Chapter Text
Eddie’s two towns over, meeting with his supplier’s supplier because Reefer Rick got caught with a .22 and a brick of coke. He’s looking at a long stay in federal prison, but Eddie’s got bills to pay. He’s just not a fucking idiot about it like Rick, because that asshole was carrying it around to try and get chicks in his car.
Douchebag. Eddie wishes he didn’t like him so much.
Anyway, he’s two towns over, leaning against the side of his van as he waits for John to come down from his shitty apartment. His foot is tapping out the rhythm to Ace of Spades, and he’s humming a little under his breath. He’s never had an easy time standing in silence or sitting still, which is a solid half of why he’s a third year senior. (The other half is, admittedly, just not giving a shit about the expectations others place on him.)
(Except that is also a lie, because Eddie actually cares very much about what people think of him. It’s a curse. So he tells himself he doesn’t give a shit and makes himself as loud and noticeable as possible. They might not like him, but they’re going to fucking see him.)
So he’s standing there, back against the van, privately rocking out to Motorhead when this family comes around the corner up the road. It’s not like Norman Rockwell shit. The mom has bags under her eyes and the dad looks like he hasn’t shaved in a few days. Their oldest child is walking hand-in-hand with his father, head down. The mother is holding a toddler, one who is sneezing and coughing and looks like absolute shit.
Eddie sees this, and this weird, uncommon pang rises up in him. It looks hard, he thinks, being a parent. But worthwhile, too, because that older kid is humming under their breath, skipping to an unheard tune. Utterly safe with their family. Utterly unconcerned with the world. That, Eddie thinks, is a mark of truly good parenting. He was always on alert with his parents, watchful, waiting for the next fight to break out.
Being able to do that for a little person – make them feel safe like that – is a remarkable thing. He’ll never do it – Jesus Christ, he can barely keep himself alive – but it’s fucking awesome when people do it right.
Idly, he wonders what it would be like to have parents like that. Don’t get him wrong, he loves his uncle – Wayne has saved his fucking ass so many times, made so many sacrifices, and always been steady as a rock – but their relationship isn’t entirely parental. There’s a sense of brotherhood there, a commonality in that neither of them expected to end up together, but they’re stubborn Munsons and love each other too much not to fucking try. Wayne’s real big on Eddie being his own man and making his own choices – something about trusting him to make good choices. That’s on Wayne, though – he made that choice. Not the right one. Eddie’s good at about five things, and the fourth is fucking up.
Yeah. He made a list.
Anyway, he thinks about Wayne, and how Wayne is awesome but not a dad, and how he never really had a mom, and what would that be like? Would he be different? Isn’t he the product of the choices both made around him and by him, a creature built out of all the many series of events that build up his life? Who would Eddie Munson even be if he didn’t have a dad in prison, a mom who signed over custody, and a trailer park childhood? What if he had, like, a mom, a dad, a nice house, a middle-class income? What if his life was cookie-cutter perfect?
(He thinks of Jason Carver, perfect face, perfect smile, perfect grades, perfect girlfriend. God, the girlfriend. The only girl that matters in Hawkins. Chrissy Goddamn Cunningham. Jason’s got all of that, just like Chrissy’s got all of that, and what if Eddie had it? What if he grew up with a white smile, and a dad that taught him how to play ball, and knew how to ask good girls like Chrissy Cunningham to go out with him? Jesus Christ.)
With a start, Eddie realizes that maybe he’s higher than he thought. It’s a new strand, and John swore it was mild, but Eddie is clearly going a lot of weird places. “Fuck that’s a trip,” he mutters. “Who the hell thinks about that? Fuck.”
Yeah. No more for him for a while. Actually, it’d probably help if he got something to eat. Isn’t there a diner like two blocks over? Oh man, he bets they have pancakes.
“Hey, Eddie, are you ready?” John calls, hanging from the open door of his building. Eddie’s head snaps towards him.
“Yeah, man.” Coming up off his van, Eddie comes forward. “Think I’m going to that diner when we’re done. Wanna come?”
“Oh man,” John breathes, “hash browns.”
“Pancakes,” Eddie sighs.
“You want to go now, or –”
“Van,” Eddie says, already swinging back around.
(Eddie gets pancakes and extra bacon and completely forgets about the unnerving thought of being an entirely different person.)
*
There’s a van on the corner. Chrissy is sitting in the passenger side of Jason’s car, ankles crossed and knees together, waiting with her hands in her lap. He’s in the station, paying for gas and probably getting himself a snack. That’s okay. Boys have a high metabolism, and Chrissy doesn’t. She can sit in the car while he eats pork skins, or M&Ms, or jerky and not feel her mouth water. It’s okay.
