Hole

by fayfayfay

Summary:

Steve is a typical guy leading a typical teenaged life--except he's obsessed with his hole. He spends a lot of time engaging in unsafe masturbatory practices, and trying to fill himself physically and emotionally. Eddie Munson comes along, and that becomes a lot easier.

Chapter 1: Pretty on the Inside

Steve becomes obsessed with his own hole pretty early on.

It starts with Tommy Hagan, but no, not like that. Steve is a teen, old enough to have hair on his chest but not old enough to get a job. Summer break is long and hot, even in Tommy’s air conditioned house, because they’re in the attic most of June, July and August.

Tommy’s dad has this insane porn collection in the attic. Boxes of dirty magazines, books. There are little yellowed comics the size of your palm, starring characters like Popeye, only fucking.

Tommy’s dad must be some kind of loon, Steve thinks, even though he seems normal enough. Normal man, normal family, normal job selling normal, American cars. But the collection—Steve’s never seen anything like it. He must have been collecting since he was a kid, and God knows what Tommy’s poor mother thinks of all this. Even Steve’s own dad only has a few—dirty magazines in a nightstand drawer that Steve pretends never to have seen.

Mr. Hagan must be a little crazy.

Steve isn’t crazy. He’s normal. He spends a lot of time outside, and he and Tommy talk to real girls all the time, and Steve loves his family and his mother and his country. He’s normal.

But still, whenever Mrs. Hagan is out of the house, and it’s quiet, and Tommy looks at him all deviously, Steve knows what they’re in for. They spend a lot of that summer up there looking intently, sometimes laughing about what they see, sometimes flushed and stunned and open mouthed and pointedly not laughing.

Steve loves the pictures, almost as good as when a real girl looks at you a certain way, but sometimes he looks at them and he gets a little sad without knowing why. So, the comics are actually his favorite. It’s so thrilling to see the little naked people. They’re so happy; there’s a little story, but mostly they get naked right away. Olive Oyl decides she wants it and on the next page Popeye’s plugging away at her. Steve stays hard all summer. He and Tommy pretend not to notice each other squirm.

At the bottom of the box, there’s a few weird ones. He doesn’t even get to them until August.

Boys will be Girls. A Fairy’s Paradise.

“Is he dreaming about his own dick?” Steve asks.

“No,” Tommy cackles, “He’s a queer!”

“A queer?” Steve repeats, frowning. He’s heard about queers. His dad warned him about queers, and watching out for himself. But he didn’t really know what to watch out for. They want his dick?

“See, look—” Tommy flips the page.

Where normally there’s a girl sucking dick, here there’s two men, and then they’re on top of each other—

“What?” Steve asks, “in his rear?”

“Yeah!” Tommy laughs a little too loud, and he’s pointing at the next page, where a hard prick is sticking up, going into one man’s mouth as another fucks his behind.

“What?” Steve asks, feeling dizzy, confused. “Why would he let him do that?”

“I guess the fairies like it,” Tommy shrugs, “He’s hard, isn’t he?”

Steve blinks. He is hard. It must be nice, or at least okay, if he’s still hard.

“Doesn’t it hurt?” Steve asks.

“I don’t know,” Tommy says, “Probably.”

Steve looks at the page, desperately confused.

“I do know something,” Tommy says, “I read about it.”

Steve looks at him frantically, this sense of urgency making him feel small and insane. “Well, spit it out!”

“Okay! Okay,” Tommy says, and furtively, secretively, he tells Steve about a letter in one of the magazines—a man who was “getting a blowie, alright? And the lady stuck a finger up there, and he didn’t think it would be good, right, but actually when he shot off it was like, yowza! Fireworks!”

“You’re pulling my leg,” Steve says, “I would’ve heard about that.”

“No you wouldn’t,” Tommy smiles, sniggering at him. “You didn’t even know what a blowie was until sixth grade!”

“I’m not an idiot,” Steve huffs, looking back to where Snow White and Happy are naked from the waist down. Tommy is chuckling to himself, his fat, orange-brown cheeks damp with sweat. Steve can smell him, the pubescent boy smell they’ve been swimming in all summer, the one he associates with boners and trying subtly to grind against his jeans in the musty atmosphere of the attic.

“You’re not an idiot, Stevie,” Tommy says, and he grips Steve’s shoulder to reassure him. His palm is hot and heavy, making Steve sweat under its unexpected size. They’ve both grown so much.

Tommy says, “I’m not trying to be shitty. It’s just… the girls love you, but sometimes it feels like I know more than you do.”

“About this stuff, sure,” Steve says, shaking his head. “How am I supposed to know about butts?”

Tommy shoves Steve’s head down, fingers threading into his hair, and Steve wrestles him away, laughing.

 

The next day, Steve had wanted to know more about the letter, the one where the girl put a finger in it, and Tommy had surprised him by knowing exactly where it was. Steve read it quickly, then pretended to be bored of the idea, but a week later, he was still replaying the letter in his mind constantly.

My whole body was on fire, the man said, and I never got there from a blowjob before, really, but that day I came so quick it embarrassed me. It was like a geyser in there, and she choked on it before she swallowed—

Steve had thought about it every day since. He jerked it until he was raw, three or four or five times a day. It helped that Tommy was busy all of a sudden—had found a girl in the next neighborhood they went to school with and suddenly she was all he cared about. Steve stayed in his room and jerked off, obsessed.

And so, a week later, Steve is in his bedroom, still thinking about his asshole.

It wasn’t even the blowjob part of the letter. It was the revelation of, specifically, his own asshole—being prodded at like that, poked and massaged and entered. The fact that it had been back there all along was a revelation to him. He wanted it, badly.

So, he had to do it. He decided it first, that he had to do it. Then, he thought about how.

It wasn’t like he could ask a girl to do it. Just touching his dick was nasty enough to them. He’d been jerked off a few times, and Rebecca Reinholdt had even licked it up and down in the closet at the Hagans’ New Year’s party that winter. He had a girl he was talking to now, a girl who rode her bike through Tommy’s neighborhood, and she was nice, but too nice to talk to about all this. Maybe if he knew one of those older girls he’d talked to behind the plant that one time, that had been smoking, and had laughed at him and called him cute, maybe he could talk to one of them about it, but he didn’t know them and anyway, that would be rude—they were still girls.

Because he didn’t want a girl for that, really. What he wanted from them was a girlfriend, someone pretty and nice, too nice for all that, a real one like Tommy was getting, and he didn’t seem to be able to get one of those, not yet.

So anyway, no girls. He could do it on his own though, he thought: get his fingers up there and push. How hard could it be? He wiped on the toilet all the time.

He shucked his pants, and after doing a shimmy to try and press his ass cheeks apart, he decided to lie down. He laid on his side, licked his hand, and found it—the wrinkly key to the mind blowing, geyser orgasm that was promised.

Instantly, he knew it wasn’t going to work. Even with spit, his asshole wasn’t budging. The thin skin skidded this way and that, and soon he was hurting himself, trying to grip onto it and move the ring of muscle forcibly aside. He was getting hard at the idea of trying to get in and not being able to. He had to do it.

He needed something a little more slippery.

Shaving cream was out. It was too foamy and fluffy.

He walked to his parents’ bathroom, pants around his ass, feeling a bit criminal.

He tried a little bit of all the lotions in his mom’s bathroom. He’d said no when they invited him out to the country club—had been saying no for a week or two, mostly so he could stay home and jerk off. He’d say yes after he figured this out, he promised himself.

The lotions were smelly, but thin and watery. They could work, but they were all perfumed and his mother would smell them on him, in his clothes and his sheets if she came into his room.

She didn’t do so often, but still, he’d have to come up with a story—it wouldn’t work.

After searching through cabinets, he gave up, and went to the kitchen.

His mom’s olive oil was too expensive. She’d freak if she noticed a drastic difference.

However, in the baking cabinet—bingo.

Vegetable oil.

It sloshed in the bottle.

Steve knew the stuff was cheap. He knew it after he’d used Mrs. Harrington’s good salad-tier olive oil to deep fry the chicken parm last Easter and his mom had screamed bloody murder, lectured him about the price difference.

It was a big bottle. Too big. What if he had to get it back down to the kitchen?

He got a Tupperware out of the cabinet—something old, something his mother wouldn't miss, and filled it partway.

Once he hit the bedroom and slammed the door he couldn’t lose his clothes fast enough. As he dipped his fingers in the oil he was breathing fast and hard, too excited to notice his boner catching on the waistband of his underwear and slapping up toward his stomach.

He leaned forward onto his desk with one palm while the other probed his asshole, feeling himself bristle with tension at the slickness of the thin, puckered skin. Damp hair tickled his knuckles.

It was so hot. His dick pulsed. He could feel it thumping in time with his heart.

Getting inside was a relief, and he loved the feeling immediately. It was a pressure he couldn’t contain, a burning pain that felt like something he could love. The feeling against his fingertips, soft and warm, was just as good as feeling the inside of a girl’s pussy—the one time he’d done that.

He didn’t even think about his dick at first, just marveled at how good it felt, how right. He was supposed to have something in there. He wanted to look, wanted to see it, whined at the idea of watching his fingers plunge into his own ass.

He felt like he was coming already, the hot thump of pleasure filling his whole midsection and lower half as he stood unmoving, two fingers curled inside of himself and pressing down.

“Oh, my God,” he let out, releasing a shaking breath. It felt so good to talk. He’d never been a loud masturbator but something about having something inside him made him want to cry out, to put noise into the world.

“Oh my God,” he said again, clamping his eyes shut, leaning hard onto his supporting hand.

He forced himself to stand, fingers still inside himself and pants still around his ankles as he tripped toward his bed. There was a towel from his shower earlier that day.

He dragged it so that he could kneel on it, then laid down completely with his ass in the air. He moved so decisively, even though he hadn’t thought about what he would do. His body seemed to be behaving in a way that was completely natural. Then, he lay on his side, just to see what difference there was. He could go deeper on his side.

He grabbed his cock and pulled.

It was instant. He’d already felt like he was coming, but then he was, big fat jets of spend splashing up onto his chest, his chin, even. He croaked like something was rising out of him, visceral and spiritual.

He came for what felt like minutes, jerking with whole body muscle spasms of sensation, eyes closed and then open again as he realized he was still fucking coming.

“Holy shit,” he gasped, jamming his fingers deeper inside, not without pain. His asshole spasmed around his own fingers and it was heavenly, knowing he himself was squeezing them, and he himself was inside of himself, fucking himself, plunging and burrowing. His hole spasmed with the orgasm, dragging it out as Steve held it in his grasp.

“Fuck, holy shit,” Steve gasped to himself, one hand still on his dick as it leaked onto the towel. “Oh my God.”

He flexed his fingers inside of himself. Aftershocks flooded him. He grunted happily. It was like he was holding himself, wrapped around and under and inside himself, and the comfort was immense.

Feeling his fingers slide out was another revelation—the slide, the quick way his body pushed them out, it felt so good.

“Fuck,” he sighed, feeling his whole body relax.

It was then he knew. He needed something bigger.

 

From then on Steve didn’t see the point in jerking off unless something was inside of him. He got some plastic wrap and wound it around a hairbrush handle, pressed it inside of himself happily, and for a while that hairbrush was his best friend.

He ran into some roadblocks. Getting enough time alone was a struggle.

His father seemed to have infinite time off, and suddenly was taking myriad interests in Steve’s social life. Mr. Harrington lectured him about showing his face in public, at the club, and how his grandparents missed him. He doubted that; his grandparents looked at him the way you’d look at a statue when you know it’s important but can’t figure out why.

Then his mother started saying he was getting pale, and that he couldn’t abide, so he agreed to spend time with them—and had his mother approve his tan as the summer came to a close. She was thorough, even checking behind his ears that he was perfectly sunkissed. The bit of approval in her voice sounded like love.

Then, there was the matter of his digestive system. He learned his system well, becoming attuned to when he’d be empty. He ate a lot of salad, remembering someone say it “cleaned you out”, but he couldn’t see much difference. Sometimes it was unpleasant. He learned to scrub his own hands to get rid of the smell. He cleaned himself out in the shower, sometimes using his shampoo, but got worried about the soap burning and stinging inside of him.

One miserable weekend, he was aching to be filled, but knew he wasn’t empty. It tortured him, because he knew it wouldn’t be the same even if he tried to fuck himself. When it lingered through Saturday, and it seemed like he’d never be clean, he got desperate. He filled a sports bottle with water and laid on his bed with his ass in the air, remembering that first time he got his fingers inside. He got the spout in, and squirted it inside of himself, sighing with relief when he finally sat on the toilet and felt everything release, riding out the stomach cramps that told him he’d soon be ready.

That night he jerked off four times in two hours. He walked around busily between sessions, making snacks, tidying up, all with his hairbrush protruding from his asshole, happily full.

 

School started up, fall of ‘82, and Steve felt a comfort he couldn’t name walking through the halls. He was back to the old routine, but feeling relaxed and peaceful about it. It was almost like it didn’t matter, though of course it did—school mattered very much to him! But the real pursuits were a) finding a girlfriend, and b) finding something even more perfect to go inside of his own ass.

Sophomore year was defined by those two pursuits, and Steve found himself flanked by girls constantly. Tommy’s arm wound perpetually around his new girlfriend, Carol, a mousy girl with lovely auburn hair and a constant sneer to match Tommy’s constant chuckle. Steve liked her, because she was Tommy’s girl, and because she complimented Steve’s clothes, feeding him doses of approval he turned toward like a plant toward the sun.

Unexpectedly, he found himself having a lot of sex with girls. Once he lost his virginity, it just seemed to happen. He didn’t have to look for it, or work hard. He didn’t get anxious and wonder what he was doing, like with school work and tests. He just followed a script that seemed to be pre-loaded into his brain.

There was a thrill and satisfaction to watching the script unfold.

You talk, you smile, you show you’re interested. You know they like you when they look at you in that funny way, like they can’t stand you but can’t stop looking at you and giving you attention. You feel that frisson of electricity that says you’re in. That’s when you ask them out. If they touch you enough, you know you should take them somewhere private. Once you’re somewhere private, you have to push a little. Steve felt bad pushing sometimes, but they liked it when he pushed, touched him more, smiled more. He never had to worry about what to do if they weren’t smiling, because they always were. Eventually he would be inside of them, and it felt good to look at them and know they wanted him; he felt their warmth and approval in his stomach, blooming outward throughout his whole body. It was almost as good as jerking off with something inside of him.

He knew girls could come—from looking in the magazines and comics in Tommy’s attic—and he liked to ask the girls how it worked for them, but many of them didn’t know, and had never done it. Some knew that they could come if he could last long enough, which never seemed to be an issue for him. He loved looking at their faces as they came; they often locked up and gripped him tight, their eyes clamping shut and then flying open wide and watery, and Steve felt like he could see their souls.

He thought in full contented loops about what it was must have been like to be them: full and attended to and overcome with the feeling of being fucked. He desperately coveted those feelings, storing them while they were fresh, to think about later, to turn around and around in his head, to drink deeply from them while fucking himself.

His father started going on more trips that year. He’d never been involved in sales before, but suddenly he was, and that meant conferences and clients in far off places. His mother followed, joking to Steve that she didn’t trust him not to meet some pretty young thing. The joke rang hollow, smelled like TV dinners, an empty garage, and taking out the garbage without someone to hug him and thank him afterward.

Being alone most of the time, he started drinking a lot, and developed a talent for keg stands that made him popular with the boys. Being popular with the boys made him even more popular with the girls. He was attending a lot of parties. He hosted a few, mostly small time kickbacks with the idea that he could invite girls without overwhelming them with a full house.

When he wasn’t busy with a party, or a girl, or school or sports, he was inside of himself.

Coming back to that place of having something inside of him carried a bliss and peace he hadn’t before thought possible.

He planned it into his days, like it was brushing his teeth or eating breakfast. It was essential, to have something filling him, and when he went more than a day without it he got tense and squirrelly and irritable, like he wasn’t able to scratch the world’s deepest itch.

He found bigger and bigger household objects to this end. The handle of various kitchen utensils—the ice cream scoop, the citrus press. Memorably, the neck of a wine bottle, still corked, with a condom unrolled over the top. He was able to squat over that one and felt so decadently complete, bouncing over the object of this intrusion on strong thighs.

With summer came heat, both within and outside him. The memory of himself and Tommy sitting in Tommy’s musty attic pressed against his brain, making him freshly insatiable.

Steve bought a bundle of carrots, ate a salad of them and set one aside, knowing its purpose and feeling hot with anticipation.

He trimmed the carrot, both the greens and the end, feeling like he was fashioning his own personal toy. The bulb end stretched the condom, and Steve had the bizarre thought that he’d like it in his mouth, maybe. He fucked himself with the larger end, clutching it inside of himself and using the tapered end to steer it into that hot, sensitive wall of flesh between his insides and the root of his dick. He thought strangely of Tommy: his flushed, freckled face, his fingers in Steve’s hair as they wrestled on the dusty wood floor of his attic. He remembered the comics, the little dicks in little vaginas, little mouths, little asses. He came into his fist, moaning happily, feeling filled and content.

 

The next school year came upon him lazily, and he found again in the fall of ‘83 a familiar comfort in seeing the halls of Hawkins High.

His past time, his method of jerking off, it occurred to him several times throughout the day. It was close to him, and private, but it didn’t feel like a secret. It felt like a friend he missed.

He never wondered at the way he’d discovered it—Boys Will Be Girls. A Fairy’s Paradise. He was still having sex with girls, sometimes the same girl multiple weeks in a row, though Steve never seemed to be able to hold on to one for much longer than that.

“I just don’t get that feeling like we’re together,” a girl would say, and offer to set him up with someone else, like a consolation prize.

“It feels like we’re friends,” another would say, and Steve didn’t understand it. Shouldn’t you want to be friends? What was a girlfriend but a friend you were having sex with?

