Atomic | Eddie Munson

11

This chapter contains mentions of intrusive thoughts and self harm. Read at your own discretion.

At some point Eddie fell asleep, feeling content with Katherine in his arms. They slept like that for hours, soft snores coming from each of them. Katherine had actually woken up briefly at some point while the two of them were asleep. She lifted her head to look at Eddie, who to her surprise was asleep. Barely even thinking since she was still half asleep, she reached and moved a strand of hair from his face and pressed a light kiss to his cheek. She then leaned her head back on his chest and fell back asleep to the sound of his heart beat. She didn't realize that Wayne was sitting at the kitchen counter and could see the whole thing.

The older man smiled at the teens. He had never seen anyone care for his nephew like Katherine did. Even more surprisingly, he had never seen Eddie care for someone the way he did for Katherine. Wayne never knew Eddie to be particularly affectionate around other people. Sure, Eddie had brought girls over for a night in the past, but he never kept them around for very long. 

Katherine was different, whether she knew it or not. She was the one person Eddie always wanted to be around. 

Eventually, Katherine woke up for real. She rolled over slightly, but fell off the couch, causing Eddie to wake up.

"Ow," Katherine muttered, rubbing her arm that she just hit on the coffee table. Eddie laughed a bit while he helped her sit up. 

"You okay?" Eddie asked. Katherine nodded and then looked at her watch. 1:18.

"Oh, fuck," Katherine said, reaching for her jacket that she had taken off when she briefly woken up earlier. Eddie looked at her watch to check the time, but also noticed the burn that was on her arm. He looked at her with a frown but didn't mention it.

"I'll drive you home," he said, walking to grab his keys. Katherine shrugged on her jacket and grabbed her bag, making sure all of her things were inside. She didn't realize her copy of 1984 was still on the coffee table.

Eddie came back out with his keys and the two walked out of the trailer after Katherine had said goodbye to Wayne who had the night off. 

Once they were in the van, Eddie decided to confront Katherine.

"So... what's that on your arm?" Eddie asked awkwardly. Katherine turned to look at him. She didn't realize that he had seen it, and now there was no hiding it.

"Uh, nothing," she said, pretending not to know what he was talking about as she subconsciously moved her arm away from his view, despite it being covered by her jacket. Eddie rolled his eyes at her and stopped the van. 

"Don't play dumb with me. I saw the burn Katie. Just about the right size to be a cigarette, don't you think?" he asked rhetorically. Katherine sighed, not really knowing how to talk about it.

"Okay. You caught me. So what?" she replied. 

"So what? Katie, did someone do this to you?" Eddie asked. He was worried that it was Andy during their argument at the quarry. Katherine shook her head and placed her hand into Eddie's, lacing their fingers together.

"No. I did it," Katherine said, running her thumb against the back of his hand gently. 

"What?" Eddie was clearly confused. Katherine sighed once more. She couldn't believe she was about to admit this. Not even Steve or Robin knew about it.

"So, remember when I first started buying from you a few years ago?" she asked. He nodded. "Basically, a bunch of shit went on, and is still going on, in my life that I don't really know how to process all that well. I'm working on it but it's hard. Sometimes it's like the inside of my head gets really loud, I guess is the best way to describe it. And sometimes when it gets too loud, I get these intrusive thoughts in my head. Sometimes it's not so bad, but other times, it just gets louder and louder and won't go away until I do it. Like, my skin feels like it's on fire until I do it. So when I was at the quarry and the whole thing with Andy went down, I started smoking, but then my brain was all like 'shove the burning cigarette into your skin' and the thought wouldn't go away, so I just did it," Katherine admitted, not looking Eddie in the eyes.