Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

When Eddie goes to answer a knock on the trailer door, Jonathan Byers is very low on the list of people he expects to see. It’s surprising enough that Eddie stands there for a good several seconds, just blinking.

“Hey,” Jonathan says, shifting from foot to foot, and it’s a bit of a relief that he too, seems very aware how atypical this is.

“Hey,” Eddie says slowly. “Can I— what’s up?”

Jonathan’s mouth twists, and if Eddie didn’t know better, he’d be worried he was angry. There’s something worryingly intense and intimidating to his thinking face. It’s only the past few months of movie nights and assorted other interactions with the buffer of their mutual friends that’s given Eddie enough insight to recognize it for what it is, so he waits while Jonathan tries to put his thoughts in order.

“Can we talk?” Jonathan asks, wincing a little.

Eddie stares at him, and then, “Oh. Is this a shovel talk?”

That startles a laugh out of Jonathan.

“Could I persuade you out of it?” Eddie asks drily. “Robin’s already warned me not to break Steve’s heart, and she may have been sweet about it but it’s no secret Steve’s her person. And we are all well aware of how scary your girlfriend can be when she’s angry. I know full well the hell I may bring down on my head without you adding to it, because I am sure you could also kick my ass six ways to Sunday.”

Jonathan’s grinning as he shakes his head in exasperation.

“You’re insufferable, Munson,” he mutters. He pauses, looks at Eddie. There’s something weird and considering and intense to his gaze.

“You know that you’re one of us now too, right?”Jonathan says, and Eddie startles a little. “This fucked up little group protects our own, and that includes you. We’re not all immediately going to kick your ass if things don’t work out with Steve. Not to say we don’t all want it to work, because, like, fuck, really hope it does, but—”

Eddie stares at Jonathan.

“That’s very sweet of you, Byers,” he says, trying for joking, and missing by a mile.

Jonathan shrugs, offers up a sheepish smile. Then his expression pinches a little bit.

“It is sort of about hurting Steve though,” Jonathan admits.

“Hah, knew it,” Eddie says, if only because it causes a flicker of a smile to break the anxious expression on Jonathan’s face.

He suddenly realizes he’s still standing in his doorway, and that Wayne may be asleep, but he is still home, so he closes the door behind him and tips his head towards the woods in a question.

“Lead the way,” Jonathan says, so they stroll out until they’re thoroughly isolated, at no risk of interruption without hearing it coming.

Eddie drops into a seat on a fallen log, just a little bit rotten, and Jonathan joins him.

“Smoke?” Eddie offers. “Joint?”

Jonathan wavers a moment, then shakes his head.

“I’m tempted, because I’m really not looking forward to this, but I promised Will I’d try and be better. I’ve been a little too high through too many important conversations the past year.”

“Fair enough,” Eddie offers. “Okay if I smoke though?”

“Go for it.”

So Eddie taps out a cigarette and lights up while he waits for Jonathan to gather his words.

“That black bandana perpetually in your pocket’s not an incidental fashion choice, is it?” is what he starts with, and Eddie’s eyebrows shoot up his forehead.

“Jonathan Byers, where did you learn about the hanky code?” he says, putting his hand to his chest and affecting a scandalized tone. “Man, maybe Cali really is paradise.”

Jonathan laughs and kicks him.

“Shut up, you’re distracting me.”

Eddie grins, takes a drag, and takes a moment to assess.

“Jonathan Byers,” he says, this time slower, (slightly) more serious. “Are you worried my deviant tastes will scare Steve’s vanilla sensibilities?”

He expects another laugh. Instead Jonathan frowns.

“I was worried you two hadn’t talked about it,” he says instead. “Been kinda worried he hasn’t talked to anyone about it but me.”

“You’re being a little cryptic there,” Eddie says, tamping down the anxiety that’s building in his chest, because this seems beyond a ‘maybe be careful unleashing your freak shit on him’ talk. “What’s ‘it’?”

Jonathan groans, scrubs his hand through his hair in frustration.

“Fuck,” he mutters, “This sucks. I’m trying to figure out how to, you know, like, it’s not my place to air out his shit. But also, like, we both know the guy. He might never open up unless something forces him to. And I want to make sure he’s fine, and that everything goes fine, and that you don’t accidentally fuck you both up without realizing, yeah?”

“Yeah,” Eddie says quietly. He feels kind of stupid for not thinking ahead, trying to feel out what other pitfalls might be lurking underfoot, because fuck, god knows this relationship with Steve has had enough of that. It’s absurdly shortsighted of him to have assumed that’s all done and in the past just ‘cause he and Steve are officially dating now.

