Archive of Our Own

It starts in second period study hall. 

Everyone knows to steer clear of the furthest study carrel at the east side of the library; he’d carved his name into the partition his first senior year and the addition of a half-assed pentagram guarantees all the god-fearing chumps avoid it like the plague. Most days, he even gets a clear radius of empty carrels around his, and he likes it that way—nobody to complain to the librarian when he starts drumming on the desk. 

Eddie’s in his spot, scribbling in his D&D notebook, when someone drags out the chair across from his. 

He glances up lazily—if it’s one of Carver’s goons he’ll need to be on guard, but he can ignore anybody else—and nearly chokes on his own spit. 

Chrissy raises an eyebrow and finishes hooking her pink backpack on the back of the chair. 

“You okay?”

Eddie quickly looks around—it’s a grouping of four carrels, tucked into the nonfiction stacks, and nobody’s currently around to see the cheer captain sitting across from the resident freak, but still.

“What are you doing?”

“Studying,” she says simply, and slides into the seat. He can only see her eyes now, the rest of her face hidden by the partition between them, but the glint in them makes him instantly uneasy. 

He clears his throat. “Are, uh. Are Kim and Brianna gone today or something?” She usually sits with them at a round table near the windows.

“Nope.” 

He can hear the rustling of waxy paper, and he drops his face into his hands.

“You want some gum?” Chrissy asks, like it’s an innocent fucking question. He’d been a Big Red guy, once upon a time. The first time he’d tasted Hubba Bubba on her mouth, he’d converted. He’s like Pavlov’s fucking dog now—the scent of the sugary gum or the sight of her blowing a bubble is honest to god enough to get him going. 

Which she knows. When she found out, it had sent her into a giggling fit that hadn’t even ended when he’d yanked her underwear off and eaten her out. She’d still been laughing when she came, though she’d managed to dial it down to a delighted smirk by the time she’d jerked him off. 

“No,” he says shortly. 

“Suit yourself,” Chrissy replies, and the pop of a bubble makes his shoulders hunch.

Eddie stares at the lined paper in his notebook. He’d been jotting down ideas, getting real sadistic with it too—the next Hellfire meeting should be the very end of Vecna and he wanted to send it off with a bang—but right now the chicken scratch in front of him might as well be Tolkien elvish. 

He can smell her perfume from here, that sugary peach-cotton-candy scent that makes his mouth water, and a hint of the gum. Taking a deeper breath seems like a bad idea with the way he’s already fighting the urge to squirm in his seat, so Eddie focuses instead on simply steadying his breathing, short breaths in and out, attempting to convince his heart rate to go back to its boring normal operating speed.

“What are you working on?” she asks conversationally. 

“D&D,” Eddie mutters. 

“What’s that?” Chrissy asks, like she hasn’t come up with half of the most recent skirmishes he’d unleashed on the guys.

He guesses he ought to be grateful that if she has to talk to him at school, she’s at least pretending she doesn’t know a thing about him. If they can keep it simple, distant, professional, then maybe nobody’ll clock them. If nobody clocks them, then nobody’ll be a prick to Chrissy for being with him—the whole point of keeping this thing between them secret. 

This thing being how Eddie’s completely fucking in love with her and wants to live in her pussy for the rest of his life, but—semantics.

“A fantasy role-playing game.” If he can’t write, he can at least pretend—he starts to doodle in the corner of the notebook. 

“Fun!” Chrissy chirps. “I’m working on Spanish. Señora Álvarez taught us a bunch of new verbs. Querer, desear, anhelar.”

“Sure. Cool.” Other than adios amigos, any Spanish might as well be Martian to him. 

“Te quiero,” Chrissy lists, “te deseo, te anhelo.”

“Back at you,” Eddie says automatically, and realizes his doodle has turned into Chrissy’s name inside a heart. He quickly fills in the heart with dark ink before somebody walks by and sees.

“Eddie?”

Against his better judgment, he flicks his eyes up to meet hers beyond the partition. She’s already watching him, and she blinks languidly when their eyes meet. Her eyeshadow is pink today—he’d watched her swipe some on early this morning, using the mirror inset in the van’s visor to see. 

“What would you do if I touched you now?” 

His pen skids a dark line of ink from the filled-in heart to the edge of the page and beyond. 

“What?” he wheezes. That—she—she didn’t just say what he thought she did, right?

“If I touched you. Right now. What would you do?” 

Oh, christ. He squeezes his eyes shut. “Die.”

She giggles quietly from her side of the study carrels. “Well, don’t do that.”