“I don’t let it bother me,” he would tell Tommy, when another potential girlfriend would slip through his outstretched hands.

But it did bother him, deeply. Girls were supposed to be like perfect complements, and Steve knew one should fit to him like a cog, so that they could operate together and move through the world and not be alone. He should be able to look at a girl and know they are together and finally feel whole.

He missed girls when he wasn’t talking to one. When he thought of his future, there was always a woman next to him. They had lots of kids, all with different personalities. Sporty kids and kids who were good readers, and kids who loved animals and kids who loved music, all mismatched and together. They were happy, and loved each other, and Steve had a job that didn’t take him away from them all the time. Work wasn’t important for any reason but to support his family, and when he left town they all left together so they could see the country.

So, he never figured himself a queer. He was going to get married one day. The vision changed, but the elements stayed the same.

 

Nancy Wheeler was perfect for the future.

Nancy Wheeler was so, so nice. She was sweet and sharp and pretty, pretty like a doll in her sweet cardigans and skirts and her delicate gold necklace. Steve wanted to cradle her and rock her to sleep.

She didn’t want to be rocked, but Steve liked that too. He loved when she gave him a piece of her mind. She wouldn’t let him tell silly stories or sway her into skipping class. She was his girlfriend, but she wouldn’t call him her boyfriend, not yet.

Having sex with her felt even better than having sex with the other girls. The way she looked at him before, during, and after, like she really loved him, and she wanted him to love her.

Then Nancy’s best friend disappeared from his backyard, and all hell broke loose.

 

Steve would wonder later at the bizarre jumble of events that led to him becoming a bat-wielding, babysitting misfit.

He’d always thought of himself as being nice. He wasn’t the smartest guy, but people liked him alright, he was valuable—because he was nice! He didn’t laugh at people for the wrong reasons. When he picked teams in gym class, he made sure he picked Tommy first, but then he’d pick the guys that weren’t so popular, even if it meant he might lose.

And he never thought of himself as being a wimp. He didn’t keep harmful secrets, or hurt people’s feelings, the way his dad did. He was a good friend.

So when he found himself holding the spray can, when he realized he’d hurt Nancy’s feelings—Nancy, who he cared more about than anyone else in the world! When he felt the thump thump of blood in his face and realized it was his fault, he wondered where he’d lost the plot—when exactly he’d stepped to the wrong side.

He made sure when he stepped into the Byers’ house—he wouldn’t be on the wrong side again.

 

The Upside Down defeated, the kids safe, Will Byers returned—and Steve was still dumped.

The month without Nancy was worse than the night of the Demogorgon.

He spent it jamming multiple tissue-wrapped plastic spoon handles into a condom to see how many he could take. Nothing could make him feel full.

When Nancy finally agreed to talk to him again, he was so happy that he gladly bought a new camera for Jonathan. Dirty pictures of his girlfriend or no, Steve was the one who was on top of the world, finally official with the girl he’d keep by his side—maybe until they died.

The summer of ‘84 was perfect, even though he seemed to have fallen out with most of his friends.

Steve felt more relaxed around the little chuckleheads anyway—they were dorks, but Nancy’s kid brother and his friends had faced the same monsters he had, and seemed more and more grown up in comparison to Steve’s peers, who didn’t have a clue.

He and Nancy were in each other’s arms all the time, laughing and talking, and they were closer friends, really, than he and Tommy had ever been.

They spent long days stretched out at the lake, languorous and flush with heat while the kids played and splashed around them. He made sure he always had extra sandwich meat and snacks so they had a reason to invite him. He managed to spend just about all of his time with Nancy, sneaking into her bedroom most nights to end the day inside her.

Consequently, he’d go days at a time without jerking off.

When he didn’t have it, he started dreaming about it. He needed to feel the thin skin of his asshole stretched around something, needed to feel the fullness and pressure within himself, needed to roll onto something and feel his hole slip sliding around it. He wanted to feel himself being pummeled, rocked back and forth on the intrusion. He wanted to reach back and feel the hair at his rim sticky with oil. He wanted to feel the thrum of his heartbeat in his ass.

When he finally managed to get a moment alone, to get something in his ass, he gasped into his pillow, feeling the sweet relief of his almost-favorite feeling, second only to being loved.

 

The knowledge that he probably wouldn’t get into college wasn’t nearly as bad as the knowledge that Nancy didn’t love him.

Drying out from the booze of the Halloween bash the previous night, he felt like a man on death row, even as he dressed for gym and was picked first for the shirts side of the shirts vs. skins game.

He hadn’t lost Nancy yet, but he’d lost her. She’d slipped through his fingers, just like the others, just like all of the others. She was supposed to be his fit, his perfect fit, and he’d lost her.

Why couldn’t he be normal? What was it about him that kept girls from cottoning on? It was like oil and water, and he was the oil, something about him too dense to mix and flow with the rest.

He was too dried out and post-heartbreak to be of much use on the court.

Then there was Hargrove, constantly in his space.

He couldn’t fit with Nancy, couldn’t make it last even a year.

Nancy just wouldn’t stick, and there was Hargrove on him like glue, hissing in his ear, touching the small of his back, so close to his—

Hargrove would probably fuck him.

The idea flew into his head unbidden. Carrying it, he felt heavy and dull, like he'd been hit with a brick; it tingled behind his eyes like a nosebleed.

How full he’d feel, with a body behind the intrusion. How hot it would make him, when instead of a carrot or a handle, it would be a dick, the temperature of blood.

Hargrove paced around him, looking like something out of Jurassic Park.

He was muscular and compact. Steve had never had a reason to notice his body before. He was defined like none of Steve’s friends were—when did he have the opportunity to grow abs, for fuck’s sake?

Steve didn’t want to fuck Hargrove, but maybe if it were just Hargrove’s body—

Even just a dick—if he could just jerk off with a dick inside of him, it would be so good, better than anything he’d tried.

It wasn’t the time to imagine it. Not the time to get even a little bit hard, although he’d bet Hargrove was sporting something if the way he was licking his lips was any indication.

Then Nancy showed up, and they headed into the alley to break his heart all over again. He became empty in every way that mattered.

 

After everything else happened, it was reasonable enough that Steve didn’t feel any ill will against Nancy.

Dust settled. Kids safe. Hair still great.

He saw Nancy and Jonathan together. After everything they’d been through, he couldn’t be angry. He was confused, even, at how he was happy for them. The sight of them made him feel warm and relaxed, like he’d made sure Nancy ended up happy after all.

He knew they made a spectacle at school: Steve bruised and battered, sitting openly at lunch with his ex-girlfriend and The Other Man. Tommy made him acknowledge it.

“The three of you, huh?” he said, appearing suddenly behind Steve’s locker.

Steve jumped.

“Fuck,” he breathed, clutching his chest. “You can not sneak up on people like that, dude. This town is way too weird for that shit.”

“You freaked about Barb, still?” Tommy asked, and Steve had to load up all the facts in his brain, flick through the information Tommy knew versus everything Steve knew, what he’d experienced.

“It’s still weird,” Steve protested, “do you know how many times I had dinner with her parents?”

“So you soft about her, huh?” Tommy asked, smiling, smacking on a wad of gum, looking bizarrely like his girlfriend Carol. “Did the three of you have something going, like you and the wonder dorks?”

Again, Steve had to really think about what Tommy was implying, and just who the wonder dorks were. The concussion was still working on him, and it was like Tommy was speaking in code, unnecessarily mean.

“Lay off,” Steve said, “we’ve been through a lot.”

“So you are,” Tommy said, “Does Byers swing both ways, then? Some of the front for Nancy and some behind for you?”

Steve clamped his eyes shut. The lights were too bright, his head still buzzed a little bit, and it had been way too long since he jerked off.

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” Steve asked, and walked away, content with the idea that Tommy might actually be wondering.

 

But actually, he would let Jonathan do it. Fuck him, that is.

He’d put a hurting on Steve in every other way.

It hadn’t occurred to him to let a man in, before. He’d been content with fingers and objects for so long. Sometimes he imagined that one day several years down the line, when he was married, his wife might want to do it for him—like in the magazine. Maybe if a girl like the one in the magazine did it to him first, without asking—-maybe he’d just get down on one knee then and there.

But once he considered a man, all bets were off.

He imagined something like his own dick. Warm and turgid, with just enough give to it that it wouldn’t be uncomfortable, no matter how big it was. Steve is used to putting a lot back there. He doesn’t even need to stretch himself out—whatever he’s using goes right in.

He starts imagining a human at the end of whatever he’s using to fuck himself, and comes hard, too hard to ignore the idea now that it’s there.

He’s going to have to fuck a man.

Realistically, it would have to be someone… gay. He didn’t know anything about gay men, though, and hadn’t the first idea of who to ask. The very idea of approaching someone known to be gay was a little scary—Steve pictured a skinny, mustachioed man with bags under his eyes and a windbreaker, someone who smelled like potpurri and B.O.

Hargrove, despite his strange and enduring interest in Steve, wasn’t gay—he was going out with girls all the time. But then, so was Steve. It didn’t matter; he didn’t want to fuck Hargrove.

It could be that someone was gay but hiding it, but then how would Steve find out?

“Hello, I’m Steve Harrington, nice to meet you and will you put your penis in my rear end while I jerk off? I think that would be just swell.”

He started reading the writing in bathroom stalls whenever he was out, usually ferrying his new child-friends. It was bizarre, of course, the fact that he couldn’t seem to allow the kids to go anywhere by themselves. He was terrified that something would happen when he wasn’t there, and jumped at the chance to drive them to the arcade, the lake, whatever. But then, while he was there, he was scanning the bathrooms for leads. The kids would even follow him in, most of the time. Dustin thought it was weird he always went to a stall, always talked about him loving to shit in public.

There was a bit about the overgrown bathrooms in the city park—the ones that didn’t have a front door anymore, because the building was dilapidated, and no one goes to that side of the park anymore.

So, Steve visited in the middle of the day, stepping down into the tile room that was cast in shadow, electricity long defunct. He didn’t have a flashlight, but a lighter showed him what he needed to see: in the wall between stalls, a hole the size of an apple with jagged edges.

He felt genuinely scared—as if something supernatural were going to push him to his knees and shove its ghostly dick down his throat, and then he’d be pregnant with their ghost babies and they’d all go live in the upside-down and he’d have to start drinking blood or something to survive with his new ghost family. He shuddered, pulling the lapels of his jacket closer to himself.

Deciding to nut up, he stepped into a stall, taking a closer look at the writing on the wall. Lewd messages, mostly. Phone numbers, some crossed out.

The hole in the wall stared back at him. He imagined taking his pants down, sweaty with anticipation, and trying to aim his asshole correctly at the dick sticking through. Or maybe he’d be pressing his hairy ass to the cold wall and waiting to take the hard, anonymous cock that could belong to anyone.

Really, anyone. It could be one of his teachers, or a cop, or Mr. Hagan.

Steve wouldn’t be able to use a glory hole, he decided. He took off from the bathrooms a little faster than he would be proud to admit.

 

Meanwhile, it was twice a day that he was shoving an ice cream scoop inside himself—one he bought specifically for his bedroom night stand. The handle was huge and red and rubber. He didn’t even put a condom on it, just took it to the en suite when he was done and rinsed it with hand soap. He had a bottle of vegetable oil under the bed.

He would have been terrified that his mother would find everything, except he hadn’t seen her in his room in months.

Imagining a man on the other end, it became embarrassingly obvious that he’d stopped caring about girls.

Not that he didn’t miss them. He did. He missed Nancy, and waking up next to her, and cooking her food and making her laugh.

He still thought about the future, and he thought about a little house, smaller than the one he lived in, filled with kids. Only it was kind of nebulous, at that point, who would be next to him. Nancy was there, in the daydream, but so was Jonathan, and maybe they’d be having breakfast with Steve and his…. The fantasy stopped short, a foggy little bubble where a person would be. It was hard for him to imagine having sex with someone without caring about them at least a little bit, and if he were looking for a man to have sex with, maybe that would mean looking for a man to be with. The idea became more and more appealing to him, like how Elton John or Freddie Mercury only like men—they must have people they date, he figured, not just for sex. He didn’t know if that meant that the person in his dream of the future would be a man, or if it could still be a woman, like if something changed and his interest in men just went away.

Sometimes when he’d come, he’d be lying there sated, feeling his heart rate return to normal, he would hug his pillow close and think—if only it were warm like a body. He would imagine someone in his arms, or maybe he could be in theirs.

When he started imagining a man, he allowed himself to think of himself cradled in arms like his own. It felt good.

“I love you,” he said out loud, muffled and quiet into his pillow, imagining someone saying it to him, and saying it back.

 

After inspecting what felt like every public restroom in Hawkins, the answer was embarrassingly close to home.

The Freak sucks dick was scrawled in the handicapped stall of the English hall bathroom.

Steve stared at it. There was only one The Freak, as far as Steve knew. The dealer. Steve had never talked to him, had only ever seen him in the halls, and class sometimes—his seat stayed mostly empty, but he showed up once in a while.

Steve wondered if it was true.

Eddie Munson wasn’t bad looking. Steve hadn’t thought about him much, not in a long time, so he took a minute to imagine him.

Eddie was poor. He lived on the south side of town, probably near the Byers’ place. Steve’s family didn’t know his family, which said a lot about who they were and how they lived. It was perfectly plausible that people were just making fun of him because he was an easy target, and that he wasn’t gay at all.

He couldn’t really remember what Eddie’s face looked like, except that he had really big eyes that felt like they were always staring. It made him look a little crazy, but he probably liked that, Steve figured.

He was lanky under his clothes, rangy and lean, and around Steve’s height, probably.

Steve stared at the writing on the stall. He had no way of knowing if it was true.

The late bell rang for the next class and he quickly snapped out his little dick-centered reverie, gathered his things, and left.

 

Then, in the locker room, someone complained about The Freak. “That faggot,” they called him.

 

The idea hung around, and whenever Steve saw Eddie in the hall, or at lunch, or in class, he felt his heart rate escalate.

Once he started looking, he couldn’t stop.

Eddie didn’t come to school often, maybe twice a week. When he showed, it was a little like winning a prize, and Steve’s mouth watered, looking at him. Eddie had broad shoulders, narrow hips, those same big eyes Steve remembered, and wild, long hair that was always down. He looked wild on purpose, of course. Steve wondered where he got his clothes—he must go to a lot of concerts, Steve reasoned, because of all the tour shirts.

Eddie became something to look forward to, a little bright spot in the days that seemed dark and lonely.

Whatever his reputation, and his appearance, Eddie didn’t seem angry, or mean. With every interaction Steve observed, his fixation became worse, because Eddie smiled most of the time, actually, and seemed to have a lot of friends. Well, he yelled a lot, but it was never at anyone in particular—sometimes it was rhyming words that Steve figured were song lyrics. Sometimes he seemed to say lines directly from Shakespeare, or at least something old-timey—Steve didn’t know Shakespeare exactly, if it wasn’t like, Romeo and Juliet, and only certain lines.

Eddie and his friends did like to make spectacles of themselves, and it did grate at Steve’s sensibilities. He reasoned, though, that it was their version of sports. Make sure everyone knows your name, except instead of football, it was giving each other piggyback rides through the halls screaming “Charge!” or hissing like a cat at passerby.

But they were all smart. Steve recognized the mathletes. He recognized the people who always raised their hands in English. Steve loved it when people were smart, when they read a lot. Sometimes when they were dating, Nancy would have her head in a book, and he’d sit and look at her, thinking about all the things she knew that he didn’t.

Steve could tell just by the way he said henceforth that Eddie was smart. He was the type of guy to read in bed, and to predict the end of the movie before it came. Steve wanted to take him on a picnic and watch him read poetry or something. Mostly, he just wanted to look at him, and to know what he looked like under his clothes.

The more he saw, the more he admired.

If it were a girl, Steve would say he’d developed a bit of a crush.

He watched Eddie. Steve managed the basketball team. Everyone was real nice about the fact that it was usually a girl’s job. Steve sat on the bench with his clipboard and tried not to look back too often. Eddie was in the marching band. He tapped the little snare drum, though Steve knew from spying that Eddie played guitar. He didn’t wear a hat, like the rest of the marching band. During games, Steve would look toward where he sat in the back row. Did Eddie look at him too?

He imagined talking to Eddie. He wanted a reason to approach. He thought about what he looked like under his clothes. He thought a lot about what he looked like under his clothes, imagined what kind of dick he had, imagined himself on his knees for Eddie, backing onto his dick while Eddie watched it go in and out.

Something new for Steve, he even imagined sucking on it. Maybe Eddie would want to do oral first. With girls, he always did oral first. It seemed polite, and they were always surprised. Even when they pushed him off and told him not to, because it was gross, or they didn’t like it, they seemed to like that he offered.

If Eddie wanted to do oral first—Steve found himself drooling over it. He’d never thought about it before, but sucking dick became one of his daydreams, fast. He almost never daydreamed about going down on a girl, unless he was planning his moves, but with Eddie—he just really wanted Eddie, wanted everything to do with his body, his dick. He wanted to hear Eddie’s nasal, gravelly voice in his ear while he came. He wanted to make Eddie come.

He memorized Eddie’s classes. They shared two, then Eddie went elsewhere, always in the same direction. He knew where Eddie sat in the cafeteria. He’d heard about where Eddie went after school.

One place Eddie never went was the locker room, or gym class altogether. That was one point in favor of the rumors being true—if Eddie were gay, he wouldn’t want to be caught looking, Steve reasoned.

Or, he just didn’t like gym.

Maybe Steve would never know.

“Why don’t you just take a picture, Harrington?”

Steve blinked. Eddie stood in front of him suddenly, hands on his hips, casting his blue flannel shirt to his sides. His black band shirt sat on the waistband of his jeans. Steve felt his eyes hover at Eddie’s hips.