“I appreciate that,” he tells Jonathan, because he does. It means more than he thinks he can articulate that other people are looking out for them like this.

Jonathan huffs again, leans back on his hands, stares up at the sky.

“Just— Don’t assume you know what Steve’s into, okay?” he says. “But also just— I need you to know that the things he’s into might be, like, a minefield or something, and you’re in a place where you could fix it, or to really fucking blow it all up.”

“Okay,” Eddie says. He wishes he had more to work with, but he suspects pushing that point might hit that boundary Jonathan was talking about, between worrying about Steve’s wellbeing and worrying about betraying his trust. “Okay.”

“Thanks,” Jonathan says quietly. “Sorry I can’t—”

“Nah,” Eddie says gently. “I get it.”

They sit in silence for a long while.

“That offer for a joint still open?” Jonathan finally asks.

“Oh, thank fuck,” Eddie says. “Absolutely.”

Eddie turns Jonathan’s words over in his head a lot the next few days. He can’t quite puzzle them out. He knows he’s missing pieces but he can’t help the vague sense that he should be able to guess at their shape, but they manage to elude him. He knows, one, it’s something Steve’s apparently talked to Jonathan about, but perhaps no one else. Two, it’s something to do with Eddie’s own tastes and preferences, but that could be about pain, or control, or any number of facets of it. He can’t quite pin down a three.

It’s not about sex in general, or sex with another guy in specific. Steve’s got a reputation for the former, and, one would think the gay sex thing might’ve been a problem, given all the complications and roadbumps in Steve coming to terms with wanting a relationship with another guy. But in hindsight, maybe Eddie should’ve known better, because again, Steve’s always had a reputation for sex. The feelings and the romance and the desire for a relationship with another guy—with Eddie specifically—may have been hard for Steve, but the sex? For Steve, the sex part, apparently, is easy, and the introduction of another dick into the equation had remarkably little impact on Steve’s enthusiasm for it.

That’s also, admittedly, one of the main reasons Eddie hasn’t had a chance to test the waters on how Steve might feel about Eddie’s… interests. Yes, part has been the worry that he might scare away American sweetheart and high school heartthrob Steve Harrington with his ‘deviant’ sexual tastes, so Eddie’s always intended to hold back and take things slow anyways. But honestly, that’s been massively eclipsed by the fact that Steve’s enthusiasm is mind-blowingly hot, and they usually end up too eager and frantic to get complicated with it.

Eddie turns the thought over and over and over and doesn’t really get any answers. So he decides to set it aside. He won’t figure it out until he has more, so there’s no point dwelling on it, he just has to keep it—whatever this is—in mind.

Chapter Text

One night they’re atop Steve’s bed, a single lamp on, curtains drawn against the darkness. (And it’s weird that, over the past few months, something about Steve’s stupid ugly plaid wallpaper has turned kind of cozy to Eddie.)

Eddie’s got his knees splayed wide over Steve’s lap, tongue in his mouth, and his hand in that hair. And Eddie can’t help himself, because Steve always responds oh so prettily to any attention it’s given, and Eddie kind of wants to test that boundary, so he tangles his fingers in it, and yanks .

And Steve’s head goes back and his eyes go wide and his pupils blow out, huge and dark, and he whines, and Eddie can feel the proof that Steve is really into it from where he’s perched. And Eddie thinks oh fuck yes , and he can’t help but grin to himself when Steve buries his face in Eddie’s neck, hiding it from view.

And Steve’s trembling a little, and that’s a rush too.

“You— you don’t have to do that for me,” Steve says, voice small.

Eddie almost laughs it off, but there’s the faintest undercurrent in Steve’s voice that’s not quite right, and like a bolt of lightning he remembers that conversation with Jonathan. The weird seemingly unrelated focus on Eddie’s bandana, and Don’t assume you know what Steve’s into , and the things he’s into might be a minefield, and you’re in a place to fix it or to really fucking blow it all up .

“Sweetheart,” he says slowly, “You know I do it because I want to, right?”

Steve flinches, and ah, fuck .

So Eddie settles back onto the sheets, wills his dick into compliance, and resigns himself to a serious talk.

“Steve,” Eddie says, and then he flounders because he’s not sure where to start. He tilts his head in thought, and Jonathan’s in might actually work just as well here, so Eddie reaches back into his back pocket and pulls the black bandana free.

“Anyone ever told you what this means?” Eddie asks, and internally winces when Steve just looks puzzled.