Eddie tries to go back to that whole breathing thing, keeping the air going in and out in a way that’ll keep him from spontaneously combusting. It’s not all that easy, what with her going back to blowing and popping those damn bubbles of hers, but after about ten minutes of furious focus, he’s almost got himself all calmed down. Which, of course, is when Chrissy stretches with a little sigh and lifts her feet into his lap. 

Eddie jolts violently; it’s only by grabbing for the edge of the desk that he doesn’t fully topple backwards in his chair. 

“Cunningham.”

“Munson.” She must have slipped her sneakers off beneath her own desk; her socked toes nudge the inside of his thighs and he is going to have a heart attack. 

He seizes her feet and holds them still, glaring at her. “Do you want someone to think I’m forcing you to give me a fucking foot job?”

Chrissy wiggles her toes. “You’re the one growling at me. If you keep quiet, nobody’ll come over here. They never do.”

Eddie continues to scowl, and he can see her head tilt at him. Her eyes crinkle and he hears another laugh in her voice when she adds, “And even if they did, I’d tell them the foot job was completely voluntary.”

One foot slips out of his grasp, and she presses the arch of it directly against his crotch.

Oh, fuck him. Eddie imprisons that foot again and lets his head fall to the top of the desk. 

“I thought,” he says, muffled against his own notebook, “that we established I would, in fact, die if you touched me right now. You got an alibi planned? Because you’re seconds away from a manslaughter charge at the least.”

He’s probably getting ink on his face. A smeared blue heart on his cheek to proclaim his love for Chrissy Cunningham to the world, just in case her feet against his groin somehow slips passerby notice.

“I know CPR.” Another bubble pops. “You want to quiz me on my verbs?”

“No,” he replies, aggrieved.

“Fine. Me quieres, me deseas, me anhelas.”

He survives the rest of study hall somehow—Chrissy cools it with the torment, simply leaving her feet cradled in his lap, and it’s almost…nice, having the quiet connection between them as they work. 

However, work is still a very generous word for what he gets done. Even though it feels nice, he’s all too aware of the open legs of the study carrels, the clear view underneath of what he and Chrissy Cunningham are up to. After the past few months of nothing more than lingering glances and shoulders brushing against one another in the hallway whenever they’re in public, sharing a study area and having her blatantly use his body as a footrest feels dangerous.

The bell rings for passing period; Chrissy’s feet are out of his lap in a flash, her things packed up.

“See you later,” she says, bouncing over to him with her backpack slung over one shoulder. She kisses his cheek before he can even react, and then she’s out of the stacks and gone.

It had been the middle of March when Chrissy Cunningham had sat down across from him at the table in the woods and asked, “How does this work, exactly?”

“Oh, just like any other old sale,” he’d said, bracing his chin on his hand as he’d smiled at her. He hadn’t really meant to smile at her, but she’d been so wide-eyed and serious about the transaction, he hadn’t been able to help it. Be still his middle-school heart with its massive fucking crush on a pipsqueak cheerleader, still alive somewhere in his chest. “Except, uh, cash only, and for obvious reasons, no receipts.”

“I’ve got cash,” Chrissy’d promised, and dug through her backpack until she’d produced a thick leather wallet stamped with a monogram. “How much for an, um. Ounce?” 

The upturn of her voice had pulled another grin out of him; he’d chuckled and shaken his head. “Well, depends. That wallet yours or Carver’s?”

She’d cocked her head, eyes narrowing slightly. “Jason’s. Why?”

“Well—” Eddie had shrugged. “For you, an ounce of the good stuff could run you…oh, forty bucks or so. But for Carver—” He’d clicked his tongue regretfully, then grinned at her. “Hundred, easy.”

Flirting with the queen of Hawkins High probably hadn’t been the wisest move, but Chrissy Cunningham and Jason Carver had been going steady for nearly two years by that day in March. Eddie was morbidly curious to see how she’d react to his blatant upselling to her boyfriend.

(Though, technically—a hundred wasn’t out of bounds for decent grass. Technically, it was the forty for an ounce would hardly make his own investment back. But he wasn’t about to tell her that.)  

However Eddie’d hypothesized she might react, he did not, in fact, expect her to throw back her head and laugh.

“Huh,” he’d said thoughtfully, watching a dimple appear and disappear in a rosy cheek as she’d giggled, and that middle-school crush updated its resume to 1986. 

“I’ll give you a hundred and twenty,” she’d countered then, nose wrinkling with mischief, and his eyebrows had gone up. 

