Archive of Our Own

A summer storm like this, drumming heavy against the windows, lightning flashing against thick gray clouds– it should cut the heat a little. It doesn’t. 

The smell of ozone just adds to the oppression, the nagging pain that always lodges just behind Steve’s right eye leading up to a storm making his whole brain feel hot and slow, the barely-touched beer in his hand sweaty and not nearly cool enough. Nothing could be, with the A/C clearly on its last robot legs, threatening to give out after a week of apparently fighting for its life. He’s been entertaining the thought of an ice bath on and off for the last hour, but he’s distracted. Can’t quite commit to it. 

Instead, he stays parked at the kitchen table. Lights out, like that makes any kind of difference to the temperature. But he can still see out pretty good, the sky lit up with a grim glow, occasional lightning painting the outline of the solitary figure sitting at the edge of the diving board. And he knows they can see him, too. Dark as it is in here. He can still see him. 

This week has been fucking relentless. Hot, and muggy, with the sky feeling like it’s been hanging about four feet above his head. Feels like he’s had a headache for about four straight days, and it’s been longer than that since he’s had a peaceful night’s sleep. The whole town’s on edge, snippy, nervous. Steve feels like he’s been fighting his way through jell-o all week. And he’s just… he’s tired of fighting. He can’t do it anymore. 

He gets up. Settles the beer bottle down decisively, taking a petty delight in never using a coaster anymore, as if his mom will ever come back to see the rings on the table. Turns, and slides open the door onto the patio. 

The wet, hot air hits him in the face like a slap. The sound of the rain is like a marching band snare drum, and within two steps Steve feels like he’s already soaked through. Still, he takes his time as he crosses the patio, steps carefully down to the backyard and the pool. Savoring the feeling of the rain against his face. 

Lightning cracks, at the same moment Eddie turns to look at him. The light catches his dark brown eyes, and for a moment they flash a bright, eerie orange. It passes, and they’re brown again just like they had never been anything else. But with some kind of lingering light left to them, a kind of glow. But that’s not surprising. That’s just how he’s always looking at Steve, since he came back. Opened his eyes with a shuddering breath, locking them immediately onto Steve’s, the first sight of his Life, Part Two: Eddie Strikes Back (what Dustin has been calling it, and Steve has been pretending not to understand, because it gets Dustin worked up every time). Recognition came a split-second later, but first this look– a little shocked, a little awed, a little…something else. 

He looks like a drowned rat. Hair slicked down flat over his forehead and along the side of his neck, a few strands clinging to his jaw, his cheek. He’s in the same simple black t-shirt (Black Sabbath today, in purple lettering across his chest) and cutoff jean shorts he was wearing when Steve saw him earlier today, when they all tried to find some relief in ice cream and a movie. Which Steve had bowed out of it, because honestly the kids pick weird fucking movies, and even with ice cream it had still been too hot to really be around the others too but. Steve saw him, but didn’t really speak to him. Because around the others, Eddie keeps his distance. Around the others, Steve just tells Dustin to give Eddie time, that like, it’s kind of embarrassing, to have some guy you barely know drag you back to life. Because the others don’t need to know what’s actually going on. 

Steve has actually made it this far without any plan for what he would say. So, when he finally is standing at the edge of the pool, he keeps it simple: “Come in,” he says. Raising his voice a little, to carry over the rain. 

Eddie’s eyebrows go up a little. “What?” he says with a little smile. “Worried I’ll catch my death?”

Steve doesn’t smile back. “That spell was hard as shit,” he says dryly. “I don’t have another one in me.”

“Give yourself a little credit,” Eddie says. Sincere as hell suddenly, no jokes. Just looking at Steve like— like he’s been crawling through a desert, and Steve just showed up with a pitcher of water, complete with lemon slices and rattling with ice. And then, like he can’t stop himself, he goes on. But with a grit in his voice, like maybe he tried to hold it back. “You’re incredible.”

Steve tries not to shudder. It’s all so fucking unfair. “Come in,” he says again instead, and turns to go back inside. Either Eddie does or he doesn’t, but Steve suddenly can’t look at him anymore.

But when he steps over the threshold back into the kitchen, a hand catches the door before he can slide it closed behind him. 

“I’ll grab towels,” Steve says over his shoulder. “Want something to drink? Eat?”

He turns, and Eddie is reaching for the beer bottle Steve had left out. Rubs his thumb over the lip of it slowly. Like he’s trying to pick up a trace of something. Looks up at Steve abruptly, a little guilty. 

“I’ll get you a cold one,” Steve says, beating a hasty escape for the refrigerator. 

The wash of cold air that ghosts across his skin, his flushed cheeks and the bare skin of his shoulders, almost makes him shudder in relief. He wants to stick his whole head in here, clamber inside for a few hours or a few days, but– he has to make it quick. Reach for the beers, step back and close the door. Any longer is rolling the dice. Ever since he found the book, ever since he brought Eddie back, him and appliances kind of… don’t get along so good. It’s not fair, since it’s not like he’s touched the book since, but it might be only getting worse, if anything. Robin had kind of told him, and Murray had kind of shouted at him, that just because out of all of them he’d been the one to find that old weirdly normal-looking notebook and also the only one who could read it, didn’t mean he knew what he was doing and didn’t know the risks. Steve still thinks that if the price for Eddie being alive is that he’s running through lightbulbs in the house at an accelerated rate, and his microwave has been useless and dead for months, whatever. He only ever used it for frozen dinners anyway and that shit’s no good for you. 

