissy's fingernails were clenching in his back, her legs wrapping around his waist as he drove into her and he blessed this new mattress for not creaking with every movement. He was close, he could feel it. Tilting his head back, he heard his own rugged pants in his ears along with the soft exhales coming from Chrissy underneath. He thrust into her, feeling his legs quivering on the precipice of his climax. He felt himself releasing and saw a blinding white flash in front of his eyes as he fell into that roaring completion.
Dropping his head down beside her head, he kissed the sweaty skin between her neck and collarbone and then nuzzled his head against her, thanking her.
/ /
The sky was falling. The vines were flailing. And Eddie saw one rising up behind Isaac, poised to strike. He stumbled forward on his injured legs, grabbing Isaac by the jacket and throwing him bodily sideways. A rush of cold swept over him, accompanied by what was almost a distant pain somewhere below his heart. Pressing a hand to his abdomen, his fingers came away sticky with blood that looked inky black in the portal light.
"Well…shit," he heard himself say, and then pitched forward. Before he could smack his face on the ground, Isaac's hands caught him, turning him over and gingerly lowering him to the ground.
Isaac formed a pillow with his arm to prop Eddie's head up and keep him conscious. "You're okay. I'm gonna get you home and you're gonna be okay."
"If you say so, man."
"Eddie, look at me. I need you to stay with me, okay?" Isaac called for the others, voice breaking as he demanded that someone help him. "We'll have you out of here in just a minute."
"Yup," said Eddie, not entirely in control of what was choosing to come out of his mouth and this was proven by the blood he was trying and failing to swallow back. The coppery taste was not new to him, but the clammy coldness was. His blood should have been steaming hot.
He could see the gaping wound in his stomach where the vine had pierced completely through him. There was no denying the severity of a hole that size. He would never make it to the hospital. He would never make it through the gate.
"Stay awake. Stay with me. Please, don't do this to me. You can't go anywhere."
Not going anywhere. I'm staying right here, probably forever.
"I'm not gonna let you do it, Eddie. You don't get to check out on me. Not for a long time."
"Sure, bro."
Eddie had lost all feeling below his legs even though he could see them twitching. Even with a portal light pressing in on his eyelids, everything was growing darker, colder, distant. This wasn't so bad. There almost wasn't any pain; just incoherency and frustration.
"Why didn't you just yell at me to move?" Isaac asked brokenly. "Why did you have to step in the way?"
Eddie cracked a grin at him in a red-stained smile. He had been the only one to see the vine at the pool gate, the only one to react in time to save Isaac. This time his reaction had been quick enough to spare his brother completely–and condemn his own actions.
See? I'm just as good at protecting what's mine as you are.
He didn't feel much now, just cold. And tired. So very, very tired. He might just close his eyes for a minute or two, just to rest…
Isaac was pressing his lips to Eddie's forehead, a searing heat next to the ice that Eddie's skin had become. Eddie saw the crucifix necklace his brother always wore dangling in front of his eyes but his sight was blurry, losing focus, going grey, and then white…
"Eddie, no, not like this," Isaac begged frantically. "Don't you leave me. Don't you fucking do it. Please, you're all I have. I love you and you can't leave me."
But he was already going.
There was a feeling of lightness enveloping him now, of weightlessness, of drifting into nothing, and then he was gone.
"Eddie!"
Chrissy was kneeling over him on the bed, shaking him frantically and he realized that he had seized in his sleep. There was foam running out of his mouth and he tasted blood in the back of his throat, perhaps from biting his tongue. He drew in a shuddering breath as his body came to the realization that he was still alive or rather, that he had come back to life because he had been dead. There was no doubt whatsoever that he had been dead and sent back.
If Eddie had had any clothes besides his boxers on, they would have been stuck to him in sweat, for he could feel himself laying in a puddle of the stuff. Above him, Chrissy's face was white and there were two trails of tears running down it.
"Say something to me," she pleaded.
"I'm okay," he lied. He sure as hell was not okay, not after whatever the fuck that had been he just escaped from. And she must have felt it or seen it or sensed it somehow to be the weeping mess she was at the moment. "What–happened?"
"You were asleep but then you started twitching and your eyes opened but you couldn't see me or hear me. You were rabid and there were–it looked like there were black veins spreading out all over your body for just a second. Then you stopped and didn't move. You weren't even breathing for close to a minute. I thought–I thought you'd died.."