“You drive a hard bargain, Cunningham,” Eddie had said dryly, and flipped his metal lunchbox open to get the product.

“I’m not even invited to smoke it with him,” she’d informed him with a roll of her eyes. “It’s for him and the team after the championship game is over.” 

Eddie had cocked his head. “Do you want to smoke it?” 

Chrissy had paused, considered the question with a wad of Carver’s twenties in her hand. Then the corners of her mouth had turned up. “Is that an offer to sell to me?”

“It’s an offer to join me,” Eddie’d found himself saying, “free of charge.”

Stupid, stupid, stupid—

“Okay.”

Somehow, he’d found himself taking her home in his van, lighting up in the trailer’s living room, teaching her how to inhale without choking to death while Cheers played in the background. 

Chrissy had told him about the colleges she had applied to, about how much her mom got on her case, about how she was pretty sure Jason was cheating with Linda from his youth group. Eddie had told her about growing up with Wayne, about Hellfire Club, about the music he played with the band—

“Corroded Coffin!” she’d gasped, her eyes a little red. She’d clasped his face between her hands, squishing his cheeks together. Eddie had laughed and rescued the joint from between her fingers before she set his hair on fire. “I remember! You clapped for me. You were so—so—”

“Different?”

“Sweet,” she’d declared, and that’s when she’d kissed him.   

That had been the start of this thing between them—again, thing being his undying love and also undying lust—but even after Chrissy broke up with Carver, Eddie had made the case for not making their relationship public. A strong case, in his opinion. 

Chrissy was less convinced, even though he knew it was the best course of action. He’d developed a thick skin over the years, but Chrissy’d only ever been a Hawkins High darling. If the school realized she’d hooked up with him, of all people? They’d be worse than a pack of hyenas with an injured gazelle. 

“It’s your choice to keep this quiet,” she’d told him between kisses, straddling him on his bed while Wayne had been working a double. “I, however, think you’re being dramatic.”

“Grant took that Kelly girl out for a burger last year and they graffitied her locker to say ‘freak’s hore,’” Eddie had replied, clutching her hips for dear life as she’d ground against his erection. “No ‘w.’ And people hate me a lot more than they hate Grant, baby.”

“I can handle a little spray paint,” she’d breathed against his mouth. “Don’t you want to hold my hand in the lunchroom?”

“Yeah, but—”

“And you could kiss me in front of the squad.” Chrissy had pulled her shirt off at that point, then unclasped her bra, freeing her pretty, flushed tits.

“Uh huh,” Eddie had said dumbly, staring at the pink nipples right in front of his face, then shook himself. “Except—” 

“We could dance together at the prom.” Chrissy stretched, arms extending over her head as her spine arched, and her breast had brushed his mouth. 

He might have whimpered; whatever, shut up. 

“You could have me all the time. Any time. Anywhere,” Chrissy promised, and fuck—Eddie had known she hadn’t meant it like that. 

It’s not like she wanted to fuck him in front of the glee club—she’d meant he could have more than furtive meetings in his van long after the school parking lot has emptied, more than her clandestine visits to Forest Hills. 

But the blanket promise of her words had been so fucking tempting, he’d stuttered like an idiot until she’d laughed and pulled off the rest of her clothes, then his.

“Alright,” Chrissy had said as she’d sunk down on his cock. He’d thrown his head back in a gasp at the feeling of her hips coming to rest on his. “Fine. I can be patient,” she’d promised. “For a while.”  

Stupidly of him, he hadn’t given much thought to what would happen when Chrissy Cunningham’s patience finally ran out.

It continues when Eddie’s on his way to dreaded O’Donnell’s. Study hall is the only period he and Chrissy share, but their paths always cross in the west wing as they trade places for English and Biology. Not to be a lovesick idiot or anything, but he lives for that trek to English—without fail, they’ll both aim right down the middle of the hall so that somewhere near the water fountain, the sleeve of his leather jacket will brush against the sleeve of her letter sweater or whichever atrociously adorable little cardigan she’s wearing that day. 

Which, now that he thinks it, is possibly the least metal thing he could ever be jonesing for on the regular. For their sleeves to touch? Might as well stuff him into one of those Austen books Chrissy loves so much. 

On this particular day, they aim for each other like normal. Chrissy’s got a little bounce in her step that makes him bite back a smile even though it’s probably at his expense, lingering joy from the way she’d tortured him earlier. She’s in a pleated white skirt and a sleeveless flowery top, but no sweater. Her bare arms look soft and strong.

