Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“Hello?”

“Buckley.”

“Harrington. It’s eight in the morning.”

“And good morning to you. What do you say we go bowling today? Get the kids and all, have teams.”

“Yeah, that sounds good. I mean, I don’t have the basic spatial awareness and hand eye coordination needed for something that requires that much quick mental math, thinking fast under pressure and then enacting that decision by coordinating your muscles and articulations in such a way that some ball heads right in the direction of – ”

“Is that a yes?”

“I’m not good at it, is what I mean.”

“Neither is Henderson, nor Sinclair, it’s fine. Wheeler will probably drop the ball on his foot, and El has superpowers, so I don’t even think we’ll be keeping scores. Just a bit of fun.”

Also, the mall has been rebuilt, and the bowling alley is in there. Steve has been waiting for some form of reason to return to the mall and build some new memories there, hopefully sans torture and giant monsters. He thinks it might help with the… whatever is going on with his brain that has him fucking baking in the middle of the night.

Couple more phonecalls later and it’s a plan, and Steve’s actively looking forward to his day off. He hangs the phone back on the wall and busies himself with getting dressed.

The phone rings exactly half an hour before he’s due to leave and pick up Henderson and Sinclair on his way.

“Ok, don’t freak out.”

Steve feels himself begin to freak out just a little; Robin certainly sounds well into freaking out territory already.

“What?”

“I’m just going to say it. Billy will be there.”

Oh, for fuck’ sake.

“What, like, dropping Max off? Working? What do you mean?” Steve knows he’s being obtuse, but hey, maybe if he pretends not to understand, then it won’t happen.

“He’s coming with Max, yeah, and, uh… well him and I were chatting earlier and…”

“You what?!”

“…and I couldn’t not say to him to come along, could I? Not when he’s driving Max and he was being really friendly…”

“You were chatting with Billy Hargrove?”

To her credit, there’s a slight manic hysteria to Robin’s voice when she replies:

“I know!”

“In what context?”

“Well I was lending him this movie, and…”

“What movie?”

“The Rocky Horror… never mind, you haven’t seen it. That’s not important. The important bit is: Billy will be there, and you shouldn’t freak out about it.” A silence. Steve can practically feel Robin’s nervous energy fizzing through the phone. “Ok?” Steve gulps. “You ok? Steve?”

“Yeah,” Steve’s mouth is really dry. “No, I’m not freaking out. But actually, I… I’ve just remembered. I was going to go to Brenda T’s party – you remember Brenda T from biology, right? – and I’d forgotten that was tonight.”

Steve knows it’s a crap excuse. He knows Robin knows it’s a crap excuse. He knows she knows he knows that she knows.

“You were not going to go to that party, Steve. You and I both laughed out loud when we heard about it. You said there’d be no way in hell you’d set foot there.”

“Well, I changed my mind.”

Silence.

“Well, even if that wasn’t complete bullshit, the party’s tonight. Bowling is this afternoon.”

“Takes a while to do my hair.”

“Steve.”

“Guess you’ll have to pick up Henderson and Sinclair for me. Gotta go.”

“Wait, Steve! I don’t have a licence – ”

Henderson, the cheeky brat, gives him a call from the actual bowling alley, probably by high jacking the front desk. He’s all ‘where are you, man?’ and Steve has to cut the conversation short and say that he’s washing his hair for Brenda T’s party, like that’s a normal thing to do, and then Dustin is saying ‘ok, princess’ (rude) and threatening to come round after bowling to call him on his bluff, so now Steve does actually have to go to that damn party. It stings all the more when Dustin interrupts Steve’s rambling about how much he does want to go to the party with an ear-piercing ‘WHOOOOOO!’ followed by ‘Billy just scored his, like, fifth strike in a row! Wish you could see this, dude!’

“Oh yeah?” Steve snaps into the receiver, voice positively boiling with sarcasm. “Sounds like he’s amazing.”

“Yeah, he is!”

Of course, Steve would love to be able to say that going to Brenda T’s reunion party had been a bad idea in retrospect, but the truth is that Steve had known from the start that it wouldn’t be a good idea. Brenda used to hang out with Tommy, Patrick, Jason, fucking Billy (pre his ‘born again in the light of the Mind Flayer’ act), and so those people are very likely to be there, plus a huge number of other assholes and douches that peaked in high school and can’t for the life of them let go of the bullshit concept of popularity.

