Chapter Text
The cabin had been Robin’s idea. Well, really, the cabin had been Steve’s parents’ idea. His mom had seen some feature in Better Homes and Gardens about cabins in Brown County, Indiana, and how magical they were in the fall surrounded by the changing leaves.
“Oh, Cliff, we just have to! What a fun investment, right?”
It was how Steve’s mom always pitched things to his dad. Steve always thought it was funny. Everything had to be an investment to catch his dad’s eye. And it was effective. They’d gone down one chilly October morning and saw how beautiful it really was, and Cliff Harrington had snatched up his wife’s pick of cabin immediately. But they never went there anymore.
They’d gone to Brown County exactly three times before his mom decided it wasn’t as magical as she thought it would be. His dad was out of sight and on the phone for most of the time, and his mom never wanted to do anything she thought was too “outdoorsy” so it really wasn’t a surprise that they didn’t love the cabin that they’d spent tens of thousands of dollars on.
Most of the time, they rented it out. (“See, it really was an investment!” his mom had said). But Steve knew it usually stood empty from November to January, and the second Robin heard that, she had made a plan.
“Friendmas, Steven!”
“Friendmas?”
Steve slowly fished a tape out of the returns bin, plopping it on the pile he’d started making on the Family Video cart.
“It would be like Christmas, but without all the family bullshit and obligatory fake niceness and formal dining room and socks from your grandma. Christmas just with people we actually like.”
“Ok, that doesn’t sound… awful.”
“Just think about – a big cabin, cozy fire, gorgeous Christmas tree.”
“Rob, I love you, but you know I don’t really give a shit about Christmas so that part isn’t what’s going to convince me.”
Steve had never really given a shit about any holiday. He hardly gave a shit about his own birthday. He liked celebrating other people – he’d thrown Robin the surprise party to end all surprise parties when her birthday had come around. And he willingly participated in whatever holiday plans Robin or Nancy or whoever made for everyone. But Steve never really got what was so special about Christmas. He’d spent almost his whole life, until lately, either having the most awkward formal Christmas parties imaginable; or spending his Christmases entirely alone – his parents having gone off on some trip that they would always try to get him to come along with, but that he never wanted to join them on. This year it was Aspen. His mom didn’t even know how to ski.
“Steve, I will fix you. I will imbue you with the most Christmas spirit. I promise, I will. If it’s the last thing I do, so help me god, you get it.”
“Is that supposed to convince me to say yes to this idea?”
He did though. He always said yes to Robin. It didn’t matter what half thought through idea Robin came up with, Steve always said yes to it. Sometimes he didn’t even wait to hear what the entire idea was. Sometimes he was forced to wait through a very elaborate telling of whatever her plan was. Either way, he couldn’t say no to her.
Robin had just squealed when he agreed, and she was already off and talking a mile a minute on the phone – it could only be to Nancy. The two of them making plans could be the seventh wonder of the world. For as in tune as Steve and Robin were, sometimes it seemed like her and Nancy didn’t even need words anymore.
It made Steve smile. After the horror that was the spring of 1986, and the uphill battle that recovering was, he was happy that his best friend had found another friend. He knew that Robin had told Nancy exactly why Robin and Steve could never date, too, and Nancy’s unquestioning acceptance of her had made Robin beam.
It made him smile, too, that he and Nancy finally found their footing in being friends. That once the dust had settled, and they all had to figure out a way to just live, that he and Nancy were able to talk honestly – and that she had helped him figure out that there was actually no way in hell he wanted six kids and an RV. The RV with just him driving across the country? Maybe.
But Steve Harrington had finally discovered that he didn’t have to have and didn’t want to have the white picket fence lifestyle that everyone expected of him and that his parents so desperately wished he’d have.
“Ok, here’s the plan.”
Robin finally hung up the phone and turned back to him.
“Rob, I’m never going to get any of these actually put away, and Keith is going to fire me.”
“Keith could never fire you; he’s convinced you’re bringing babes in.”
Steve couldn’t help but snort.
“Right. So many babes. Drowning in babes.”
“Oh my god, we are not talking about your desolate dating life right now. Besides, I offered to set you up with someone. Multiple someones. Multiple times.”
“I am not going out with Kenny from band, Robin.”
“He’s such a nice guy though!”
“Robin.”
“Yeah, yeah, not your type, whatever.”
Robin hadn’t been surprised when Steve finally confessed to her that he thought he might be gay. She had been disappointed that he wasn’t willing to go out with any of the guys she’d tried to set him up with though and quickly gave up her matchmaking dreams.
“Ok, Steven, focus. Here is the plan.”
Steve gave up trying to organize any of the tapes and motioned for Robin to continue.
“So, we’re thinking we’ll leave Thursday. Jonathan won’t be back in Indy until Friday, but he can meet us at the cabin. Also, me and Nancy need to know if your parents pick out some kind of weird name for the cabin like ‘Harrington Manor’ or ‘Autumn Gardens,’ oo, or maybe something like ‘Yellowwood Estates’?”