Also like normal, their paths converge near the water fountain, and Eddie minutely adjusts his course for optimal collision. They can get away with it easy—Hawkins High isn’t exactly spacious, and only douchebags like Carver made a big deal of bumping into somebody. Sometimes they mutter pretend sorries to sell it, but nobody ever pays attention. 

Chrissy drops her hand from her backpack strap as they pass; the backs of her knuckles glance off his and he smiles at his shoes. 

He usually doesn’t get her hand on these rendezvous. It’s nice, he thinks like the sap he is, and that’s when that same, sneaky hand squeezes his ass. Eddie practically leaps out of his skin when Chrissy cops a healthy feel, accidentally colliding with Robin Buckley. 

“Whoa—shit—” she yelps, windmilling her arms and taking out Nancy Wheeler’s binder.

“Fuck,” he blurts, snatching the front of her vest to catch her before she falls flat on her ass. “Sorry! Sorry, I—sorry.” 

Nancy Wheeler looks up at him, an extremely unimpressed expression on her face. “You see a spider or something?” she says dryly as Robin steadies herself, plucking his hand off her vest like it’s a dead frog. 

“Or something,” he mutters, and crouches to grab the binder, shuffling all the papers that had exploded into a pile. “Sorry.”

They both give him the hairy eyeball before taking off down the hall; Eddie exhales and catches Chrissy watching him, just beyond Ms. Kelley’s office.

Sorry, she mouths, but both the grin on her face and Eddie’s own gut instinct call bullshit on that. 

He narrows his eyes, then scratches at his nose with his middle finger before turning toward O’Donnell’s; he can hear Chrissy’s laughter even after he makes it into the classroom.

He’s sitting with the Hellfire guys like usual, plus Sinclair and Wheeler’s girlfriends; Chrissy’s tucked between the squad across the cafeteria. None of that is cause for alarm.

What does make him straighten in the ancient chair, crushing a handful of pretzels in his fist, is that after she eats the PB&J he’d traded her that morning for the low-fat tuna sandwich she hates—god, her mother’s a bitch, and her tuna sandwiches suck—Chrissy pulls out a sucker. 

A sucker. And then she winks at him. 

Shit. Eddie swallows, trying to convince himself to look away. 

(Ha. Fat chance.) 

Chrissy takes her sweet time unwrapping the candy—he can’t make out the color from here. Is it grape, strawberry, root beer? It’s hardly important, but Eddie’s got a fixation and anything to do with Chrissy Cunningham feels pretty earth-shattering—

She curls her tongue around the lollipop in a way that, frankly, would be categorized as sinful by at least five different religions. He would know; he’s been the grateful recipient of said sinful move. Eddie shifts uncomfortably in his seat. Chrissy’s eyes are locked on his with a wicked gleam. She’s being so obvious, staring at him across the room. One of the other cheerleaders is bound to notice, or maybe one of the jocks. 

After a minute of what feels like a fever dream, Chrissy pulls the sucker out of her mouth and sticks out her tongue at him. Even across the room, he can see the bright red streak. 

If he kissed her now, he bets she’d taste like cherry instead of Hubba Bubba.

And…he’s pretty sure that’d get him going too.

“Whoa,” Will Byers says, rearing back when Eddie viciously yanks his notebook out of his bag and holds it out directly in front of his own face. He splays the cover open like a newspaper to block his view of Chrissy. “Uh…everything okay, Eddie?” 

“Fine,” Eddie snaps, mind racing as he stares at the metal spiral in the center of the notebook. “Buzz off.” 

“Jeez,” Dustin Henderson says, holding up his hands in surrender, eyebrows high. He’s pretty sure he catches the rest of the Hellfire guys exchanging rolls of their eyes, and resolves to kill them dead in the final Vecna campaign. 

“What’s his problem?” Max Mayfield mutters to El Hopper, who shrugs. 

Blatantly sitting across from him, tucking her feet into his lap, grabbing his ass in the middle of the hallway, and now this? Porn star moves with a Tootsie Pop, making eyes at him where literally anybody in the whole school could see? 

Warning bells begin to go off.

When he opens his locker after the dismissal bell, a folded piece of binder paper flutters to the ground. He can see the shimmer of the ink from here. As the rest of Hawkins High’s captives scatter like ants, Eddie stuffs his entire bag into the locker, then has to bash the metal door three times to get the latch to catch.

