Four Times Someone Asked Steve to Stay. One Time They Stayed for Steve.

Max 'Maxine' Mayfield

The trailer park was mostly deserted because of the late hour, only a few of the homes still had their lights on. Steve pulled into the familiar driveway and spared a fleeting look to Eddie's old trailer.

Quickly, he grabbed the skateboard from his backseat and tucked it under his arm.

Steve intended to just drop it off by the door for Max to find in the morning since he knew that it was her main mode of transportation outside of him when he hesitated, almost tripping over his own feet on the uneven ground. Max was sat on the small porch, wearing nothing but her thin set of pyjamas and a zip-up jacket that had been thrown on over the top.

When Steve got closer, he noticed the dark circles beneath her eyes.

He approached carefully and ensured that he made enough noise that he didn't scare her half to death by appearing out of nowhere; Max's eyes jumped to him almost instantly the moment that he stepped into her line of sight. Her shoulders tensed up by her ears but she didn't change her position where her knees were tucked in close, arms wrapped tight around them and with her chin propped on top. As if just noticing it, her eyes slid to the skateboard that Steve lifted as a peace offering and silent explanation before her gaze shifted back to his face when he stepped closer, joining her on the porch.

"Thanks." She mumbled when he propped it up against the wall.

"You know it's cold, right?" Steve questioned. His hands were posed on his hips as he stood behind Max who went back to staring out at the trailer park. He tried to follow her eyeline, wanting to know what had captured her attention so intensely, but all he could see was dead grass and dark homes.

Max's face scrunched up irritably. "What do you want Steve? You dropped the board off. Go home."

For a moment, Steve stood dumbly behind her knowing that she was hyper aware of the way he hovered awkwardly; he'd learnt a while ago not to take Max's harsh words to heart. "Does your mom know that you're out here?" Silence. Steve frowned and worry seeped into his voice. "Max?"

There was a tense second where Steve thought all he'd get was silence and more silence.

Max was stubbornly good at that.

But then a heavy breath- that sounded a little choked up- escaped her lips and Max's body slumped forwards and her legs dropped so they crossed over one another like a puppet whose strings had been abruptly cut. Her hands fell to her lap and she picked anxiously at a thread on her sleeve. Carefully, Steve lowered himself beside her so that his legs hung a few feet off the ground.

"My mom's not here." Max finally murmured while her eyes stayed fixed on her hands.

Usually when Steve tried to comfort Dustin or Lucas, he wanted them to see how much he was listening. Wanted to show them that they had his undivided attention. But Steve knew better than to look straight at Max or to make her look up at him- he had to remind himself to stay relaxed and act like the fact that Max revealed something personal wasn't a major breakthrough for her. He knew that she preferred subtlety, something more akin to only a second of eye contact or a quick, almost unnoticeable piece of physical contact to show that he was listening.

That he was there and that he cared about what she had to say.

Steve brushed his shoulder against her own under the pretence of moving to rest his arms on the rail in front of them. "If you're worried about the place being safe, I can lock up and check everything." He offered, scratching absentmindedly at his face as he looked out at his car. Max shook her head with her eyebrows pinched together until they almost formed a singular, furrowed line. Her chest rose and fell twice before she opened her mouth and then snapped it closed again. "If you just want to sit for a bit that's cool too." Steve shrugged like he hadn't just had a long shift that day. Like he was willing to sit and wait for hours on a hard porch in the cold night air if that was what she needed to get through the night. "Sitting is nice. I like to sit. Love, to sit."

Max glanced at him out the corner of her eye and her lip twitched as if she wanted to laugh before it disappeared. A sceptical look settled on her face instead. "She's out drinking." Max blurted out. Colour rose to her cheeks at the confession but she pressed on despite her embarrassment.

"And I don't like being alone in the house when she's like that."

Understanding dawned on Steve as his eyes darted to Max only to see that a strand of her hair had fallen forwards and now obscured half her face, stopping him from properly gauging how she was feeling. He swallowed and looked back up at the sky. "Yeah. Me too."

Max's head jerked up so suddenly so she could stare at Steve that he feared she'd gotten some form of whiplash, but he didn't risk looking back at her. For a moment, her eyes blazed with fury and she looked as though she was only a second away from cursing him out and kicking his ass off her porch- then Steve thought screw it and looked. Max paused when she faced Steve head on, (her eyes roamed over his open expression and her chest hurt with the idea that he could understand her fear the way no one else in the Party had been able to). The fire in her expression dwindled and she slumped again.

Steve waited patiently- he had to be with teenagers who were all impulsive dipshits and could be frankly unreasonable at times, (specifically one Dustin Henderson).

"Will you stay with me?" Max asked, her voice quiet and hesitant. Steve had never heard it like that.

"Yeah. I will." He made sure to catch Max's eyes when he said it.

Wordlessly, Max nodded once and rose to her feet expecting Steve to follow suit when she headed back into the trailer. He was thankful that she was finally out of the cold.

They wandered through the rooms, (Steve only stopping to grab a blanket and cushion off the couch), before they reached her bedroom. He kicked his shoes off by the door and shrugged off his jacket before settling onto a spot on the floor while Max climbed into bed; she curled close to the edge of the mattress and waited until Steve had stopped moving around before she switched the lamp off.

Neither of them said anything for the first few minutes until Max breathed out an almost unheard, "Thanks Steve." above his head, finally relaxing for the first time since her mom left hours ago.

Steve smiled up at the ceiling. "Anytime Mayfield."

It may not have been the bed that he'd been daydreaming about all day at work but Steve decided that he didn't mind falling asleep on a hard floor when he heard Max huff out a quiet breath and finally fall asleep. He didn't mind at all.