So he has got himself dressed, and ready, and then the little to no sleep he’s had the night before catches up to him and Steve does fall asleep for a little while, until the nightmares flare up again.
Steve wakes with a strangled cry, a tingle under his fingernails and a shirt so drenched in sweat he’ll have to hang it up to dry before it could be put in the laundry basket. Another shower later, a glance at the clock (ten, turns out it was more than a little nap) and Steve is feeling somewhat self-destructive. Fuck it all, he will enjoy this shit party.

He walks to Brenda’s – fully intending on getting legless. Knowing it is a bad idea. Knowing Nancy would disapprove. Kind of hoping she would. Kind of hoping the kids will call on him, despite the late hour, and realise he has indeed gone to the party. Anything rather than hang out with Billy Hargrove and hear about how amazing he is with balls.

The party can be heard from two streets over. As he approaches, Steve sees people spilling out onto the streets, stumbling, laughing, arguing, tripping over their own feet. Inside the house, there is the sound of glass breaking. Loud music. A little distance away, curtains are twitching, someone probably already calling the cops.

It looks like hell – it is perfect.

Steve walks in like he’s been invited and no one challenges him.

Pretty quickly, he spots Billy Hargrove (of course) in the corner of the dining room, standing there all magnetic and intense, too much, too uncomfortable, his presence like a black hole, sucking the light and air out of any room. And of course, Billy Hargrove spots him too. Steve turns on his heels and leaves the room. Billy follows him into the kitchen, but when Steve immediately pivots into the living room he seems to get the message, finally, and doesn’t try to approach him again.

An hour later, Steve’s smoked two joints and drunk four cups of some disgusting punch. Cherry flavoured, as well, of course. Disgusting. The room is swaying around him, but at least there are no evil men with pliers anywhere. Just douches and assholes that peaked in high school.

Like him.

He still catches glimpses of Billy Hargrove, every once in a while, lurking at the corner of his field of vision, always surrounded by other people, with his eyes always on Steve. Not that he’s looking in Billy’s direction, not at all, au contraire, Steve is very much not looking in Billy’s direction, but it’s like he can feel it: Billy’s gaze on him. Heavy, creeping along the back of his neck. Uncomfortable. Another joint, another cup and Steve begins to forget about Billy, too.

Tommy H finds him leaning against a wall, a half-finished red cup in his hand, hair beginning to fall askew.

“Well, if this isn’t King Steve,” Tommy sneers, and what the fuck, man, how the fuck had Steve ever thought this dude was cool? He’s flanked by Carol, still, maybe there’s something romantic about the fact that these two are still together after all this time. United in their assholery, no doubt. And fuck, Steve’d be an asshole if it was with Nancy, he’d be anything at all to be with Nancy.

Tommy’s face is just a thick constellation of freckles, dancing right there in front of Steve’s hazy gaze, his wolfish grin pulling tight at his cheeks.

“Did you get lost, or something? No princess Wheeler, this time? Or, who’s the latest chick?”

“Ronnie Buckley,” Carol wears a matching sneer on her tiny little face, “from freaking band.”

“Oh yeah, her!”

“It’s Robin,” Steve slurs. “Her name’s Robin.”

“Right, right, my bad,” Tommy H is still grinning, like the Cheshire Cat, like a freaking devil in a polo shirt. “So, where is she? Or did she dump you for Byers too?”

Carol snickers.

Steve feels like the room is spinning that little bit faster. He feels his own anger rising in the distance, like a rumble of thunder somewhere over the hill. Nothing overwhelming, more like the lingering echoes of a learned behaviour.

Ah yes, this is the bit where I get angry.

“Bullshit,” he slurs, thickly, and the word and tone remind him of something, something bad and painful. “Fuck off.”

Not his best come back, and it drags drunkenly on the ‘f’, but Tommy H looks insulted nonetheless, so there’s that.

“You fuck off, Steve, what the fuck are you even doing showing your face – ”

“Is there a problem, here?”

Tommy H and Carol both look to the side, Steve’s eyes following belatedly. Billy Hargrove is here.

“Billy Hargrove is here,” Steve says out loud, voice flat. “Great.”

“Hey, Billy, nice to see you man – ”

“Why don’t you fuck off, Tommy?” Billy interrupts, tone harsh, eyes unblinking. “Hm? Like you’ve been asked to?”