Meet me in the art room. xoxo

Eddie stares at the note. It’s not the first time she’s left a note in his locker to adjust their plans. All the teachers love her, and it’s easy enough for her to get out of class while the halls are empty and deposit a message when no one can see. 

It is, however, the first time the change of plan is to meet somewhere in the school. 

Their usual M.O. is to meet in the woods, or to linger in their last classroom of the day until the parking lot empties out and they can make it to the van without being caught. He huffs out a breath, then shoves the note into his pocket.

As he heads through the halls toward the wing where all the elective classes are housed, Eddie tries not to think about what a bad idea this is. A very bad idea. Horrible, even. Because what’s the point? 

Is he capable of not caving to a bad idea? Theoretically, sure. 

In actuality? Absolutely not, especially when it’d mean leaving Chrissy in the lurch if he never met up with her. 

He thinks this could be how addicts feel—knowing on some level that they’re being an idiot, but unable to say no to the thing they want most.

Eddie’s nearly there now. He’s moving slowly, feeling a bit like a hunted animal. A few students are still around, talking to their friends or exchanging things at their locker, though no one gives him a second glance. 

The door to Miss Gardiner’s art room is nearly in reach. Seven paces away. Five. Three, and—

A hand darts out, fists his jacket sleeve, and yanks him bodily into the art supply closet right next to the classroom.

“Oh fuck,” Eddie says, tripping and nearly crushing Chrissy between his body and the shelves as the door shuts with a firm click. “What—” 

Her mouth is on his before he can say another syllable, and Eddie might freeze for a second, but he’s not an idiot —the second he realizes what’s happening, he sinks his hands into her hair with a groan and kisses her back.

Chrissy forcibly turns him until his back digs painfully into the wooden supply shelves; he doesn’t care. She’s on her toes, front plastered against his, pinning him in place as her hands clutch at his shoulders; her mouth is sweet and tastes like that damn gum. 

“Baby,” he gets out between kisses; she does her typical happy little shimmy at the name and hums. “Baby,” he tries again. “What’re you doing?”

“What do you think?” Chrissy breathes, and kisses his throat next. She lets out a little laugh when he swallows hard, his adam’s apple bobbing under her lips. “All day, I thought I’ve been obvious.” 

“Obvious,” he echoes stupidly, and Chrissy hums in agreement. “Why—why the art room?”

“Needed a door.” She’s busily sucking a hickey into his neck; her hands are under his shirt, skating over his stomach with her nails. The ticklish pressure makes it nearly impossible to think.

“The van—”

“Too far,” she says, and pulls back. “You’re not going to make me wait, are you?”

All the puzzle pieces of the day, from the library to the hall, the lunch to the note, coalesce into one crystal clear image. 

Obvious.

“Cunningham. Do you want me to fuck you here? Right now?”    

“Uh huh. Something like that.” 

“Jesus,” Eddie mutters, heat running up his spine. It’s not like he’s a prude who turns up his nose at fucking anywhere without turndown service. There was that one time in the woods, and the van’s gotten more than its fair share of action—but always when it was tucked in some inconspicuous spot. 

The hallway hadn’t even been empty when she’d dragged him in here. Someone might have already seen them, and even if they hadn’t, neither of them are all that quiet when they fuck—he lives for the sounds he can wring out of Chrissy, and she gets off on hearing him talk, especially about her. 

They’re less than a month from graduation. If they can just keep this under the radar—

Chrissy kisses his chin and bats those baby blues at him. “Eddie…”

Well…

Maybe they can be quiet. Just this once.

“Alright,” he says. “But I’m keeping your panties.” 

“Okay.” One of the dimples in her cheek flashes at him. Then she tells him, “Throw your jacket on the floor.” 

His brow creases. “What?” 

“Throw. Your jacket. On. The floor,” Chrissy says, smile as sweet as honey, eyes as wicked as the devil himself. 

Forehead furrowing in confusion, he does what she asks, slipping his jacket and vest off in one go, then dropping it to the ground. 

“Thank you,” she murmurs, and twines herself around him in a kiss so deep and dirty it makes his head reel. He’s still out of it when Chrissy breaks the kiss, and is blinking slow blinks like he’s been drugged when her hands go to his belt. Eddie’s hips buck against her grip with a shout he only barely chokes off. 

Chrissy gets the old handcuff buckle undone and the zipper down in the next second; the one after that, she’s lowering herself until her knees kiss the leather of his jacket, down on the floor. 

