Chapter Text
First time Steve makes a cake, it’s because they all forgot it was Max’s birthday and now the shop is shut. The whole gang, meaning Steve, Nancy, Jonathan, Will, Mike, Lucas, Robin and Dustin are gathered outside the video shop where Steve and Robin just finished a shift. Max, the soon to be birthday girl, has just wandered back inside to use the toilets, hence the last minute chat about what they’re going to do in the morning when it’s time to present her with a cake. Steve looks at Nancy first (to be fair, they all do), since she’s the most responsible one of the group, but then Nancy snaps at him:
“I don’t know why you’re looking at me, I can’t even cook an egg!”
“Really?” Steve frowns.
“Sexist,” Dustin mutters, as of the little shit hadn’t also been assuming that the most likely person to be able to bake a cake would be Nancy.
“I can give it a shot,” Jonathan offers, and he gets a syrupy smile from Nancy.
“Don’t,” Will says immediately.
“I’m a great cook, are you kidding me? You never complain,” Jonathan argues back, mellow as ever. Once more, Steve wonders what it would actually to make Jonathan Byers lose his temper, then, once more, he realises he already knows: going after his little brother Will, or going after Nancy.
“Not cakes, though,” Will smiles shyly.
“Fair enough,” Jonathan concedes.
“I could make one,” Dustin declares, “I mean, it can’t be that hard, right? What goes in a cake? Flour and sugar and… and oil, or something, right?”
“I’ll do it,” Steve says.
It’s not that Max won’t get a cake from her mum, and it’s not like there isn’t a shop somewhere that is probably open and could probably be driven to and bought a cake from, but somehow, at some point after all the shit that happened at the mall, the almost dying etc… somehow, they’ve begun this weird little tradition of doing their own little cake celebration whenever something happens. Birthdays, new job, good grade, whatever… everything’s a cake.
None of them are bakers, really, so they tend to just put their money together and buy one the day before, but it looks like this time, they messed up.
That evening, Steve digs out one of his mum’s decorative baking books and follows an easier recipe to the letter. His parents are away, so no one to comment on the mess he’s making in the kitchen, though, equally, no one to tidy it up for him. Steve makes something called a vanilla sponge which hasn’t ‘risen’ much but still definitely smells good. Once he’s washed up and put everything away, it’s pushing midnight, so Steve collapses into bed.
Convinces himself he’s exhausted and well ready to sleep.
It nearly works.
Steve wakes with a cold slap on his chest, ice cold and tight and painful, his mind still reeling from the nightmare, the torture, never over, always replaying in his head again and again, each blow and each glance, sometimes nothing happens, he’s just in his house or at the video shop and then one of them appears behind him and Steve can’t do anything. Not fight, not run, not shout.
Steve wakes gasping, dripping with sweat, a whimper of a scream still stuck in his throat.
This happens nearly every night.
It’s three in the morning the time that Steve made the first cake.
Steve lays there, still and petrified, until he works up the courage or shame to reach for the light and flick it on. He gets up, takes himself to the kitchen, pours himself some water. Downs it.
His eyes land on the vanilla sponge. It’s shit. Utter shit. Max deserves a heck of a lot more than that.
Steve flicks the baking book open to one of the later pages: there. A three-layered chocolate cake, with jam between the layers of sponge and icing all over, and with crushed up M&Ms littered over the top. Yes. That’s the one.
It takes just over two hours and a half to make that cake but the end result is well worth it. Turns out Steve Harrington can be good at baking.
He collapses back into bed after the cleanup, well after sunup, and sleeps for about two hours, until it’s time to go to the video shop.
Max loves the cake, and Nancy (along with everyone else) gives him a truly impressed look.
It becomes his role – each time there’s a celebration, they don’t buy a cake anymore. They all want Steve’s chocolate cake.
He doesn’t mind, not really. It’s nice to be needed, nice to be good at something. Nice to spend that two and a half hours alone without any thoughts other than the next step in the recipe.
A few months pass by, like that. Nightmares come a little further apart, every other night, then every couple of nights, sometimes Steve even goes a full week without waking up in a sweat.