Steve shakes his head. “No. I mean, I know Marisa and Adam have commented on it, and that guy at the record shop, uh, David. But none of them ever—” Steve’s voice trails off. He blinks, stares at Eddie, opens and closes his mouth a few times as he seems to put together the common thread between those people.

“Oh,” he says finally. “It’s a… signal?”

“Yeah, babe. Also, remind me to have words with your cousin and his gal, if they wanna be your queer elders, they should be teaching you this stuff. But it’s not just a—” Eddie huffs. He really wasn’t prepared to have this conversation, and certainly not today.

“Okay, so, yes, it’s a sign that I like guys, and a way for similar people to recognize that. But it’s more specific, yeah? Different colors, different placements, sometimes different patterns, if you want to get into the nitty gritty, they mean different things. Different things guys are looking for, different things they want, they like. Some girls use it too, but they’ve got some different systems too, and that’s a topic for another day. We’re simplifying all this way down for now.”

Steve blinks up at Eddie. The small mercy of this is that the flood of all this new information seems to have pushed back whatever it was that made Steve flinch, that made him curl in on himself, shoved into the back of mind while he processes.

“Okay,” Steve says, “I think I follow?”

“Good,” Eddie says, and he gently presses a kiss to Steve’s jaw. Steve shivers a little.

“So what does the black mean then?” Steve asks, voice a little breathless.

“Smart boy,” Eddie says, hoping that it’ll help soften the landing. Predictably Steve’s breath hitches in response.

“It means I like stuff like this,” Eddie says, and then sinks his teeth into Steve’s neck right over a small scattering of moles that he’s wanted to bite for a while now.

Steve whines and his spine arches, and it makes his hair pull in Eddie’s grip, and for a moment Eddie thinks okay, good , but then Steve’s hands are shoving at his chest and he’s gasping and—

“No, no, no, Eddie—”

Eddie immediately lets go, slides back out of Steve’s lap.

“Okay, okay,” he says softly. “That’s fine, I’ll stop. Do you want me to stop touching you entirely, or just—”

Steve immediately twines his fingers in the hand Eddie outstretches, and when Eddie carefully leans forward, Steve buries his face in Eddie’s shoulder.

“Shh, It’s okay,” Eddie says softly, making sure to be as gentle as possible as he runs his hands through Steve’s hair. “Whatever you need, sweetheart.”

They sit for a while, and Steve opens his mouth then closes it a few times.

“You like that?” he asks.

“Mm-hm.”

“That— but you’re not a violent person, Eddie,” Steve says quietly.

Eddie tilts his head as he looks at Steve, trying to process that.

“No, but enjoying a little pain with sex is different from violence.”

Steve goes weirdly still.

“Is it?” he asks, and Eddie’s not sure how to read the tone—is it doubtful? Is it hopeful? Just perplexed?

“It’s like spice, right? No one wants to eat just a jar of chili powder, but it sure makes plenty of other things taste good.”

And that startles a gratifying amused snort out of Steve.

“Really?” he says, looking up through his hair to grin disbelievingly.

“Are you doubting my metaphor, Harrington?” Eddie teases. “I think it holds up.” He softens his tone a little bit. “I like it, but not with everything, not all the time. There’s plenty of things I enjoy that don’t have it at all. If you’re not into it, then that’s not a problem.

“If you want me to be sweet to you, and that’s it, I will. I like being sweet to you,” he says directly into Steve’s ear, to watch Steve shiver a little at the warmth of his breath.

“It’s just—” Steve hesitates, his fingers fidgeting with one of Eddie’s rings, twisting it around and around, and it’s not exactly comfortable, but if that’s what Steve needs right now, then it’s really just a minor blip.

“You know I was into Jonathan.”

“Mmhm,” Eddie says, letting just a bit of amusement bleed into his voice, because it brings a flush to Steve’s face. “I do know. I think about it sometimes, when I’m here all by myself without you for company. It’s a pretty hot picture, though I’m not sure Nancy would appreciate me thinking of her boyfriend like that.”

Steve shoves at his chest just a little, but there’s a tiny disbelieving smile at the corner of his mouth in place of the tension from before.

“Asshole,” Steve mutters. Then the smile falls a little.

“You know when that started?” Steve says quietly.

Eddie shakes his head.

Steve chews his lip. Pauses. “I’m sure you, like the whole rest of the school, noticed when Jonathan beat the shit out of me way back when.”

“Ah,” Eddie says softly. “It’s a lot of skin to skin contact, sweetheart, a lot of physicality. It’s nothing fucked up to realize then.”

