Don't You Want Me? ✵ Steve Harrington

Chapter 57

The quinet cautiously approached Reefer Rick's house. For a drug dealer, Kim thought it looked pretty nice – right off of Lover's Lake, a boat house, it even had decent curb appeal and a little homey wreath on the front door.
   
Dustin rang the doorbell repeatedly, causing the rest of the group to share looks of annoyance.
   
"Okay, Well, that's settled," Steve sighed. "I guess he's not here."
   
Dustin took to wrapping on the door. "Eddie! It's Dustin!"
   
"Great," Steve rolled his eyes.
   
"Look, we just want to talk, okay," Dustin continued to ignore Steve. "Eddie! Rick! Reefer Rick!"
   
"Don't scream that!" Steve whispered yelled.
   
"Call down, Stevie boy," Kim smirked, trying to get a look through the front window.
   
"What, you think it's a good idea for your little brother to be pounding down a drug dealer's door? Cause I don't," Steve replied.
   
Dustin, Steve, and Kim fell into their usual bickering while Max started to wander off. With her flashlight she scanned the wooded property, eyes landing on the boat house. "Hey, guys?" she called.
   
Steve, Robin, Kim, and Dustin stumbled after her. Once they saw what Max had found they all exchanged nervous glances. Kim was the first one to walk forward, the rest of the group quickly falling into line behind her. She pushed open the unlocked door, shining her flashlight around for any sign of Eddie Munson.
   
"Hello? Is anyone home?" Robin called from right behind her.
   
The group crept inside. The dark, damp boat house felt strangely eerie and it made Kim's chest tighten with nerves and anxiety.
   
"What a dump," Steve muttered. He grabbed an oar off the wall, slowly approaching the boat in the middle of the room and beginning to prod at it.
   
Dustin jumped as the tarp that covered the boat crackled. "What are you doing?"
   
"He might be in here," Steve said like it was obvious.
   
"So take the tarp off," Dustin suggested, rolling his eyes.
   
"If you're so brave, you take the tarp off," Steve argued.
   
"Hey, look over here," Max waved the other two girls over to the table covered in beer, packs of cigarettes, and fast food wrappers. "Someone was here."
   
"Maybe he heard us," Robin said. "Got spooked and ran."
   
Kim glanced at her friend out of the corner of her eye. "Why do you have a way of making everything sound creepy?"
   
Robin held her flashlight up to her face like she was telling a ghost story. "OoOoOo!"

"Don't worry, Steve will get him with his oar," Dustin said sarcastically.
   
"I know you think you're being funny, Henderson, but considering everyone in this room has nearly died about a hundred times, personally, I don't find it funny in the slight–"
   
The tarp was thrown off of the boat from the inside and Eddie Muson jumped out, slamming Steve against the wall and pressing a shard of a broken beer bottle to his throat like a knife.
   
The group screamed in protest, but Dustin was the most coherent. "Whoa, whoa, whoa, Eddie! Eddie, stop! Eddie!"
   
The crazed looking boy turned to glare at the younger one. Kim never thought that Eddie could be capable of hurting anyone but in that moment he looked terrified and desperate. That was not a good combination.
   
"It's me, Dustin. This is Steve. He's not gonna hurt you, right, Steve?"
   
"Right, yeah," Steve breathed, trying not to move.
   
"Steve, why don't you drop the oar?" Dustin suggested, trying to stay calm.
   
The oar clanked to the ground, but Eddie only pressed his make-shift-knife harder into Steve's throat. It took every ounce of Kim's will power not to tackle Eddie to the ground as blood seeped from her boyfriend's neck.
   
"He's cool, he's cool," Dustin said, a bit more panicked.
   
"I'm cool, man. I'm cool," Steve repeated.
   
"What are you doing here?" Eddie questioned harshly.
   
"We're looking for you," Dustin answered.
   
"We're here to help," Robin added.
   
"Eddie, these are my friends," Dustin said slowly, trying not to startle him. "You know Robin, from band."
   
The loveablely awkward girl imitated playing her trumpet.
   
"And you know Kimmy too, my cool older sister, remember? You guys get along. This is my friend Max, the one who never wants to play D and D. Eddie, we're on your side. I swear on my mother, right, guys?"
   
"Yes, yes we swear," Max echoed.
   
"On Dustin and Kimmy's mother," Robin nodded.
   
Eddie looked to Kim for confirmation. She nodded slowly, trying to telepathically communicate to him that it was going to be okay.
   
He let go of Steve and walked away from the group, still wary and trying to put some distance between them.
   
"Are you okay?" Kim asked, crouching down in front of Steve.
   
"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine, whatever. Don't worry about it," he waved her off, wiping away the small trickle of blood on his neck. After a moment he looked back up at her. "You know him?"

"What?" Kim asked, eyebrows drawn together in confusion.

"Dustin said that you guys knew each other," Steve clarified. "You never told me that."

"Oh, I guess I didn't think it was that important," Kim muttered, helping Steve stand back up but unable to look him directly in the eye.

Dustin slowly approached the panicked older boy. "Eddie, we just want to talk. Okay?"

"We want to know what happened," Robin added.

Eddie sniffled. "You won't believe me."

"Try us," Max shrugged.

Eddie took a deep breath, sneaking a glance at Kim again before he started to explain what had happened. Chrissy and the drugs. Chrissy unresponsive. Chrissy floating in the air. Chrissy's bones snapping before his very eyes before she crumpled to the floor in a dead heap of limbs.

"Her eyes, man," Eddie mumbled. "I-it was like there was something, like, inside her head, pulling. I-I didn't know what to do, so I... I ran away. I left her there."

The rest of the group stood in stunned silence. They had dealt with some strange things, but this was even a little gruesome even for them.

Eddie scoffed and shook his head of dark curly hair. "You all think I'm crazy, right?"

"No," Dustin said quickly. "We don't think you're crazy."

"Don't bullshit me, man!" Eddie snapped, head in his hands. "I know how this sounds."

"We're not bullshitting you," Kim piped up, finally speaking to him for the first time that night.

"We believe you," Robin agreed.

Eddie's eyes were on Kim as he exhaled loudly. Steve's eyes flicked between the two; there was something about this that he didn't like one bit.

Kim walked forward and joined her brother right in front of Eddie. "Look, what I'm about to tell you might be a little difficult to take."

"Okay," Eddie nodded slowly, a look of confusion painted on his features.

She took a deep breath, trying to figure out where to even start. "You know how people say Hawkins is cursed? They're not way off." Kim did her best to explain the Upsidedown and her and her friend's encounters with the monsters from it.

"That night, did you see anything?" Robin asked.

"Dark particles, maybe?" Max added.

Eddie shook his head, still wondering if they were messing with him and how they came up with such an elaborate story.

"It would almost look like dust, swirling dust," Dustin explained.

"No, man, there was nothing you could see or, uh, or touch," Eddie shook his head, trying to will the image of Chrissy's corpse out of his head. "You know, I tried to wake her. She couldn't move. It was like she was in a trance or something."

"Or under a spell," Dustin realized.

Eddie seemed to realize where Dustin was going with this. "A curse."

Dustin nodded, the wheels turning frantically in his head. "Vecna's curse."

"Who's Vecna?" Steve asked, incredibly confused.

"An undead creature of great power," Dustin said ominously.

"A spell caster," Eddie added.

"A dark wizard."