“Hello?! Earth—to—jock?” Eddie downright broadcasted—several people turned to look before getting back to their business. Eddie waved his hands in Steve’s face, and Steve blinked a little. Seeing Eddie’s eyes on him was surreal, like being in a dream. Eddie had never looked at him before, and now they were eye to eye.

Steve swallowed, not knowing how long he’d been silent.

“I’m actually off the team,” Steve said, closing his locker.

“What?” Eddie spat.

“Concussion,” Steve clarified. “No more basketball for me.”

Eddie paused, then said with a shrug, “Once a jock, always a jock.”

“Tell that to my dad,” Steve snorted, “He was a three season athlete, and now he can’t run a mile to save his life.”

“I don’t run unless it’s away from something,” Eddie dismissed, shaking his head, “Speaking of which, you got a fuckin’ problem, Harrington?”

“What?” Steve asked, as Eddie chewed his lip, arms crossed defensively around himself. “No, no problem.”

“You sure? Cause if you’re planning something I’d rather hash it out right here—”

“You still hang around the clearing?” Steve asked, interrupting.

“What?”

“The one south of the football field,” Steve clarified. Do you still… hang out there? For.. stuff?”

Eddie looked at him, then nodded slow. “I uh, I don’t have much on me right now.”

Steve waved a hand, shaking his head, “That’s fine. You gonna be around after school?”

“Can be,” Eddie said, “I have play practice, but I can be late.”

Steve nodded. “See you then,” he said, turning toward his next class.

 

He didn’t know what he was going to say. He never had to plan this stuff with girls, just went on the feeling of the moment.

He figured he might do that with Eddie, but if it didn’t work—he’ll have blown it.

Once he knew he liked Eddie, the stakes were so high.

There was so much Steve didn’t know.

Like, he was in drama, apparently? He said he was going to play practice. And Steve wasn’t weirded out like he would’ve been if Eddie were a girl. It seemed like a good way to channel Eddie’s energy, his weird wildness.

He wondered if Nancy and Jonathan would go to the play with him. He didn’t even know what the play would be, but he would see it, and he’d have eyes on Eddie the whole time.

He liked Eddie.

Maybe it was the way he knew that no one could know about them, if there was a them. Maybe it was the fact he didn’t really care about appearances as much anymore. He still cared, but only as far as it pertained to being bothered by people like Hagan and Hargrove. He didn’t want anyone to say anything to him, though he could handle himself.

Most of the time he just wanted to be invisible, except for to Eddie—and Nancy, Jonathan, the kids, maybe a few more. After everything, he didn’t want to talk with anyone else.

 

In the bathroom after school, he did his hair a little bit. If anything was on his side, it was his looks. He didn’t have acne, he wasn’t short or ugly, and his hair was great.

If there was anything Eddie had against him—whatever, he told himself, can’t think about that right now.

 

Steve sat at the picnic table in the clearing for ten minutes before Eddie showed up, coming from a different direction than Steve expected.

“Hey,” Steve said in greeting, doing a lame little wave before putting his hand back in his pocket. It was cold.

“You’re on my side,” Eddie said, and Steve nervously shifted to make room.

Eddie snorted, “I’m fucking with you. Anywhere’s fine.”

He plunked his lunchbox on the picnic table and opened it. He straddled the bench as he began flicking little baggies around.

“Okay, so I can give you a gram, maybe two, but I’ll have to charge you a premium because I’m almost out and—”

“That uh,” Steve began, and when Eddie looked up, “that’s not why I’m here.”

Eddie sighed, seemed to sag in his seat, “Oh. So, I won’t be charging you a premium. Just as well. I promised someone the lot of it, but was going to make an exception, y’know, because of your—”

He swirled a hand in front of his face, gesturing to himself. Steve knew he was still blue and yellow, still had a pink line where his lip split, even a month out from the fight.

Steve stayed quiet, frowned a little.

“Hargrove really got you good,” Eddie concluded, his constantly-twitching face coming to a halt. Steve got a good look at his dark eyes, almost black, and so close.

Steve swallowed.

“Do you like guys?” he asked. Eddie reared back. His chin retreated backward, toward his throat. Steve wanted to lick it.

“What?” Eddie asked, sneering.

Steve swallowed again, closed his eyes, told himself: It’s fine. Either way, Eddie was bound to be defensive.

“What is this?” Eddie asked, looking around and behind Steve, as if for some accomplice, like Steve planned to jump him in the woods.

Steve began, “I—”

“Did someone put you up to this?” Eddie asked. He closed his lunch box, slung his bag onto his shoulder as he stood.

Steve shook his head.

“I’m sorry man,” Steve said, wiping his suddenly sweaty palms on his thighs. “I’m not trying to mess with you.”

“What?” Eddie asked, “Who is trying to mess with me?”

“No, I mean—” Steve sighed, closing his eyes. “It’s not—I’m really not sure how to say what I wanna say, and I don’t even know if you like guys, or if that’s just a mean joke—”

“Do you like guys?” Eddie asked.

Steve looked at him, not sure what to say.

Eddie gaped. He said, “You’re fucking with me.”

Steve looked at him.

Eddie said, “You’re not serious.”

Steve looked at him.

Eddie said, “Why would you be telling me, Harrington? What if I went and told everyone?”

“I’m not sure,” he shrugged, “I’d turn it around on you, maybe? If I were worried. Not that I would. Turn it around on you.”

“They’d believe you. The Freak Sucks Dick, after all,” Eddie said, nodding. He turned to Steve, suddenly. “Wait. Is that why Hargrove—”

Steve snorted, and it made his nose hurt, just a little. He touched it, hoping the tender feeling of a purposeful touch would calm the soreness. It did not.

“I wish,” Steve said, “That would be easier to explain.”

Eddie winced, and his eyes stayed narrow, like he was trying to suss out something about Steve.

“Hargrove doesn’t know?” he asked.

“About me? No one knows,” Steve said. He asked, “So, do you?”

“Like guys?” Eddie asked, grinning, “Or suck dick?”

Steve smiled, and it might’ve been the first time he’d smiled all day. Eddie is handsome and charismatic. Steve feels himself blush.

Steve hadn’t expected to talk to Eddie. He thought he’d get an answer out of him, and if he were amenable, Steve figured he’d cut to the chase.

He didn’t.

Eddie knew about what was written in the bathroom. It hadn’t got him any trade, he said, but he left it up, figuring that they’d just write something else if he crossed it off.

“Besides,” he said, “People are afraid of queers.”

Steve thought back to what his dad would say, about watching out for Men Like That. It was true, he supposed. Even Steve was a little afraid, before. He remembered what he thought a gay person would be like—he didn’t even know where it had come from, this impression he had.

“You want people to be afraid of you?” Steve asked, curious.

“It’s better than having to be afraid of them,” Eddie said with a shrug.

“You were afraid of them?” Steve asked.

“Just full of questions, aren’t we?” Eddie asked, eyes sparkling, placing a palm under his chin with some sense of irony.

“I don’t know you very well,” Steve shrugged.

“And you wanna know me, Harrington?” Eddie asked. “What could you possibly want that for? With your women and your riches and your big fancy beamer in yon parking lot? What is it that you could want?”

Steve shrugged, and the answer came to him quickly, something even he didn’t expect:

“A friend.”

 

Eddie had to get back to the drama club, eventually. Only, Steve hadn’t come this far and been so brave just to allow him to get away without a follow up. They planned to hang out at Steve’s, later in the week. No parents, no problems.

“How do I know this isn’t an ambush?” Eddie asked, and Steve could tell that it was partly sincere. Eddie was partly afraid. “You’re not gonna beat me with a pillowcase full of bricks as soon as I show up?”

Steve shrugged and said, “I guess I’m asking you to trust me.”

“Ooo,” Eddie said, “Spooky.”

Then he backed out of the clearing, waving his fingers all separately like a cartoon villain.

 

Afterward, Steve found himself wondering what happened. He’d meant to ask Eddie to fuck him, and instead he had a playdate.

And what was he supposed to do? Put on a record? Mix a fruit salad? Put out some crudités? Hey, you wanna know where this carrot’s been?

He settled on beer and tortilla chips. Hospitable, but low key.

It felt like a date, but not. He didn’t make himself particularly neat, put no extra effort into his outfit, thinking Eddie would be confused if he changed just for this.

Eddie arrived.

He looked good. Knowing himself, Steve recalled that he falls fast. Knowing himself didn’t make it any easier to look at Eddie, whose jeans hung low around his hips, whose white shirt clung to him as he moved.

Instead of waiting to be shown around, Eddie took Steve’s proffered beer and started leisurely exploring the place, like a housecat, trailing from room to room.

“I hope you don’t mind my curiosity,” Eddie drawls, “these places fascinante me.”

“Houses?”

“Lifestyles of the rich and famous,” Eddie says, gesturing. His voice low and rumbling, Steve tried not to notice. “Matching towels to the wallpaper? And the soap dish? Mrs. Harrington, you’re a class act.”

“You’re serious?” Steve asked, “it’s just a bathroom.”

“Just a bathroom, he says, the Phillistine, the rube. One learns so much of the inhabitants, just with a flick of the wrist—”

Eddie opened the medicine cabinet, revealing… nothing. There was some dust, and a toothpick.

“Shit,” Eddie says, “I didn’t expect to be depressed.”

“Depressed?” Steve asked. “No one really uses this bathroom.”

“What?” Eddie asked. “How many bathrooms do you have?”

Steve blinked, counting. “Five?”

“Five?” Eddie asked, “You have five toilets?”

Steve shrugged, “It's a big house.”

“How many people live here?” Eddie asked, incredulous.

“Three,” Steve answered, “but my parents are never here.”

“A surplus?” Eddie snapped, “you have a surplus of toilets?”

Steve shrugged again, smiling.

“Do you know what I’d give? Not to share a toilet?”

“You can bring one home with you,” Steve said, feeling light, happy, “they wouldn’t notice. At least, not at first.”

“Okay,” Eddie said, “this is my toilet. No one uses this, lest they be subject to the pit.”

It went on, the two of them talking easily. Steve was nervous, sweating at his palms and under his arms.

Luckily, Eddie spoke and moved constantly, wrapping Steve in his electric atmosphere.

Steve found himself inching further into Eddie’s space—not too close, just to try to catch a bit of how he smelled: soap and deodorant and human.

He felt himself getting a little hard, just from the effect of Eddie’s presence. His smell, the visual imprint of his shoulders, his hands—the rest of the world was muffled, like there was cotton in his ears. If he weren’t so nervous, he’d be at full mast, walking around with tented shorts.

Steve was never like this with girls.

He shook himself with a shiver as he followed Eddie up the stairs, watching Eddie’s hips move, the swirl of his hair around his shoulders, his strong chin as he continued talking to Steve.

“So, Steve Harrington wants a friend,” Eddie said, hands on his hips as he reached the landing. “The usual crowd not working for you anymore, King Steve? The simpering of the golden children falling on jaded ears?”

“No one’s called me that in a long time,” Steve said with a conciliatory smile. He was looking down, arms crossed over his chest. “Haven’t done a keg stand since junior year.”

“Not into parties anymore?” Eddie asked.

“Not really.”

“Don’t be shy, King Steve,” Eddie said, and it felt like a tease. Flipping on the light in the guest bedroom, he visibly shuddered, explaining, “Bedrooms no one sleeps in. Gives me the willies.”

“Henderson slept there last week,” Steve shrugged.

“Who?”

“You wouldn’t know him.”

“You had your man sleep in the guest room?” Eddie asked, hand to chest in mock indignation. “You’d think—“

“Gross, dude,” Steve laughed, “Henderson’s a kid. Well, he’s like 13. Long story.”

“A kid,” Eddie clucked. “Didn’t take you for the nurturing type, Harrington.”

“I very much am, turns out,” Steve said, “Even Mike and Lucas call me mom, sometimes.”

Eddie was unreadable, but he was looking at Steve like he was speaking another language.

“It’s like that?” Eddie asked.

Steve shrugged. “I kind of like it.”

“No way,” Eddie said, shaking his head. “No way is this real. Steve Harrington, into dudes, and total mother hen.”

Steve led Eddie, still gaping, to the next room.

“They’re the only people I like anymore,” Steve said, then shook his head. “That sounded mean.”

He sat on his parents’ bed, watched as Eddie crept around, picking up knick knacks, flipping through clothes on hangers. Steve breathed in, the particular scent of his mother’s things calming him, a bit.

“I mean—I like people. I don’t hate them,” Steve said.

“You don’t have to explain to me, Harrington,” Eddie said, reassuring, “Mother Theresa I am not.”

“I want people to be alright. I just…” Steve paused. “I’m getting tired of the whole competition. Why does anyone have to be better than anyone else?”

Eddie looked at him for a second, then sniffed and turned back to the clothes.

“Well, you’re one of the good guys, then,” Eddie said, “Which, to be entirely transparent, seems impossible. Rich parents, popular, chicks dig him, and he’s not a douche?”

Eddie twirled from in front of the closet, looking at Steve intently.

“Goes against everything I’ve ever known, gotta say.”

“Well, I hope it’s true,” Steve said, leading him out of the room and back to the hall.

“I didn’t get pummeled by the basketball team as soon as I opened the door, so you’re doing alright so far,” Eddie said, which is what led them both to this moment.

They’ve come to the door of Steve’s room.

Steve really tries, wills himself to stop sweating. His nerves are alight, his heart on a slow roasting spit. No one else has been in his room for so long—just Steve and his scoop.

“The royal chambers,” Eddie intones, pushing the door open with his fingertips. “The palace of plaid. The patterned fortress.”

“Laugh it up, Munson,” Steve grumbles. Eddie is picking up a an autographed baseball and tossing it before setting it down. He’s sweeping the coverlet with his fingertips spread wide.

“You have to forgive me, Harrington,” Eddie says. “This is surreal to me, in a lot of ways.”

“What do you mean?” Steve asks. He’s flushed with the nerves of having Eddie close, as if some untamed part of him will kiss Eddie without permission.

“You’re not exactly normal, Steve,” Eddie says.

“Of course I am,” Steve insists, brow furrowed.

“Nope,” Eddie says, “you have a secret. What else could you be hiding?”

“Why would I hide?” Steve asks, feeling newly self conscious.

He doesn’t get much time to adjust to the feeling. Suddenly, Eddie tugs the drawer of his night stand.

Steve feels the blood drain from his face. He’s pale and limp, an over cooked noodle in a polo shirt.

“Perception check,” Eddie mutters.

“What?” Steve asks. He’s thinking if he blinks hard enough, he’ll wake up.

“Is this what I think it is?” Eddie asks.

Steve’s heart is in his throat. He swallows.

Eddie’s eyes cut through him, like a knife to his gut.

“Why do you have an ice cream scoop in your side table?” Eddie asks, fingertips delving into the drawer.

Steve jolts.

“You might not want to… touch that.”

Eddie’s head tilts, a silent question.

“I, uh… I jerk off. With that,” Steve says. His ears might be on fire.

“You—with an ice cream scoop?”

Steve swallows.

“With—with the other end.”

Eddie looks at him, then through him, for a moment. Then, he jumps.

Thankfully, he hasn’t picked it up.

“The other end?” he asks. “Like—”

He’s looking into the drawer.

Steve walks toward him, as calm and confident as a jack rabbit. He looks down, into the drawer, where the scoop rests, dull and innocent-looking.

Steve looks up at Eddie. Eddie looks at him.

A jolt courses through him, cold lightning shaking his hammering heart.

“I put it in… me,” Steve says. “I’ve just… I’ve always wanted something… there.”

Eddie swallows. Steve watches his adam’s apple, a lump bobbing under the tender skin of his long, pale neck. He hasn’t shaved today. Steve wants to bite his neck, imagines he can taste the salt.

“Where do you want it?” Eddie asks.

“In… my hole,” Steve says. “I want it in my hole.”

Chapter 2: The Girl With the Most Cake

Notes:

Decided to stretch this out a little (haha) so I could publish more often. Enjoy.

“Can I watch?”

It’s out of Eddie’s mouth like a shot. He’s staring fearlessly and wide eyed at Steve. He gnaws his bottom lip.

Steve feels his mouth fall open.

“I won’t touch,” Eddie says, reassuring him with a quickness.

Steve blinks at him. The blood has started to flow south. Even the idea of being full again and his body has started to flush.

“Yeah,” he says, and “you can touch.”

“Oh,” Eddie says, and his eyes grow larger, darker, opening up like Steve’s—

Steve ducks toward his closet, where he keeps his bottle of vegetable oil.

He’d just jerked off before Eddie came over. He needed the fullness to center himself, calm his nerves. It won’t be a problem to go again, though. Even just the feeling of having something in him would be nice enough.

And with Eddie there. Oh, yes.

He sets his bottle of oil on his dresser and reaches for the hem of his shirt.

It used to be that he only took off his pants to do this, leaving on his shirt. He learned the hard way that oil stains don’t come out.

When he takes his shirt off, Eddie is watching him.

When he notices Steve looking, he turns away a bit before shaking his head, seeming to realize how ridiculous it is—why look away? He resumes his watch, arms crossed, lips in a flat line.

Steve reaches for his belt, undoing the buckle while staring at Eddie.

He’s never done this in front of someone else. The closest he’d come was talking to his mom through the door, telling her he wasn’t decent after his shower when in reality he’d put a condom on his toothpaste and managed to fit most of it inside, before cutting the inside of his ass cheek with the sharp corner of the tube. The cool give of the plastic was still enough to fill him with a pleased placidity as he bid his mother goodbye for the weekend.

Eddie’s face is pink, setting off the contrast of his freckles. Steve wants to feel the warmth of the flush traveling down his neck, under his shirt. He wonders if Eddie’s armpits are going damp.