Billy’s not particularly tall, but he’s built like a tank, and he’s a mean fighter (Steve would know). There’s also something about him, something intense and off-putting and uncomfortable and just too fucking much. Steve remembers Billy at parties like this one, from their senior year: how he’d move around the rooms, unstoppable, how crowds would part to let him through whilst stragglers and groupies would follow in his wake, though he never spared them much of a glance. It has always been known that Billy is not to be messed with. Tommy H knows it too – he beats a hasty retreat, and now Steve is looking at the empty space where Tommy and Carol had been. Did he dream that?

Steve slips a little against the wall as he tries to look down at his hands, wondering where the joint he was just smoking has disappeared to.

“Woah, hey,” Billy Hargrove’s fucking hand is on Steve’s arm, around his bicep, holding him up. “Careful, there. You ok?”

Plant your feet.

“Get your hand off me, man,” Steve says, minus most of the consonants, jerking his arm out of Billy’s grasp. “It’s fucking bullshit.” Why was that word important, again? His feet move and something crunches – ah yes, his cup. Oops. Billy’s so damn close, too. Steve can smell him. Cologne, or something. Steve can feel his warmth, even, the dude is radiating heat. Those fucking eyes are on him, too, the feeling all goosebumpy and unsettling. Steve stumbles forward, the beginning of sickness rising in his stomach. “I’m fucking leaving.”

He trips and bumps his way to the hallway, then the front door, past staring faces and many people he doesn’t recognise, and some he recognises a little too well. This was a bad idea.

At least he’s not driven here.

The ground hits hard under his feet but the cool fresh air feels good on his face as Steve sets off in what he hopes is the direction he came from. The air is really fucking cold, actually. Steve’s teeth begin to chatter, his shoulders shake uncontrollably.

“Where you going? Steve?”

Fucking Billy Hargrove is still there, following him.

“G-going h-home,” Steve grits out, his jaws snapping fast, as if he’s just emerged from an ice tank. He hears a series of rapid clacking sounds and realises it’s his own teeth.

“Do you want a ride?”

“F-fuck n-no.”

Steve powers on, still freezing, still swaying, but not giving up. Billy’s still following him.

“W-what are you d-doing? I s-said I don’t w-w-want a ride!”

“I’m walking you home.”

Steve barks out a laugh.

“W-walking me h-home.”

“Yeah,” Billy’s voice is too close. Uncomfortable. “You seem pretty drunk, man. Feels like I should make sure you get home.”

“Oh, wow,” Steve stops abruptly, swinging an arm around. “You’re s-such a g-good guy, aren’t you? The f-fucking hero of S-Starcourt m-mall!”

Steve swings another arm and suddenly he’s spinning a little, tripping, the sky turning and the ground going up, and oh shit he’s actually falling isn’t he, but then Billy Hargrove catches him and stands him back up like it’s nothing. How is he so freaking strong? His hands on Steve’s arms, fingers searing hot through the fabric of his shirt.

“Careful there,” Billy says, too close, so close Steve can smell him again and feel his hot breath against his frozen cheek. “Jesus, how much did you have?”

“Oh, fuck off, H-Hargrove,” Steve jerks out of his reach, again. “Go h-have some c-cake.”

Billy laughs at that, actually laughs. Like Steve’s funny. Is Steve funny? He’s not been funny since high school.

“Fuck, it’s cold,” Steve moans.

Billy doesn’t comment on that, just keeps walking behind him, leaving a bit more of a distance between them (how dare he be decent? Who does he think he is kidding? Not Steve. Steve isn’t kidded.). Steve makes his excruciating way home, bumping into poles, near slipping over the edge of pavements, occasionally pausing to catch his breath or watch it come out of his mouth like dragon breath (which it doesn’t, not really, because it’s objectively not that cold, but Steve is freezing). The entire time, Billy is walking behind him, at a safe distance, not commenting, and honestly it pisses Steve off: how dare Billy fucking Hargrove pretend to be a nice guy? When Steve trips and lands, hard, on his knees, so hard it probably ripped the denim and drew blood, Billy reappears at his side.

“Ok, that’s it, King Steve,” Billy’s gruff voice is right by his fucking ear. Something hot and heavy falls over Steve’s back, nearly throwing him to the ground, and for a terrifying second he is convinced that Billy has just tackled him. Fear grips him fast and hard, the way it probably grips animals when they realise the predator’s about to pounce.