Their little group of survivors recovers – slow and steady, bit by bit, brick by brick.
And then, it begins happening.
Fucking Billy starts to show up.
He’s there at movie night, like a great fucking beacon of darkness in the corner of the room. Steve doesn’t comment on it, not at first. He ignores the dude, totally ignores him, doesn’t even hand him a plate of cake like he does the rest of the gang. Zones out whenever Billy starts talking, refusing to even sacrifice an ounce of his attention for the asshole piece of shit.
It takes the third movie night, and Lucas’s birthday party, for Steve to confront Robin after Max and her step brother leave his house (it’s always at Steve’s house, as well, not that he minds, but maybe he does mind, now, because why the fuck are they inviting Billy fucking Hargrove to his house).
“Why the hell is Billy here, now?”
“Huh?”
“Billy,” Steve articulates. “Why is he here? Since when do we hang out with him? Guy’s a fucking dick.”
“Oh, uh…” Robin’s avoiding looking at him now, busying herself with the cleanup. “Well, I mean… he’s Max’s brother, right?”
“Stepbrother.”
“Right. Stepbrother. And, uh… I mean, he did help us, right? Like, he helped Eleven against that massive blobby monster, you know? Kind of turned the tides for us, really, if you think about it, like we were pretty much done for but then Billy kind of did manage to escape, like, the mind control thing, or whatever, and yeah I know he’s been awful like obviously you still have that scar near your eye and I know that’s from him totally kicking your ass last year – ”
“Robin, Robin! Who invited him?”
“Eleven suggested it.”
“…What?”
“I think she’s like, grateful you know, because of what happened at the mall… and it’s Max’s brother, right? That’s got to count for something.”
“Stepbrother. And he’s always been a total douche to her, not to mention poor Lucas. And yeah, Robin, he did also beat the shit out of me. I had a freaking concussion, Robin. Should we talk about what else he’s done? Like, be a total asshole freak, even before the mind control stuff? Come on, Rob, seriously. The guy’s a fucking violent, asshole douchebag with shits for brain – ”
“Hey.”
The floorboards creak to Steve’s right, and suddenly he’s right there: the violent asshole douchebag with shits for brain.
Flanked by little Max, no less.
“I, uh… forgot my jacket.”
Billy's gaze is steady and a little teasing, humour masking defensiveness. Steve blinks, a little stupidly. Ah, yes. Said jacket is right next to his hand, resting on the back of a chair. Steve makes no move to pass it to Billy, so, after an awkward three seconds or so, Robin does.
“Oops,” she says, tone shaky. “There you go.”
“Thanks. Uh…” Billy hangs there, stilted, hands bunched up around his stupid jacket. Steve’s not looking at him anymore, not really, and he’s certainly not going to let himself feel any sort of guilt or embarrassment at having been caught bad mouthing the dude. He does, unfortunately, feel the teeniest little bit of fear, the memory of Billy Hargrove’s fists still tingling on his face. “Thanks,” Billy repeats, before ducking out of the room.
Robin and Steve exchange a look above the kitchen counter, her, panicked and accusing, him, unapologetic and semi-exasperated.
“Hey, uh… Steve?” Steve’s attention snaps back to little Max, standing there in the doorway of his kitchen. “We, uh… we heard that, you know. Most of it.”
Ok, now Steve feels kind of bad. It’s not Max’s fault her brother’s a violent asshole douchebag with shits for brain.
“Sorry, Max.”
“Yeah.” Max nods, makes to move away, but then reappears in the kitchen, a stubborn and defiant little tilt to her chin. “You know, he’s really been trying. Billy, I mean. Like… it’s all true, what you said, but not anymore. Not all the time. What happened at the mall… it’s changed him. He’s really different. He’s being nice to me. Like a real brother. He got me a new skateboard, to replace the one he broke. The other day he even stood up to his dad to protect my mum.” Steve frowns – that must be that little bruise at the corner of Billy’s face. Steve had assumed the asshole had got into a fight, just hadn’t guessed the circumstances of it. “El, she… whatever she did in his mind, it’s like it’s clicked something in him. He’s really changing. Like, growing. And, uh… you should give him a chance.”
