Don't You Want Me? ✵ Steve Harrington

Chapter 15

Once they were completely sure the monster was gone, Kim took Steve to the bathroom to attempt to clean up his cuts from the fight earlier.

"Well, that was traumatizing," he muttered as he leaned against the small counter, wincing as Kim did a better job cleaning his face than he had.

"I told you to leave, so this is kind of your fault," she smirked.

"Really?" he raised his eyebrows and smirked back at her. "So you would have preferred I just let the thing rip your head off."   

"No," she said, putting more water on the cloth she was using. "Thank you. I mean it. I'd definitely be dead right now if it wasn't for you."

"So what- what was that thing?" he asked, not knowing if he really wanted the answer. "How did you guys know what it was."

She sighed, running a hand over her already messy hair. "You're not going to believe half of what I say."

He laughed nervously. "Well, I did just fight that demon-thing with you, so I'd say I'd believe anything you tell me."

She bit her lip before telling him everything that had happened, from finding a telekinetic girl in the woods, to cutting her hand to try and summon the demogorgon.

"So this demo-thingy," Steve said, not remembering the right word for it.

"Demogorgon," Kim told him. "It's the name my brother and his friends came up for it. Apparently it's from dungeons and dragons or something."

"Yeah, the demogorgon," he went on with what he had been trying to say before. "It took Will? And it killed Barb?"

She nodded, afraid that if she opened her mouth she would start to cry.

"Jesus Christ," he breathed, pulling her into his arms. "You could have just told m-"

She scoffed, pulling away from him out of fear that Nancy would walk in. "Like you would have believed me if you hadn't seen it for yourself."

He sighed, knowing she was right. "You are officially insane, you do know that, right?"

She laughed. "Jee, thanks."

"No, really," he laughed as well. "Who else would try to take on a demogorgon with pretty much no protection."

"Um, you, you idiot," she reminded him, a large grin taking over her face.

"Okay, that's fair," he nodded, his eyes flicking down to her lips. They were a bit bloody and chapped from her biting them so much out of fear, but he still couldn't help but be entranced by them. He started to lean closer to her, his hand going up to her brown hair.

The door to the bathroom swung open and they quickly jumped apart before Nancy could notice anything had been about to happen. "Hey, there's a bunch of ambulances and stuff headed towards the school. You don't think-?"

"Oh my god," Kim breathed. "The kids!"

•••••

Kim flung herself out of Jonathan's car and sprinted over to where she saw her brother's curly haired head. She hugged him tightly before cupping his face in her hands and looking for any sign of serious damage.

"Kim, Kim," Dustin said, swatting away her hands. "I'm fine."

She nodded, still worried about him. "Where are the others? Where's Eleven?"

"Sh-she-she," he stuttered, tears he had been holding back finally falling down his face. "She sacrificed herself for us."

It felt like a hand had reached inside her chest and crushed her heart between their fingers. She pulled her brother close to her again. "I'm just glad you're okay, Dust."

"We're did you go all that time?" he asked his older sister.

She smiled sadly at him. "Monster hunting."

•••••

The large group sat in the hospital waiting room, some of them asleep and others just barely awake. Kim was one of the many who was sleeping, her head rested on Steve's shoulder. He didn't mind though, and Nancy didn't seem to either. After all, Kim hadn't slept in over twenty four hours and had been through a lot in that time.

Steve smiled as he looked down at her, realizing how peacefully she looked in sleep. His hand lightly brushed her's, wanting to intertwine their fingers, but worried Nancy would notice.

Jonathan came back into the waiting room and Mike jumped up, shaking his friends awake. Steve gently nudged Kim, trying to wake her up as well. "Kimmy, Will's awake if you want to go see him."

She quickly rubbed the sleep out of her big brown eyes and raced down the hall after her little brother and his friends. Steve smiled again as she dashed away, loving how happy she looked.

"It's good to see that you two are friends again," Hop whispered, sitting down next to Steve. 

"Yeah, I'm just glad she doesn't hate me," he laughed awkwardly — Hopper had always made him anxious.

"You should tell her how you feel, kid," the cop said quietly, making sure no one else would hear them.

"I-I don't know what you mean," Steve lied.

Hopper chuckled and shook his head. "You know exactly what I mean, Harrington." Hopper shrugged when Steve refused to look at him. "But what do I know, right?"

"There's no way in hell she feels the same way," Steve finally said. "Just earlier today she punched me."

"And from what I heard, you deserved it," Hopper reminded him.

Steve sighed, running a hand through his usually perfect hair. Steve and Hopper sat in silence again while the younger of the two tried to untangle his feelings for both Kim and Nancy.

•••••

After a little while Kim and Dustin came out of Will's hospital room, ready to head home now that everything appeared to be going back to normal.

"Hey, Kimmy, you want a ride home?' Steve called, following them out of the hospital.

Kim looked surprised that he had asked, but she agreed. The three sat in comfortable silence as they drove to the Henderson household, all of them too exhausted to say much. Kim felt herself slowly drifting off to sleep again when Steve stopped the car in front of her house.

"You alive over there, Kimmy?" Steve laughed, when he saw how worn out she looked.

"Barely," she mumbled, as she climbed out of the car, Dustin already walking in the front door of their house.

"Hey, wait," Steve called out the car window.

"What?" she asked, turned back to face him.

He hesitated, not knowing if now was a good time to tell her that he like her or if he should wait. "N-nothing," he said after a minute. "See you at school next week, okay?"

"Okay," she smiled awkwardly, wondering why he was acting so weird all of a sudden. "Don't crash on your way home."

He rolled his eyes jokingly at her as she closed the door and walked up to her front door. Steve sighed, leaning his head against the back of his seat, yelling at himself for not just telling her how he felt. As he drove down the deserted road, he tapped his hand on the steering wheel, finding I'm Still Standing by Elton John quiet fitting for the night's events.