He’s going to beat me up again.

“C’mere.”

Steve is being hauled back up to his feet, easily, and his arm is being thrown over Billy’s strong shoulders. One of Billy’s hands is holding onto Steve’s forearm, the other has slipped round his back and is holding him upright. The heavy thing on Steve’s back is Billy’s jacket, the warmth of it already slipping through to Steve’s frozen bones. He wants to protest, but the sudden rise in temperature half puts him to sleep right on the spot.

Walking is a lot faster and easier when Billy’s hauling his ass around, that’s for sure.

In no time at all they make it to Steve’s house, where Steve battles for a few seconds too long with his key and the keyhole before stumbling inside and collapsing onto the rug.

“Ok,” Steve mumbles over his shoulder, as he pushes himself up to his knees, then on his left foot, then the right, then up and standing again. “See ya, bud. Thanks for the ride.”

The hallway is spinning all around his head, his brain, and now his stomach wants to start spinning again. He should not have mixed weed and alcohol, but hey, on the bright side maybe he’ll get a scolding from Nance about it. Maybe she’ll get worried about him and start calling him more often.

Maybe she won’t give a shit.

Steve fights off his own sneakers for what feels like an eternity then makes to take off Billy’s jacket, realising it’s already gone. Billy, however, is still there, standing in the doorway and watching Steve embarrass himself.

“G’night,” Steve waves him off. He collapses against the banister and begins his slow ascent of the stairs. To his distant dismay, the front door shuts, with Billy still inside his house. “Whu-What are you d-doing?”

“You’re completely smashed, dude,” Billy says, taking his own shoes off and then appearing right behind Steve, hauling him up again, and now they’re climbing the stairs way too fast for Steve’s sense of balance. When they reach the top, Steve throws himself out of Billy’s hold and stumbles towards the bathroom, which he misses by a few feet.

Vomit bursts out of him like hot, acid lava, burning his throat and nose and tongue and spilling all over the floorboards and half over the bathroom door. Steve slips on it and near lands head first in the toilet, which he then fills up with more sick. Tears well up in his eyes as Steve continues to vomit, retching, powerless, only distantly registering Billy Hargrove disappearing then returning with supplies.

He’s cleaning, now. Picking up chunks of half digested burger meat, spraying stuff, scrubbing.

“Fuck,” Steve half sobs, as another tidal wave of sick bubbles out of him and repaints the toilet bowl.

He has never felt this awful. Never. Not even after the drugs he was given during the torture at the mall, not when Jonathan Byers beat him up, not even when Billy Hargrove beat him up. A deep sense of panic rises abruptly. Pure, unadulterated fear, hysteria forming, and all of a sudden Steve is certain that he is going to die tonight.

“Call an ambulance, man,” he begins to beg at Billy, who dumps something on his back (a towel, Steve clutches it around his shoulders like a blanket) and flushes the toilets before pouring a glass of water. “I’m serious, man, I’m dying, I feel, I feel like I’ve been poisoned man, please! It’s Tommy H, man, he poisoned me!”

“You’ll be fine,” Billy replies, calmly, a touch patronising, like Steve isn’t dying right there in front of him. “Let it all out, drink some water. You’ll be fine.”

“I’m dying, dude! Call an ambulance – ”

“Harrington,” Billy’s face is right here. Next to the toilet bowl. “You’re drunk, and high. You will be ok.”

He’s so sure. So calm. Steve tries to cling on to that, even as another wave of vomit rushes up his throat, burning the flesh raw inside of Steve. His hair falls all over his face and he pushes it back, swearing some more (“Fuck, I don’t want to die now, man”). Across from him, Billy Hargrove is stifling a laugh, thumb and index pressing into the bridge of his nose. Steve can’t find it in himself to be embarrassed or angry, it’s all just still fear swirling in his mind. He closes his eyes, to keep the room still a little bit, and takes shuddery breaths, letting his stomach settle. His eyes remain closed for about ten minutes, unless it’s been an hour already. Hard to tell.

He’s still drunk as a skunk, and high, but the overwhelming sense of doom is dimming a little and nothing is coming up his oesophagus anymore. Billy Hargrove stays there, sitting on the edge of the bathtub, arms crossed, watching Steve.