“First off, you thinking that my parents put an ounce of effort into this place is adorable. Secondly, who all is ‘us,’ Rob?”
“Me, Nancy, you obviously, Jon on Friday like I said, Eddie if he says yes, and Vicky if I can work up the nerve to ask her.”
Robin and Vicky had been tentatively circling each other for weeks now – they’d gone on four dates, all of which Robin insisted had been disasters, but Vicky had still said ‘yes’ every time Robin had asked her out.
“Rob, you know there’s only three bedrooms in this place. I didn’t know this was going to get crazy.”
“Six people is hardly crazy. Didn’t you used to invite the entire high school to your house every weekend?”
“Yeah, and it was fuckin’ awful.”
“Ok, well, still, for Friendmas to work it has to include, you know…friends.”
“Do you think Eddie’ll even say yes?”
Steve tried to keep his voice casual and started to push the cart toward the first section he needed to reshelve. He knew that if he turned around, he would see Robin with an eyebrow raised and a hand on her hip – daring him to say what he actually wanted to.
Before Kenny from band, and David from the record store, and Michael from her study group – Robin had wanted to set him up with Eddie. Steve had immediately refused. They were friends, actual friends, and Steve felt like he needed all the friends above the age of 15 that he could get. He didn’t want to make things weird and end up ruining it.
“Uh, yeah, he’ll probably say yes.”
Robin had insisted that Eddie was into him. Steve had insisted there was no way she could know that.
“Oh, ok, sure, Steven, his blatant flirting with you during a life or death situation wasn’t a dead giveaway or anything,” Robin had told him.
“It was a life or death situation, Rob, that’s exactly why it didn’t mean anything. People say crazy shit when they think they might die. Hell, I told you I was in love with you when I thought we might die. And I told Nancy I wanted to live in an RV with her and our six kids, too. So, even if he was flirting, it did not mean a thing.”
Steve had stuck to that belief – that Eddie had no feelings for him aside from friendship. But it didn’t stop Steve from looking a little too long at him, and it didn’t stop Robin from catching him almost every time he got distracted staring at the man.
He knew Robin would be unbearable if he just told her that yes, he thought he had feelings for Eddie. And she would definitely want him to confess that to Eddie if she found out, and Steve just couldn’t. He couldn’t take the chance.
“Ok, well, good, I just want to make sure it’s not me and a bunch of couples, you know?”
“Could be you and Eddie as a couple, but you won’t – ”
“Robin!”
Steve cut her off as the bell jangled on the door of the Family Video, and the man himself walked in.
If it had been Steve on the run, accused of horrible things, and nearly dying, he felt like he’d have lost something about himself – but not Eddie. Eddie still filled a room to the brim anytime he walked into it. Steve thought at first that all the bravado and brashness was annoying – that it was some front that Eddie put on.
He was a little bit right, but as soon as Steve started to see the real Eddie – still loud, still rambunctious, but not as performative – Steve knew he was wrong about him. It wasn’t some front he put on – Eddie Munson was just unapologetically himself. Steve was still trying to figure out how a person could have that kind of attitude. Even at the height of his King Steve days, he always felt a little bit like an imposter.
“You two look like you’re scheming – Harrington is bright fuckin’ red.”
Steve was sure that he turned an even deeper shade of red when Eddie pointed it out.
“I was, in fact, scheming, Eddie Munson, and you’re just the co-conspirator I’m looking for.”
“Love that sound of that, lay it on me, lady bird.”
Steve pushed the cart off down an aisle as Robin pitched her Christmas plan to Eddie, trying to focus on where each of the returns was supposed to belong on the shelves, instead of focusing on the way Eddie’s hands danced around when he spoke – gesturing with the enthusiasm that always spilled out of him. It was hard to keep his eyes off the silver glint that sparkled out when the rings on his lithe fingers caught the sunlight just right.
Steve knew that he should probably be ashamed of himself for the kind of thoughts he was constantly having about someone who was supposed to be his close friend. But if he was honest with himself, he was too enamored to feel ashamed of it. Steve just hoped he was successfully keeping it under wraps.
“So, we’re gonna be roomies for a bit, huh, big boy?”
It was like Eddie appeared out of thin air, leaning on the shelf beside him, and it made Steve jump a little.
“Jesus, man, how do you move so quiet?”
“I’m like a jungle cat, just comes with the territory.”
“Pfft, maybe a feral cat, Munson.”
Eddie smiled widely, and Steve had to turn back to his shelving.
“And what do you mean roomies?”
“I mean, I’m assuming you don’t want to shack up with Nancy. And Robin would kill you if you didn’t let her share a room with Vickie.”
Steve knew that he’d just told Robin there were only three bedrooms in the cabin, but he hadn’t done the math about who’d be sharing with who.
“That all right, Harrington?”
Eddie had leaned over and was trying to catch Steve’s eye. He cleared his throat and hoped again that his face wasn’t red.
“Yeah, sure, why wouldn’t it be? You practically lived with me for like weeks after the spring.”
“Perfect, see you there then, roomie.”