Steve shrugs. “Yeah, I— maybe. Jonathan and I talked about that, a bit. And maybe if it was just Jonathan, or just you in that boathouse with that broken bottle, but it’s—”

Another long silence, and Steve not meeting Eddie’s eyes.

“You don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to,” Eddie tells him quietly. “But I’ll always listen.”

“How much do you know about Billy?” Steve asks. “Besides the posturing and flaunting in high school. Has Max ever talked to you about—” Steve cuts off, voice going smaller. “Or Lucas?”

Eddie frowns. He can’t figure out what Lucas would have to do with any of this.

“I mean, I know Billy was a dick, and I know you two had some like, pretty intense borderline sexual tension that was kind of hot—“

Eddie trails off before he finishes that sentence because Steve’s expression instantly shutters.

“Steve?” Eddie asks.

Steve doesn’t answer.

There’s a very long silence, and Eddie’s left searching Steve’s face, trying to place the expression. Guilt? Shame?

“I’m not gonna judge you if you were into Billy and the rivalry thing got you hot, you know?” Eddie says gently, worried that’s being too blunt.

“That’s ‘cause you don’t know what Billy was like,” Steve says, voice dull. “He was—“

Steve’s voice catches in his throat. He closes his eyes, swallows.

“I swear I didn’t know either,” he whispers. “How bad he really was. So it— it was different if he was just shoving me around. It was fucked up, but—“

“But you’ve sort of worked through that, right?” Eddie asks hesitantly. “Getting a little hot at the physicality isn’t some awful thing you gotta hate yourself over.”

“Yeah, I— maybe. I guess.”

Steve breathes slowly through his nose.

“Except it wasn’t just— maybe if that was it, then I could come to terms with it. Like it’s fucked up to like getting shoved around but—“

“It’s not,” Eddie cuts in firmly. “It’s not.”

Steve’s eyes squeeze shut.

“But it’s one thing to like getting shoved around if it’s Jonathan, or if it’s you, where you— you’re still good people. And I kind of fucking deserved it both times, with Jonathan beating me up, and you in the boathouse. And— neither of you would really hurt someone. So maybe that’s fine. You’d never hurt anyone to be cruel. You’d never hurt someone because— Neither of you—“

Eddie stares at Steve.

“Can I ask what Billy did?” he asks quietly.

Steve won’t meet his eyes, fingernail picking at the bedsheets.

“He said he was gonna kill Lucas,” Steve said quietly. “For just being around Max. For not staying away. For— He was throwing Lucas around, and— I swear I didn’t know before that. I swear I didn’t realize he was that bad until then, and I tried to stop him, I swear, but—“

Steve’s shaking and Eddie’s staring at him, a pit in his stomach. He very carefully takes Steve’s face in his hands.

“Steve,” he says. “That’s not on you. If you didn’t realize that Billy was a racist piece of shit who would hurt children, then that’s not on you .”

Steve flinches but doesn’t pull away, doesn’t meet Eddie’s eyes.

“As far as you knew, he was just a posturing dickhead who got up close and physical with you, and who was, by the standards of literally all of Hawkins, super hot. So if that gave you a rush before, if that got you hot, that’s totally reasonable.”

Eddie pauses, and then chews the inside of his cheek when he sees Steve’s face. Steve’s listening, but it doesn’t feel like it’s sinking in.

“Do you understand that?”

Steve’s throat bobs as he swallows. “I mean, I guess, but like—”

“You don’t trust me?” Eddie asks, trying not to take it personal.

“It’s not— it’s not that I think you’re lying,” Steve says slowly. “Just, I dunno, sometimes I think you or Robin or like, Adam and Marisa—you guys care about me, and I think maybe it’s— I dunno, gets in the way of how you think about me.”

Eddie sighs, releases Steve’s face, but leans in for a quick kiss at the corner of his mouth.

“We do care about you,” he agrees, because it’s good that Steve’s gotten to this point. And maybe the direct method isn’t clicking now, but Eddie can hope that maybe it’ll sit in the back of Steve’s head, and someday it’ll make sense, someday he’ll believe it, the way he eventually started to believe that people like him for him.

So for now, maybe a different method.

“Look,” Eddie says, “Do you know what one of my favorite snacks is?”

Steve blinks at the pivot, but goes with it.

“Sugary breakfast cereals?” Steve says, and the teasing edge is pretty weak, but it’s there. Steve’s wearing a wobbly smile and maybe he’s just trying to distract Eddie from whatever he thinks is wrong with himself, but Eddie will take it. Baby steps. He smiles back at Steve, and the reassurance seems to buoy him.

“Or maybe apple slices?” Steve continues, a little steadier, a little more teasing. “You sure eat a lot of them at Hellfire nights.”