"I did, I think. I…I died. I saved my brother and I died."
He recounted his dream to her, how he could have believed that they had just defeated Vecna but instead of watching Isaac be taken by the creatures and the pull of the Upside Down, he had succumbed to that fate instead. He described how real it all was, how it felt like a memory rather than a vision.
When he came to the part of having the vine stick him completely through, he lifted himself up off of the bed on his arms to get a proper look at his stomach: pasty white, sparsely decorated with hair, and lacking any sort of attractive or redeeming qualities, but whole. He ran his hand over the skin, testing it just to be absolutely sure, and remembering seeing his own blood staining his fingertips, solidifying his fate.
He had been ready. He saw it happening as if it had been the first time, as if everything since then had not yet happened and this was not a chance at a do-over. That had been the one and only time. And if one of them had to die, it was not going to be Isaac. Eddie had known that when he pushed his brother out of the way and he had been prepared to die, accepted that he was going to die. And he did. He had felt himself cross over and wondered if on this side, however briefly, he had died. He wondered if while Chrissy was attempting to wake him, his heart had stopped for just a moment and he had seen the beyond.
But he was still alive, in bed with Chrissy beside him, and his brother was gone. The present had not changed since awakening even though he would have accepted it, welcomed it if it had. He would rather have gone on ahead, rather have entered that unknown realm before his brother and waited for him on the other side than be here in this single dimension without him.
Chrissy nestled in closer to him, still sniffling, and it was these noises that allowed his own to come forth without being heard by her as he blinked away tears.
/ /
He was lucky that Chrissy had thought to set an alarm for the next morning because he sure as hell didn't and if he had had his way, he would have slept until well past noon. His body felt like it was trying to make up for lost time and that included many lost hours of conscious sleep. His and Chrissy's sexual escapades had used up what little energy he had left to spare and after he had fallen asleep, his body had insisted that he stay that way for as long as possible until he had been jolted back into consciousness by his nightmare. After that had taken its toll, he returned to a somewhat fitful sleep that had held him hostage until Chrissy had to get rather violent with a pillow and smack him unceremoniously upside the head with it to get him moving.
Ever the chivalrous man, he had let her shower first but she was in an out inside of a minute which impressed him since they had about the same amount of hair and she had additional shower services to attend to like shaving and moisturizing and whatever the hell else women did in the shower that kept them in there for hours. He couldn't exactly complain since he so rarely got the opportunity to have a long, hot shower that when he did, he spent quite a long time in there as well. Still, he was thankful that he would not be standing under an icy cold spray this morning.
In those few minutes before he stepped out of the bathroom, standing wrapped in his towel and shivering slightly, he rubbed his thumb over the area of his stomach where he knew that hole had been in his nightmare. With a jolt, he felt something there that had not been there six hours ago. There was a line, the tiniest, faintest scar right above his navel. His body was covered in scars now and he could count them all with surprising accuracy, but apart from his legs, those marks were only milky white recollections. This thing on his stomach was not on his list of healing injuries and one month was hardly enough time for any cuts of that caliber to have nearly faded. He tried to remember where this injury might have come from, but nothing came to mind and so he had to put it aside for the time being.
Usually, he let his hair air dry but since Chrissy had salvaged her hair dryer from her parents' house, he used it to full effect and found the results rather satisfying. Since he knew that it didn't matter what he wore underneath his robes, he donned his Hellfire Club t-shirt and his rattiest pair of jeans, just to stick it to the board one more time that he was graduating whether or not they liked it. There was a small moment of panic when he threw his gown over his head since he had trouble locating the neck hole and spent a few frantic moments traversing the vast expanses of the silky green jungle before Chrissy rescued him, fighting back a snicker at his misfortune.
The bigger challenge than finding the right way to put the gown on was trying to make the damn cap stay on his head to the point where Chrissy had to secretly use a few bobby pins to hold it in place. She brushed some lint off of the front of his gown and stepped back to admire her handiwork with a self-satisfied smirk.
The boys would be dressed in green and the girls had opted for orange instead of white this year which was going to clash horribly on the football field where the ceremony was to take place. Chrissy had put on bright orange eye shadow for the occasion to match her robes and had a white bracelet on that had some letters inscribed on it that Eddie couldn't make out.