Still. It’s a little unfair. Like a lot of shit in his life right now. 

Eddie’s still standing next to the table when Steve turns back around, though he’s set the bottle down. Far from him, almost at the edge of the table. Steve sits the cold ones next to it. Doesn’t reach out to offer it to Eddie directly, just– he can take it if he wants it. 

“Hold on,” Steve says, and squelches his way to the linen cupboard. To his mom’s guest towels, the really fluffy and snowy-white ones that’ve barely ever been used. Doesn’t let himself think about why he reaches for those in particular. Lets himself think that it’s because it would infuriate her. And not because he just wants to give Eddie the best.

This is the second time Eddie’s been inside his house, alone, since he came back. That first time, he’d strode in confident. In a rush, like he couldn’t hold himself back anymore. And smiling. Uncertain, a little nervous. But excited. Happy, most of all. Steve remembers that. How Eddie had reached for him with shaking hands. Not like he was scared, but like– like the thought alone of holding Steve was lighting him up like a live wire. Rattling his very bones. 

He hasn’t been inside since. But he’s been outside. Not every night (at least Steve doesn’t think so, anyway). But at least a few nights a week, he’s out there. Sometimes at the end of the diving board, like tonight. Sometimes under the treeline, at the edge of the yard. Sometimes under Steve’s window. And he’s not always watching the house. He’ll have his walkman in hand, headphones on. A paperback, held casually between two fingers even though the trace glow of streetlights out front couldn’t possibly be bright enough to read by. Once, Steve even caught him playing solitaire. 

Whatever he’s doing out there, as soon as Steve appears in a window, hesitates, looking out at him– Eddie looks up. And will keep looking up at Steve, until Steve steps back and out of view. Not expectant, like he’s waiting for Steve to do something. And not angry. Not even sad. He just looks at Steve. Like Steve’s all he wants to be looking at. 

Steve hesitates in the dark hallway, towels in his arms. The air is thick in the house, he can almost taste it over his tongue, creeping down his throat. Something slides down his chest under his undershirt– he’s not sure if it’s sweat, or the rain. 

He doesn’t know what he’s doing. Not sure if he’s being kind here. Or like, even crueler than he already has been. He just– he didn’t like it. Eddie out there, alone, getting soaked. Not like Eddie could get sick. Not like Eddie was likely to even feel cold. Or tired. Or faint with heat. He’s sure it didn’t bother Eddie. But it bothered him. 

He’s so, so tired of fighting. 

Eddie’s drifted from the table when Steve gets back, surveying the rain outside. One of the bottles in his hand, the green glass catching reflected lightning as Eddie raises it to his lips, tips it back. He drinks, even though he doesn’t get thirsty. Eats, even if he’s never hungry. Looks at Steve, even though Steve’s explained…Well. Desire isn’t as simple as knowing what you do or don’t need. Or why you need it. 

Steve just watches him for a second. Gives himself that little gift, like shaking a box under the Christmas tree. It’s just a hint, and it’s not that satisfying. But sometimes you can't help yourself. 

Getting the spell ready, he’d thrown himself into every little bit of Eddie he could find. Barely-legible notebooks filled with nerd game shit, character stats and backstories and gruesome little stick figures. Handmade gig flyers for Corroded Coffin and scribbled song lyrics. Some of them alarmingly like poetry. And some of them hilariously shitty. Ragged t-shirts that smelled a little bit like sweat and some kind of funky old man-smelling cologne. The original of the photo Wayne had slapped onto the Missing posters, Eddie looking weirdly pensive and kind of grouchy, expression half-shaded by the tree spreading its leaves above him. 

According to the book, he’d had to pull all parts of Eddie to him, to bring him back. All senses. Smell. Sight. Sound. Touch. Even asked Dustin what his favorite snack was, for taste (“he usually just ate pretzels or whatever for lunch,” he’d said, which had made Steve feel… kind of tragic about it for some reason). To get all that, and get it right– he’d had to dig deep. Had to channel Nancy’s dogged reporting skills. Track people down. Ask questions. Take notes. And he’d been good at it, weirdly. Drawing a clearer picture of Eddie– known to him for a week, and barely known to him at all– through the memories of others. Through what he’d left behind, Wayne throwing open the door to Eddie’s room, untouched, grief shadowing the hollows of his eyes, his cheeks, giving Steve a guarded look that was almost hopeful. 

It had taken a long time. A long time, drawing these pieces of Eddie together. And holding them close. So he could see him clearly, clearly enough to bring him back. 

But Steve was an idiot. He’d fucked up. He hadn’t held Eddie close. He’d worked the guy (who he had barely known ) under his own skin. And then hadn’t known how to get him out. 

Still doesn’t. 

