Eddie Munson - A Collection of One-Shots!

001. There really is no place like Home.

I hadn't bargained on being back here again in this very same lifetime. When I left, I had been determined it would have been for good.

But life as it often does, throws a devious, unfair curveball and that was exactly what was happening to me, now.

After Vecna, I had never wanted to set foot in this shanty, run down little town ever again. I had been overjoyed to leave it all behind. And some part of me had been glad to leave my friends behind too, forgetting about them alongside forgetting everything else. What we'd done that day, had been a pivotal moment in my life that I had almost successfully quashed to the very depths of my mind.
And I was determined for it to remain that way.

There was so much to forget, too much to remember.

Of course, it hadn't been without its scars; I was afraid of things I'd never even given a thought to before. A red sky at night, broke me out in a cold, panicked sweat only for me to wake up the following morning to frost; the red sky merely the natural sign that it would be a cold and crisp morning, the following day. And the only consequence would be that I'd need to de-ice my car windows.

And I was also mildly afraid of the dark.
The last time I'd been afraid of the dark was when I was six years old.

Now at 22, I was that same six year old girl again who slept with a light on every night otherwise I couldn't sleep.

I had to hold or hug a pillow now too, for comfort at night.

Because during it all, we'd held onto each other; in the final days when we thought we were going to make it out alive, we'd all found a support system in one another.

My support system had been Eddie Munson.
I remember that we held each other through the long nights and held each other up through all of it; I had gotten used to someone being there.

Someone caring, compassionate and kind.
Someone of which my boyfriend had been the total opposite.

There had been some feelings on my part for Eddie that to this day I was sure had been unrequited, and as much as that had crushed me at eighteen years old, at twenty two I'd made my peace with it. As much as I could anyway.

I'd often wished I'd told Eddie. But at that time, I hadn't wanted to face the crushing rejection I was sure I would have received.

I'd have sooner faced Vecna, at that point in time.
When I looked back it shouldn't have been that hard, given what was going on. But it was. It had been.

And so I'd gone off to college, and within a few short weeks I was in a fully fledged adult relationship with Darry.

A cool, collected, totally charming sports major.
But also a closet narcissist, with a penchant for verbal and mental abuse.

So I wanted to forget all of the bad, figuring that if I had aided in the defeat of Vecna, Darry wouldn't be an issue.

He may have been charming, but he didn't really show the love or affection I'd been hoping for. I stayed, thinking it would come with time, but after four years I'd finally realised it wasn't going to ever come. And so, I'd tolerated the mental abuse, and I'd tolerated the narcissism, along with occasions of verbal abuse.

Until he had decided to be a first class asshole and put his hands on me for what would be the first and last time.

He had often underestimated me throughout the four years we were together, but that day he had really thought he could plant a series of left hooks to my jaw and get away with it.

The result? I'd taken a bat to his.

I'd been convinced that it would always just remain as verbal or mental. But no, he'd truly outdone himself.