Eddie laughs, and tucks his face into Steve’s throat. “You’re the one who provides them!”

Like this, he can mostly see Steve’s expressions, but maybe Steve won’t feel so watched. He lets his mouth skim Steve’s skin, takes comfort that Steve leans into it instead of shying away.

“Because I want the teenagers to eat healthier, not for you to snag them all before they can get to them. What are you, a child?”

“If I was a child I’d dip them in that peanut butter you always put out, you absolute babysitter.” Eddie scoffs, before he continues.

“No, but the one that’s important here is knockoff HoHos, or Swiss Rolls. Not the actual Hostess or Little Debbie ones, though they’ll do, but the shittiest cheapest gas station brand you can dig up.”

Steve looks up at Eddie.

“Okay,” he says, expression open and earnest. “Next time I see some I’ll get them.”

Eddie’s heart aches, and he leans up to press a kiss to Steve’s forehead.

“Very sweet, Stevie, but not the point.

“The point is, I probably like them because my piece of shit dad used to buy them for me.”

Steve goes quiet and very still, staring into Eddie’s face, eyes searching.

Eddie squishes down the rising tide building inside his chest and continues.

“If he was celebrating his latest petty theft, or if I did a good job hotwiring a car, or if he’d gotten his current girlfriend to fork over her latest paycheck, he’d go down to the gas station or the convenience store and buy himself a six-pack of beer and a pack each of those snack cakes for us.

“And that’s objectively pretty shit,” Eddie says softly. “That even years later, when I’ve learned my lesson, when I know my old man doesn’t give a shit about me, doesn’t love me, doesn’t care what happens to me, there’s still some part of me that eats those and thinks ‘this is what love tastes like,’ even though I know that’s not true. I was just a stupid fucking kid who thought cheap rewards for a job well done were signs that he cared.”

“Eddie,” Steve says softly, but Eddie shushes him.

“Or metal, right? I can step back and say, yeah, I probably like it so much because the world has been so fucking shitty for most of my life. I probably like it because there’s times when just existing made me so fucking angry I wanted to claw the world apart until I tore all the flesh from my bones and everything around me was on fire. And listening to metal, or playing it feels the same way.”

Eddie has to close his eyes a moment, because he thought saying this would be easier than it is. Steve squeezes his hand, gentle and reassuring. He takes a deep breath.

“And I could spend my life trying to untangle it all, or feeling guilty about liking them, or pretending I don’t. But what’s the point? I do like them. Those shitty little snack cakes are tasty. Metal is fun and it makes me feel so fucking alive. I like them, and I think life is better for them, even if their origins for coming into my life really fucking suck.”

Steve’s thumb traces back and forth across Eddie’s knuckles.

“Do you think I shouldn’t like those?” Eddie asks. (He knows Steve’s answer, but he needs Steve to reach it.) “That it’s wrong for me to like the knockoff HoHos and metal, because the starting point was objectively pretty shit?”

Steve frowns.

“I mean, but that’s— that’s not really the same, is it? You might just like them, would’ve liked them even if everything had been normal and good.”

“Maybe,” Eddie shrugs. “Who’s to say the same’s not true for you?”

Steve stares.

“But that— normal people don’t want this, right?”

Eddie presses a small kiss to Steve’s shoulder and grins.

“I mean, I’m not normal either so I don’t know that we have to care about that.

“ But , if it makes you feel better, I promise you there are like, I dunno, bankers and suburban housewives who are getting their rocks off to getting tied up and spanked, no trauma needed.”

Another startled laugh.

“I don’t know about that Eddie, are you sure?”

“Sure! You could even have some BDSM perverts among your fancy Loch Nora neighbors.”

Steve rolls his eyes.

Eddie thinks a moment, because it seems like this tactic is maybe working.

“Look, what if we try this, what if we go to this little bookstore I’ve heard about up in Indy, yeah? Because earlier you said I might be biased, right?

“And as good as it is I think for you to talk about this with people who love you, maybe it’ll be easier if you hear that this isn’t fucked up from people or magazines or books who have no skin in the game. So maybe we go check out some stuff somewhere no one knows or gives a fuck about you, okay?

“And then once I’ve proved to you that this? It’s totally fine, sweetheart, and that’s not just me saying it ‘cause I love you—”

Steve flushes, and pushes a hand over Eddie’s face.

“That— you— shut up.”

“I do,” Eddie says, muffled and awkward. Then he licks Steve’s palm, and he yelps.

“Eddie—!” Steve starts, but Eddie continues as soon as he’s free, cutting him off.

