So have you got the guts?

chapter one

"You're more fidgety than usual tonight," her voice broke the silence finally. "Was it another nightmare? How bad this time?"

Eddie scoffed with a shrug doubled with an eye roll. "Detective Nancy strikes again everyone."

It was Nancy’s turn to roll her eyes now, lightly shoving him with a small smile. "Eddie. I'm serious, was it bad?" Nancy could see how his shoulders tensed, how his hands gripped the mug too tight and shook. His leg bouncing and his teeth chewing at his bottom lip. She reached out to squeeze his knee, smiling softly when he looked up at her. "How bad this time?" She asked again, her voice softer.

"I-I…," he cleared his throat trying to hide how his voice cracked. He shifted next to her, fidgeting with his rings as he stared down into the mug. "It was like I could actually feel it this time, you know? Like I was really there, back in the Upside Down, but I wasn't myself? I was something else. Something horrible. As if those bats did something when they tore-," he took in a shuddered breath, swallowing hard, twisting one of his rings around. "I felt his body go cold as I drained the blood from him, Nance. I wake up with the taste of blood in my mouth, with how it felt to shred into his skin. I-I-..."

Nancy grabbed both their mugs, setting them on the nightstand and pulled the older male closer, squeezing his hands tightly with both of hers. "Listen Eddie, you know as well as I do that that place is gone. Forever. El locked it up. We defeated Vecna and everything the Upside Down threw at us. No gates will open again, no creature is coming back out to ruin our lives. You're breathing and alive, and so is Steve ."

"Yeah, but what if I wasn't meant to survive Nance? What if- what if that bat attack was supposed to like, kill me or I was supposed to be some creepy vampire servant thing to Vecna? Like Kas in the actual lore of D&D." Eddie was shaking even more now as he met her gaze, tears bubbling at the corner of his eyes. "Why am I the only one-"

"You're not the only one." She cut him off immediately, but her tone was still gentle as it always was. "We all have these nightmares. Hey, don't scoff at me, I do have them."

"The badass gunslinger Nancy Wheeler has nightmares? You walked into that creepy house with literal guns blazing and shot the fucker up. How?" Eddie sounded so pathetic.

"The visions he showed me, Eds. They are still as vivid as the day I had them. They're more gruesome and just-," she swallowed, shaking her head, hugging him tight. This was about him, not her own nightmares. "My point is, we all struggle, Eddie, but we have each other to lean on. Like I've explained before, we all help out. It's why I offered my place to you six months ago when I found you on the porch breaking down. No one should go through this alone. No one. I'm not saying it's going to go away but it makes it easier to handle if there's others that went through what you did around you to keep you grounded. Trauma bonding I think Robin called it at one point."

Eddie knows she's right. Knew she was right. She was always right. He just didn't want to seem weak and frail in front of everyone else.

Especially not to Steve.

"You know I will always offer my place, always, but we miss you. We miss that stupid smile and that contagious laughter. The kids miss their dungeon master." Nancy smiled, rubbing his back.

Eddie chuckled lightly, smiling. "Nancy my my, you know the terminology?"

"What? Did Mike never tell you I dressed up for their campaign once?" She smirked at him.

The older male laughed, a genuine smile on his face now. "That's the best, oh my God. Really?"

"Yeah yeah, then I got too old for his dumb stuff, dating and whatever, but I still remember some things." She moved to sit beside him, bumping their shoulders together and holding his hand. "So, tomorrow, why don't you join Jonathan and I? We're heading to the mall."