Boys Don't Cry - Steddie

Chapter 12

Turns out The Cure wasn't the only band Steve seemed to be obsessed with. Eddie had been looking through the tapes that were kept in a drawer downstairs up until now, but Steve's personal collection was up in his room.

"I guess technically they're all mine. The ones downstairs, too. No one else is here to listen to them." All his cassettes were currently splayed out across his bed so Eddie could look at them while Steve lay next to him and watched

Eddie paused to look over at him, taking mental note of the comment and deciding to come back to it later. "Tears for Fears isn't bad. I'll give you that one. Probably would have listened to them before The Cure if you weren't hoarding them all up here for yourself. I don't think I can forgive The Bangles though."

Steve snatched the cassette from his hand, "That's not even mine. Nancy brought it over one time and never took it back." He tossed the tape carelessly onto the bed and looked back up at Eddie.

"Likely story..." he went back to dissecting Steve's music taste, outright laughing at the next one, holding it up in front of his face, "No fucking way... Make It Big?"

Steve groaned and rolled on his back, dragging his hands down his face, "You're such a music snob."

"Uh... yeah, when you listen to fucking Wham! I am." Eddie had reached the point where his laughter had turned into coughing and he held his stomach, "Ow.. fuck..."

"You know what? That's what you deserve," Steve smiled at him, folding his hands behind his head.

"I can't believe you would wish pain upon me. You're breaking my heart here, sugar."

"'Sugar?' What are you, from the 50's?"

"It's endearing."

"It's stupid."

"How about sunshine? Definitely not sunshine. More like... partly cloudy with a chance of rain. That's you."

"You're such an ass," Steve kicked him lightly. "Clean up the mess you made. I had those all organized and everything."

"Sounds like a thunderstorm today," Eddie teased, leaning over so his face was above Steve's. Steve tried to scowl at him, but when Eddie's hair fell from behind his shoulder and hit him in the face, they both broke out laughing.

Laughter died down into smiles as they were drawn closer, lips ghosting over each other before they were pressed together in a brief kiss. It was quickly followed by another, and another, and then Steve was wrapping his arms around Eddie, who had no objections to staying put. He felt Steve's hand trail further down his back and opened his eyes to look down at him when Steve pulled away.

"If you think making out with me is going to get me to forget about the mess you made you're wrong."

"Oh so we're making out now?" Eddie flashed a smile.

"God, shut up," Steve kissed him again, almost eagerly this time.

Eddie brought up Steve's parents over dinner. "You don't have to tell me about it if you don't want to. You just... it seems like you don't like them very much."

Steve sighed and looked down at his plate before he spoke, "I can't really complain too much. My mom makes sure I can actually live when my dad threatens to kick me out and cut me off and whatnot." Eddie was staring at him when he looked back up at him, silently urging him to go on. "They started traveling a lot more when I turned fourteen. Figured I could handle myself for three or four days, no damage done. I mean, I was still basically a kid so they didn't have to worry about any parties or shit like that, but I was just old enough to look after myself alone. Then it just started happening more often. Business trips, cruises that they would 'love to take me on, but I had school,' some of them they didn't even explain to be honest. I think I kind of stopped caring anyways. I mean... they got me a pretty sick car, so I couldn't really complain."