A few more minutes and Steve is standing again, unsteady, brushing his teeth a little too hard and too slow, blinking at his own red-eyed reflection in the mirror. Billy’s blue eyes are still watching, from under his long eyelashes. He’s still sitting there on the edge of Steve’s bathtub. Steve struggles with his own puke-stained shirt, dragging it over his head and dumping it on the floor.

“I got puke in my hair,” Steve realises abruptly, his tone almost as panicked as when he’d asked Billy to call an ambulance. Billy barks out a laugh. “Shit, Billy, I got puke in my hair!”

“Alright, alright,” Hargrove is there again, catching Steve mid panic attack. “It’s fine, c’mere.”

“The smell will sink in!”

“C’mere, pretty boy.”

And that is how Steve finds himself bent over his own bathtub, hot water running through his hair and neck, Billy Hargrove’s hands also running through his hair and over his neck. Too stunned to process anything beyond the next instant, Steve watches bubbles of shampoo running along the bottom of the tub and disappearing down the drain. It’s over that hill again, the emotion he should be feeling right now. Something like humiliation, probably, or rage. Unless it’s terror? Whatever it is it remains just out of reach, obliterated by the fact and feel of Billy Hargrove’s hands in his hair and on his neck. Hot water running along his throat.

Then, just as suddenly, the water stops running, Steve is being hauled back up, Billy’s hot hands straight onto skin now that Steve’s top is gone, and now Billy’s rubbing a towel over his hair.
It’s weird. Intense. The gentleness and force of it, the strong hands that rub caringly over Steve’s hair, like he’s a little kid. It’s that same sensation again, the one that pops up whenever Billy’s near, whenever Steve risks a glance at his golden skin and golden hair and his blue eyes. The same sensation that creeps all over him whenever he feels Billy’s gaze on him. Too much. Uncomfortable. Something you cannot relax into, something that keeps you on edge and watchful.

“Get the fuck off me,” Steve tries to move out of Billy’s grasp, to no avail.

“Stay still.”

Steve’s head is being rubbed so hard he cannot argue back. He just has to take it. Whatever Billy’s doing to him right now, whatever Billy will do next, Steve can’t fight him off. He just has to take it. Play dead.

“You fucking crying, Harrington?” Billy exclaims. And shit, yes, he is. Steve watches his own eyes welling up, a tear already rolling down his cheek. His damp hair is standing in all directions on his head, Billy’s hands gone. “The hell?”

Steve moves away from Billy, now, a little steadier on his feet, adrenaline cutting through the haze of drunkenness. He heads for the door and bumps into the wall, then stumbles into the corridor and grabs the first thing he can reach from the laundry basket, a t-shirt that doesn’t look too bad, in fact it’s the Back to the Future t-shirt Robin borrowed the other night. He eyes his bedroom, not too far away.

“All of this for fucking Wheeler? Really?” Billy’s walking him to his room, now. His breath is hot against Steve’s damp cheek. He sounds pissed off. “I can guarantee she’s not crying about you, man.”
No. It’s too much, actually. Steve can’t explain why, but it feels just too much, impossible. He cannot let Billy into his bedroom, it’s bad enough the dude has made it to the upstairs floor in the first place. Bad enough he’s been manhandling Steve for the last… however long.

Wrenching out of Billy’s reach, Steve pivots and takes himself downstairs surprisingly fall-free, making it to the living room and collapsing face first onto the leather sofa.

Billy’s still fucking there.

“You sure you want to sleep on the couch?”

“Fuck off.”

“Your hair’s wet.”

“Fuck off.”

“What if you puke again? Hm? Won’t you get in trouble?”

“Fuck off. Bullshit.”

“Fine, it’s your fucking problem.”

Steve buries his face a little deeper into the couch. Has Billy finally gone?

“On your side, Harrington,” strong hands manipulate Steve into place, tucking his own hand under his face and his own knee sideways. Steve realises he’s being put in the recovery position.

“Fuck off,” he says again, not sure why, maybe because Billy’s seen him cry. He tries to turn onto his back.

“On your side,” Billy repeats, and the hands move Steve again then fucking hold him down until he stops fighting. How the hell is Billy this strong?

“Whatever, man. This is bull - ”

“Bullshit, yeah, you mentioned. Your bucket’s here,” Steve hears the hollow thumb of something being placed right next to the couch.

“You’re full of bullshit.”

Billy is taking a seat in the armchair opposite Steve, like he owns the place.