Eddie’s breathing has gone funny. Steve realizes with surprise that he’s nervous.

He’s made Eddie nervous. He’s never seen Eddie nervous, and he’s been watching Eddie for a long time.

Steve shucks his pants. The weight of the belt pulls them down with a metal clink.

He’s hard under his briefs.

Steve has never been shy about his body. He’s never had a reason to feel concern. He was a normal little boy, and now he’s a normal young man. He’s standing, naked, before another normal young man—a beautiful young man— one he’s desperate for.

Eddie stares at him greedily. He’s wide eyed and he scans over Steve slowly: up and down, then again, then side to side.

Steve’s arms hang at his sides. It’s not cold. He looks down at his body, wondering at what Eddie could be seeing. The two gentle peaks of his nipples, framed with straight dark hair, stand at his forefront, his belly just beyond. Then, his dick, pressing against solid blue briefs.

Steve touches his right nipple. He hears Eddie make a sound with his mouth, a kind of disbelieving puh.

He watches his own nipple as it pebbles beneath his touch with a sort of detached fascination.

He’s never been on the side of the equation, before. He’s never been looked at like this.

His body has always been a tool, something to use, its appearance only relevant in that it wasn’t off-putting to the girls he wanted.

But Eddie likes it. From the sound, he really likes it.

Steve’s never wanted someone like he wants Eddie.

“Holy shit,” Eddie says. “I, uh.”

Steve looks at Eddie. Eddie swallows. Steve hears the click.

“I usually lay on the bed,” Steve says. He crouches in front of the chest of drawers, pulls the bottom drawer, where he keeps his stained towels. The one he pulls is clean and pink, softened and fraying at the edges with age. There’s a few bleach stains in the corner.

Steve approaches the bed from the side, and Eddie jumps out of the way to give him space.

He smoothes out the pink towel over his plaid bedspread and swings a leg up, then another. lowering himself to the towel with his ass in the air.

Once his chest kisses the softness of the towel he reaches under himself to find the waistband of his briefs, starts to pull them down.

“Oh, holy shit,” Eddie says again.

“Can you get my bottle?” Steve asks.

“What?” Eddie asks from above.

“The oil,” Steve says, looking toward the chest of drawers, “I forgot.”

“Okay, yeah,” Eddie says.

Steve is bizarrely excited. He’s never shown anyone this before, and he’s so good at it. He can fit so much.

Eddie moves to hand him the oil bottle, then hastily sets it, plunk, on the bedside table.

Steve had paused in taking down his briefs, and now starts again, closing his eyes with divine pleasure at Eddie’s little intake of breath.

His hole is still sticky from before Eddie got here. He feels the slip of residual oil between his ass cheeks as he pulls his briefs to his knees, and then off of his feet. His dick is hard against the towel.

The familiar buzz of the terry cloth is comforting.

Steve hears from above, “Oh.”

Steve grabs the bottle of vegetable oil. It’s a little tacky. He’s not always careful.

He pours just a little on his fingers before replacing the bottle.

He’s done all of this a million times—a million times that feel like dress rehearsals for this time, with Eddie watching.

Steve reaches back, swiping between his cheeks, prodding a bit with one fingertip.

Turning his head toward Eddie, he’s eye level with crotch. The tell-tale bulge of his dark jeans fills Steve with a sort of iridescent, slick satisfaction. He wants to mouth Eddie’s zipper.

Steve slips the oil between his fingers as he swirls one fingertip around his hole, pressing the thin skin into a circle. This part is good; it’s like settling into his seat before a favorite meal. It’s not a tease; it’s a promise.

Eddie moves, and Steve realizes he’s stepped to the side and back, just to have a better angle on the sight.

Steve arches his back, pressing his hole toward the ceiling.

“Fuck,” Eddie says, sounding like he didn’t even mean to say it. Steve wonders if that’s what he’ll sound like when Eddie is inside him—when they’re fucking.

Because they have to fuck after this, right?

A finger slips past the shiny plump skin of his rim. It’s inside of him. He loves this feeling, the dual sensation on his hand and his hole. He can feel himself being touched from the inside, and feel himself touching his insides.

Another finger slips in, more difficult than the first because of the angle.

He pushes his head into the pillow and sighs with relief.

He thinks of Eddie.

What do you see?

“What do you see?” he asks.

Eddie is silent for a beat.

“What?” he asks.

“What do you see?” Steve asks.

“Uh, fucking—God,” Eddie says. Steve can imagine him shaking off his trance, like a dog shakes off the rain.

“You can call me Steve,” Steve says, wanting to laugh. He pushes into himself again with his fingers, arches into the touch.

“Did you just—did you just make a joke?” Eddie asks, “Steve—”

Eddie huffs a laugh. Steve smiles, warm with pride. He’s so comfortable here, finally showing Eddie his favorite thing.

“I see your hand—fuck, Steve,” he swallows, “I don’t usually want for speech—”

“Hmm?” Steve asks. His eyes start to slip closed. It feels so good, just to pause with fingers inside of him. He almost forgets about the scoop.

“The blood isn’t exactly in the brain right now, Steve,” Eddie says.

Steve hums. He allows himself to clench around his hand, just a bit.

“You look—” Eddie says, “You don’t want me to say how you look.”

“I do,” Steve says. There’s a whine, hiding behind it.

“You look—”

Steve feels Eddie sit on the bed, just at the edge. He must be looking directly at Steve’s hole, where Steve’s hand is drawing in and out.

“Divine,” Eddie says.

Steve presses his hand down, into the wall of flesh between his asshole and his dick. He massages as best as he can, but it’s not enough, the angle isn’t right.

“My scoop,” he says, “Can you hand it to me?”

“Uh, yeah,” Eddie reaches for Steve’s bedside table. Steve is closer, but Eddie is cute when scrambles.

Steve unthinkingly draws his slippery right hand out of his hole, which clenches around nothing. He accepts the scoop from Eddie with tenderness.

His presses his face into his pillow and uses both hands to point the scoop, handle first, toward his hole.

Getting it in has always been more difficult than he would like; it doesn’t taper to a gentle, rounded tip, instead blunt and circular. Steve presses one crescent of its circumference into his hole until he feels himself give, then eases the rest in.

Eddie sits back on the bed.

Steve gasps a little, when the bottom is firmly inside. It’s not cold, but it’s not warm. It’s hard and plastic and suddenly not enough, not when Eddie is sitting beside him, living and breathing and filled with warm blood.

“Eddie,” Steve says. He eases the rest of the handle inside.

“Fuck,” Eddie says, and Steve feels a warm hand on the back of his thigh.

“Yes,” Steve says.

“Is this okay?” Eddie asks, and Steve feels the shake of the bed, hears the sound of Eddie’s jeans coming undone.

“Please,” Steve says, “Will you—will you use your hands?”

Steve’s hands drop from the scoop and it protrudes from him, standing in the air, already starting to slip out from the pressure of his hole.

Eddie catches it.

“Yeah,” he says, rough and ragged and barely there. He turns on the bed, toward Steve, and his left hand is around the scoop, the other so gentle and so warm on Steve’s hip.

It’s so different. It’s being held in, but not by Steve. Steve feels his hole grip around it and relax. The uncertainty is riveting. When will he push?

“I don’t—” Eddie says, “I don’t want to hurt you.”

He holds the scoop exactly where it is, so still, so weak compared to what it could be—

“Eddie,” Steve says, beginning to push back onto the scoop. Eddie falters for a second, then holds firm. Steve bobs up and down while Eddie holds the scoop, desperately seeking the sense of fullness he knows is just within reach.

“Holy hell,” Eddie says, weak with wonder.

Steve did that.

Eddie is definitely watching him. Steve fucks himself on the scoop and the knowledge that Eddie is watching it slip into him—is watching his hole suck around the handle—burns through him, unquenchable like greasefire.

He’s touching himself, but he can barely feel the pass of his hand over his dick. His hole feels pink and plump, like it’s preening toward Eddie’s attention. Every ragged nerve is reaching for Eddie’s hands.

It can’t get any better.

Then Steve rocks back, and he’s rocking back onto Eddie’s hand, the one holding the scoop.

Steve wants to scream, wants it to erupt out of him like a volcano of joy. Eddie is touching him, with both hands. His other hand is still on Steve’s flank, still and clammy.

“More,” he says, rocking even further back into the scoop, feeling Eddie’s elbow buckle under the pressure.

With a note of wonder, Eddie says, “That’s all I’ve got, baby.”

Steve releases a sob.

Baby. It ricochets off of the walls of Steve’s skull, hitting every neuron and lighting it up like a pinball machine.

Baby. It washes over him like a bath, fragrant and familiar.

Baby.

With a gasp, Steve comes over his hand. Semen shoots onto the towel in jets, and spills over Steve’s fingers in rushing streams. His hole clenches desperately around the handle of his scoop. He comes for ages, comes for Eddie.

He wants to see Eddie.

Steve turns his head at just the right time, looking back over his shoulder.

One hand still on the scoop, Eddie’s desperately clawing at his boxers, blue and white checks. His dick comes out, not even all the way, and he’s working fast over the head for maybe five seconds before he’s coming, too.

Eddie’s hips come off of the bed. His whole body jerks around where he’s holding his dick. He’s silent as his mouth gasps around something. The scoop falls out of Steve’s ass, and Eddie lets go.

Steve blinks, watching the glossy white of Eddie’s come.

He’d never thought about Eddie’s come.

Steve watches his face, the way his mouth hangs open, and then Eddie’s neck swivels.

He looks at Steve. Steve looks at him.

Steve thinks he’s in love, a little bit.

Eddie’s still coming. His dick pulses a little bit, the hole of it winking and gaping.

Something is different about Eddie’s dick, and for a second Steve thinks it’s just the color, before he registers that Eddie’s hands must be small. His hand doesn’t close fully around his dick.

But his hands aren’t small. They’re normal. Eddie’s dick, even just the part Steve can see, is bigger than any dick he’s ever seen.

At the realization, Steve says, “Oh my God.”

He looks at Eddie’s dick, feeling waves of emotion he can’t name as Eddie gingerly tucks himself back in.

“Uh, yeah,” Eddie says, breath heavy. “You really know how to entertain a girl, Harrington.”

“Steve,” Steve says.

“That’s, uh, that’s some party trick, Steve.”

“Do you want to have sex, sometime?” Steve asks.

“What,” Eddie says.

“Not now,” Steve reassures him, shifting to lie on his side, letting his naked, slippery ass rest on the old pink towel. He holds his sticky hand in the air as he lounges. “I’m okay for right now.”

“In the sands of time, then?” Eddie asks.

Steve smiles. Eddie is so smart.

Steve says, face relaxed and drooping, “yeah.”

 

Steve suggests that Eddie wipe his hands on Steve’s towel, and shuck his pants, lie back. Happily, Eddie does. It’s easy to make these suggestions and Steve looks on in satisfaction, knowing he orchestrated this: the comfort of the boy he likes.

“So, an ice cream scoop,” Eddie says, and Steve never understood what it was like for eyes to twinkle before now.

Steve nods, happy to lie back and observe, not needing to speak. He’s comfortable in the afternoon light of the room, losing focus as he stares at parts of Eddie, the wall, and back again.

“That’s comfortable?” Eddie asks. “I mean, it’s not cold?”

Steve shrugs, “Sometimes.”

“What if you need to scoop some ice cream?”

“There’s another one downstairs,” Steve says, shrugging with a lazy smile, “Mine stays up here.”

“She’s loyal,” Eddie says, nodding.

“My most loyal lady friend,” Steve says, blinking slow.

“Ah,” Eddie says, “Is that heart’s sorrow I’ve ascertained? Have you been unlucky in love, Steve?”

Steve lets himself think. Eddie doesn’t rush him. He lies there, looking at Steve in the eye, occasionally roaming over his still naked body.

“I’ve had some luck,” Steve says honestly, sighs. “A lot of good times. I just can’t get 'em to stick.”

Eddie snorts. “Could it be the homosexuality, perchance?”

Steve feels his nose scrunching, brow furrowing. What’s that got to do with anything?

“You’re serious, though?” Steve turns toward Eddie, suddenly vulnerable. “You’ll…”

He gestures with a nod to Eddie’s crotch.

Eddie huffs a laugh.

“You want me to?” he asks, turning toward Steve.

Steve nods. This is the strangest way he’s gone about courting a potential romance. It sits strangely in his belly, the fact that he’s requesting sex but asking for so much more, just hoping it comes across in the vulnerability of his naked body.

“Have you done it?” Steve asks. He’s thinking about Eddie’s dick again, huge and thick and oblong, the way his come wept out of it.

“I—“ Eddie coughs a little bit. “You perhaps noticed its.. stature?”

Steve nods, scooting close.

Eddie looks at the ceiling. He presses his jaw into his shoulders, seems like there’s a laugh hiding in his throat.

“Some have attempted,” Eddie says, quietly, “None has managed.”

Steve swallows. He wants to see it again. He has to stop himself from reaching for it.

He breathes, looking up and down Eddie’s still-clothed body. Eddie’s breathing too. The slow expansion of his rib cage is making Steve feel a million tiny feelings, sparks that light him up from the inside.

Steve reaches for Eddie’s chest. The shirt looks so soft, rippling in that way only worn shirts do— with a tear near the neck, probably from being bleached to death.

His torso jumps a little when Steve touches him, but then he relaxes into the bed, allowing his eyes to close when Steve pets him, back and forth, back and forth.

“You’ve got me half convinced this is some kind of dream, Harrington,” he says.

“Steve,” Steve corrects.

“Steve,” Eddie confirms, then coughs, seems to frown at the ceiling, says, “I have to pick up my check.”

“Hmm?” Steve hums, feeling like his brain is somewhere soft.

“My check. It’s Friday,” Eddie says. He rises, leaving a cloud of cold where his body should be. Steve frowns. “Hate to come and go, of course—”

“Will you come back?” Steve asks, feeling vulnerable in a way that doesn’t matter, like he knows no hurt will come of this.

“Back?”

“Yeah,” Steve says, lifting himself, starting to look for his underwear. “I’ll make you something.”

“Me?” Eddie asks, as if someone else is in Steve’s bed, is in Steve’s thoughts, walking around his daydreams.

Steve blinks. He asks, “Do you like lasagna?”

“You want… me to come back?” Eddie asks, confused.

Steve slips on his dark blue briefs, standing nearly naked in his room, feeling full and more complete than he has in a long time.

He says, “Please?”

Notes:

talk to me on twitter at fayfayfaye :)

Chapter 3: I Think That I Would Die

Summary:

Eddie comes back.

Steve is patting lasagne noodles dry with flour sack towels. He doesn’t make his own sauce, but the smell of glassy onions and garlic is enough for anyone to think he does.

He’s been browning the meat, whipping ricotta with eggs and seasoning, and thinking about Eddie’s come.

After Eddie left, all bashful and earnest with promises of his return, Steve returned to his room where the soft and fraying pink towel was still tacky with spend.

At first he only observed. Eddie had left a significant mark, more than Steve, when he’d wiped his hand full of come on the towel. Maybe he hadn’t come in a while. It was the third time in 24 hours, for Steve.

Then, curious, Steve bent low and examined the difference in smell. There was the soft nutty scent of himself, familiar, and then Eddie—just a bit different—salty, a little acrid.

As it dried to a crust, Steve studied the texture, wondered how quickly it would dry on his skin, how it would feel inside of him.

Then he began thinking about the lasagne. He wondered if Eddie would like the cabernet he’d pre-selected from the cabinet in the basement, or if he would think it’s silly to drink from a wine glass with his tattoos and holey knees.

Steve folded the pink towel, so that the come was on the inside, and stowed it away in the bottom drawer of his dresser.

Now, as he methodically layers the noodles, cheese, meat and sauce, Steve thinks about Eddie’s come inside of him. His dick, enormous and bulging just below the tip, pulsing and gushing. Eddie would shake with it, held so tight inside of Steve’s hole. He’d be wracked with the feeling.

Steve probably won’t feel the flood of it, the warmth, but he will definitely feel the pressure of Eddie’s dick. He’s never had anything that big inside of himself. Thinking of his hole starting to stretch around Eddie, he's in his kitchen, and he unthinkingly humps the cabinet, a little.

The lasagne assembled and safely on the center rack, the oven door claps shut with a nudge of Steve’s hip.

He hears the door open. He’s nervous, so he grabs a towel, mimes drying his hands until his breathing is even.

“Mea culpa, didn't mean to intrude upon the estate,” Eddie says as Steve approaches him in the hall foyer. He’s all angles, elbow and jaw, beautiful even while swaying awkwardly on his feet. “I knocked, but thought you might be—“

Steve smiles. “Lasagne’s in the oven.”

“You really didn’t need to do that,” Eddie says.

“I was planning on it anyway. I like to cook,” Steve says.

“Is there anything you can’t do?” Eddie asks.

Steve scoffs, “Dude, so much. Do you drink wine?” he asks, pointing toward the kitchen.

“Only ever out of a bag, to be honest,” Eddie says.

Steve feels his nose wrinkle. “Is that any good?”

“I wouldn’t know,” Eddie shrugs, “Does good wine taste any better than bad wine?”

Steve thinks for a second, remembering the wine coolers in the girls’ hands in the summertime, the way their pink nails wrapped around the necks, the way he wanted to try fuzzy navel, and says, “I wouldn’t know.”

“Well, I’m not one to refuse a free drink,” Eddie says.

Steve pours two glasses of cabernet, something he stole out of the cabinet in the basement, his ears warming when Eddie says, “It smells good in here.”

Eddie doesn’t scoff at the long stemmed wine glass, and sips carefully from the cut crystal.

“So… you really drink this?” he asks.

“Since I was like, nine? Is it that bad?” Steve smiles.

“No, I can see the appeal,” he says, and holds the glass aloft, posing with one hand on the counter. “Does this glass make me look like a vampire?”