“Think fast,” Steve says, and throws the towel at Eddie’s head. 

Eddie might be back from the dead, with a few extra souvenirs from the experience. But he’s still Eddie – he turns too slowly and the towel hits him right in the face. He makes a shocked angry little noise, and then chokes and coughs– hadn’t swallowed that mouthful of beer, apparently.

“Asshole,” Eddie wheezes, clutching the towel in his hands, once he’s recovered a little. 

“Oops,” Steve says smugly, riffling his own towel over his hair. 

Eddie glares at him, though he’s also clearly trying not to smile, dabbing at his streaming eyes with the towel. “Heineken up the nose, ugh, very nice.”

Steve laughs.

The effect on Eddie is immediate. His spine straightens, blinking furiously before his eyes settle into an almost sleepy expression, half-lidded and dark. His mouth drops open just a little, lips parting. Like he can taste Steve’s laugh on the air.  Steve can see his chest rise and fall sharply, as he sucks in a breath. 

Steve freezes, one hand still on the towel over his head. Watches Eddie carefully, like he might vault suddenly over the table between them. He’s not– Eddie jokes, about being a zombie, a vampire. He’s not exactly any of those things. And he’s not dangerous . But there’s that light in his eyes again, that awed, hungry look. And Steve is suddenly afraid to move, suddenly in sympathy with every deer he’s cursed out for freezing in front of his headlights. 

“I love how you laugh,” Eddie says slowly. Like he’s tasting every syllable on its way out. His voice is low, but Steve can still hear it perfectly, even under a fresh crack of thunder. “I love how it sounds.”

Steve doesn’t dare answer. Because if he does, Eddie will somehow know what that tone of voice is doing to him. He doesn’t know what to say, anyway. 

Maybe that’s all Eddie had to say too. He just presses the towel to his own chest, drawing it slowly down over his arms. Keeps his eyes on Steve while he does, that same fixed stare. Like nothing else could be as fascinating, as delightful. 

Lightning flashes. And, after it, another rumble of thunder. Something about thunder after lightning, something Steve has been told about seconds between the two equaling the miles from the worst of the storm, or something. A drop of sweat, or rain, makes a slow journey down between his shoulder blades. He wonders if they’re getting to the heart of it. If the center is close to crossing over them. Steve doesn’t move. 

Eddie doesn’t jump over the table. He walks around it, like a normal guy, his soaked sneakers squelching against the kitchen tile. Nothing particularly graceful, or notable about it. Eddie moves like what he is: a lanky guy, but one with deceptive strength in his thighs, his shoulders. And comfortable in front of Steve, like he’s meant to be here. Like there’s nothing else for him to do, but take these unhurried steps towards him. Steve lets him approach, silently. Drops his hand, leaving the towel draped over his head and shoulders, like a weird hood. Feels like he needs its shelter, somehow. 

And then Eddie’s in front of him. Takes his eyes off Steve’s for the first time in what has to be something like a million seconds, to take a long assessing look over his shoulders and chest, and lower. Steve feels heat everywhere he’s looking, like it’s some kind of laser beam. 

“Missed a spot,” Eddie says quietly. Takes the towel in his hands, pressing one end to the top of Steve’s left arm. Nothing but the best, the softest, the gentlest for guests in the Harrington house, and the towel’s slow rub across his skin makes Steve immediately break out in goosebumps. 

Eddie steps in a little closer, sliding the towel down to Steve’s elbow. Lifts his arm, gently, to get the other end of the towel across Steve’s forearm. Brings both hands together over Steve’s, the towel keeping them from touching skin-to-skin. It doesn’t help much, as Eddie presses down through it with his thumbs. Making soft circles against the back of Steve’s hand, his palm. 

Steve is pretty sure he isn’t breathing. There’s another crack of lightning. Two… three… four… thunder. 

“It’s not getting better, Steve,” Eddie says quietly, apparently addressing Steve’s hand in his. “You promised it would. But it’s not.”

“Give it time,” Steve manages to say. Eddie shudders at his voice, hunching his shoulders a little like the sound of it hurts him. 

“Time?” Eddie lets Steve’s hand go, abruptly. But immediately moves the towel to Steve’s other arm, and starts the process over again. Soft strokes. Gentle circles. Steve tries not to tremble. “It’s been months. Months, Steve.”

“I’m sorry,” Steve says. 

Eddie’s at his elbow again. “What are you sorry for, Steve?” He asks. Almost soothing, like Steve’s some kind of pony who’s likely to spook. It’s not a totally unfair comparison.

Steve swallows, mouth dry. He wishes he could get at those beers on the table, but. Moving is beyond him right now. “I’m sorry it’s not getting better,” he says weakly. 

Eddie snorts a little. Maybe skeptical, like he doesn’t quite buy it. But he doesn’t look at Steve. He’s at Steve’s right hand now. Cupped in the towel between his hands, fingers sure and firm up and down across Steve’s wrist. 

“I’m not,” Eddie says quietly. And finally looks at him fiercely. “I don’t want it to get better.”

“Eddie–”

“I love you,” Eddie says. Quiet. Fervent. Longing.