Steve glances at Robin, who raises both eyebrows at him. What the hell, honestly?
“Give him a chance? Give him a chance? I freaking… host the dude every couple weeks, isn’t that enough?”
“Steve.”
“What, Robin? I haven’t kicked him out, have I?”
“Steve.”
“Fine,” Steve raises a hand. “Fine. Fine. Sorry, Max. I’ll, uh… make an effort.”
“Max?” Billy’s voice calls from somewhere down the hall, not mad, just insistent.
“Make sure you do,” Max says to Steve, “give him a chance. Bye.”
This time, Steve waits till he definitely hears the front door open and close before he lets his emotions run.
“Big fucking deal, he bought her a skateboard to replace the one he broke. What, is he going to buy me a new face, next?”
“Steve!”
“I’m over this.”
Alas, no matter how over it Steve is, none of it is over. Two weeks later they’re celebrating Robin’s birthday, cue the huge chocolate cake, and then it’s Jonathan’s. A couple months down the line, during a shift, the little brats crash the video store and Max drops a bomb:
“Hey, uh, Steve? Robin? It’s Billy’s birthday next week, on Saturday.”
Silence.
“Oh, is it?” Robin says lightly.
Steve busies himself with stocking up the back shelf. A reptilian part of his brain can feel where this is going, and he’s not about to make this easy for them.
“Yeah,” Max sounds forcefully cheerful. “Our parents are away, too, so he won’t be getting any kind of like… yeah. I mean, not that they’d do anything anyway, but like…yeah.”
It’s not like Max to ramble like this, Steve knows it, and part of him does feel a little bad for making the kid so nervous about asking him something, but he cannot help it. This is all a damn joke.
“So anyway,” Max rambles on, “I was wondering if like we might be able to do our usual thing of like…”
“Can we use your house, Steve,” Dustin finishes decisively.
There it is.
“If you want to use my house, I guess I won't stop you,” Steve replies eventually, eyes fixed upon the tape he is now rewinding. It’s as reticent a response as he can possibly give without outright saying no, and Henderson, the little shit, totally runs with it.
“Great, so that’s sorted. Guys, let’s go. And, uh, Steve? Use the peanuts M&Ms this time, ok? The crunch is better. Did you hear that, Steve? Pea-nut. Thanks, bud.”
“Hang on, wha…?”
The brats leave, and Steve finds himself left behind with Robin, who’s smirking.
“I gotta make him a cake, now?!”
Robin shrugs.
“Robin, there is no way I am making that douchebag a cake. Do you hear me? No way in hell.”
Steve makes the damn cake.
He doesn’t pay close attention this time, and takes some shortcuts, so the buttercream is a little curdled and not as smooth as usual, but whatever. He also usually uses raspberry jam, because of how nicely the sharpness of the fruit cuts through the excessive sweetness of the chocolate icing, but this time he has none at home so he uses cherry. He’s not going shopping for Billy fucking Hargrove. Well, no more than he already has. Fucking peanut M&Ms, man.
The whole gang, minus Max and Billy, arrives early and begins setting up decorations around Steve’s living room. Then they try to get him to crouch behind the sofa, which he definitely does not do, and when Max and Billy enter they all jump out from their hiding places and yell “Happy birthday!”. There’s a brief second, right between the moment Billy enters the house and everyone jumps up when it’s as if it’s only Billy and Steve in the room, and, for the first time in months, they make eye contact.
It's a little thing – a little nothing. It’s eyes meeting across a room, when there’s not much else to look at. It’s nothing, yet it throws a shiver down Steve’s spine, it halts Billy’s steps, it fizzles and prickles and it’s uncomfortable and nothing and too much all at once.
“Happy birthday!!”
Billy jumps visibly when the kids appear, and Steve scoffs under his breath.
“Oh wow, what’s this?” Billy’s being accommodating, friendly, he’s indulging the kids. The same kids he terrorised the year prior – again, what a fucking joke. Now here he is, all deep voice and smiling eyes and emphatic exclamations of surprise and joy. Fucking douche. Max gifts him an air freshener for his car and you’d think he’d just be presented with a whole new Chevrolet.