“What?” Steve laughs.

“A little bit?” Eddie probes, and bites his bottom lip to show his top row of teeth.

“Aren’t vampires old?” Steve asks.

“Well, if you’re speaking in the time-bound sense of the word, sum of existence in the temporal plane, I suppose, technically, yes—”

Steve had planned to lead them to the sofa in the TV room, somewhere he’d feel more comfortable sitting with a glass of wine and pretending not to stare at Eddie’s body, his mouth, but he hadn’t expected to forget they were in the kitchen. He didn’t expect the ease with which Eddie talks to him, enough to make him forget the way they were still standing, the press of his stocking feet into the linoleum.

A half hour passes, banter that doesn’t feel like small talk. He never asks Steve if he knows what a word means, but always seems to know when to explain something Steve’s never heard of.

“You should be a teacher,” Steve says suddenly, surprising himself.

“What? Did you mean to insult me?” Eddie asks, and Steve recalls that Eddie doesn’t actually like school, misses a lot of days.

“What do you do all day? When you’re not at school?” Steve asks, then pulls from his wine. He’s almost done, has been robotically sipping while listening to Eddie talk about vampires, then Romania, then Steve’s mother’s wine glasses, which launched him into an explanation of his uncle’s jelly jar collection.

Eddie mimes a knife to the chest, but he’s smiling, says, “You’ve noticed my truancy?”

Steve nods, trying to think of an explanation for the way he watches Eddie, has been watching Eddie.

“I’m really trying to do better with that,” Eddie says, chagrinned.

“You are?” Steve asks, genuinely. If Eddie is trying, he’s not doing a very good job of it.

Eddie nods. “I’m not supposed to miss school. Uncle Wayne’s rules. The only ones I feel bad about breaking.”

Eddie grins, making sly eye contact from beneath his bangs, and something draws tight in Steve’s body from his throat to his heart to his dick. He swallows.

“So, why do you?” he asks. “Miss school?”

Eddie shrugs, shaking his head. It’s as if he’s looking down on an errant child he can’t control.

“Same old story,” he sighs, “Up late. Sleep late. Rather stay than go. Don’t go.”

“Isn’t that boring?” Steve asks.

“Sometimes,” Eddie says, “Aren’t you bored at school?”

Steve snorts, “Always. I just don’t know what I’d do at home.”

“I draw,” Eddie says, “Play guitar.”

“Music,” Steve nods, “That’s something I’d like to know more about.”

“Oh, Harrington,” Eddie smiles, shakes his head. “Don’t go there. Don’t tease my tender heart.”

“I’m serious! I think,” Steve says, finishing his wine. “I asked for piano lessons when I was a kid, but I had to pick that or baseball camp, and Tommy picked baseball, so.”

Steve’s egg timer goes off, and Eddie is still looking at Steve and not the timer or the oven. Steve grabs a couple of towels to hold the pan, and when the bubbling dish releases a cloud of fragrant moisture into the air, he hopes Eddie’s paying attention. He hopes Eddie’s thinking God, he’s so good at that, he’s a natural.

“It's gotta sit for a minute,” Steve explains.

“So what happened there?” Eddie asks, still looking at Steve.

Steve looks at the lasagne, the browned edges of the decades old pan, the crisped mozzarella.

“I mean, with Tommy,” Eddie clarifies.

Steve has them retreat to the tv room, spending the walk to the couch thinking about what to say. It doesn’t feel right to call Tommy names, or even to say they grew apart, because they’re not apart. Tommy is still inside of him, living in little patches of his feelings and his thoughts and his memories. Tommy’s part of what makes him Steve and he knows he’s part of what makes Tommy.

So Steve explains the whole bit, with Nancy, because at the time it felt right—Nancy being so positive, so warm, so pretty and perfect, and she was his girl. Steve doesn’t know when it became Tommy or Nancy, but somehow he knew who to pick.

It’s easier to talk when the smell of Eddie starts to slowly surround him. Every move on the plastic-covered couch sends another waft of air at Steve: old cigarettes, deodorant that’s been working pretty hard, and the tannins of wine.

“You really liked her?” Eddie asks, and Steve just nods, even while Eddie starts to grow visibly nervous, like he’s growing thorns. He continues, “So… even though—-she’s a girl?”

Steve shrugs, “Yeah?”

“So you still—you like girls?” Eddie says, carefully. “I mean, the whole—physically?”

“I—” Steve stops, and his face draws up tight, and he has the bizarre realization that he might cry. Steve says, “I don’t know.”

“So… sexually, the idea of the—nether regions, and breasts and such—”

Steve looks at Eddie, mortified at the idea that he hasn’t actually considered a naked girl in months. When he jerked off, Steve’s thought about his hole. He’s thought about something—or someone, mostly Eddie—filling him, touching him, stretching him wide, maybe surrounding him while inside of him in an all encompassing way—like darkness or hope or warmth.

He’s thought about Eddie. He’s watched Eddie in the halls, listened to Eddie’s voice, touched Eddie’s drawings on his handmade posters in the hall. He’s stared at Eddie’s hair in class, listened to the sound of his jeans and his leather jacket, memorized his school schedule and the names of his friends.

“I like you,” Steve says.

“Would you like me if I was a girl?” Eddie asks, not missing a beat.

“You’re not a girl,” Steve says.

“What if I was?” Eddie says, excited suddenly, setting his glass down and turning toward him on the couch, and it would be annoying if he weren’t blindingly adorable. “What if my name were Cassandra, and I had a flat ass but a massive rack, and I wore purple lipstick and all black—“

Steve laughs, “I’ve never liked a girl who wears purple lipstick.”

Eddie flutters his eyelashes dramatically, asks, “Would you start? If it were me?”

Steve should’ve brought his wine glass. He has nothing to do with his hands.

“Wait,” Eddie says, his face losing elasticity, sagging like a clock in that painting. “You like me?”

Steve flushes, and that feeling is back, prickling up and down his nose like he’s about to cry.

Eddie is lifting the lid off him. He keeps doing it, keeps taking it off just to peer inside. It hurts, but that’s how the light is coming in and Steve never wants it to stop.

Eddie’s looking at him hard, and Steve nods. He feels his own mouth, wine stained, slack and open as he leans against the back of the couch. Eddie’s eyes are like dinner plates.

Steve wonders if this is how girls feel when they want to be kissed—like they’ll die if it doesn’t happen.

He asks, scanning Eddie’s stunned face, “Do you want some lasagne?”

 

Steve is, actually, very hungry. It’s been long enough that the lasagne has set, and he feels proud watching the servings depart the pan with strings of stretchy mozzarella falling around the spatula.

Eddie makes noises when he eats, too, which seems to be enough for Steve to forget that Eddie hasn’t acknowledged his impromptu confession. He wonders for a minute whether Eddie likes him, thinks he’s good-looking, but then remembers the pump and the glisten of Eddie’s come, spilling over his hand.

They sit together on the floral sofa in the TV room. He’s put on Poltergeist, because he’d just bought it, and horror movies are supposed to be good for dates. Eddie’s wine glass is still half full, but he’s retrieved a second helping of pasta.

Eddie’s talked about ghosts. He’s asked Steve where he learned to cook, where his parents are, if he’s always lived in this giant hotel of a house.

They’ve been making little comments about the movie, and Steve expects to hear a joke when Eddie opens his mouth, but instead what comes out is, “I’ve been with a girl, before. Sort of.”

Steve pauses, wants to say “duh”, but remembers that Eddie’s supposed to be gay. It’s been too long of a pause when he asks, “Really?”

Eddie nods. “You might recall my secondary source of income.”

Steve laughs. “Yeah?”

“The guy I get it from. Reefer Rick.”

“He sells… reefer?” Steve guesses.

“He’s many things, but never subtle,” Eddie says, crossing his arms as he leans back into the couch. His plate is on the coffee table. “He’s always talking to people about my dick.”

Steve nearly spits. “What?”

“He’s okay. I just don’t like to be around him when other people are there, and he’s smoking them out. He just loves to bring it up. ‘Have you heard about Munson’s dick?’”

“What?” Steve asks again. He can’t imagine being this vulgar, this rude about someone, and he’s spent a good amount of his adolescence in locker rooms.

He feels a strange protectiveness creep over his skull and fists, growing like moss. Who is this guy to be talking about Eddie’s dick? Steve’s barely seen it. Why’s he seen it?

“He’s seen it?” Steve asks. He stops pushing around his lasagne, sets down his fork.

“It—” Eddie flushes. “That might be my fault. I told him. He was always asking, really weird about me being a—virgin. Never being with a girl. I didn’t tell him about the gay thing.”

“That’s good,” Steve says, “Doesn’t seem like he’s good with secrets.”

“He’s not. Because after I told him I couldn’t get a girl to do it, it’s physically too much, he just kept—bringing it up. He’d tell everybody, and I’d come over and they’d all already know, and they’d wanna see it. He’d say, look, it’s like—”

Eddie swings his right arm out, holding it at the elbow with his left hand, “As big as my arm! And if there was a girl there, he’d ask if they’d ever seen anything like it, and—and it didn’t bother me, I’d just show them. And they’d get uncomfortable and blush or they’d laugh and get intimidated and—-” Eddie waves his hand. “Part of me was disappointed, because it’s not like I—-it’s not like I really like girls, but I kind of wanted to…”

Steve’s eyes have grown progressively bigger as Eddie tells the story. He’s holding a pillow he doesn’t remember picking up. He feels strange, because if it were anyone else, he’d be congratulating them. Eddie doesn’t seem uncomfortable, but Steve is, and he wants to find this past Eddie and tell him they can go home, wants to punch Rick in the stomach, wants to throw a coat over Eddie’s shoulders and tell him he’s fine, he’s okay.

Eddie shakes his head. “My hand doesn’t even fit around it, you know? And if someone could do it...”

Steve nods. He does know, about wanting something inside, wanting it desperately.

“So no… no guys either?” he asks.

Eddie shakes his head, frowning on one side. “None of the guys I’ve ever—-they thought it was nice, or whatever, but they wanted to do me instead, and I don’t like that.”

Steve blinks. He can’t imagine not liking that.

Eddie exhales hard through his nose, and Steve can tell he’s getting the details together. He continues, “So it was—I’m going to say a little over a year ago. It was a summer night at Rick’s, and there’s a bunch of people there. Rick was telling these girls about it, and they were older, like twenty-two-ish. I stand up, and I show them, and Rick is saying can you believe that? And nobody is willing to fuck him? I’m already over it, because no one ever wants to try, after they see it. But the one girl, her name is Lisa, she says sure, he’s cute, and I’m nothing if not susceptible to flattery.”

Steve feels a wave of hot, bitter envy.

“Lisa takes me upstairs, and the whole time I’m thinking, this is it, finally, finally it’s going to happen, and I can tell it’s not my wildest dream but I’m so excited, I just—”

Eddie shakes his head.

“Teaches you not to get ahead of yourself, because god damn it was bad—just—terrible. I got hard, so it was bigger, and she was already getting nervous, I could tell. Condoms are difficult, but mind you, not impossible, so I got it on and she’s on top just giving it the old college try. It’s not working, we change positions, she starts crying, but she’s pretending not to, telling me to keep going. I’m like an inch inside? and it’s just not gonna fit. I can tell she feels bad about saying yes and not following through, but I’m not hard anymore and the weird fantasy I invented where her very male cousin is in the next room waiting to take over for her just isn’t working, so we just stop.”

Holy shit.

“Holy shit,” Steve says.

Eddie nods. “So, does that count?”

Steve looks at Eddie—his living daydream. A smart, sensitive boy who aches to be touched, who’s lived for too long in a world where he’s too much—both mentally and physically.

“I’ve got big hands,” Steve says.

 

They’re upstairs, and Steve has held Eddie’s hand as he led him back to his room. It’s a strange imitation of every time a girl has led Steve to their room, of the time Lisa led Eddie, and it fills him with joy to do it.

Eddie’s eyes are darting around him, his face, the plaid wallpaper. Steve’s face is set and determined as he leads Eddie to stand next to his bed.

“Can I take off your clothes?” he asks, and Eddie nods, so Steve does, delicately drawing down his zipper, watching Eddie’s checked boxers rise up, tented. His jeans are loose, and they fall down. His legs are skinny, pale, and there’s two tattoos on his right leg—a skull and a bird, looking strangely optimistic.

Because Steve has been eating and drinking what Eddie has, Eddie’s breath just smells like warmth, like him. It’s a smell Steve has been growing steadily obsessed with, even better than the smell of his sweat under his clothes. His white shirt is soft and comes up easily over his head. Steve wonders at the pallor of his chest, the pale hue of his nipples.

“Can I do you?” Eddie says, and Steve is nodding before he realizes that he means Steve’s clothes. Steve helps him; his clothes are tighter and there’s more of them. He’s thankful the house is warm, standing naked and so hard he’s leaking in front of Eddie, who feels somehow destined to be next to him.

He stares down. His dick is fine. It’s not something he’s ever thought about. Eddie’s dick is perfect. It hangs between his legs even fully hard—not as long as a forearm, like Rick implied, but so broad it makes his mouth water, the foreskin wrapped thick around the widest part, just under the head.

He coaxes Eddie to lie down. Eddie’s silent as he stares up at Steve. He settles himself, bending his legs a bit as Steve crouches over him. He touches Steve’s hips, tentatively, as if they’ve never touched.

The vegetable oil is still on his bedside table. He pours enough into his hands to coat them, with some extra.

Eddie watches his hands. They might not close around Eddie’s dick by themselves—luckily, he has two of them.

“Oh, my God,” Eddie says, and he jumps when Steve slides Eddie’s dick through his slick hands, tight as he tries to close each hand around it. He didn’t expect the skin to be as soft as it is, as velvety and unblemished over a spongey texture that is nevertheless bloated with blood, so hard he’s purple at the tip.

It’s easier for his hands to close around the base, where he’s prickly; the hair grows part of the way of the shaft of him. He sounds like he’s choking as Steve pulls his way, fascinated, back to the top.

Slow and tight, he draws his hands up and down, hearing Eddie gasp and sputter, his pale chest heaving. Both his hands plunge and rise along Eddie’s twitching dick, and he laughs.

“Something funny?” Eddie asks, breathless, thrusting his hips a little. Steve wants him to fuck his hands, wants Eddie to be inside of him any way he can.

“It’s like—those people who make pottery? On a wheel?” Steve says, sliding his hands quick, and Eddie smiles.

“Steve,” he laughs, “You’re so—”

“Yeah?” Steve asks. He wants to know, needs to know what Eddie thinks of him.

“You’re so—you’re beautiful.”

Steve laughs softly, happily, because he’s said that before, while girls have touched him. He meant it.

“Will you touch me?” Steve asks, but when Eddie’s hands try to reach around his for his dick, Steve shakes his head. “Will you—”

“Yeah,” Eddie says, and he sits up, reaching for the oil like he’s read Steve’s mind. Steve reluctantly releases Eddie’s dick.

Eddie settles himself against the headboard and beckons Steve forward. Steve blushes like a new bride, because finally, someone is going to touch him. Someone is going to give his hole what it wants.

Eddie replaces the bottle.

Steve lounges over Eddie like a willow bough, letting his ass hover. Eddie reaches behind him, his slick fingers finding the cleft of his ass, parting their way through the dense layer of straight, dark hair Steve has seen in the mirror a thousand times.

“Are you ready?” Eddie asks. His dry hand clenches Steve’s flank, the area where his hip and his ass are the same.

“Please,” Steve says, his hands finding Eddie’s huge, perfect dick.

Stars are behind his eyes, though they’re still open. Eddie’s fingers are there, where his own have been a thousand times.

“Please,” Steve says, and he slips his hands over Eddie’s dick just as the pads of Eddie’s fingers find his hole, clenching and gaping with want.

Eddie pushes, finding the inside with two of his fingers at once. Steve’s hole releases sparks of feeling that fly through his whole body.

“Fuck,” Steve says, tearing up.

The slide of his fingers is perfect. The texture is perfect. The force is perfect.

He can feel every ridge, every wrinkle of Eddie’s hands.

“That’s it, baby,” Eddie says, and the tears in Steve’s eyes start to run down.

“Do you like it?” Eddie asks, and Steve can’t speak, so he nods, looking into Eddie’s wide eyes with wonder.

He falls onto Eddie’s fingers, wanting more. He gasps even as he stares at Eddie. He bounces as Eddie pushes.

His purposeful pulling at Eddie’s dick becomes erratic tugging, and Eddie responds in kind, pushing himself into Steve.

Steve falls onto Eddie’s body, then, forgetting himself, any of his inhibitions, pressing his wet face into Eddie’s neck. Eddie is warm and alive and he’s inside of Steve’s hands and Steve’s ass and spread out below him.

“I want you,” Steve says, grinding desperately onto Eddie’s hands. Eddie’s is thrusting still, inside of Steve’s hands, both of them trying to find some kind of rhythm. They’re so close to one another.

“I want you too,” Eddie says, wrapping his free hand around Steve’s body. “Baby—I’m gonna—”

He comes like that. Steve looks down, wanting desperately to see the gloss of it, the force of it, the purple head gaping at him.

Steve is stunned, and thinks for a moment how perfect it would be if Eddie’s come landed in his open mouth.

“I want you too,” Eddie says. His hands move inside of Steve, rubbing up and inside of him, in a way that’s always felt so perfect, that hot path that he clenches around with his whole body.

Eddie draws out of him, still panting with his orgasm, but then uses three fingers to push back inside of Steve.

Steve cries out, arches his back, thinks that nothing could be more perfect than this—something moving inside of him, something attached to another human—another human he likes so, so much.

“I like you so much,” Eddie says, staring up at him with dark, bright eyes like windows at night.

Steve collapses, thrusting hard onto Eddie’s come-coated belly, Eddie’s fingers still inside of him. He comes hard, starlight prickling his vision. His hole clenches around Eddie’s fingers.