“Holy shit,” he croaks. Chrissy smirks up at him, kneeling in front of him. She’s got one hand on his thigh, the denim sagging now that his jeans have been loosened; the other hand toys with the waistband of his boxer briefs. “I—you sure? I could fuck you first. Make you come—”

“I’m sure,” she says. “This first. Please? I’ve been thinking about it all day, Eddie.” 

“Jesus christ.”

“Are you hard?”

“Jesus christ,” Eddie repeats, and can’t stop himself from smoothing a hand over her silky strawberry blonde hair. “After the way you teased me today? Course I’m fucking hard, baby.” He doesn’t have a clue why she was out to rile him up today, but of course it’s got him ready for her. 

She dimples at him again. “Good.” 

He swallows hard when she pulls the jeans and underwear down, freeing his cock; she presses her palm firmly against the base, pushing his dick against his own stomach as she glides that hand up, up, then finally curls her fingers around him in a secure grip just below the head. 

He wasn’t lying—he’s hard as stone, the head a yearning red. Her thumb teases him there, where he’s already leaking; Eddie mutters a curse and tries not to let his knees stop working. 

This—holy shit, this is a bad idea. There isn’t even a lock on the supply closet; if someone hears, if someone sees, they’ll know and they’ll make Chrissy’s life hell—

Chrissy sucks the head of his dick into her mouth which enough force that her cheeks hollow; Eddie chokes and promptly forgets anything but the heat of her mouth and the soft rasp of her tongue. 

Her hand strokes down, working the length of him that’s not in her mouth; her other hand still braces against his thigh. He needs it there—her mouth feels too good, too warm and soft and wet, and he needs her hand pinning him in place to remind him not to mindlessly thrust. 

Chrissy pulls back briefly, licking her bottom lip until it shines. She looks up at him from under her lashes. “Why aren’t you talking to me? You know I like when you talk.”

Someone might hear, the small, muffled voice of reason reminds him. 

“Please?” she adds, and the voice is swiftly ignored. 

“Fuck,” he says, and she kisses the head of his dick. “Fuck, Chrissy. You’ve got the sweetest fucking mouth. Can’t believe I’m so fucking lucky—” 

Eddie’s words stumble a little when she swallows him back into her mouth, squeezing the base of his dick. “Y-you do that so good, baby. Fuck, you’re so pretty with your mouth around my cock.”

Chrissy lets out a pleased little hum, and Eddie unthinkingly knots her hair into his fist as he groans. When she squeaks, he blinks heavily, then drops his hand like he’d burned it. 

“Sorry,” he blurts out. “Sorry, baby, I didn’t meant to—”

She takes her other hand from his thigh and grabs his wrist, squeezing tight; at the same moment, she takes him deeper into her mouth, deep enough that she sputters a little. 

“Holy—fuck,” he grates out, clutching at the supply shelves with the hand she’s not gripping. The sucking warmth of her mouth around him, the softness of her tongue and throat against his dick, pulls him steadily closer to the edge. “Chrissy—”

She pulls back on a gasp then, and starts jerking him off as she looks up at him with dark, needy eyes.

“Pull my hair,” she says, panting out the words.

“Huh?” 

“Pull my hair,” Chrissy repeats, and uses her grip on his wrist to bring his hand back to her head. He instinctively threads his fingers into the strands and she lets out a fascinating little whimper when his hold grows tighter. “I don’t mind. Make it good for you. Anything you like, do it. I’ll like it too.” 

He swears his dick jumps in her hand at the thought.  But— “I don’t want to be too rough. Hurt you.”

“Eddie,” she says, the name rough on her throat and fond as anything. “Anything you do, I’ll like it too.” 

She briefly lets go of his dick, reaching up until he takes his hand from the shelves and lets her have it. She brings it to the other side of her skull, and when he hesitantly grips her hair there too, she lets out a goddamn moan. 

“Oh christ,” he rasps. He has to briefly cast his gaze up to the flickering bulb on the ceiling, not because he wants to, but because he’s one wrong look from Chrissy Cunningham away from being a two-pump chump. “Baby. You’re gonna kill me.” 

“No, I’m not,” she says, and plants her hands on his hips as she leans in to kiss the underside of his cock. Her tongue darts out, licking the sensitive skin; Eddie shivers. “I’m gonna make you feel good.”

He exhales when she nips at the tender line of muscle on his abdomen, but the exhale becomes a strangled groan as she takes him into her mouth even deeper, sucking and licking and moaning around him. “Shit, Chrissy—jesus fuck, I can’t fucking believe you. I’m so fucking—lucky. F-f-fuck,” Eddie stutters as her tongue tickles the underside of the crown. 