“Steve, if you scowl any harder your face is going to get stuck that way,” Robin whispers to him on her way back from his kitchen, carrying plates and forks.
The ‘no eating away from the dining room table’ rule has long been bypassed, but today it particularly stings. If Billy fucking Hargrove drops chocolate crumbs all over his parents’ sofa, Steve is going to murder someone. Billy, probably, or maybe Dustin. Maybe even Robin.
Steve rolls his eyes as Robin snickers, and when he looks back up Steve catches Billy glancing away from them.
When it’s time for the cake (“Steve made it!” yells Dustin), placed in its towering chocolatey glory in front of Billy fucking Hargrove, the latter once more looks up at Steve, who is standing a little away, arms crossed.
“Thank you, Harrington,” Billy says, way too civilly, and everyone’s heads whip round as they turn to gauge Steve’s reaction.
Steve doesn’t give one.
Robin cuts the cake and Steve stabs at his slice, appetite well and truly gone. Still, he does not miss the way Dustin’s face scrunches up when the little shit scrapes at the curdled buttercream with his fork.
“The buttercream curdled,” Steve hears himself blurt out defensively, “and I ran out of raspberry jam, so, cherry it is.”
“Yeah, it’s a bit too sweet, isn’t it,” Dustin has the freaking nerve to point out. “Didn’t think that was possible, but hey.”
“I thought the icing looked a bit grainy,” Lucas cringes at his plate.
“Definitely not your best, but they can’t be perfect all the time,” Mike says semi-reasonably, as the table erupts in comments about everything from consistency to colour to sugar levels of the cake.
“It’s the best damn cake I’ve ever had,” Billy declares suddenly, and the table falls silent. “Cherry’s my favourite.”
Well, fuck.
Heads whip round again to avidly watch Steve’s reaction play on his face: surprise, growing into shock, melting into ‘well, fuck’ and a thick dose of embarrassment.
“I didn’t notice any graininess,” Billy adds, talking to his plate, before shovelling some more cake into his mouth.
“It’s just a bad fucking cake,” Steve snaps, glaring at the man sitting opposite him on his mum’s new sofa. “Also I’m pretty sure I told everyone not to eat away from the table,” he addresses the rest of the room, feeling himself growing uncharacteristically and irrationally enraged. “If there’s any mess on these cushions, you guys are cleaning it.”
The room is silent and still, so many pairs of eyes either staring openly at Steve or somewhere on the carpet. Billy’s fork scrapes the plate slightly when he finishes the last few crumbs of his birthday cake. Steve’s chair scrapes the floor as he stands abruptly, stalking off to the kitchen to begin washing up.
Thankfully, the party peters out after that, and soon people begin leaving. Steve remains (hides) in the kitchen until it’s sounding fairly silent out there, and then he comes back out to assess the damage no doubt made to the sofa.
And of course, Billy is there, dustpan in hand.
“Oh hey, man,” Billy says, sweeping some microscopic crumbs off the leather cushions.
“Hey, man,” Steve parrots under his breath, voice dripping in sarcasm. “I got it from here,” he adds, louder, a dismissal by any other name. “You go on home.”
“It’s ok,” Billy mumbles, getting up and heading to the kitchen to empty the already empty dustpan.
Steve follows him, more out of weird survival instinct than anything else: keep an eye on the predator, always.
Billy Hargrove is massive in Steve’s kitchen. Larger than life, moving slow but powerful, magnetic and terrifying as a blackhole in the universe. It’s… uncomfortable.
“I said I got it from here, man,” Steve repeats. “You can leave. Max’ll be tired.”
Billy places the dustpan back under the sink, then uses a dishcloth to wipe the worktop, facing away from Steve.
This fucking dude.
“Steve?” Robin bursts into the room, larger than life too, just in a much safer way. “Is it ok if I stay over? It’s like, super dark, and I don’t want to walk home, plus you’ve had like three beers so I’m pretty sure you shouldn’t drive – ”
“Yeah, of course,” Steve responds automatically. Robin stays regularly. The guest bedroom is practically hers. She’s scared of the dark, which Steve still does not know whether this is a new thing, like a ‘since we’ve been tortured by evil Russians’ thing, or if she’s always been this way. He hasn’t dared ask yet. “Take something from my drawers.”