“Once I’ve proved that part to you, then we can come back to what that means for you— for us, okay?”

Eddie leans down over Steve, lets his hair fall like a curtain around their faces.

“Or if you want to ignore this, and just want me to be sweet to you, I’ll be happy to. Always and for-fucking-ever, Steve. But if you like something, and I like something, then maybe it doesn’t have to be so complicated. It’s up to you, and I’ll always stop or step back if that’s what you need, but—”

Up close like this, Eddie can see the way Steve squeezes his eyes shut, how his eyelashes tremble. He can watch the way Steve’s teeth worry his lower lip. And he can see the little flecks of color in Steve’s irises when he opens them again, how deep and dark the pools of his pupils are, blown wide, shielded from the light by Eddie’s hair.

“Okay,” Steve says quietly, voice a little shaky. “I trust you, Eddie. So if— maybe sometime. Not—”

“Doesn’t have to be anytime soon, sweetheart,” Eddie says softly. “Doesn’t have to be ever.”

Steve shakes his head.

“Sometime,” he says a little more firmly. “I— trust you. With anything and everything. If you say something can be good, I— I want you to be right, and I trust you to prove it. You’ve already done that with so much else, so—“

And what else is there for Eddie to do but lean down and kiss Steve?

“Just tell me when, sweetheart.”

Chapter Text

It takes some time, but Eddie and Steve finally get out to that little bookshop. Eddie’s never been before, but he’s heard about it from people at that bar in Kinleyville, and books and magazines bought there have been passed around, so he has a vague sense of what to expect.

It’s on the second story of a building, whose first floor is comprised of a kind of shitty convenience store at the front, a smoke shop in the back, and another set of unlabelled offices on the same floor as the bookstore. Everything except the convenience store is accessed through a side door to a narrow, windowless hall and the stairs. It’s a reassuring touch of ambiguity and anonymity—even if you’re spotted going into the building, even if whoever sees you knows that bookshop is there, there’s no way to know which place you’re going to.

A bell above the door jingles as they enter, and the view of the store is mostly blocked by the front register, and a partition wall. A huge guy in a leather jacket, feet propped up on the counter, lowers his magazine (Rolling Stone, innocuous).

“Morning,” he says. He surveys the two of them. “Anything I can help you two find?”

And Eddie considers it, because he’s not sure where to start, but Steve looks nervous, so he shakes his head.

“Nah, not right now. Probably best if we just start by browsing, and then maybe we’ll ask once we get our footing?”

“Mm,” the guy says.

“Thank you though,” Eddie says cheerfully, and then tamps down the anxiety ratcheting up his pulse, shortening his breath, because this should be fine here, right? And he takes Steve’s hand and guides him around the partition and into the store.

“Mm, welcome,” the clerk says. Eddie thinks the hum sounds a little more approving this time.

It’s not a big store, but Eddie hesitates as the rows of tall bookshelves spread out before them.

“Your hand is really clammy,” Steve teases, though his voice is shaky, and his gaze is darting around the room.

“Sorry,” Eddie says, giving a half shrug and a wry smile. “Just, uh—”

Steve intertwines their fingers. “Yeah,” he says simply. Then he visibly swallows. “Uh, where do we start?”

Eddie chews his lip, then his eye catches a sign and he grins.

“Comics?” he suggests, and Steve startles a little laugh.

“They have those?”

“Oh, for sure,” Eddie says. “C’mon.”

It’s a good starting point— a little more distance than photographs, a faster and easier skim than a book, and they can start with things that are more general, not quite diving into the real reason they’re here yet.

“Is he—?” Steve’s brow furrows as they flip through one of the publications.

“Imagining talking to his anthropomorphic dick?” Eddie asks. “Hm, yep.”

Steve laughs.

It’s a good combination of comedy to help them loosen up, and autobiographical stories (that Steve reads and then rereads and stares at a little too long), and some porn, which, in (semi-)public, is also a little bit of an avenue for snickering and poking fun.

“See?” Eddie says after they’ve skimmed and laughed and joked for a while. “Normal, right?”

Steve smiles, but it fades a little as he shrugs. “I mean, this stuff, but it’s not—”

And Eddie spotted it when they first entered this little section, so he reaches over and brandishes it now.

“All right, I think it’s time that I can break out the big guns. Behold, Tom of Finland.”

“Whoa, those dudes are buff,” Steve says, sounding amused.

“Yeah,” Eddie agrees, handing it off. “The physique mag body-builder aesthetic isn’t exactly my thing, but there’s enough other stuff to his art that I can get past it. And, I dunno, you’re an athlete, right? Could be your thing.”