Steve shuts his eyes. Eddie’s hands tighten around his, but not enough to hurt. Lighting flashes behind his eyelids, and he can still see Eddie there, outlined in pink and red by the flash. Two… three… thunder, so loud it feels like it rattles the house. 

“Steve,” Eddie says insistently. “I love you.”

“It’s not–” Steve shakes his head, eyes still closed, like a stubborn kid. “It’s just the spell, man. It’s– something in how I did it, or something in it, I don’t even know. Something in how I brought you back, there was all this Latin bullshit I had to sound out but I didn’t get the chance to properly check my translation I just– I didn't know what I’m doing, I still don’t. I’m the most bullshit excuse for a witch, or whatever I am. If that’s what I am.”

The pressure on his hand lessens a little, but a moment later Eddie’s hand is pressing over Steve’s heart. No towel between them, just the soaked cotton of Steve’s undershirt between his chest and Eddie’s palm, his fingertips. Steve’s eyes fly open in surprise, and Eddie is– close. And looking evenly into Steve’s eyes. They’re so deep, so dark. It’s like Steve would only have to let himself go, just lean forward a little, to tip right into them. 

“I love you,” Eddie says firmly. 

“Please stop saying that,” Steve begs.

“You’re amazing, Steve,” Eddie says, which isn’t a lot better than another I love you . “You’re magical, man, and I’m not even making a stupid witch joke here. I mean you are magic, how you talk, how you move, how you are to your friends. The people in this town. How big your goddamn heart is. How powerful you are, how it radiates off you, and how little you even seem to see it.”

The hand Eddie isn’t holding is clenched in a fist at Steve’s side. To stop him reaching for Eddie, or shoving him away. “Please–”

“I think about you all the time,” Eddie says, stepping in even closer. There’s a smell of ozone in the air, like the storm has come inside with them, and it seems to be coming right off Eddie’s skin, still shining with rain, or maybe tangled in his soaking wet hair. His eyes drop to Steve’s lips, close enough now for Steve to make out the slim line where the dark brown of his eyes meets the black pupils, blown wide. “I’m always wondering what you’d think about something I’m looking at, or what you’d say to whoever I’m talking to. I’m always– I always want to be close to you. I. I need to be close, and when I can’t sleep, the only thing that helps–”

Lightning flashes again. Catches Eddie’s eyes, blinding orange for a moment in the reflected light. Steve sucks in a startled breath, and Eddie’s hand flexes against his chest in response. One…two… and a rolling, rumbling boom of thunder. 

“I just want to be close to you,” Eddie whispers. “And when I am, all I want is to touch you.”

“It’s not real,” Steve says, pleading. “It’s not real, what it’s doing to us. It’s–” He stops, but– shit. It’s too late. 

“Us?” Eddie echoes. Cocks his head a little, like he’s trying to hear Steve better. He’s not smiling, there’s no triumph in his face. He’s gone still now, like he’s the one afraid of what Steve might do next. 

The last time Eddie was here, he’d reached for Steve with trembling, eager hands. He’d told him that he couldn’t help it anymore, that he’d never felt like this, that he loved Steve and– And he’d kissed him. Had framed Steve’s face in his hands, and drawn their lips together. Tender, and reverent, and with a laugh bubbling up his chest, like he was giddy with the feeling. With happiness. Like Steve made him happy. 

And Steve had– fuck. Steve had kissed him back. For a second. Hadn’t been able to help himself. The dream of the Eddie he’d learned through all his fragments and searching colliding with the guy who’d faced down Vecna with him during the worst Spring Break of all time and all mashed up with the Eddie who had sucked in a new breath under Steve’s hands, looking for him and reaching for him before even realizing where he was or who he was reaching for. And the Eddie he’d been since, re-learning his body and the Hawkins of now, who Steve had watched and worried over and ached to touch again. He’d wanted to kiss him back. He’d needed to kiss him back. But–

He’d felt it in his fingertips first, where they were pressed against Eddie’s hips. That radiant warmth, the feeling of dragging your hands across soft cornsilk on a summer day, that feeling that had so addictively surged through Steve’s whole body when he’d done the working. It was calling to Eddie again, and–

And Steve had pushed him away. Told Eddie that it was just the spell. It was just the magic that had brought him back, that had pinned him to Steve. That it was just temporary. And that he was sorry. 

If Eddie had said more, Steve honestly doesn’t remember. He’s pretty sure Eddie had just left without a word, hunched over himself like Steve had got him right in the solar plexus. Knocked the wind out of him. And he hadn’t been back in this house since. Hadn’t been alone with Steve since. But only a few nights after that, Steve caught him standing watch outside his house for the first time. 

Now, the rain pounds against the roof. He can feel the warmth rising off Eddie’s skin, the air thick and heavy around them, between them. 

“Us?” Eddie says again, more urgently now. 

Steve is so tired. He’s so fucking tired of fighting. He’s so tired of looking at Eddie, and reminding himself that he can’t touch him. Tired of feeling fucking insane, not knowing what the fuck is happening in his own head, let alone his heart. 