“DibsonyourBacktotheFuturet-shirt,” Robin blurts out, no spaces. “Ok, great, love you, thanks!”
She bounces away.
Despite himself, Steve snorts affectionally.
“She might as well call it her t-shirt, at this point,” he mumbles.
“My toothbrush’s still upstairs, right?” Robin shouts from halfway up the stairs.
“Yeah,” Steve yells back. His eyes once again land on Billy. The dude has stopped wiping, thank fuck, and is now watching Steve with a weird look on his face. “What?”
“Nothing.” Steve raises an eyebrow. Billy looks away. “Nothing, uh… good for you.”
“Good for me?”
“Yeah, like… you and Robin Buckley. Good for you. You’ve finally… moved on from Nancy Wheeler. Good for you.”
Oh. Oh.
“It’s not like that,” Steve follows Billy out of the kitchen and into the hallway. Max and Lucas are chitchatting just outside, voices low and playful. Steve watches Billy like a hawk, waiting for a sudden escalation in his mood. “Robin and I. It’s not like that.”
Billy scoffs.
“No?”
“No,” Steve snaps. “She’s not… I’m not her type.”
“Bullshit.”
“Excuse me?”
Billy's laughter is humourless, his eyes glinting in the semi-darkness.
“You’re everyone’s type, King Steve.”
That fucking nickname. Steve’s mouth opens and closes a couple times, before he can find it in himself to formulate a response.
“Not everyone’s. Not Robin’s.”
“Oh, yeah? What is she into, then? Ugly dudes?”
The hell?
“Chicks, actually, Billy,” Steve claps back. “Robin’s into chicks.”
Billy stares back at him, stunned silent, stunned still, halfway through the motion of shrugging on his brown leather jacket. Outside, Max and Lucas are still chatting, a happy thrumming sound in the background. Steve realises too late what he’s done wrong.
“Don’t tell anyone,” he blurts out. “What I just told you. Don’t tell anyone. I shouldn’t have told you. You fucking… you pushed, and I… just don’t tell anyone.”
“Ok,” Billy’s still staring, slack jawed. At least there's no teasing light in his eyes now, no mirth at all. Just shock.
“I’m serious, Hargrove,” and Steve steps closer, into Billy’s space, into his face, to convey serious. “Don’t tell anyone.”
Up close, Billy’s got long eyelashes.
“I won’t.”
“I’m serious. If you talk, I’ll…”
What, Steve? Beat him up?
I’ve been dying to see the famous King Steve everyone’s been telling me about!
“Just… don’t tell anyone.”
“I won’t.”
Billy’s eyes are darting all over Steve’s face, from his eyes to his lips to his hair to a spot near his eyebrow and then back to his eyes.
“And… you’re cool with that?” Billy asks in an oddly quiet voice.
“Yeah,” Steve nods, “I am.”
Billy nods, his eyes darting all over Steve’s face again and settling for good on his eyes. Intense. Uncomfortable.
“You don’t got a problem with it? Really? That she’s some kind of deviant?”
Steve’s jaw ticks.
“Why? Do you got a problem with it?” Steve growls. “With… with Robin?”
“No,” Billy finishes putting his jacket on, breaks eye contact, moves away from Steve. “Not at all.”
“Sure?” Steve acts like he’d take Billy on, which, to be fair, for Robin he would.
“Sure,” Billy’s hand is on the doorknob, he twists it. The voices of Lucas and Max come in louder, breaking the weird fog between them. “It’d be pretty hypocritical of me, wouldn’t it?” It comes out barely audible; a rushed whisper chucked into the space just before Steve.
What?
“What?”
Billy hangs on the threshold for a moment, kind of facing Steve’s way but not looking at him.
“You heard me,” Billy says finally, kind of aggressive, before walking off. “Ok,” his voice rings outside, “let’s get you kids home, shall we? Sinclair, you need a ride?”
Steve stands there a good few minutes, staring at the door, before returning to the kitchen and realising only then that, for the first time, there's no cake leftover at all.