Steve snorts, squints at the cover, tilts his head.

“I dunno,” he says, “Maybe?”

Eddie lets out an exaggerated sigh of relief. “Whew, okay, thank god. If you were too enthusiastic about that, my scrawny ass was gonna be a little worried.”

Steve laughs and rolls his eyes.

“Yeah, you’re fine, Eddie,” he says, just the edge of flirtatious to it, and Eddie grins, then realizes, holy shit, I can probably kiss him right now .

So he does.

It feels a little funny, keeping things soft and sweet, while sandwiched between the two of them is a goddamn Tom of Finland book, but Steve’s relaxed, which is exactly what Eddie wants here.

“Okay, no more flirting, sweetheart, you’re distracting me.” He pokes Steve in the chest. “Point is, open that bad boy up.”

Steve sighs fondly, opens up the book, and then goes quiet. Eddie gives him time, leaning against his side, watching but not commenting. Some of the art is more of the standard erotica and porn they’d already looked at, but other images are populated with leather, handcuffs, men pinned down and tied up. Two half-nude cowboys are tangled together, tied in presumably their own lasso. A man in uniform raises his belt while another man, stripped down and naked, is suspended from a beam in the ceiling. A man is leaned back, head forced backwards by a hand around his throat, while another man pushes into his open mouth.

The bell of the door jingles, and Eddie’s head snaps up. Steve’s still staring down at the book, and slowly flips another page.

There’s too many rows of shelves and that wall for Eddie to see who came in, and he doesn’t want to leave Steve’s side, but he keeps an ear out.

“Morning,” the guy at the front says.

“Morning,” a woman says. The faint rustle— maybe someone taking off their coat— and a soft thump— a bag being set down, Eddie thinks. “Quiet shift so far?”

“Mm-hm,” the man says. “You got the counter while I go do some stocking?”

Eddie relaxes, releasing the tension in his shoulders he didn’t realize he’d been carrying. He turns back to Steve, and lets himself tune out the quiet conversation.

Steve’s staring at one of the images, and then slowly begins to speak.

“This— they— they look—” and then he seems to struggle with what he’s trying to say.

Eddie considers the picture in question, the way the men in it seem relaxed and comfortable, if not outright joyous.

“Look like they’re having a good time, yeah?” he offers gently.

“Mm,” Steve says slowly. “Happy, I guess. Even though—” he doesn’t finish the sentence, but Eddie can imagine they’re getting hurt .

“If everyone wants it and agrees to it, why shouldn’t they?” he asks.

Steve doesn’t answer, turns another page, but Eddie likes to think some of the tension Steve’s been holding, that rigid line in his posture, has maybe relaxed, just a fraction.

A few moments later, there’s the sound of footsteps, and the guy from the front passes their aisle.

“Doing okay?” he asks, but his voice is low and gentle.

“Mm, think so,” Eddie says slowly. “Steve?”

Steve blinks as he finally looks up.

“What?” he says faintly.

“We all good?” Eddie asks.

“Um,” Steve hesitates, looks down at the book as he closes it.

“Good taste,” the clerk says. “Classic.”

And Steve startles, staring up at the man.

“You— you think?” he asks.

“Yeah,” the guy nods. “Tom of Finland’s pretty iconic.”

“Oh,” Steve says. He carefully sets the book back on the shelf. “Um, yeah. We’re—” he breathes out a long exhale, “Yeah, we’re good.”

“Wanna take a look at something else for a bit?” Eddie offers, chest tight, somehow, with relief, because this is exactly what he was hoping for with this trip, but Steve probably needs a breather.

“Yeah,” Steve says.

“If you need anything, just let me or Amy know,” the clerk offers, before he disappears behind one of the shelves.

The two of them wander slowly through the aisles, and Eddie laughs as they pass a small photography section on the way to the magazines.

“What’s so funny?” Steve asks.

Eddie picks up a glossy book of Robert Mapplethorpe photographs—pretty thin, maybe some kind of exhibition catalog, from the looks of it.

“Gift for Jonathan?” he jokes.

Steve just frowns at the pretty innocuous cover. “Sure?”

Eddie supposes he should’ve expected that Steve wouldn’t get the joke— hell, Eddie hasn’t seen any of these pictures himself, just heard about them, so of course Steve wouldn’t really know. Also, Eddie’s curious.

So he flips it open, holding it off to the side a little so Steve can get a look, eyes half on the photographs, half on Steve’s face. Steve’s eyes go wider and wider as the nudes give way to leather and straps and rope and—

“Whoa!” Eddie yelps, startled, catching a glimpse of the next page a fraction of a second before it turns fully, and he immediately slaps the book shut.