Though the entire town would have risen against him and revoked his driver's license if he had posed the suggestion to them, none of them knew that Eddie Munson was about to take the wheel after abstaining for the past thirty days. He wanted to arrive at graduation in his own vehicle so he could make a hasty exit before he had to endure the throes of watching happy families celebrate their graduate's achievements. Eddie was passing by on a fluke and he wanted as little to do with the celebrations as possible.
On the bright side, Hawkins was a small town which meant there was a small graduating class of about sixty people and so he would not have to sit through hours upon hours of names being called. The downside was that he would have to stand up in front of an entire town that knew his brother had been the last supposed victim of those two unnamed murderers. He had a stern talking with himself during which he agreed that he would keep his eyes down.
As the to-be graduates flooded onto the football field to the rows of foldable chairs sitting before the elevated stage, Eddie could not share in their excitement. It was stupid how his life had come to this point, that he had to wait for a flimsy sheet of card stock paper with some asshole's signature on it saying he had completed the necessary levels of education to enter into society as an adult. He'd been an adult for more years than that asshole had had hair, but he would have to bear it for the sake of his sanity because he was not going to spend one more second in the hallowed halls of Hawkins High.
Fixing his tassel one last time, Chrissy hurried to her seat in the front row while Eddie took his in the third row back between Gregory Mansfield and Rhonda Nielsen, both of whom looked quite shocked to see Eddie in attendance.
Me too, he told them with a shrug.
To no one's surprise, Nancy had made valedictorian but as much as he respected her and even admired her, he couldn't commit enough motivation toward paying attention to her speech. Instead, he played with some of the rings on his left hand while he flicked through the index cards that were hidden in his gown pocket. Subconsciously, he touched the scar on his stomach. Nancy's speech was mercifully short compared to the ones Eddie had heard in past years and then Principal Higgins tapped the microphone and asked the top ten percent of the graduating class to move into place beside the stage. They were those with honors, with special cords denoting their involvement in high placement clubs and societies. Pricks, the lot of them–besides Nancy.
Following them, Robin was the first to take the stage, tripping over the front hem of her gown which was too long, but managing to cover her clumsiness with an impromptu dance move. She saluted Eddie as she moved back to her seat.
He had to wait a tense moment as Jason's name was called right after Robin, followed directly by Chrissy according to surname alphabetical order. Jason stopped at the bottom of the steps to see Chrissy accept her diploma case from the principal and Eddie fidgeted in his seat, welcoming any sort of move that would give him an excuse to bolt early, but Jason moved on, shooting a look Eddie's way that promised something, though Eddie had no idea what.
Down the list they went and Eddie drummed his feet on the grass, severely regretting having not stopped to piss before making his way onto the field.
"Edison Munson."
He heard cheers from the crowd, proof that he meant something to someone back there and squinted backwards into the sunlight to see Max, Mrs. Hargrove, Steve, Dustin, Lucas, Mike, Will, and Eleven all clumped together off to the left holding up a large paper sign that read: Congratulations Eddie and Chrissy! Way to go Nancy and Robin! Heartened, he climbed the stage and accepted his diploma from Principal Higgins. It was definitely on his mind to flip the balding bastard the bird, but instead he shook the man's hand with a fixed smile, remembering to not show his teeth, and then returned to his seat.
The last name called was Samantha Zimmerman and then they were given permission to turn their tassels and toss their caps sky high. Avoiding the sharpened points of dozens of caps falling back down to earth, Eddie simply snatched his off to rid himself of the bobby pins and stuffed it under his arm as he let the swarm of graduates sweep him back up the bleachers to the blacktop where families were congregated with flowers, balloons, and other gifts to bestow upon the class of '86.
Max was the first to tackle Eddie in congratulations, followed closely by Dustin, and then the others in quick but very public succession. He was getting far too many hugs than he was accustomed to but found that for once, he didn't mind it. He even got the most uncomfortable sideways bro-hug from Steve that he never wanted to experience again. The last in line was Will who Eddie still didn't know well, but who he shared an unfortunate bond with and he could tell that the kid needed those extra few seconds that the hug had to offer. Eddie tried to put all of his unspoken words into the embrace, to apologize and offer sympathy.
