idiot - steddie

Fourteen

(Act as if Robin can drive for the sake of this chapter, you will thank me later.)

After awhile of driving down the long, winding streets of Hawkins, Indiana, I stopped. Not only was my hand tired and knee hurting, but I couldn't stand Eddie behind me, staring at the side of my neck as Nancy and I conversed, laughing and smiling with each other. I had glanced back at him a couple times when we came across stop signs, and whenever I did he scoffed and turned his head the other direction. It was clear that he was just an teensy bit jealous of me and Nancy, so, as one good friend does to another, I handed over the driver's seat to Robin, giving her an opening to talk to Nancy in a more flirtatious way than I had with her. So I could deal with the man behind me.

I sat down next to Eddie, grunting as I regained feeling in my ass from the difference in seating. He looked over at me, an established look of desire hiding behind his eyes. "Bonjour, Harrington." He greeted me with a soft-spoken smile, I turned to him, meeting his already lingering eye. "Good day to you, Munson." I mimicked his greeting in an accent I couldn't even figure out myself. It sounded a bit country. He rolled his eyes and smiled, slapping my clothed thigh with the back of his palm, the metal rings on his finger adding more pained to the hit. "Idiot. Texas isn't in France." He chuckled.

I looked down at his hand on my thigh, resting there like a top hat on a magician's head. A perfect match. He slowly turned his wrist the other way, sprawling his fingers across my knee, causing me to inhale as he crept his hand down towards my inner thigh, and I squeezed back a noise of excitement at the soft pressure he added once he reached his destination.

He smiled knowingly as he brought his hand away from my thigh, his hair covering the sides of his face while I looked at him, head turned away from me and staring forward at the wall above another tiny bench that was unoccupied.

His lips parted, "Are we going to talk about it.. or just.. forget it happened." He said, his eyes not meeting mine as the words fell from his mouth, and the sentence hung in the air like a balloon about to pop. I bit my lip, my teeth sinking deeper and deeper into it, deep enough to draw blood at the time a slow, cheesy song began playing on the stolen RV's radio as the latest song tuned out with a slow guitar riff.

I snorted at the irony of the moment, trying to avoid the straightforward question he had asked me. "Not the first time I heard that coming from you." I said, bumping my knee against his. Eddie chuckled, looking down as he shook his head back and forth. He took his time bringing his face out of the position it was hanging over his legs in, his eyes locking onto mine.

"And it won't be the last. Not until you answer my question once and for all, Harrington."

I felt my heart ache at the impact of his words, and I couldn't muster up the courage to continue meeting his piercing brown eyes. I had been avoiding that question for so long, and the second time was nearly a success until that freak saw through me. But hell, who was I calling a freak? He was anything but that. He was one of the most beautiful and worthy guys I had met. He had practically shown me that I could move on from Nancy after all those years. Move on from her and go to him. But it was such a hard thing to do. I didn't know what I was. I wasn't gay enough to fit that label, and I wasn't straight enough to fit into that category either, so I was just.. in the middle.

Yet, all I knew was that I was falling for him. Hard, and I was so close to hitting the floor without him catching me. And I knew whatever I said next would probably mess everything up, in a good way or a bad way. I just had to keep to my promise that I wouldn't hurt him.

Eddie silenced himself, setting his head on his hand, looking anywhere but at me. Like he had signed a lifelong contact to, "Ignore Steve Harrington at all costs." And to be real, I did the same. The only contact between us was our knees pressing against each other, and the unspoken questions bubbling in an invisible pot in the air above us.