Chrissy’s fine.
She focuses on the van. It’s old, dirty, and just looks like it smells weird. She kind of wants to get out and go sniff it. That sounds crazy, doesn’t it? But at the start of the year she bumped into Eddie Munson in the hallway, and he smelled like Irish Spring, cigarettes, weed, and a little bit like leather. It was such a shock to Chrissy’s system, so used to tightly constrained everything, that this little contact shook her entire world. It was the only time Eddie Muson ever looked directly at her.
He blinked big, brown eyes and said, “Oh, sorry,” and bent to pick up the notebook she dropped.
Chrissy inhaled deep of his scent – thinking it smelled like pure, wild freedom – and tried not to get weak kneed. He straightened and handed her the notebook. Chrissy tried not to blush and took it with a squeaking, “Thank you!” before speed walking away.
It was the only time they’ve ever spoken, which tracks, because Eddie Munson hates jocks, which means he hates cheerleaders, and Chrissy would die if ever turned his scalding tongue on her. She’s seen him in the cafeteria and halls, she knows how brutal he can be. It’s a wonder to watch though, and she always, always does. Because he is just…brutally honest. He doesn’t fake anything. He thinks it so he says it, and it’s all very off the cuff and intense, and it knocks Chrissy for a loop every time.
She doesn’t even pick her own clothes. She can’t imagine being so…so impressively free. Unchecked by societal expectations, an overbearing mother, and an emotionally absent father. Unburdened by the need to be small, smaller, smallest, until she’s tiny, pocket sized Chrissy. Good for people to tuck away when they’re done playing with her, out of sight and out of mind. With a nice, pretty, painted on smile that shines and shines, and doesn’t dim until the toy box lid is closed.
Chrissy doesn’t know much about Eddie, not really. People say a lot of things about him, but she’s pretty sure most of them are lies. If he’d really killed someone, he’d be in prison, and if he was a real Satanist, wouldn’t a portal to hell have opened up by now? (Chrissy thinks that it might be kind of cool if one did, if it sucked up the Methodist church she goes to every Sunday in a little pastel dress and pink lip gloss. Sure, end of the world or whatever, but at least there’d be a little peace.)
They say Eddie doesn’t have parents, that he lives with an uncle or grandfather or something, and Chrissy wonders what it would be like to not have parents. To be shockingly, achingly free.
“You want something to eat?” A skinny, dark haired boy asks. He’s walking up to Eddie, who’s standing outside his van, but thrusting his thumb behind him towards the gas station.
“No, dude, I ate before I came back. Best fucking pancakes I’ve ever had in my life.”
Chrissy wonders constitutes a good pancake much less the “best fucking pancakes” Eddie’s ever had in his entire life. She hasn’t had one since she was like nine, and mostly she remembers the taste of the syrup. She’d kill for syrup. She thinks Eddie ate a whole plate by himself, because boys eat a lot and there’s no one there to remind him to be small.
She bets he eats a lot.
Chrissy doesn’t want to eat a lot, just a little, that would be okay. But that’s as attainable as being brave enough to get out of the car and go up to Eddie Munson, to give him her best cheerleader smile and say, “Hi, I’m Chrissy! We have English together, right?” It sounds like a simple thing, but it’s harder and more terrifying than climbing a mountain.
Small girls, good girls, Chrissy girls, do not speak to boys like Eddie Munson. And Eddie Musnon does not, would not, cannot ever spend more than a second of thought on her, because who would? She’s an empty smile, empty eyes, empty stomach. She’s a cheer skirt and a cheer sweater and pom-poms. She’s all fluff, and he’s as solid and unyielding as a brick.
(She’d give anything to know what it’s like to be solid, just for a moment.)
“Hey, babe, I got you a water.” Jason gets in the car, thrusting a sweating, expensive bottle of cold water in her hand. He’s got a Big Gulp, a gas station cheeseburger, and a crinkly bag of onion rings. Chrissy almost cries at the smell of it all, greasy and heady and forbidden.
“Thanks, babe,” she says, smiling so widely he can see her gums.
*
Eddie wakes up all at once, startled and disoriented. The sun isn’t out yet, which means he sure as fuck should still be sleeping, but his alarm is blaring. Well, he says his alarm, but it’s a clock radio set to the local top 40 station. Wham! is playing at an ungodly level. Wham! in general is ungodly, and Eddie’s soul screams at the hype pop.