Steve laughs.

“Isn’t this supposed to be your thing?” he teases, and reaches out to gently yank Eddie’s bandana. “Isn’t that what this is for?”

Inside, Eddie’s doing a goddamn jig, because even if Steve’s voice is a little weak, wobbling just a bit, the teasing means he’s starting to relax.

Outside, Eddie’s still a little shellshocked, because that’s— extreme.

“Stevie,” he says, blinking a lot. Holy shit. “You have to know a lot of my interest has been pretty, uh, abstract, right? Conceptual? Like, I’m still from Hawkins.”

Steve laughs again, a little louder, a little stronger.

“Where do you think I’d be getting this kind of exposure, let alone experience? A lot of this is new to me too.”

Eddie frowns, and tips his head, staring down at the frankly deceptive cover. (Although, to be fair, he thinks, you couldn’t get away with putting a photo like that on the front, for sure.) Because yes, this was mostly about Steve, but also—

“I don’t think I’m into that part,” he says faintly. The start had been good (great even), but, uh, whoa.

“Yeah, okay,” Steve says drily.

Eddie shoves him gently, then carefully sets the book back into the display, handling it a little like a live bomb. “Don’t make fun of me! You didn’t even see that one!”

“Okay,” Steve says, hand reaching out for the book, “Then—”

“Nope!” Eddie yelps, slapping his hand away. “We’re easing you into this, right? Trust me, let’s save that for, uh, another day.”

Steve shakes his head, exasperated, but he’s smiling.

(Eddie’s pretty sure he can just hear muffled laughter from the front of the shop.)

“Fine,” Steve says.

They stroll through a few more aisles, picking up and flipping through various books and magazines, and there’s a moment where Steve pauses, so Eddie forces himself to pay attention.

“Is it— is it all abstract?” Steve says slowly. “Now that you’re here?”

Steve’s holding an edition of Blueboy, which should be pretty vanilla—they’ve mostly steered away from the hardcore stuff while Steve processes (and, admittedly, while Eddie recovers from that one photo). Eddie’s not sure if this is just Steve having a delayed reaction to Eddie’s comment, or if something’s triggered it, so he sidles up and hooks his chin over Steve’s shoulder. And it takes a moment for Eddie to find what caught Steve’s eye—one of the pages is a set of phone sex hotline ads, and down in the corner, one of them features one man on his knees, hands tied behind his back, while another man in leather straps stands above him, hand fisted in his hair.

“Hm,” Eddie says, trying to hide his internal sigh of relief. Sure, both guys in the ad are too blond, too hairless, but the content of it? (Especially with the smell of Steve’s cologne in his nose, the tickle of his hair against Eddie’s jaw, the warmth of his body bleeding through the fabric of their shirts where they’re pressed together.)

“Not all abstract,” Eddie says, dropping his voice low, knowing he’s right next to Steve’s ear and anticipating the shiver. (He gets it, and it feels like the sweetest payoff.) “That? That, I’m definitely into.”

He lets himself yank a little bit of Steve’s hair before he leans back. (It’s mostly playful. They’re still in semi-public.)

Steve goes bright red.

“That— I— okay,” he says, just a little squeaky, and he sets the magazine down, and hurries down the aisle.

Eddie laughs, and jogs a little to catch up.

“More seriously,” Eddie says, as they turn into the next, “You know it’s okay if we aren’t into the exact same things, right? Like, whether or not I like it doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong with you liking it.”

Steve chews his lip.

“But what if—”

Eddie gently grabs his wrist to pull him to a stop, then leans in and kisses Steve again, because he can here, and isn’t that fantastic? And because the way Steve sighs into it and his mouth falls open stops the anxious tic.

“Then we’ll talk about it, right?” Eddie says, just a little breathless as they part. “We’ll figure it out, right? You don’t like D&D and I don’t like basketball and that hasn’t stopped us.”

Steve snorts, shoves Eddie.

“That’s not the same.”

Eddie catches himself before he bumps into a display.

“No? It’s just one part of what we have going for us, right? And sex is just another part. We still have plenty other good going on whether we nail that or not.”

Then, he can’t help himself, and gets a handful of Steve’s ass.

“And kinky sex is just one part of sex. I think we got the other parts down pretty good, yeah?”

“Eddie!” Steve admonishes, but he’s smiling despite himself.

“We’ll figure it out, alright?” Eddie says.

“Alright,” Steve says.

“Now,” Eddie says. “What next?”