She makes another muffled sound, then reaches up to his flick his wrist. His fist curls tighter into her hair, and he can see her squirm, hips jumping, thighs rubbing together as she sucks harder at him. 

“Oh,” he breathes. She’d said, but—

Oh.

Pull my hair.

Make it good for you. 

Anything you like, do it. I’ll like it too.

Okay. Okay.

“You’re so pretty,” Eddie tells her. “So fucking pretty, down on your knees for me.” Her eyes flick up to him when he says that, wide and wanting. “I’ve never felt anything as good as your mouth, sweetheart.” As a test, he very carefully tightens his grip, the fine blonde strands tangling around his fingers; her eyelids flutter. “You’re doing such a good fucking job, sucking me off like a good girl.” 

Her fingers dig into his hips as she sucks and moans, then pulls off of him for another gulp of air. 

“Eddie—” Her voice is pleading; she pushes her head against one of his hands. “More?”

Jesus H. Christ. “Y-you want me to fuck your mouth, baby?” He trips over the first word, which is the fucking opposite of suave, but Chrissy doesn’t seem to care—she nods so hard he nearly loses his grip on her hair. 

He lets out a deep breath, and if it’s a little shaky, well fuck him. “Open your mouth, sweetheart.” 

She opens her mouth instantly, lips already a little swollen, shiny with spit. 

“A little more, baby,” he gets out, and releases one hand to grip his own cock as she drops her jaw open a little further, pretty pink tongue against her teeth. He holds the head of his dick against her soft lower lip, feeling the plush warmth of her, the heat of her breath as she quickly pants. He pushes inside of her mouth just the smallest bit; her eyes are glued to his, but she lets him rest against her tongue, then whimpers a little when he pulls back out. 

“You’re gonna be such a good girl for me, huh?” 

Chrissy nods again, emphatic, and Eddie lets out a shaky laugh. Holy shit. Holy fucking shit.

“Tell me no if I do something you don’t like. Or if you want me to stop,” Eddie tells her. “If you can’t talk, pinch the shit out of me.” 

She nods, and he shakes his head. “Say it, baby.” 

“Okay,” Chrissy breathes. “I’ll pinch you.” 

He can’t help but smile. “Good girl. Open your mouth again, sweetness.”

She obediently opens, and this time, Eddie pushes into the soft heat of her mouth further, until he’s well-seated inside. Chrissy groans, and Eddie grits his teeth at the vibration. 

“Okay?” 

She hollows her cheeks in response, sucking at him and moaning, and meaningfully drags his hand away from his dick and back to her head before grabbing tight to his hips with both of her hands. Another shaky laugh escapes him. 

“Right,” he says. “Got it.”

She tries to chase his dick when he withdraws a little, but he holds her in place with his grip in her hair; he can feel the full-body shudder travel through her. He’s trembling too—he’ll give her the words she wants, the touch, but holy christ, he’s not sure how long he’ll be able to.  

“I’ll do the work, baby. You’ve already done so well—I’ll do the rest, okay? I’ll move you if I need it, and you’ll let me, right? You wanna make me feel good.”

Her thumb strokes over his hip, and she nods her head slightly, eyes locked on his. Her rapid breaths through her nose hit his skin, and if he didn’t already love her, he’d have been a goner now. 

“Good girl,” he whispers to her again, and the next time he pushes into her mouth, pulls out, she stays perfectly still. Hectic red is splashed across her cheeks, her nose; her eyes are glossy with need. Eddie’s own lips part as he begins to fuck her mouth, need and desire and pleasure whirling in his gut at the dripping, wet warmth around him. 

“So good,” he pants, and tugs on her hair until she moans again. “So good, baby. I fucking love your mouth, the way you take me in so good. You think you can take a little more?”

She moans again, squeezing his hips; this time he uses his hold on her to bring her mouth closer as he pushes between her lips, hitting the softness of her throat. Her eyes widen; he can feel her sputter a little. Eddie pulls back, watching as she sucks in deep breaths. 

“Too much?”

“No,” Chrissy says. He can feel the words against his cock. “More. I can take it.” 

Fuck. “Course you can, baby,” he says, “you’re so good to me,” and this time goes three strokes before pulling back to let her breathe.

“More?” 

“No more,” she pants, “but you can go harder. Deeper. I don’t mind.”

“Oh, fucking christ,” Eddie says, and she’s smiling when she takes him back in. 

