I Wish You We're A Girl

Chapter 5

"Right," Steve was able to get that much out before his mind caught up with his mouth and understood he hadn't thought any farther than that.

"So where?" Worst case scenario, fake it till you make it. That's what he would do, if he had through parts of high school, he could here.

"Leave it in here, that's fine. I've told the kids upstairs is off limits already anyway, so they won't find it." Steve walked off to the side of his room with his desk as Eddie placed his backpack on his bed.

"Sounds good. I also brought a pack of beers for the adults too. Want me to put 'em in the fridge or pass 'em out now?"

"Pass them out, I have a feeling people will end up staying the night; with this bunch, they tend to." Steve was out the door with Eddie following him, he was doing well so far. At least he thought he was.

Everyone was either in the pool or sitting on the sidelines watching the people in the pool. Robin was playing Abba over the speakers and putting on what looked like a performance in the shallow end to 'Gimme Gimme'. Steve laughed, he befriended a goofball of a person to be his best friend. It was certainly a good distraction.

"Steve, you wanna join the show!? I know you know our dance to it."

"Absolutely not, Buckley. I'll watch you make a fool of yourself from here, thank you very much." Steve sat with his feet in the water, the furthest he had gone and planned to go.

"You're missing out." There was no doubt in Steve's mind that Nance had gotten her to already do shots with her, at least one. Even if she didn't have a drink in hand, Nancy did and he knew she grew into enjoyable drinking at parties. At least that's what he's heard from Robin, there were stories.

"I think you need to catch up, Harrington," Steve was handed an opened beer can from Eddie. "Robin seems to be out drinking you already." After that Eddie went to take his tank top off and it was the first time Steve saw his scars. Even in the hospital, he always had a gown on.

It all made sense to Steve now, why he had been covering up in public. He would have had the eyes of unknowing people on him like fucking vultures. More than he wanted or already had, even after the clearing of the allegations. Steve was staring again, but it was because he had similar scars. He knew what it was like, he had kept his shirt on that day too.

When he looked back to the pool, Robin gave him a cheerful smile, a moral support smile. He lifted his legs out of the water to go to his pool chair, finally taking his t-shirt off too. What could he say, he had a sudden burst of inspiration. At that moment, he didn't know why he was making such a big deal earlier about acting normal. Eddie was human, he was too, they made mistakes and worked things out all the time. Right then, he just wanted to act like stupid young adults.

"Why do you guys get to drink and we don't?" Mike shouted after successfully pushing Dustin and El underwater in their game of chicken fight.

"Because we're adults, idiots. No drinking until you're 18, that's final. You know the rules in my house." Steve went back to sipping his can of beer and sitting at the edge of the pool again.

"Eddie, convince Steve to let us drink." Eleven chimed in with her slightly monotonous voice, not as whiny as Mike was.

"Why do I have to convince him? I agree with him, you kids don't need alcohol in your systems. You're hard enough to babysit."

"Babysit?!" All of them shouted at once except for Max. She had been on enough drugs from her hospital visit to last a lifetime, she didn't need anything else.

"You two are no fun, what happened to our mom and dad. You're not supposed to agree with each other." That comment made Steve and Eddie pan to each other, wondering how the hell they ended up being mom and dad.