Rolling towards his nightstand, he flings an arm and tries to find the top of his messy nightstand. He finds soft sheets, soft mattress, soft pillow. Pushing himself up, he drags himself across the bed – which makes a little voice in his brain say what the fuck, because he’s got a twin sized mattress in his tiny trailer room. He’s for sure in a double bed, softer than anything he’s ever slept on before.
There’s no nightstand on the right side of the bed, either. Pushing himself up on his arms, hair falling around his face, Eddie looks around the dimly lit room. There are two big windows to his right. Frilly curtains and white sheers cover them. Light bleeds in from outside, the dull glow of distant street lamps.
“What the fuck?” he whispers. Except it’s not his voice, low and raspy from sleep and the bong hits he took last night. It’s light, sweet, a little sleep hoarse but feminine. Well, he thinks, that’s not fucking right. Which tracks, because nothing about this morning is right.
What the fuck happened last night?
He wasn’t even partying. He worked until almost one, came home, finished his math homework, hit the bong, and fell asleep. That’s it. Nothing stronger than weed.
Sliding across the bed, he sees the glowing red numbers of a clock radio. 6:34.
Who the fuck sets an alarm for 6:30 in the morning and why do they hate themselves?
Eddie smacks along the top of it until he finds a button that makes the music stop. Sighing heavily, he pushes back the covers and stands. Immediately, he knows that everything is wrong. His center of gravity is – it’s fucked. First of all, he’s short, and that’s fucking weird, because how does a person shrink? Second of all he feels all…weird. Lighter and stronger at the same time. When he stands straight, his knees and right shoulder both pop like he’s an old man.
“Ow, what the fuck?” he whispers, hand flying to his shoulder. That hurt. The same girl-ish voice speaks his words.
Eddie is officially starting to freak out a little bit.
He trips, like, three times while crossing the room. Once he finds the door he slaps his palms around the walls beside it, until he finds a light switch. Flicking it on, Eddie is stunned to find himself surrounded by a room that is pink and white, frilly and delicate. Pink carpet, white four poster bed with pink drapes, pink curtains, a bit white vanity, white bookshelves. It’s horrifyingly neat and impersonable.
Staggering for the vanity, Eddie takes a long look at himself.
“Holy fuck, did I take acid?” he asks. Because he’s staring at himself in the mirror, but he is Chrissy Cunningham. Her hair is messy from being slept on, her face is bare of make-up, and she’s wearing a soft pink gown nightgown. It has little white flowers on it and a lace ribbon. He can see her nipples through the thin fabric.
“What the fuck,” he whispers. “What the fuck, what the fuck, what the fuck.” Chrissy’s face twists with his expressions, and Chrissy’s mouth forms the words, and Chrissy’s voice is a little hysterical in the big room.
Looking left and right, Eddie tries to find an answer to what’s happening to him. He finds none. So he very carefully sinks down onto the soft carpet and sits down. Why? Well, he’s not sure. It just…it just seems safer, maybe?
He stays there for a long time, quietly panicking. He needs a cigarette. He needs a cigarette and then a joint. He needs a cigarette, a joint, and to know why the fuck he woke up in Chrissy Cunningham’s body.
There is a sharp rapping at the door. “Chrissy?” a woman’s voice says, moments before the door swings open. An extremely slender woman, almost skeletal in appearance, steps inside. Her hair is in curlers and she’s frowning tightly. “Chrissy, what in the world are you doing?”
“Uh,” breathes Eddie, because he has no fucking clue what he’s doing actually. “Um…sitting?”
“Don’t be smart, Christine,” the woman – her mother, he imagines – snaps. Her mouth is very thin and tight. “It’s not pretty. And get your running clothes on, or you’re going to have to cut your run time down. God knows you can’t afford it, look at those thighs.”
Eddie blinks rapidly. His head jerks down, and he considers Chrissy’s thighs under the pink nightgown. They look pretty goddamn great to him. Soft skin, strong muscle, a spray of freckles on the inside of her right thigh. He’s spent too many classes staring at those freckles, shown off by her cheer skirt. He would fist fight Lucifer in a pit of fire to lick them.
“Uh, right,” he says. “My thighs. They’re…what’s wrong with them?”
Her mother’s frown only grows more severe. Eddie flinches backwards at the sight of it. “I told you not to be smart, Christine,” she snaps. “It’s not pretty. Now get up. No lazy girls in this house, or you won’t be allowed any breakfast.”
Eddie has about two seconds to wonder what kind of fucking parent threatens not to feed to their child – Wayne has never once threatened to take away food. Not the first time he got Eddie with pot, or when he found out Eddie was dealing, or every year Eddie flunked a grade. He just sighed through his nose, real tired, and gave him a serious stare.