“That’s it,” Eddie says, his clean hand wrapping around Steve’s head, holding him there. “That’s it, baby.”

“I like you so much,” Steve repeats to him, feeling the waves of orgasm push through his body again and again—from his hole and outward, to his calves and his hands and his shoulder blades.

“I like you, too,” Eddie says, and Steve can hear his smile. Eddie holds him close, close enough to hear the thud of his heart beating. Steve lies against him for a long time.

Notes:

Thanks for reading ch3, next up: feelings

Chapter 4: Softer, Softest

Summary:

Steve sticks to Eddie like glue. Eddie is not complaining.

Steve rolls out from beneath the sheets, too early. The need to pee eclipses the need to stay in bed, the vague feeling that his purpose is there, that he’s leaving something behind.

He brushes his teeth sleepily once his bladder is relieved, noting with curiosity the toothpaste—no cap.

Eddie.

Eddie’s fingers, where that toothpaste has been. Eddie’s dick in his hands.

Eddie.

Steve spits and, mouth still tacky with toothpaste, stumbles back to the bedroom, soft cock bouncing between his legs, quick on sleep-heavy feet. He whips the door open.

Eddie is clothed. He’s sitting up in Steve’s bed, hands folded in his lap.

“You’re here,” Steve says, smiling.

“I used your toothbrush,” Eddie says, hurried, “At first it seemed fine—but I’ve been up for like, twenty minutes? and the more I think about it the more I think it might be weird. So. I’m sorry.”

“Not weird,” Steve smiles. He trots forward, grabs a pair of clean briefs from his chest of drawers, slides the briefs on his body and his body underneath the sheets.

Steve leans against the headboard so that he’s seated next to Eddie, Eddie looks a little bedraggled. His hair is puffy and nested, his shirt looking slept-in, wrinkled around his chest and underarms. Steve wonders if he put it on before or after he slept all night in Steve’s bed.

The best thing about Eddie is that he’s looking at Steve, like he’s waiting for him to speak, but his gaze keeps wandering around Steve’s face, his body, his naked shoulders.

“So,” Eddie says, biting his lip, playing with his fingers.

He can’t wait for anything, Steve thinks, with fondness.

“I had a wonderful time last night,” Steve says. He can feel himself smiling. He can’t tamp it down.

“Me too,” Eddie says. Eddie has a great smile. It stretches his whole face to the sides, pushing the apples of his cheeks toward the sky.

Steve gazes at him dreamily.

Eddie coughs.

“I uh,” he says, “I gotta get Wayne’s heart medication.”

“Oh,” Steve says.

“Yeah, my uncle, he—” Eddie breathes in powerfully through his nose, like he’s nervous. “He works nights, and usually I’d pick it up in the evening after I get my check, but I knew they’d be open this morning and also I kinda wanted to get back here, so—”

“Oh,” Steve says.

“But they’re only open until 10:30 Saturday mornings so—”

“Oldhams’?” Steve asks. It’s a pretty sure bet, the only pharmacy in town.

“Yeah,” Eddie says.

Steve is already out of bed. He asks, “Do you want a ride?”

 

Eddie doesn’t need a ride, but says he’d love the company, and no, he doesn’t mind waiting for Steve to shower. Sitting on the toilet, Steve takes a long moment to stare at the wallpaper and try to bid his smile back down.

After the pharmacy, Steve suggests breakfast at the local diner, and Eddie seems shocked that Steve would want to be seen with him in public. Steve, who is having trouble remembering that other people exist, blinks sleepily at him, which is apparently enough for Eddie to insist on paying for their meal.

Steve sips hot coffee while looking out at the cold February day. He smiles at Eddie, who rambles about his job, his uncle, and his uncle’s job. He eats a fruit cup, and two orders of scrambled eggs, and some buttery toast with strawberry jam. He watches Eddie order a side of french fries, even after having a full breakfast, and stuff it in his mouth while Steve explains his dad’s job and his big empty house.

“They sound like dicks,” Eddie says summarily, and Steve would usually deny it, but instead he laughs, sinking into the red vinyl booth joyfully.

Steve rides with Eddie back to his neighborhood, a dusty field surrounded by dense forest, sparsely laid out with mobile homes. Eddie’s uncle’s trailer is paneled and warm-looking on the inside, and smells homey, like someone has been living there for a very long time. Steve stays silent while Eddie deposits the orange pill bottle in the kitchen, wary of Eddie’s uncle sleeping in the main room.

They step back outside and Eddie leads Steve around the trailer, down a dirt path to the forest’s edge.

“Are you sure you want to see any of this?” Eddie asks, doubtful.

Steve wants to ask: Are you sure you want me hanging around your home? Your family? All your secret places and unknowns? But he doesn't actually want Eddie to say no, or to feel pressured to say yes, so he doesn’t ask.

“I want to see,” Steve reassures him, “You said you spend a lot of time out here.”

“I do,” Eddie says, “I skip a lot of school, and my uncle sleeps during the day, so—”

“Why is this purple?” Steve says out loud, and he didn’t mean to, but he just kind of says what’s on his mind, sometimes, especially when he’s happy. He touches the purple branch and a few of its dozens of tiny shoots. Some end in little berries.

“That’s pokeweed,” Eddie says, “it’s poisonous.”

Steve lets go.

“Not like, kill you poison. Unless you eat a lot of it.”

“Oh,” Steve says. “How do you know that?”

Eddie shrugs.

Steve smiles, “Did you eat one? The berries?”

“No!” Eddie yells, but he’s smiling too when he says, “I spit it out.”

Steve laughs and asks him about more plants as they traipse along the path, just to hear the names of them and the way Eddie speaks so confidently. When he doesn’t know, he makes up something, like “old-man-in-the-shower” or “vampire’s bane”, which Steve actually believed for a few seconds.

Eddie asks him about where he went as a kid, and he doesn’t have much to say. He didn’t spend much time in the woods. All of his memories are suburban sidewalks, baseball diamonds and swimming pools. He doesn’t know much about the outdoors, except for what a maple leaf looks like.

“Oh,” Eddie says suddenly, “this is weird.”

“What?” Steve asks.

Eddie bends down and springs back up with an iridescent black feather.

“Grackle,” he says. “Should all be gone by now.”

Steve holds out a hand, and Eddie gives him the feather. His mother’s voice says something about mites in his head. He shrugs it off.

The feather is short, just a couple of inches, and some of the ridges are bent from being outside in the cold, but most of it is uniform, all black and shiny like an oil spill but smooth like velvet. It reminds him of Eddie.

He tries to hand it back, but Eddie shrugs.

“For you,” he says.

Steve smiles. He says, “You’re good at this.”

“At what?” Eddie asks.

Steve walks along, staring at his feather. He says, “I was never this good at flirting.”

Eddie snorts, a little defensive when he says, “I’m not trying to get in your pants, Harrington.”

Steve looks at him; from where he stands he can see the long line of Eddie’s shoulders. His hair is combed out and dry-looking, his skin just a little tired looking. The pallor of it reminds Steve of Eddie’s hips, how he could see hints of blue veins under his pale belly, leading to his dick. Steve drools a little, feels it pool in his mouth.

He says, “You don’t have to try.”

Eddie looks spooked. He touches his chest. Steve thinks maybe he doesn’t have anything to say.

Steve asks, “Do you think you could come in me later?”

Eddie trips on a root.

 

Steve has Eddie drive them back to his place. Eddie’s uncle, Wayne, is still sleeping.

Knowing that Eddie’s willing to fool around has him hard in his jeans already. Eddie has to playfully slap at his hands to keep him from unzipping Eddie’s jeans while they’re still driving.

“Stephen, we are in public,” Eddie says, with a faux propriety.

“Funny,” Steve says, looking around, “I don’t see anyone.”

Eddie’s eyes shine. He bites his lip.

“I do have plans tonight,” Eddie warns him, “I’m not saying that because I wanna run off—”

“No, me too,” he says, “The brats want to go to the movies.”

Eddie snorts. “The brats now, is it?”

Steve looks at his mouth.

“I want to kiss you,” he says.

Eddie exhales, choppy and soft. His chest vibrates. Steve wants to touch it, ruck it up and feel the planes of his belly, his nipples.

When they arrive, Steve takes his hand again, never mind any hint the neighbors might take. He leads Eddie inside and up the stairs, shutting the door with finality.

“Yeah?” Eddie asks, cheeks pink, mouth hanging open.

“Yeah,” Steve says.

They close the distance.

Steve is intimately aware of Eddie breathing, through his nose and into his lungs, making his broad, flat chest rise and fall.

His mouth is warm, his lips plush and Steve wonders if he’s kissed anyone with lips as thick as Eddie’s. He wonders if maybe this is his best kiss, as he feels a tingle roll through his spine.

They part and Eddie shifts his head to kiss Steve again. He’s got Steve by the elbows, is pulling him close, is pulling Steve’s body and his mouth into his own.

Steve’s never been pulled like this. Eddie is strong, his fingers large and dense where they cradle Steve’s arms. A sound comes out of his mouth and into Eddie’s, something needy and to his ears, a little whiny. Eddie pulls him closer.

“Come in you?” he asks, and Steve nods, his lips falling against Eddie’s, they’re still so close.

Eddie says, “s’not gonna fit.”

“It will,” Steve says. He wraps his arms around Eddie’s waist, spreads his hands out along Eddie’s back. He grinds into Eddie, who shudders. He’s hard under his clothes, and Steve wants to touch him, taste him.

His mouth tastes so good already—clear and wet and eager, his tongue soft and curiously timid when Steve licks into him.

So timid that Steve doesn’t expect when Eddie crouches low and lifts him, cradling him under his ass and drawing his legs around his waist.

“What the hell!” he yelps, and, laughing Eddie drops him onto his bed.

“Wanted to do that,” Eddie says, crawling over him and nipping at his lips, kissing him repeatedly.

“Don’t hurt yourself,” Steve says. He reaches over Eddie’s broad back to pull up his shirt, revels in the feeling of Eddie closing him in.

“You wound me,” Eddie says, reaching for Steve’s shirt in turn.

Steve gives into his wants, spreading his hands out over Eddie’s abdomen. The fine, downy hair of his skin becomes brown and whispy closer to his belly button.

Steve thinks of the wiry hairs at the base of his dick, wants it in his hands again. He strokes up instead, over Eddie’s chest, the dark ink of a tattoo under his spread fingers.

He loses contact too quickly as Eddie ducks toward his chest, but then the warmth of Eddie’s mouth is on his skin. He gasps, touching Eddie’s soft hair. No one’s ever touched his nipples before, and he wants Eddie to touch them, to lick them. Eddie does. He’s using one hand to prop himself up and another to touch where he’s kissing. He lies back and lets his hips move, grinding up into Eddie.

Suddenly, he feels empty.

“Please,” he says, “Eddie.”

“I’m here,” Eddie says.

Steve reaches for his waistband, moving to shimmy out of his pants. They come quickly with Eddie’s help.

“Empty,” he says.

Eddie sucks in a sudden breath, pressing his forehead to Steve’s chest.

“Oh, honey,” he says.

“I want you inside,” Steve says.

Eddie shakes his head. Steve’s brow scrunches up over his frown. He thought they were on the same page.

“It’s not gonna fit,” Eddie says again.

Steve flits through his memories, trying to come up with anything he’s had inside of himself that’s larger than Eddie’s dick. He can’t think of anything.

But that’s why he has to have it. He burns up inside at the thought.

“Let me look at it,” Steve says, reaching for Eddie’s jeans. Eddie rises, standing on his knees on Steve’s bed.

With his long hair, his tattoos, his kissed red mouth, his no shirt and his unbuttoned jeans, Eddie looks kind of like a rock star.

“Let me see it,” Steve says again, pulling at Eddie’s waistband.

“Okay, okay,” Eddie laughs, and Steve is too, until it comes out.

Eddie’s dick will never stand up when it’s hard. It’s too heavy, long and thick and hanging like an elephant’s trunk between his legs.

Steve is so close he can smell Eddie’s skin, the close and warm scent under his clothes and in his boxers.

“Holy shit,” he says. Eddie is so hard, the tip of his dick is pink and purple in places, and it’s wet where it opens. He can’t tell if Eddie is moving it on purpose or if that’s Eddie’s heartbeat, slowly shaking it from the root to the tip.

“Please,” Steve says, and regretfully breaks his stare to look up at Eddie’s eyes, which are equally beautiful, big and wet. “Let me try.”

Eddie swallows, and says, “Okay.”

 

Steve doesn’t let Eddie’s hands inside, at first, checking himself, reacquainting himself as he prepares. Eddie watches from behind him.

“Can you really—oh,” Eddie pauses as Steve reaches into himself with four fingers.

“You don’t need to go slow, do you?” Eddie asks, fascinated, and Steve shakes his head into his pillow, feeling just a spark of shame and smallness under Eddie’s gaze. It feels good.

The angle is wrong, he can’t get off like this, doing this to himself, but he can prepare. He can fit a thumb in beside his four fingers and open himself wide.

“Is this big enough?” he asks. Eddie makes a noise, something between a cough and a choke. The bed is moving, like he’s touching himself while he watches Steve’s hole.

“Fuck,” Eddie says. The sound of his skin rasping against itself makes Steve’s eyes close in sleepy pleasure, like a cat in a sunbeam. Eddie’s doing that because of him.

“Can you try?” Steve asks, and looks over his shoulder.

Eddie is pink at his chest and along his neck.

“Please?” Steve asks.

“Yeah, baby,” Eddie says, nodding, “we can try.”

He starts to fumble with the bottle of vegetable oil, slicking himself. Steve enjoys the sight of it, his slight, pale hand working along his dick. His oiled fingers stretch out inside of his hole before he draws them out.

Eddie scoots himself behind Steve, who lies on his side, looking back at him.

“Are you ready, baby?” Eddie asks. The weight of his breath hits the back of Steve’s neck. Steve shivers.

Days ago, he was watching Eddie Munson from across the hall, across the classroom, across the gym, wanting and wishing for Eddie just to talk to him. Now Eddie Munson is in his room and he’s about to be inside of Steve, inside of his hole.

“Yeah,” Steve says, swallowing, “I’m ready.”

Steve reaches back to pull one ass cheek aside, and Eddie presses his dick to lie inside the cleft of his ass. Steve can feel the warmth of it, the slick skin of the head. He lets his ass cheek fall, just to feel Eddie’s dick between them.

“Shit,” Eddie says, and from the sound of his voice Steve can tell he’s looking down. He wishes Eddie had a camera.

Eddie presses forward. It’s not forceful enough. Steve can feel the head slipping around the wrinkle of his asshole, can picture it in his mind.

“Eddie,” he begs, trying to push back, “push.”

“I—don’t want to hurt you,” he says, his breathing tight. He grips Steve’s hip with one hand.

“Put it in,” Steve begs, pushing back.

He knows how to relax his hole. He knows how to push past every instinctual, automatic muscle movement. He relaxes and moves back against Eddie.

“Okay,” Eddie says, and, using the bed for leverage, gives a slow but heavy push.

Steve’s hole opens. He can imagine the slick pink stretch as Eddie’s dick breaches him.

“Fuck,” Eddie groans, rough and choked. “Oh, fuck, baby—baby, it’s in—”

The pain is sudden and searing. The head of Eddie’s massive dick is fully inside of him, and he cries out.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” Steve says, and tears spring to his eyes instantly. His instinct yells at him to scramble up and away from the intrusion, but he breathes through it, picturing Eddie’s face, the warmth of his smile as he says baby.

Eddie seems to know something is wrong. He gasps as a clench rolls through Steve’s asshole and draws back.

“No!” Steve shouts, gripping Eddie’s wrist, “leave it, please, leave it, okay?”

He tries his best to look back. Eddie’s eyes are huge and watery. His hair shakes as he nods.

“Okay,” he says. He seems to laugh as he shakes his head. He strokes Steve along his back, his hip, and says, “You’re so tight, Steve.”

“Stay,” Steve chokes out. Tears continue to build in his eyes, running down his face toward the pillow. “More,” he says.

“More lube?” Eddie asks, “or more me?”

“Both,” Steve says. He wants the warmth of Eddie’s body against him.

Eddie draws out to apply more oil. Steve grabs a disheveled blanket and clutches it close, willing his body to relax.

Steve watches this time as Eddie hauls his body toward Steve’s, sees the barest glimpses of him.

Eddie pushes the head of his dick into Steve’s hole, newly oiled and newly welcome. Steve groans, relaxing around it, pushing back as the head slips further into him.

Steve’s hole flutters as it adjusts.

“Shit, shit, shit, baby,” Eddie says, “I’m already—I’m trying not to come.”

The words roll with warmth across Steve’s brain. Eddie, so beautiful when he comes. Eddie’s dick, purple and thudding, weeping out glossy come. Inside of his hole. It’ll be inside of his hole, with Eddie’s dick.

“Gonna feel so good,” Steve says, into the pillow. Eddie’s dick seems to have stopped, just before the widest part. Steve can picture it, the way it flares out from the base of the head, at its widest maybe an inch under the ridge.

“You’re gonna kill me,” Eddie groans, then asks, “Can I move? Please, baby?”

Steve burns. He’s nodding without thinking of the pain, the way the searing will return if Eddie pushes any farther. He only knows what he wants, and he wants Eddie so badly, wants him moving around inside of his hole.

Eddie doesn’t push any farther. He’s drawing out. Steve wants to panic, chase his dick, but he presses back in. Steve moans, long and loud.

He’s being fucked.

Slowly, Eddie pulls out, and pushes back in, not the whole way, just a few inches of his incredible length.

The feeling sends roaring hot flames through Steve’s body. His hole is being fucked, by a human, by a man, by Eddie Munson.

Eddie pants as his rolls his hips.