“Water’s on the coffee table.”

Steve’s eyes well up again and he scrunches them shut.

“Stop crying, dude.” Exasperation, now.

“Fuck off. M’not crying. Why are you even here? Fuck off already.”

“Wheeler’s not sparing you a thought,” Billy insists, meanly. “Is that what this whole thing was about? Getting shit-faced? You miss her that much?”

“Stop talking about her.”

“She’s probably getting railed by the Byers boy as we speak – ”

“Stop fucking talking about her!!” The words explode out of Steve, raw and painful along his throat.

“You fucking stop talking about her!” Billy yells back, startling Steve. “Stop fucking crying over her, man! Move the fuck on!”

Steve frowns. Billy looks weirdly enraged, what’s his problem, honestly? No one asked him to be here, seeing Steve like this.

“I’m sick of it!” Billy ploughs on. “Stop fucking crying!” Exasperation laced with something else, now. A plea, maybe?

“Or what?” Steve taunts. “You gonna beat my face in again?”

Billy flinches back visibly, his mouth snapping shut then dropping open, shoulders deflating. Finally, he’s got nothing to say. Steve feels vindicated, triumphant, in a sick and sour sort of way. He’s won. They fall into silence, Steve’s eyes glazing over then shutting. He could almost pretend Billy’s gone.

Until the asshole talks again, that is. Why can’t Billy just go already?

“Just to be clear, Harrington,” Billy’s voice is coming from behind his clenched teeth, “I will never, ever hit you again. Ok?”

Steve scoffs.

“Whatever you say, dude.”

Billy says nothing to that, so Steve risks a little peek and sees, to his great astonishment, that Billy is looking away from him with something akin to heartbreak on his face. It makes his face look way younger, way more vulnerable. Blue eyes soft under long eyelashes. Billy must have been a very cute baby – what a weird thought to have.

“Hey, how come you’re hanging out with Robin, now?” Steve hears himself ask.

It has bothered him. A lot. These last few weeks, since Billy’s birthday, Robin and him seem to have been spending some time with each other. They must have done, to get to the point where Robin is lending him one of her precious movies. She doesn’t even lend them to Steve. Steve’s… not sure why that is, but he knows it can’t be good.

“Does that bother you?” Billy smirks. The douche.

“She’s not into you,” Steve sits himself up, head resting back against the couch. “She’s really into chicks, ok? Don’t try and… don’t get any ideas.”

“Any ideas?”

“About… turning her, or whatever sick fucks like you believe in. Fucking watch yourself, I will kill you.”

“Ah, Harrington…" Billy laughs, "did you not hear what I said? I don’t have a problem with Robin being like that.”

“Don’t tell anyone about her.”

“Steve, I won’t.” Not laughing now.

“She’s not going to give you a threesome or whatever – ”

Billy’s eyebrows rise all the way up and he scoffs:

“Shit, is that something you’ve thought about?”

“What? No!” Steve splutters. “Look, my point is… just stay the fuck away from Robin. She’s not going to be another of your girls, alright? She’s my friend. My best friend. She’s a good person. Don’t come after her.”

Billy smiles and it doesn’t reach his eyes. When he speaks, his voice is a little venomous, and a lot tired. If he’d looked really young just moments prior, now he looks kind of aged.

“That’s what you think I’m doing, then?”

“I don’t know what you’re doing,” Steve quips back, “I don’t care what you’re doing. Just don’t do it anywhere near Robin.”

“She’s safe, Steve, fucking relax already.”

“Relax? What happened to ‘plenty of bitches in the sea, I’ll be sure to leave you some’?” Steve knows he sounds petty, with his jazz hands and wide eyes and dodgy impersonating of Billy’s manly gruff, still coming out half slurred despite the fact that there’s nothing illicit left in his stomach after the Exorcist levels of puke he ejected upstairs, but honestly, the asshole deserves it.

Billy’s gaze is avoidant and his smile is stilted as he shifts in his seat.

“Yeah, well, turns out you can have all the bitches, Harrington.”

Steve feels incredible sadness at that, like a cold wave washing off all the righteous anger. All the emotions have risen and fallen over that hill, blasting through Steve and leaving nothing but despair.

“I don’t want all the bitches,” he lays down on his side again, closes his eyes. “I just want…”

Sleep gets him before he finishes that sentence.

It gets him before he finishes the thought.