“How can you be so sure?” Steve asks, trying– needing to understand. “How do you know it’s real?”

“How do you know it’s not?” Eddie says. Drops the towel, and Steve’s hand with it. 

The one draped over Steve’s head slides back, hitting the floor without a sound, as– fuck, as Steve gives up. Gives in. Unclenches his fist and slides his hand along Eddie’s neck, cool damp skin and wet hair feeling like heaven, kissing Eddie with a ferocity that’s so far out of his usual playbook, King Steve would be horrified. 

He doesn't have a playbook for Eddie, though. He never has. 

Lightning flashes. Too close to count, thunder rumbles all around them. Like it's right on top of the house, bouncing it against the foundation, rattling the windows. They’re in the heart of the storm. 

Eddie’s lips part against his immediately, a devastated groan ripping out of him as he sinks his fingers into Steve’s back, pulling him against him sharply. Staggering back a little, taking them both back against the kitchen table with a jerk. Eddie’s– god, everything, tongue sliding against Steve’s and teeth in Steve’s bottom lip, biting down until Steve is gasping, groaning, twisting a hand in Eddie’s hair to jerk his head back, expose his neck. 

Eddie lets him do it, lets him, fuck– Eddie is begging him, “please, Steve, yes–” as Steve puts his lips against the column of Eddie’s neck and sucks hard. 

“Fuck,” Eddie pants, hot breath into the hot air, holding onto Steve for dear life. Thunder shakes the house, but Steve still hears him say it– “God, I love you.”

Steve groans. A little bit despair. A little bit giving in. A little bit how Eddie’s rocking his hips against Steve’s. 

He feels it. The silky touch against his palms, his fingertips, the bubbling feeling like standing in front of a hot tub jet. Fuck it. Fuck it. He doesn’t care right now. He can’t care right now. The echo of a spell, this stupid witch shit he hasn’t figured out, he’s done fighting it off or trying to push it away. He sets his teeth against Eddie’s pulse, and gets his hands under Eddie’s thighs. Kicks a chair out of the way, sending it clattering to the floor, and lifts Eddie up onto the kitchen table. 

Eddie wraps his legs around Steve’s waist immediately, swallowing down Steve’s moan, drawing him close and kissing him with a wildness, a desperation, like he can’t get enough. Steve’s only realized he’s shoved Eddie’s damp shirt up so he can get his hands on the skin of Eddie’s back when he’s already done it. Eddie is arching up against him at the touch, panting against Steve’s lips before drawing Steve’s tongue back into his mouth. 

Well, he’s already halfway there. Steve draws back long enough to whip the shirt up and over Eddie’s head before kissing him again, with a fresh urgency, palms pressing against Eddie’s jaw, like that split second was too long. Eddie mumbles something against Steve’s lips, his hands sliding up under Steve’s undershirt, palms flat and worshipful over the planes of Steve’s stomach, the rise of Steve’s pecs. Steve cradles the back of Eddie’s head with one hand, the other one bracing himself against the table top as he presses forward. His dick is straining the front of his old basketball shorts, Eddie is pushing hot and hard against the zipper of his wet denim shorts, which has to feel a little miserable. 

There’s a well-timed flash of lightning just as Steve pushes Eddie flat on his back on the table, clambering up to straddle his thighs. Steve pauses, hovering over Eddie, blinking against the shocking flash of light. The way it had cast hard contrasting shadows under the pale lines of Eddie’s ribs, the peak of his nipples, the dusting of hair in the middle of his chest. All the places he should have been scarred to hell, but isn’t (came back without a mark on him, even his tattoos, which had been the cause for much griping actually). All of him washed in smooth, even light. Painted all shades of white and black, except for that flash of orange in his eyes. Tender, aching, bright human eyes when the light faded, looking up at Steve like he’s the only thing in the universe. 

It’s not real, a tired voice in Steve’s head sounds faintly, as Eddie raises a hand to cup Steve’s cheek. Steve turns to press a kiss to the center of Eddie’s palm. It’s not real, it tries one last time, as Eddie’s other hand slides slowly up Steve’s thigh, crappy polyester offering pretty easy access. 

“I love you so much,” Eddie says, voice thick like his heart is right there in his mouth. 

Steve leans back, and pulls off his shirt. Tries not to look too smug at how Eddie’s eyes go wide with hunger and a little shock. He only has a second to appreciate it, before Eddie’s pushing himself up, tracing a path through Steve’s chest hair with his hands and immediately chasing it with his tongue. 

Steve’s eyes roll back in his head, hands locking around the back of Eddie’s head and holding on for dear life. Eddie’s teeth press into the swell of muscle just under Steve’s nipple, and he lets out a hoarse noise that’s swallowed up by another peal of thunder. 

Eddie grunts against Steve’s skin in response, gets his hands around Steve’s waist and twists—Steve’s back hits the table with a thud. There’s a  tinkle of breaking glass as at least one of the bottles of beer gets knocked to the floor, which blends in almost perfectly with the drumming rain. Kind of inevitable, probably. Steve just hopes the table itself doesn’t give out next.  