He says, “Steve, Steve—”

Steve lies limp as the freeing feeling of being fucked washes over him. Eddie is pushing moans out of him with every thrust, fucking him like that, just the tip.

The tip is big.

It’s so big it’s overwhelming. It’s so big it’s all he can think about. It’s all he can feel. That hot and sensitive wall of flesh between his dick and his asshole is pounding, sending waves crashing over him.

He has an idea.

“N’top of me,” he slurs.

“What?” Eddie asks, but Steve just rolls, and Eddie rolls with him, until he lies on his belly and Eddie is braced over him, propping himself up with his arms.

Steve groans happily at the extra weight, and Eddie curls protectively over top of him, almost immediately rutting into him again, punching stunned moans out of Steve.

“You like that?” He asks, but instead of deliberately seductive he sounds surprised, as if he didn’t know he could make anyone feel good.

“So good,” Steve groans, and, riding on instinct, “fuck me.”

“Course,” Eddie says, tucking his face into Steve’s neck. “I’ll fuck you, baby.”

“Please,” Steve says, and the tears are back, sinking into the pillow along with his drool and a bit of mucus, slipping out of him unnoticed. The only thing he feels is Eddie.

Suddenly, he’s coming.

It’s not a burst, or a sudden break, like it normally is. With the feeling of Eddie inside and around him, so large and overwhelming, his orgasm beats through his body, long and low like a drum, whiting out his senses as his dick spurts against the sheets.

“Oh, fuck,” Eddie shouts, harsh, “you’re coming—Steve, I can feel you coming—”

Steve can feel his hole lapping around Eddie’s dick, rolling around it and squeezing. He knows Eddie feels it, as Eddie groans and plugs faster into him.

He feels, in that moment, like nothing but a hole, a receptacle and an orifice that exists only for Eddie to fuck. He remembers: little porn magazines, little dicks, little assholes. He remembers Tommy, damp with sweat, dotted with bronze freckles, cackling at his ignorance. He remembers wondering whether anyone had ever wanted his asshole. He knows Eddie wants it.

Eddie shouts, and Steve feels him come.

When he imagined Eddie’s come, he imagined feeling wet inside, as if he’d be able to feel the slick force of it. Instead, he feels the tremor of Eddie’s dick as it pulses, shooting out the jets of come that he knows are being deposited inside of him, making him even more full. It makes him feel better than anything else has.

Eddie thrusts a few more rolling thrusts, pushing that precious couple of inches back into Steve. Steve doesn’t want him to leave—now or maybe ever.

Eddie is pressing his face to Steve’s back, his neck. He might be kissing him.

“Thank you,” he says, “God, thank you.”

Steve reaches back to clutch his hand, wondering that he was so out of it during sex that he’d forgotten to hold it.

Eddie leads the way in rolling them over, then pulls the blanket over them. His soft dick starts to slip slowly out of Steve’s aching hole. Thinking of it, his own dick gives a little twitch.

“Eddie?” he asks. He feels content—perfectly warm and sated, and like he wants to lie with Eddie for hours.

“Yeah?” Eddie asks.

“I think I’m gay,” Steve says, and Eddie laughs, a loveable sound.

Notes:

Well, Steve’s been fucked… kind of. Tune in next time for The Boyfriend Experience.

Come see me on Twitter at fayfayfaye and Bluesky at FayeFaye. Thank you for all of your delightful feedback. You truly make my day. PS explicit comments welcome 💖

Chapter 5: Heaven Tonight

Summary:

Steve spends the weekend thinking about Eddie. They go back to school, and everything works out.

Steve wanted to watch Beverly Hills Cop at the dollar theater. He’s seen it about five times, though, which means Dustin has seen it three times, and apparently a free ride and popcorn aren’t enough for him anymore.

They’re leaving the matinee showing of The Breakfast Club when Dustin asks—

“Your dad doesn’t put out cigarettes on you, does he?”

Steve chokes.

“Dude, what?” he asks.

“Just—answer the question!” Dustin says.

Steve kind of loves when Dustin gets flustered. He puffs up like a chicken.

“No,” Steve shakes his head. “I mean, he sucks. But just—a normal amount.”

They slide into Steve’s car and shut the doors. Steve turns on the heat and slides the vents away from Dustin while they still blow cool air.

“Okay,” Dustin says, “I don’t want you dealing with that.”

“What?” Steve asks, feeling a wave of protective anxiety, “did you… deal with that?”

“Not as such,” Dustin says. He’s wearing a burgundy knit sweater. He folds his hands over his stomach, like Steve’s grandfather used to. “He wasn’t great, but not overly violent.”

“Well, he’s gone, right?” Steve asks.

“Oh yeah. When I was five.”

“Good riddance,” Steve says. “Just let me know if he ever—shows up. Or bothers you. Or something. Okay?”

Dustin considers him, and asks, “Are we having a moment?”

“Jesus, dude,” Steve says as he throws the car into gear.

Steve had noticed the scene where the rough-and-tumble character talked about his dad, but it was one of only a few he really watched. Mostly he sat and allowed his eyes to unfocus in the dark of the theater. He wondered if Eddie had any of those fingerless gloves that the bad boy character wore. He thought a lot about Eddie.

Before he left Steve’s house, Eddie kissed him on the mouth, and when Steve opened his eyes right afterward, Eddie winked. He bit his lip as he smiled, and Steve flushed, felt his heart race, his asshole clench around the come Eddie had put inside of him.

He visited the bathroom partway through the movie, shut himself into a stall, and considered the toilet. If he sat down, he thought, Eddie’s come—which was still sitting somewhere inside of him, beyond the walking clench of his sphincter—it would probably force its way out of his hole. Steve opened the stall and decided to use the urinal instead.

Steve and Dustin drive to the arcade. As the vents warm, Steve slides them toward Dustin. Steve tries not to think about Eddie as Dustin talks about high school social dynamics.

At the arcade, he and Dustin play Joust at least three times.

“Shit,” Steve mutters. “I keep dropping the ball.”

“There’s no ball,” says Dustin, “What have we discussed about sports metaphors in the arcade?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Steve grouses.

Steve thinks that Eddie probably plays dorky games like this. He imagines Eddie’s ringed fingers mashing the buttons.

Lucas shows up and takes over Steve’s spot. Saturday night at the arcade is busy, but Steve finds a place at the pinball machines, where he wonders if Eddie will think it’s stupid that he hangs out with a bunch of kids. He decides that Eddie won’t think that, because he is genuinely kind and considerate of others’ differences, which feels right.

When Steve drops the kids off, Dustin asks if he’s free tomorrow because he needs a plastic folio for his research paper and he doesn’t want to bother his mom on her day off. Steve asks why he didn’t say anything when Steve was driving his ass all over hell and creation today and also what research paper and Dustin explains it’s for “m’lord”. Steve sneers a little as he realizes he’s jealous of a teacher.

As Steve drives home, he’s thinking about clenching around Eddie’s dick, about the thump, thump, thump of Eddie coming inside of him. He thinks of the blankets that are still rumpled around the bed where Eddie kicked them. Eddie kicked them while he forced himself into Steve’s hole. He thinks of being full, and how he already misses it, how he already wants to be filled again. He shifts in his seat.

In his driveway, he opens the garage door. There’s a Bentley in his usual spot. He frowns.

Mr. and M rs. Harrington have set out a plate for Steve, which he doesn’t refuse. His mother has put out the fancy olive oil for the salad. Steve’s hole clenches around nothing.

As Mr. Harrington asks about college applications he hasn’t sent, and Steve says yes, sir, Steve thinks about Eddie’s come warming him from the inside out. Eddie’s arms around him in bed. Eddie’s hand, his cold, rough knuckles, brushing Steve’s in the woods outside the trailer park.

He salivates. His mom asks if he wants more salad.

 

Sunday morning, Steve is hopping like a jackrabbit on his scoop. He can’t seem to get full.

He’s changed positions three different times—first on his back, then his side, his belly, finally sitting on his scoop and bouncing. It’s getting to the point in the morning that his father will give him shit for not yet being awake and putting himself to good use. He doesn’t hear anything from downstairs, though, concerned only with making himself full. He twists the scoop handle around. It seems to have gotten smaller overnight.

When he finally comes, a pitiful spill onto the pink towel, Steve thinks about the last time he slept with Nancy, how she wouldn’t look at him, and he clutched her hand as he pretended to finish. He’d thought—next time will be better. He hadn’t felt full enough.

He showers and hops down the stairs, several at a time. His palms are sweaty. He feels antsy, churlish.

If his father calls him ungrateful, he’ll be correct.

“Did you get the car worked on recently?” Mr Harrington asks. He’s sitting at the breakfast table, newspaper open.

Steve hits the landing. He frowns and shakes his head.

“Steven,” his father says.

“No, sir,” Steve corrects.

Mr. Harrington hums, says, “Someone showed up this morning. Mechanic’s uniform. Long hair.”

Steve’s stomach swoops inside of him.

Mr. Harrington asks, “Friend of yours?”

I love him, Steve wants to say. He always wants to say it too soon. His mouth moves uselessly.

“I don’t want you associating—‘hanging out’ with—hoodlums and the sort,” Mr. Harrington says. “You’re old enough now that I didn’t think I’d have to tell you that.”

“Yes, sir,” Steve says, but he’s already grabbing his coat and heading toward the door.

Mr. Harrington says something as Steve leaves, and Steve would normally feel bad about disregarding his elders, but he’s thinking about kissing Eddie, the plush width of his lips giving under his own.

Steve is most of the way to Eddie’s house when he realizes that Eddie was dressed for work when he met Steve’s father. He’ll probably be at work now.

As the car slides to a stop on the side of the road, Steve feels his chest cave in: tenderness and heartache and the tiniest panic. He’s never longed for someone like this before. The fantasies come upon him faster than he can catalogue them—some sexual, some not. How does anyone cope with feeling like this?

Steve squeezes the leather of the steering wheel. There’s nothing for it, and nowhere to go.

 

Melvald’s has the plastic folio Dustin needs for twenty-nine cents. Steve drives it to Dustin’s, but Dustin isn’t there. Luckily, Claudia insists on feeding him breakfast—a poptart, at least, Steven—but then it’s also eggs and coffee. Steve asks her about work and church and her neighbor who always pretends to be gardening but is actually just spying. Claudia smiles a lot, her gently wrinkled face broadcasting love, and she asks him about his life and even though he shouldn’t, he tells her there’s someone he can’t stop thinking about and can’t see because she’s at work. She works with cars and yes that is a strange but compelling job for a girl and she’s pretty strange in general but in a nice, interesting way. She likes music and does drama club at the high school and yes Mrs. Henderson, he thinks maybe she’s the one. He doesn’t feel like he’s lying.

He’s able to slip in that he’s not intending on going to college and Claudia seems to believe in him anyhow, which makes him feel loved and full in a small, small way.

Steve tells himself he needs to give the folio to Dustin in person and ends up lying on the couch in the Wheelers’ basement while the four boy-children play their dramatic game that involves talking to each other in voices and rolling a lot of dice and sometimes shouting about complicated rules.

Nancy’s just visited Emerson College, and Mrs. Wheeler apparently can’t stop talking about that. Meanwhile, Mike is irritated enough about the attention Nancy’s gotten that he can’t stop talking about that.

“I don’t think you should worry about not going to college, Steve,” Dustin says to him. “I’ll support you in your old age when I’m a super rich, world famous scientist.”

“Do scientists get rich?” Steve asks.

“Of course,” Lucas sneers.

“Okay,” Steve sighs. “I’ll start charging you interest on that folio, then.”

Dustin says, “No problem, mom.”

Steve falls asleep on the couch to the sound of the boys’ game. He wakes up to the sight of Nancy Wheeler standing over him, frowning. Her lavender sweater looks very soft.

“Your hair looks nice,” he says, because it looks like she’s put a lot of effort into it.

“Oh, Steve,” she sighs. “Are you staying for dinner?” she asks, and he starts to nod before remembering that his parents are at home.

“I’ll be in deep shit with mom and dad if I don’t head home,” Steve says. Nancy’s frown deepens, and she looks much older than her seventeen years.

He wants to ask, were you in love with Jonathan the whole time? But the thought flits out of his mind as quickly as it had come. It would be mean to ask, he thinks, to dig up old pain for no reason. He squeezes her narrow shoulder, the size of it making him think of a bird, or a porcelain doll. She covers his hand with hers and leans up to chastely kiss his cheek. He leaves through the back door.

 

Monday, Steve has a morning shower. He’s tenderly brushing the pads of his fingers over his hole, wondering whether he should try to fill it with the handle of his shower brush.

Steve enjoys the same fantasy he’s been having all weekend, since Eddie left: Eddie is on him, in him, surrounding him. He’s pushing that fattest bit of his dick into the straining rim of Steve’s hole. He’s whispering to Steve while he’s doing it: yes, baby, yes, feels so good for me. He pushes and pushes until suddenly he’s inside, and Steve is so full he’s aching, so full he’ll combust, so full he’ll never feel empty again.

The brush handle is not Eddie, but it’s something: a weak orgasm as he rests his face against the tile wall, sperm swimming toward the drain.

Downstairs, his mother is awake, wiping down counters in her velour robe. She chatters at him in a benign way, something about new wallpaper in the downstairs bathroom. He sits drinking orange juice, wondering what Eddie looks like in the morning at home, how different he could be from the Eddie that awoke in his bedroom that Saturday morning.

At school, Steve nervously wonders whether Eddie will show. It’s maybe a split chance whether he’ll come at all, and either way, the first class of the day is not happening. Steve wonders whether Eddie even remembers what class he has first period.

But during second, Eddie walks in. He’s trying to be silent, creeping toward his desk with wet hair, but Steve is like a bloodhound, having watched the door out of the corner of his eye all morning.

The teacher, turned toward the board, drawls something about a late pass. Eddie grimaces. Steve’s heart leaps in its chest.

Steve spends the rest of the period trying not to look at Eddie. He has only a semi-perfect view, because he can see one shoulder, and his neck, and a bit of his face. His wallet chains clink against the metal of the chair. His bony knees point to the sides. His hair dries to a frizzy mass while Steve stares at him. Steve imagines himself combing conditioner through Eddie’s hair as they both stand damp and shirtless in their shared bathroom. Bizarrely, he imagines braiding it. He doesn’t know how to braid, but maybe Erica or Max will want to teach him.

Steve doesn’t even notice the clock creeping toward the passing period. When the bell rings, he loses a minute putting together all of his things. He curses quietly, frantically refilling his book bag.

When he leaves the classroom, he spots Eddie standing among his friends. Steve approaches.

He doesn’t waste time considering the social implications of all of this.

“Hey,” he says. He’s stopped. One hand holds his bag. The other is in his pocket. He’s clean, and moisturized, and his hair is great. He has no reason to worry.

Eddie’s eyebrows bob on his forehead. He says, “Steve! Hi.”

“I had fun this weekend,” Steve says, because it’s true, and it’s what he would say to a girl he likes in this situation.

Steve has never had to worry about what to say. The script is easily accessible in his head. It is clear, and honest, and friendly, because Steve is a friendly, normal guy, and people like him.

But Eddie falters. This is when Steve notices that all of Eddie’s friends are being weird.

Normally, when Steve approaches a chattering friend group to talk to one person, the others either join in talking to Steve or they continue to talk to each other. All of Eddie’s friends have stopped speaking entirely. They frame Eddie like a wedding party, turned slightly toward him as they all stare, blankly and unsmiling, at Steve.

Steve decides to try again.

“We should hang out again,” he says.

One boy, short and sharp looking, says, “What?”

There’s a girl who turns to stare at Eddie. Steve wonders if she’s jealous of Eddie’s attention. He wouldn’t blame her. Completely irrationally, his chest feels hot and tight, just thinking about Eddie looking at her.

She asks, “When did you hang out?”

“Um,” Eddie says.

“This weekend,” Steve says, plainly and a little confused, because he just said that.

“What is happening?” another boy asks, his eyes darting between Steve and Eddie.

“Is this a prank?” asks the short boy.

“Uh,” Steve says, “Maybe we can talk at the game?”

“The game?” the taller boy shouts.

None of them is speaking to Steve, but rather out loud to each other. Steve wonders if they know they’re being rude. He doesn’t know how to say that without being rude himself, so he just looks around at them.

“Okay, maybe we just—relax? For a minute?” Eddie prompts, but that sends up a roar of disbelief from his friends. The girl seems particularly disgusted, and the short boy actually stomps his foot.

“You’re saying this actually happened?” the girl asks.

A taller boy with coiling hair asks Eddie, “How did you even meet?”

“Uh,” Eddie says, “Church?”

The girl whirls toward Steve, asking, “Is this about drugs?”

Steve frowns, not liking the bitter associations that are being drawn. He doesn’t like doing drugs. He likes Eddie.

Steve starts, “It’s not about—”

“Then what is it?” she snaps, protectively.

Steve says the first thing that occurs to him.

“I like him.”

The group looks at him, especially Eddie. The boy with the curly hair, his mouth is open in a sort of cherubic “o”.

“You—what would you like about him?” the short boy asks.

Steve thinks to himself: say something. Say something not gay.

His shoes.

That would he stupid. But—he does like Eddie’s shoes: scuffed black army surplus boots. He likes everything about Eddie.

“Are you headed this way, Steve?” Eddie asks suddenly, pointing a thumb.

Steve is not headed that way; he nods anyway and begins to walk with Eddie. The students in the hall seem to part from either side of them, looking on like they’re a float in a parade.

Now that they’re away from Eddie’s friends, Steve is relieved, but still confused. To soothe himself, Steve thinks about holding Eddie’s hand, maybe one day. One set of fingers flexes into his bag strap, the other into his palm.

Eddie is walking fast, and for the first time Steve considers that he might be angry with Steve for approaching him at school. Warmth cascades down his front.