Everyone moved on to also congratulate Chrissy, Nancy, and Robin and Eddie found himself face to face with his uncle who was still in his work clothes looking exhausted, but pleased. He clapped Eddie's shoulder and Eddie did not miss the meaningful squeeze his uncle put into that grasp.
"I didn't even know if you knew I was graduating today," said Eddie, somewhat embarrassed.
"Been working double shifts all month so I could be sure to have today off. I owed it to you to be here, after everything. I know it ain't been easy, but you deserve this. I hope you know that."
Like Isaac, like Eddie himself, Uncle Wayne wasn't one much for speeches and gratuitous amounts of displayed affection, but he did care, something Eddie's parents never had done. His uncle still wanted what was best for him and would continue to offer his support, no matter what Eddie chose to do. And he would never know how his other nephew had really died.
"I'm proud've you, son. No matter what circumstances led to this, I'm damn proud." His uncle clipped Eddie's jaw with two of his knuckles and then nodded at Chrissy who was being presented with a small bouquet of flowers from Mrs. Wheeler a few feet away. "She gonna be stickin' around?"
"I think so."
"She a good friend've yours?"
"She's my girl."
"Since when?"
"Since Spring Break." He didn't elaborate. Everyone knew that what happened over Spring Break was better left unsaid.
"You'd best upgrade her to somethin' other than the couch, then," Uncle Wayne suggested.
"Already have."
Chrissy sealed the deal by approaching him sans graduation cap, throwing her arms around his neck, and kissing him full on the mouth in plain view of everyone. Considering what had gone on last night, Eddie felt it was high time the word got out that Eddie Munson and Chrissy Cunningham were a couple that no one saw coming. He lifted her off her feet enthusiastically and let the kiss linger as he felt dozens of eyes on them.
When they broke apart, he caught Jason watching from a few yards off. His graduation cap was bent in half from where he had snapped it to try and contain his anger at the sight of Eddie and Chrissy kissing. Eddie invited him to do something, knowing that this animosity between them wasn't over. Despite Eddie's role in saving Patrick's life, despite Jason coming to offer a half-hearted apology about Isaac, this was far from over.
Now so close to the chain link fence that he could see his van waiting for him to hightail it out of there, Eddie was about to call for Chrissy when he spotted Eleven beckoning to him by the concession stand and he followed her around the back. Without preamble, she touched him right where his scar was, which confirmed his worst fear.
"How do you know?" he asked urgently.
"I felt something last night. A bad feeling. I went into the void and I watched you die. You died and then you were stuck and Chrissy couldn't wake you up. I had to help you come back."
Eleven parted his gown and lifted his shirt to reveal the scar, now faintly pink and definitely present. What did that mean? What could this growing scar of an injury he'd never sustained mean? The Upside Down was gone, Vecna was gone, and the dream couldn't have been more than that unless something somewhere had gone very terribly wrong.
"Was I really dead, or was it just something you saw in the void?"
"What I see in the void is real," she explained. "Everything that happens there has always been real. It may come to you in a dream, but that does not mean it isn't happening. So when I saw you last night, I knew that the feeling I had was real too and I knew that I needed to tell you today but wanted to wait until after the ceremony."
So he had died. Last night, he had died, somehow, because of something Eleven had seen. Did that mean he had died from the wound he never had or had his body given out on him when he was trying to wake from his dream?
"Mike said I shouldn't, that it would be cruel to tell you, but you deserve to know," she continued. "After I helped you out of the void, I saw something else."
"I'm gonna stop you right there because if you tell me you saw Vecna, I'm gonna have to go and throw myself in front of a car. I'm not dealing with any more bullshit from him or anything that doesn't exist strictly in our dimension."
Resigned, Eleven sighed and then plunged ahead. "I don't know what it means, if he exists between worlds now or if he is somewhere else, but I saw him, and he saw me. He looked right at me and I could touch him like he was actually there. He told me to get ready because there was more to come, that everything was only just starting. He said this time, we wouldn't be able to stop it from finding us."
"Stop what?"
"Everything," said Eleven cryptically with a shrug.
"Vecna told you this?"
Those almond-shaped eyes grew wide pointedly and with a single shake of her head, she answered, "No. It was your brother."
/ / /
AUTHOR'S NOTE: I am beyond devastated and in mourning following the S4V2 release and the only way I know how to cope is to try and keep Eddie alive through my own story, so there is a potential for a sequel in the works sometime soon. Thanks for stopping by.