There’s no leaning back to enjoy the view, no stopping to take Steve in anymore. Either too caught up in the feeling or maybe worried what might happen if he gives Steve time, Eddie presses Steve down into the table, licking a long stripe up the center of Steve’s chest, humming in a kind of ecstasy at the taste of rain and sweat and Steve’s skin. 

The feeling of Steve’s magic—for lack of a better word, though he’s vaguely embarrassed at himself for even thinking it—isn’t limited to his hands and fingers anymore. It’s bubbling in his chest, it’s blazing in lines of invisible fire across every inch of him that’s flush against Eddie’s bare skin, he can taste it like honey and cayenne pepper under his tongue. He hasn’t felt it like this in months, not since he got to the last step in the spell to bring Eddie back and just gave himself over to it. Fucking terrified but all out of other ideas, somehow sure that there was no way to go back, to stop what he’d started. He’s out of ideas now too, and fuck knows he’s giving himself up to it again, but—terror isn’t exactly chief among the things he’s feeling right now. 

Finally, after licking and sucking and biting what felt like every inch of the skin around it, Eddie turns his attention to Steve’s nipple. Steve lets out a long moan, and finds his fingers scrambling clumsy at the waist of Eddie’s jeans. Wet denim, the fucking worst, and Eddie is no help at all. Lifts his hips up a little to give Steve some access, but otherwise is apparently determined to rewire Steve’s brain and make him over new with his teeth. 

The angle is shit, Steve needs Eddie closer. And he also, maybe, needs him to stop leaving hickeys across his chest like that before he comes in his shorts. He grips Eddie by the forearms and yanks him up. Eddie allows it with a low laugh that sends lightning flashes all the way down Steve’s spine, and seems just as happy to return his lips to Steve’s.

It’s not like before. All desperate urgency and the edge of teeth. Eddie presses a smile against his lips, and kisses him gently. Even as Steve, panic fluttering in his chest at this tenderness, manages to get his thumb around the button of Eddie’s jeans, yanking the zipper down and with a grunt, forcing the wet denim down and over Eddie’s hips. 

That, fortunately, seems to snap Eddie out of that soft and gentle mood. When Steve’s hand wraps around his dick (fuck, yeah, thicker than he thought it would be—and yeah, he’s been thinking about it), even though his touch has gotta be chilly and clammy as hell, Eddie breaks away from Steve’s mouth with a throaty oh fuck , pressing his forehead against Steve’s temple and breathing hard. 

Steve experiments with the angle of his wrist, wraps his free arm around Eddie’s shoulder as he circles the head of his dick with his fingers. Smearing the pre-cum he finds there across the head, Eddie shaking against him, mouth open against Steve’s cheek. 

He wishes he could see what he was doing. But the view as it is isn’t bad: Eddie’s shoulder and the long line of his spine filling most of his vision, his arm extending across Steve’s chest to hold himself up a little, hand pressed flat to the tabletop next to Steve’s head. 

Steve’s only human (well, he thinks he’s only human, though the events of the last year have kind of…called some of that into doubt). He lifts his head, and bites the swell of Eddie’s bicep, pairing it with a long firm stroke up Eddie’s dick. 

Eddie laughs. The sound, low and delighted right in Steve’s ear, makes him actually light-headed for a second. Eddie shifts, shoving Steve’s shorts down (with a lot less effort than his own had taken). Steve jerks when his dick springs free, hard enough that it practically slaps against his own stomach. But Eddie has a hand wrapped around it at once– fuck, around the two of them. The grip of his fingers, the velvet slide of Eddie’s dick against his. Steve sees stars. 

The back of his head hits the table with a thunk. “You’re killing me,” he says weakly. 

Eddie looks up at him with a hungry grin. “I’ll bring you back,” he says, pausing to raise his hand to Steve’s lips. “That’s what we do, right?”

“You got some spell book of your own I don’t know about?” Steve asks, lips brushing across Eddie’s fingertips.

Eddie’s eyes are consuming. Suddenly serious—deadly serious, Steve would say, except that’s not a word he throws around lightly anymore. Especially when it comes to Eddie. 

“I’d figure something out,” he says. So intense that Steve can’t doubt that he means it, all promise and not a bit of a joke. And then, with an air of get with it already, “ Spit.”

It takes a second for Steve to catch up, a little stuck on the feeling of Eddie’s palm resting gently over his chin, but once he does, he takes Eddie’s hand in his and works up as much spit as he can. When Eddie brings his hand around them again, it’s tight, slick, and so good Steve clutches desperately at his shoulders. 

He’s making these rough, little desperate noises, and he can’t– he can't bear to hear them, so he ducks down, kissing the top of Eddie’s head, his eyebrow, until Eddie looks up at him again. 

His eyes are open wide, meltingly dark, seeming to reflect the rain through the window behind them. 

“Look at you,” Eddie whispers, and kisses him deep. He’s braced up on one elbow above Steve, his hand working them both. His hair falls down across Steve’s cheek. It’s dried out a little now, but is still a cool brush across Steve’s feverish skin. He smells like the rain. 