Steve realizes he’s being led somewhere. He thinks fondly about Nancy, dragging him toward the shore of the lake. Nancy, telling him where they’ll meet. Nancy, telling him what shoes to wear. He thinks: I should send her a card.

Eddie’s made a few turns, past the vending machines and the science wing and the smoking lounge, and he opens a door.

They’re in the AV room: a windowless almost-closet stacked floor-to-ceiling with tapes and equipment. It’s not a pretty scene, but just the fact he’s here with Eddie casts a feeling of romance over the area. People will stand here, years in the future, where they stand. Maybe they’ll kiss. Steve hopes for a kiss.

Eddie rounds on Steve, his hands raised expressively. His mouth is moving silently.

He says, “Uh.”

Steve decides to try again.

“I had fun this weekend,” Steve says, “We should—hang out again?”

“I’m going to have to come out to them,” Eddie says. His face is pale, his mouth set in a line.

“What?” Steve asks.

“Tell them I’m gay,” Eddie says, nodding, wiping his face. “They’ll think it’s weird, but that’s fine. It’s the only way to explain what this is.”

Steve frowns, his eyebrows meeting in the middle of his face. He adjusts his backpack, sliding his other shoulder under the strap so it’s on completely.

“This? Us hanging out?” he asks, sadly, “What’s so weird about us hanging out?”

Eddie blinks with surprise. He says simply, “You are popular.”

Steve grimaces. He says, “I’m not popular.”

Eddie’s confusion is evident. He says, “Yes… you are?”

“My best friend is thirteen years old,” Steve says. “I spend more time in a middle schooler’s basement than at parties.”

Eddie blinks. “What exactly—do you do in a middle schooler’s basement?”

Steve shrugs, “Mostly talk, while they play dungeons and dragons.”

Eddie’s eyebrows press into his hairline. “I—”

“Would that help?” Steve asks, and, feeling his heart and his stomach sliding to his knees, “Do you really think that’s the only way to explain it?”

“Well—”

“Is that… is that the only way this works?” Steve asks. He feels himself becoming small and vulnerable. He feels like he could fit in Eddie’s shirt pocket, and suddenly wishes he could, that he could just be carried everywhere while listening to the timbre of his voice, the thump, thump, thump of his heart.

Eddie’s mouth is dark pink, a little red, where it hangs open. His hands are both in his pockets. Steve wants to hold them again.

“You said you like me,” Eddie says. “Why?”

Steve steps forward. He knows this part, and it’s maybe the only thing he does too well.

“You’re nice to me,” he says, inching a little bit more toward Eddie. “And you’re really smart and creative. And you look really good.”

“Shit,” Eddie exhales, and Steve cheers on the inside: Eddie’s hands are coming out of his pockets, his arms wrapping around Steve.

“I like your shoes,” Steve says. He leans into the hug, wrapping his arms around Eddie, stroking his back, up and down, up and down. He says, “And your hair.”

“I like your hair too,” Eddie laughs, “And your—everything. I like you too.”

Steve pulls back, because he feels it: behind the softness of their honesty, there’s a frisson of heat. He looks at Eddie, and Eddie’s looking at him, too, looking at his mouth.

Eddie’s mouth tastes so good. It’s not just the cold, clear taste of his skin in the winter, or the dry, slightly chapped texture of his lips, or the smell of him and his breath, but everything wrapped together. Their mouths press together again, and Steve happily relaxes against Eddie, and whines a little, luxuriating in the feeling of being kissed, and held, and liked.

They kiss again, and again, Steve leaning toward Eddie like a plant toward the sun. Eddie chuckles.

“Go back to class, baby,” Eddie says, smiling.

“I want you,” Steve says, content but honest.

“Baby, I know,” Eddie laughs, “But I’m not gonna fuck you in the AV room.”

“But you’ll fuck me later?” Steve asks, suddenly animated. He feels like he’s been a hundred years since Saturday afternoon, when Eddie fucked him, when Eddie put his come in Steve’s hole.

“Your parents still home?” Eddie asks.

“Shit. Yes,” Steve says, but then, “You came to see me.”

“I did,” Eddie nods. “I couldn’t wait.”

“You’re the sweetest thing,” Steve says, smiling. He touches Eddie’s face, and Eddie closes his eyes as he leans into Steve’s hand.

“You’ll come to my place, then?” Eddie asks, “It’ll be empty until late tonight.”

Steve fills with warmth. His body zings with happiness. He nods. Eddie kisses him again, and they’re both late to class.

 

After school, Eddie is leaning against his van when Steve’s car rolls into the bare patch of dirt next to it.

He whistles low as Steve exits the vehicle, says, “The neighbors will certainly talk.”

Steve’s brow pinches as he asks, “About me?”

“About the beemer,” Eddie says, nodding toward Steve’s car.

“Oh,” Steve says, “Sorry. I don’t really think about it.”

“Saying sorry for his beemer,” Eddie says, shaking his head. “You know you’re adorable?”

Steve beams, “I’ve been told.”

“Come on,” Eddie says, gesturing with his head toward the door, “Your throne awaits.”

Steve waits until they’re inside to ask, “My throne?”

“If you’re willing to sit on it,” Eddie says, and Steve barks a laugh as Eddie leads him toward the back room. The trailer isn’t warm, but it doesn’t matter, because Steve’s body is suffused with heat. Even his fingers feel incandescent as Eddie touches them, holding his hand in the safety of the house. The wood paneling of the walls reminds Steve of a basement, the way it feels like everyone is more at home where they gather to watch a movie, shoes already off, blankets draped around the couch.

Eddie’s room is not clean. Steve’s mom would never allow him to keep such a space, but he can’t think about that for long, or catalogue many details, because all he cares about is Eddie, whose face he can suddenly see.

“I want you,” Steve says, “I’ve been thinking about it for days.”

“It hasn’t been days,” Eddie says with a genuine smile. He takes Steve’s mouth in a biting kiss, his sharp white teeth embracing Steve’s lips.

Steve touches his face, his warm ears, the long and stubbled column of his neck. The collar of his leather jacket is cool to the touch where he grips it, and he shoves it off of Eddie’s shoulders to find the warm rumples of a flannel shirt underneath. He starts unbuttoning it while Eddie’s hands pull his shirts out of the belted waistband of his jeans, roam up and under his undershirt.

Steve groans. He wants to be touched.

Eddie’s hands touch his front, where the hair gets thick, brushing his thumbs under the slight bulge of his chest, then into the valley of his breastbone, out again, until they’re in his armpits, pushing his shirts up, then over his head.

“No fair,” Steve murmurs, as this pushes their lips apart.

Luckily, Eddie’s shirt is unbuttoned, and Steve does away with it, hastily pulling off Eddie’s undershirt as well. His chest is just as pale and finely haired as it was two days ago, but Steve is drooling for it, wanting to taste every freckle dotted across the breadth of his chest, his stomach, his shoulders. A necklace hangs under the dip between his collarbones, and Steve wants to bite it.

Instead, he kisses Eddie again, and feels the press of their warm chests together. His eyes feel wet under the lashes as he savors the feeling.

It’s nothing like with a girl. It’s large, and all-encompassing, and he doesn’t feel like he’s holding something small, but it’s delicate and worthy of protecting all the same.

His hips buck into Eddie’s, and Eddie’s buck back. Eddie is holding the back of his hips and grinding into him as they kiss, and Steve feels indulgent, like he’s being fanned and fed grapes on the balcony of a castle.

Eddie leads Steve to his bed, which is a bit larger than his, but lower to the ground. There’s nothing but a sheet on it, so Steve sits down and brings his legs up to begin to push off his jeans and underwear. Eddie helps, pulling them off while looking plainly into Steve’s eyes, his own eyes saucer-big, barely blinking.

“Now you,” Steve says, coming forward to undo Eddie’s belt.

Eddie’s hips are tilted toward his face, at eye level, and Steve looks up the broad planes and curves of Eddie’s body. Eddie looks down at him, and Steve wonders at his luck as he tucks his fingertips into the waistband of Eddie’s plaid boxers.

And there it is, this precious and warm part of him, huge for him, for Steve, hard and bobbing between Eddie’s legs as he steps out of his pants.

Steve wraps a hand around it, looking between it and Eddie’s face.

“Fuck me now?” he asks.

Eddie nods, looking from Steve’s face toward the rest of his body and back.

“I’ll fuck you, baby,” Eddie says.

He looks toward a small wooden bed stand whose top is filled with objects, then steps toward it, the strong lines of his pale legs making Steve sigh. He pulls a drawer open.

“Never thought I’d get to use this for its intended purpose,” he chuckles, showing Steve what looks like a tube of ointment. The dark blue text reads differently: K-Y Lubricating Jelly.

“Oh,” Steve says. “Can we open it?”

“Your wish is my command,” Eddie says, and kneels next to Steve on the bed.

“Do you want to?” he asks, “Or can I?”

Steve nods as he lies back. He wants Eddie to touch him, so he opens his legs and tries to beckon him, stroking his arm. Eddie squeezes lube onto his fingertips, then with a determined face, crouches between Steve’s legs.

The first touches of lube are cold. It’s not unlike Steve’s vegetable oil: slippery, not yet warm. The most wonderful thing about Eddie’s hands is that they’re Eddie’s—smaller than Steve’s but under Eddie’s control, so Steve is able to sink into the mattress while his hole is stroked with the pads of Eddie’s fingers, which work to relax him. Then, he’s entered.

Steve groans.

Eddie’s fingers work in and out of him. He wants to close his eyes, but he loves looking at Eddie, too: his beautiful mouth, the round tip of his nose. His arm, lean and moving as he thrusts his fingers into Steve.

Eddie puts more lube into Steve, coating his fingertips several times and reaching into him, working to create a space, Steve thinks, a space for his dick.

“I want it,” he says as he thinks of Eddie’s dick.

“I know, baby,” Eddie says, “Just a bit more.”

“I want it,” he begs, as Eddie’s four fingers fill him.

If younger Steve could’ve known that he’d be filled like this, Steve thinks, he’d be amazed. He wants to go back in time and show himself this, this luck.

“I’ll give it to you, baby,” Eddie says, “Try like this?”

Steve nods. He can’t imagine sitting up right now, moving from this spot where he’s sunk into the mattress.

“Please?” he asks.

“Yeah,” Eddie says. He’s on his knees, and strokes the lube up and around his dick, “Of course, baby.”

“I love when you call me that,” Steve says, his words almost slurring.

Eddie smiles, his laugh low and gentle. He says, “Anything you want, okay? I’ll call you anything you want.”

“Call me baby,” Steve says.

“Baby,” Eddie says, smiling as he places himself close to Steve, ready to fuck him.

“Baby,” he says, and points the tip of his dick to Steve’s hole. The head of it pushes, wet and enormous, inside of Steve. The pain roars, but it’s gentler than before, and part of Steve misses it, the first burning stretch he’d felt.

Yes, Steve’s body says, Yes, and the sparks that fill his vision are made of joy.

“It’s in,” Eddie says quietly, as if Steve wouldn’t know.

Steve is making some sort of noise, a moan he didn’t expect. His body flutters around Eddie, and he bids himself relax, allow it in, let yourself be filled.

“Hnnn,” he seems to say, wants to say I love you, because he does.

Eddie pushes farther. It’s thicker just below the head. He tells his body: relax.

“That’s it, baby,” Eddie says, leaning further into Steve’s body, slipping out and then in by the millimeter.

“More,” Steve begs. It’s already not enough, not when he knows there’s more.

“Yeah,” Eddie says, and pushes.

Steve feels himself bear down and breathes through the pain. It’s incredible, the knowledge that his hole is stretched so wide, that he’s been made so full. He wants to come already, just knowing that Eddie is inside of him. He feels his pulse in his hole, hot as the skin is stretched wide.

There’s a sudden release. Eddie exhales, a gust of a sigh that sounds disbelieving. They’ve made it past the thickest point.

“Oh fuck,” Eddie says, “Steve, oh fuck, you’re incredible.”

Tears wet the corners of Steve’s eyes.

“Eddie,” he says.

“Baby,” Eddie says, and his hips grind back and forward, seemingly of their own volition, “Baby, you feel so good.”

“More,” Steve says, “Keep going.”

Eddie laughs, a manic but tender thing: “I can try.”

“Please,” Steve says, stroking Eddie’s arm where he holds himself up.

Eddie slides further in, easier now that the thickest part is inside, but still so difficult, stretching and burning. Steve feels full in a way he never has as Eddie stares down at him in disbelieving awe.

“That’s it,” he says finally, “that’s everything.”

“Everything,” Steve echoes.

“You took it all,” Eddie marvels. “Fuck, you took it all.”

“I want it,” Steve says, “I want you.”

“It’s all yours,” Eddie says, warbling.

“Please,” Steve begs.

He lifts his ass to thrust his hole onto Eddie’s dick, sending a punched-out sound from Eddie. This is like a green light—they start to truly fuck, moving back and forth on to each other, slowly at first and building to a rhythm. Eddie’s huge inside of Steve, moving through him and setting each of his nerves on fire in a way nothing has before.

Eddie’s able to pull Steve’s legs into his arms, and Steve reaches for him, touching his hands, his arms, his face.

Eddie leans down for a biting kiss, and Steve laughs as Eddie smiles with all of his teeth.
“Is that good?” Steve asks, and Eddie laughs again.

“I’m fucking the hottest guy I’ve ever seen,” Eddie says, “and he likes me.”

Steve lunges up for a kiss.

“Will you come for me?” Eddie asks, “I want to feel it around me.”

“I’m so close,” Steve says, because he is. Just the size of Eddie inside of him is pressing on every nerve he has, and he already knows it’s going to be a years-long orgasm, something he’ll be able to feel when he closes his eyes at night.

Before he’s touched himself for even a minute, it’s shooting through him. Eddie says something, but the sound of it just massages his brain without penetrating. His muscles spasm, his vision fades. He’s still coming when Eddie shouts—Steve opens his eyes to Eddie’s face as he comes. It’s tight enough inside of his hole that he can feel every spasm of Eddie’s dick as it shoots into him.

Eddie sags against him, but pulls back so that Steve’s legs can fall from being pressed against his belly. He’s smiling at Steve, face and neck flushed, hair a frizzy mass.

He’s still inside of Steve. Steve never wants him to pull out, even as he feels the warmth of Eddie’s come start to pool around his hole.

As their pulses and breathing slow, they look at one another. Steve’s legs fall, and Eddie slips out of him.

Steve scoots to the side in invitation, allowing Eddie to lie back beside him. Eddie pulls a flannel sheet and a worn looking quilt from the crack between the mattress and the wall, and Steve gratefully tucks in to Eddie’s side when he pulls it over them.

“How did this happen?” Eddie asks, his breathing still labored, his pulse still strong under his skin.

“What do you mean?”

“We never talked before this week,” Eddie says. “And now you’re—we’re—”

“Yeah?” Steve asks.

Eddie’s mouth moves. Steve feels him shrug.

“When does your Uncle come home?” Steve asks.

“Around nine, tonight,” Eddie says, “but you don’t need to worry about clearing out.”

“Yeah?” Steve asks.

“No. He’ll want to meet you, I think.”

“Me?” Steve asks. “He won’t be—confused? Like your friends?”

“My friends aren’t confused anymore,” Eddie says.

Steve raises his head, a little, trying to look at Eddie’s eyes. Eddie glances down at him.

“Don’t worry,” Eddie says, “They won’t say anything.”

“What do they know?” Steve asks.

Eddie grips Steve’s shoulder. His heart is beating like he’s nervous.

“I told them we’re together,” Eddie says, and Steve can’t help the smile that melts onto his face.

“Yeah?” Steve asks. He can tell it sounds sleepy and soft.

“So how about it?” Eddie asks. “Will you pity this poor knave, and his over-large scabbard?”

“I don’t know what that means,” Steve says, propping himself up to look down at Eddie, “but I want you to be my boyfriend.”

“Wayne will like you,” Eddie says, smiling. “Someone who watches sports.”

“He won’t freak out?” Steve asks, “when you come out?”

Eddie shakes his head. “I did him when I was nine.”

“What?”

“Yep. Just told him I don’t like girls, and I liked a boy. He told me that was fine.”

Steve looks toward his face. He feels Eddie shift, then melt back into his hold. Steve asks, “You liked a boy?”

He hears Eddie’s lips pull back from his teeth in a smile.

“Yeah,” Eddie says. “Wayne told me not to say anything, because people wouldn’t understand.”

“So you never knew?” Steve asks, “if… maybe he liked you too.”

Eddie wraps a hand around Steve’s shoulder, pulling his naked body closer to Eddie’s. The length of Eddie’s body, bones corded with tendons and tissue, cradles Steve’s. Even though Eddie’s no longer inside of him, Steve feels perfectly full, the most content he’s perhaps ever felt. The beast that is his hole is bedded down, sleeping happily.

“Don’t worry about that, baby,” Eddie says, rubbing Steve’s arm as he settles back into Eddie’s side. “Looks like it all worked out for me."

Notes:

I know Steve is the one with the scabbard here, but Eddie is a dweeb who likes the word scabbard.

Some of you know that I spend most of my hours either being a teacher or a mom. It's a joy to find an hour or two to write these two dweebs in love with each other. Thank you for being part of that. If you ever want to talk some more I'm on bluesky at fayefaye.

Thank you especially to Mads, Liana, and Tay, who've been talking to me a lot recently and making me feel more human. And Tukru, who named a few chapters when I couldn't think of appropriate Hole songs. And sweetpea and moon and anna, who comment on literally everything I post. And everyone who hopped on to twitter to say anything to me. You made me feel great.

The reaction to this fic has been pretty wild, and I love engaging with people over this bizarre hobby of ours. Let me know what you think and what worked for you, and if you see any typos, cause you know I don't beta this shit. Thank you again.