“Boy,” he’d say, “you’ve got a head on your shoulders. I sure wish you’d use it.”
The door shuts. Eddie flips it off. “Fuck you, lady,” he says. “I’m going to fucking McDonald’s for breakfast if you’re gonna be like that. Bitch.”
Then he gingerly rises, hem of the nightgown shifting across Chrissy’s knees. It’s a weird feeling. Kind of breezy.
“What the fuck am I supposed to do?” he asks Chrissy’s reflection, but she doesn’t answer and he’s left in a helpless silence in her pink bedroom.
*
Chrissy wakes late. She knows, because the sun is up. She yawns and stretches, blinking at the sunlight shifting across the white ceiling. There’s a water stain above it. Weird. Her canopy is pink, and she doesn’t have a water stain on her ceiling. Then the back of her stretching arm whacks against a wall and Chrissy hisses, jerking it down and jerking her head to the left.
The first thing she notices is her arm. It’s big. It’s – it’s man big. It’s big, thick wristed with a heavy forearm, and it’s got a covering of hair. All Chrissy can think is mom is going to kill me, because oh God, her mom is so going to kill her. Is this like Frankenstein’s Monster? How he woke up and was different pieces of people? One arm a woman’s, one arm a man’s?
Oh my God, did someone cut her arm off?
Flailing upright, Chrissy slaps at her face and body. Nothing – nothing feels right. Long hair, but it’s curly and a little coarse under her fingers. Bare chest, flat, hair dusted across it. A soft belly, with a little roll when she sits up. Big feet poking out from under a faded blanket. She’s on a twin sized mattress in a room the size of a postage stamp.
Stuffing her fist in her mouth, Chrissy fights down a scream.
She’s not sure how long she freaks, but she sits in bed for a really long time, rocking back and forth. She’s – she’s a boy. She knows she’s a boy, because – because she is a boy that has an erection, and she’s never actually seen a penis, but she has an erect penis at the moment, and she also has to pee, how does this even work? She’s in a strange room, in a strange body, and it feels like she needs to shave her face. She has no idea how to shave a face.
Knuckles rap against the bedroom door. Chrissy’s head flips towards it, and she stares with huge eyes.
“Ed,” a low voice says. “You going to school today?”
Chrissy sort of…whimpers.
“Ed? Boy, get your ass out of bed.” There’s another hard series of raps.
The best Chrissy can manage is a weak, “Come in,” because the person on the other side is knocking. It would be rude to ignore them. The door swings open, and then a hand flicks the lightswitch by the door. Chrissy is left blinking, rubbing her (borrowed?) hand across her (borrowed?) eyes.
There’s a man in the doorway. White hair, white beard, age written beside his eyes and mouth. He’s got a half open shirt on and a beer in his hand.
“Boy,” he says, “why’re you looking at me like you’re about to cry?”
“Um,” says Chrissy, and her voice is low and raspy. “I….um?”
The older man sighs, eyes drifting shut. “Are you high?”
“What?” she squeaks, jolting up and onto her knees. She almost pitches forward, and has to catch herself with an arm against the wall. Her balance is way off, because she’s a lot taller. “No! Of course I’m not high!”
The man eyes Chrissy like she is absolutely high.
“Nice act,” he deadpans after a moment. “Come on, boy, get up and get ready. I’ve got breakfast almost ready.”
“Breakfast?” Chrissy asks, her voice small and thin. “I – um – grapefruit?”
“Grape – what the fuck, Eddie, no.” Now he looks at her like she’s losing her mind. “Bacon and eggs. Fuel your brain so you learn something today.”
Eddie, he said. He thinks her name is Eddie.
Chrissy only knows one Eddie, and that’s –
Swallowing hard, she bobs her head up and down. “Okay,” she says, voice cracking painfully. “I – I’ll – just let me get ready. For school. If that’s okay.”
The man’s eyebrows are crawling high up his forehead. “Sure, Ed,” he says, shaking his head as he steps back and closes the door. “What the hell did that kid take?” he mutters, just before the door clicks shut.
Chrissy is left alone in the tiny bedroom, on the tiny bed, in Eddie’s not tiny body.
She drags herself up right, slowly adjusting to being so much taller and broader. Everything feels wrong. She’s used to being small Chrissy, Chrissy the flier, Chrissy that never does too much of anything. Suddenly she’s caught in Eddie’s big body, with his wild hair and tattoos and band posters on the wall.
And she really has to pee.