Steve wraps his fingers over Eddie’s around their dicks, and Eddie moans into Steve’s mouth. Steve wonders with an edge of hysteria if Eddie can feel it too, the swell of the magic that brought him back to life, that pulled him away from that other place that he swore he couldn’t remember at all, that stitched his bones back together again and reanimated those brilliant eyes, that provocative tongue, the breath swelling his lungs firm and real against Steve’s chest. Can Eddie feel that? The fizz that’s vibrating in Steve’s bones, that sweet sinking down into something welcoming and soft, that tight tickle like a sunburn, that tug like a rip tide? Can he taste that spicy-sweet on Steve’s tongue, in his breath?

He feels Eddie coming, like a hook through his heart, a half-instant before Eddie stops kissing him, presses his forehead against Steve’s, and lets out a long bitten-off ahh, his eyes screwed shut. 

In Steve’s (much exaggerated, but still not insignificant) experience, simultaneous orgasms are a little bit of a myth. So it comes as a bit of a shock how Eddie’s eyes are still closed, his breath still harsh in Steve’s ears, his dick not even soft in their hands, and Steve is falling right after him. His whole body arches up, pressing flush against Eddie and sparking down to his toes, the magic simply sweeping him away. 

And it feels good. Fuck, it feels– it feels right. Feels like every piece of him is right where it should be, everything aligned. It feels like finger and thumb meeting in a perfect snap. While he grips Eddie’s shoulder, mouth open with a shout loud enough to rival the thunder, Eddie’s unguarded smile blissed-out and adoring above him, he thinks– maybe he could just– what the fuck has he been fighting this for?

The thought’s chased away pretty quickly though, so quickly Steve can maybe pretend he never had it, by how Eddie almost immediately slides down the table to– fuck– to start licking Steve clean. Chasing the taste of the two of them over his abs, across the divot of his hip, even–

The moan feels like it’s ripped right out of him, when Eddie takes his softening dick into his mouth, swiping a carefully slow tongue around the head. 

“I can’t–” Steve pants, because the pleasure of it is actually so intense it brings tears to his eyes. “Eddie–”

Eddie’s up in a second, with a not-that-apologetic-looking grin. Without a moment’s hesitation, he lies back down next to Steve, pulling him into his arms and tucking Steve’s head against his shoulder. Steve, a little grouchily, feels like Eddie is maybe pushing his luck while he knows Steve is still getting his breath back. But he lets himself be manhandled, a little. Whatever. It feels nice, so fuck it. 

The magic feeling is draining out of him, not all at once, but kind of like the swirl at the bottom of a tub. And it’s got him feeling dizzy. Cold, everywhere Eddie isn’t touching him. He’ll let himself have this, this warmth, this comfort. At least for now. Until he figures out what to do next. 

Thunder again. But sounds farther off now. The rain still drums against the windows, the glass door behind them. But more of a tap than a drum, quiet enough that he can hear the soft sound Eddie makes when he pushes his nose into the crown of Steve’s head. 

“You okay?” Eddie asks, softly. 

“Yeah,” Steve says, letting out a long breath. 

Eddie rubs Steve’s arm slowly, comfortingly. Sounds like he’s angled his head away, addressing the wall or something, when he speaks again. 

“If this was you trying to, I don’t know. Prove I just needed to get it out of my system, I think you should know it didn’t work.”

“No?”

“Nah,” Eddie’s voice is warm and close again. He presses the last words into Steve’s hair. “Not at all.”

Steve considers making a joke about it. Some kind of oh darn, my evil plan is foiled, but it doesn’t sit right, even just as a thought. He closes his eyes. “Well, that wasn’t what I was trying to do.”

“Yeah?” Eddie says. And that question mark is clear, loud, underlined in red. Steve ignores it anyway. He doesn’t have an answer. 

Steve eases himself off Eddie’s chest, groaning a little as he sits up. He hesitates, for a moment, turning to look at Eddie spread out on the table. Luminous in the dim glow of stormlight. He’s just watching Steve. Waiting. Content, maybe, to just lie there and look at him. The same way part of Steve is actually fine sitting right here, like this. Watching the slow rise and fall of Eddie’s chest. The way one finger taps absently against his stomach. Steve feels like he could stay here for hours, actually. 

“Do you want me to go?” Eddie says quietly. 

He would, too. If Steve told him to. As quietly as he had the first time. No arguments, no objections. Steve doesn’t think that would be the end of it– Eddie basically said as much, and if this didn’t get it out of Eddie’s system, he can only imagine that means it’s buried even deeper in there. Locked around his heart, maybe. But Eddie would still go, tonight. If Steve told him to. 

Steve leans in. Cups the side of Eddie’s jaw in one hand, thumb tracing a gentle line across Eddie’s bottom lip. 

“Come upstairs,” he says instead, eyes on the slow passage of his own thumb. 

Maybe he doesn't know what he’s trying to do here. But the urge is the same as it was when he was just watching Eddie outside in the rain, looking pathetic and drenched out there on his diving board: come in. Stay. He could cushion it with some bullshit, how it’s really late. How it’s still pouring. Some string of excuses, giving him some kind of out. 

