Looks that Kill || Eddie Munson x Reader

February 1986

All that I could think about for the rest of the day was what Gareth had said after grilling me about what I had been doing on Valentine's Day. Eddie was going to actually try to make it official with me last night and was willing to actually admit that he was getting feelings for me. Hell, if I had actually stayed there, heard him out... I probably would've jumped at the chance to give us a shot after fighting against how I felt for so long. And as much as I wanted to still be able to do that now that I had confirmation that the feelings were mutual, the longer that I had thought about the idea of us giving this a real chance, the more that I had thought that it would inevitably blow up in our faces.

One of the main reasons why I hadn't wanted to pursue anything with anyone had been sitting on my desk. It was my dream to get the hell out of Hawkins and no matter how much I wanted to give a relationship with Eddie a shot, it wasn't going to be realistically feasible moving forward. I was going to be moving away from this town in less than six months, most likely looking for a job to keep myself busy while I worked on my degree. My schedule was going to be completely different, guaranteed to be packed with classes, working, trying to get into volunteering at a lab, maintaining my social life with my current friends, and trying to make more friends on top of it all. With all of that, where exactly would that leave Eddie?

I wouldn't be able to just bank on seeing him at school every day, seeing him in passing during band practices, or potentially sneaking off to see him on the weekends. Sure, I would be able to call him on the phone to talk, drive a few hours to visit him back here, or have him drive up to see me, but it would be hard to coordinate it with him. Hell, it would be nearly impossible to do this without rousing Gareth's suspicions if I was just suddenly home for the weekend. There would always be me returning to Hawkins during breaks, but those breaks would be months apart from each other. I wouldn't want that to eventually turn into resentment with the busyness of our schedules and not being able to see each other.

If moving and the distance wasn't enough of an obstacle for us, Gareth had made it enough of an issue. He was the other major factor in my not wanting to get emotionally involved with Eddie. We had both made it clear to each other that we would never cross one line with each other: dating each other's friends.

"Gross! You're kidding me, right?" It was the summer before my 7th-grade year. We had been sitting together on the dock situated outside of our grandpa's house, feet dangling into the waters of Lake Michigan. Giving him a disgusted look, I splashed some lake water at him.

"Hey! I mean it!"

"No offense to you, but your friends aren't exactly the type of guys I would want to date. My options would be a guy who is practically like another sibling at this point," I paused, nodding in Jeff's direction. He had been visiting the Lake Michigan house with our family this year, currently chatting with a couple of our cousins. "Which, as lovely as Jeff is, would be disgusting. Grant, no offense to him, would probably drive me insane."

"And Eddie?"

"MUNSON? Fat chance of that EVER happening. Wasn't even an option! Will NEVER be an option! Besides, isn't he going to high school?" Since the roller skating incident earlier in the year, I had continued to hold some bitter feelings toward him. Just thinking about him had annoyance bubbling to the surface at that moment in time.

"So what?"

"So does that mean that you guys are done with the band?" I had turned to look at him, taking a drink of my pop.

"Nah. I mean, we did great at the talent show and he's only going to be a building over. Not like Eddie's ACTUALLY moving."

Scrunching my nose, I set down the drink with an eye roll. "Yay. While we're on the topic of dating friends..."