But Eddie’s lips feel soft under his touch. Silky smooth, like cornsilk. He doesn’t want an out. Maybe he can’t give Eddie exactly what he wants, can’t just throw that quiet but insistent voice of doubt out the window after one (okay, admittedly pretty incredible) orgasm. 

But he didn’t get it out of his system, either. 

He kisses Eddie. Close-mouthed, sweet. His thumb still lingering at the corner of Eddie’s lips, pressed between them. Eddie’s hand lands on his hip, grips him tight. 

“Yeah,” he says, voice rough. Pulls back enough to see Eddie blink hard, like he’s just waking up. “Come upstairs. Let’s go to bed.”

“Lovely as this table is, that does sound nice,” Eddie says quietly. “I love you so much, Steve.”

It doesn’t really sound like he meant to say it. Like he was closing the door on that last sentence and it somehow managed to slip through. But after the slightest wince, Steve can almost see him decide well, fuck it. And he meets Steve’s eyes with a kind of fierceness. 

“I love you,” he says again. On purpose, this time. 

It doesn’t hurt, this time. To hear him say it. But Steve can’t–he glances away, looking into the darkness of the kitchen and– bursts out laughing. 

“Something funny?” Eddie says, sounding kind of grouchy. Which is understandable, but Steve still can’t stop laughing. 

“Dude,” Steve catches his breath with an effort. “You’ve still got your shoes on.”

He points, and Eddie, as if needing to check, kicks one foot into view. A foot with his jean shorts wrapped around an ankle, and very much still wearing his water-logged and beat up black Chuck Taylors. 

Eddie groans, and lets his head thunk back against the table. Steve’s still laughing. “Heat of the moment, what can you do,” Eddie says with a reluctant smile. “Man, shut up. There’s no good way to get these off sneaky and casual.”

“Yeah,” Steve says with a snicker. “Yeah, I get that. Here, let me–”

He gets to his feet, and slides down to kneel on the kitchen floor (taking a quick glance to make sure it won’t be on a shard of broken glass– the beer bottle broke on the other side of the table, but still worth making sure), taking Eddie’s foot in one hand. Eases the shorts off first, before starting to work his fingers into the cold, wet, and stubborn shoe laces. 

“What the fuck, did you triple-knot these?” He asks, teeth gritted. 

“Hey, I lead an exciting life,” Eddie says, having pushed himself up to sit on the edge of the table. Watching Steve, with an intense look in his eyes that doesn’t exactly match his tone. “Gotta be prepared.”

“Lead a clumsy life, you mean,” Steve mutters. Peels the wet crew sock off Eddie’s foot, wrapping a hand around his heel, the arch of his foot. Trying to will some warmth into the chilly skin there. 

Eddie just hums vaguely in response, and Steve doesn’t look up at him again as he attacks the next shoe. 

He’s rubbing his hand brusquely over Eddie’s feet, still trying to warm them up and wondering where those towels got to, when Eddie gently tugs his feet free. And slides them to the floor, standing now in front of Steve and reaching to pull him up. 

Eddie kisses him fiercely then, tangling his fingers in Steve’s hair, pressing his jaw open and gliding his tongue along the bottom of Steve’s front teeth. Steve wraps his arms around him, pulls him in close. Feels all the ways their bodies fit together, Eddie’s heart against his ribs and Steve’s dick tucked against the hollow of Eddie’s hip. 

“I know,” Steve says, when they finally pull apart, before Eddie can say anything. “I just– I know, okay?”

Eddie considers him. Runs his palm across Steve’s forehead, pushing his hair back to get a good look at him. It’s dark in here, almost too dark to see. But he knows Eddie can see him perfectly clear. 

Eddie nods. And doesn’t say it. 

Steve turns to go, to lead them upstairs, but Eddie stops him with a hand on his wrist. Links their fingers together, when Steve turns back around. Cautiously, and clumsily, god knows they haven’t done this before but. It’s a night for that, apparently. 

“You don’t need to believe in it,” Eddie says. “Just—I believe it’s real. I’ll believe it’s real hard enough for the two of us, however long it takes. I don’t give a shit.”

Steve tastes it again, for a second. Honey, with heat behind it. Sweet and strong and promising more, more. If only he’ll chase that taste. If he just lets himself take a bite. 

Maybe he’ll never know for sure, not really. But maybe– maybe however it arrived, whatever brought this bright bloom into his chest whenever he looks at Eddie, maybe causes and spells and powers that he doesn’t even a little be understand, maybe all that doesn’t have to matter. Maybe it can just be, and maybe he can forget about origins and causes and just feel it. 

Doesn’t seem that likely, honestly. But if Eddie stays. While Steve tries to figure it out– or tries to stop figuring it out– maybe that’s enough. Maybe Steve can let that be enough. 

Steve raises their clasped hands to his lips. Kisses the back of Eddie’s hand, the hand that had reached for him first, the first second of his second chance at life. The rain falls around them, gentler now, almost enough to make Steve think that the humidity might finally break. That he’ll wake up, Eddie in his arms, to a cool fresh breeze and an open, bright sky. 

He can almost believe it. 

“Come on,” he says to Eddie, and leads the way.