He doesn’t force himself in much deeper—he’ll pull her hair, he’ll talk to her the way she likes, but he doesn’t particularly enjoy feeling like he’s truly choking her—but he increases the pace, grunting each time he pushes inside. Chrissy starts to moan around him on the fourth round of thrusts, sweet, high-pitched sounds that turn into guttural groans every time he pushes into the softness of her throat.

“Fuck,” he breathes, “fuck—I love this, love fucking your dirty fucking mouth. Can feel your goddamn throat—you’re so soft there, you know that, baby? Fucking love how soft you are, everywhere. Such a sweet girl, such a dirty mouth—just for me, right?”

Chrissy nods, breathing hard through her nose; her eyes are hazy, heavy-lidded now. One of her hands drops as he watches his cock disappear into her mouth; he catches the way it skates up her leg, then disappears under her skirt. 

“Oh, good girl,” Eddie grits out; this time, he accidentally does thrust a little harder and she jolts. He can see her moving her hips, grinding into her own hand. “Good fucking girl. Touch yourself, baby. Make yourself feel so good, just like you make me feel so good. God, I bet you’re wet. I hope you’re wet to your fucking knees—can’t wait to get my fucking mouth on you—”

Chrissy whimpers around his cock, then does something with her mouth, her throat; muscles flex, relax, and then he sinks so deep into her throat that her nose nearly brushes his groin.

Eddie lets go of her hair with a hoarse shout, scrambling to grab the shelves for purchase before his knees fucking buckle. She’s never done that before. “Holy shit, Chrissy—”

She coughs when she pulls her mouth off of him, but her smile is like the cat who ate the fucking canary. “I hoped I could figure that out,” she comments, and Eddie thunks his head back against a can of paint and laughs. 

“You’re gonna kill me,” he says, and she grins up at him. 

“We’ve been through this. Now come on. I want to try that again.”

He lets her control things now—well, as much as he can. He can’t help from bucking his hips into her wet, sucking mouth, but he lets her be the one to hold herself in place when he slips deep into her throat. Whatever’s coming out of his mouth now isn’t smooth; it’s frantic, praise about her body, her mind, her mouth babbling out of him as he loses his mind to her touch. The concept of being quiet has long since left him.

It doesn’t take long for Eddie to come up to the edge; his muscles are trembling, a tidal wave of lust and feeling and pleasure barely dammed up behind his rapidly waning ability to hold off the orgasm.  

“If you don’t want to swallow, you should stop,” he strangles out. She smoothes a hand over his hip, soft and gentle, and keeps going. 

The dam breaks in a spectacular fashion, and he pours himself into her mouth with a pained, muffled groan. He registers a dull thud and minor pain at the back of his head; it takes him a good couple of minutes before his vision clears and his brain resumes working enough for him to realize he’d hit his head against a paint can again.

He’s not in Chrissy’s mouth any longer; instead, she’s got his dick in her hand. As he watches, breathing hard, she places a sweet kiss right against the glistening head. When she catches him looking, his jaw hanging open like an idiot, she giggles. 

She’s still giggling when he drops to his knees, pressing his mouth against hers in a clacking kiss; her giggles trail off into a soft moan as he dips his tongue inside, tasting her, tasting himself, and still, that sugary-bubblegum-sweet. 

“Can’t fucking believe you,” he mutters against her mouth; she cups his jaw and kisses him back. “Christ, Cunningham. This fucking mouth of yours—”

“Eddie,” she breathes, shifting closer until she’s straddling one of his knees. Her hips rub against his jeans once, then again. “Eddie, please. I want you so bad.”

“Jesus,” he breathes. He wants at once to press her to her back, flip up her skirt, get his hand and his mouth on her cunt. But it’s cramped in here, the floor dirty; her skirt is a pristine white, and he thinks it’s probably better for her if they can keep it that way. “Hold—hold on,” he says, and grips her elbows to shift her up and off of him. 

After quickly tucking himself back into his underwear and zipping up his jeans, he sits down on the ground; his knees are bent, feet flat on the floor. “Come on,” Eddie urges. “Get your panties off, baby—I want to taste you.” 

“Like that?” Chrissy asks, her eyebrows going up, but she’s already on her feet, dropping her panties to her ankles and kicking them to the side. She does pause when he bends forward to kiss her reddened kneecaps—first the left, then the right. “You’re sweet,” she says, carding her fingers through his hair, and he laughs.

“You’re one to talk about sweet.” 

She takes his hands when he offers them, lowering herself back down; when he lies back, pillowed on his own jacket, she’s hovering over his sternum, knees beside his ears.

“I haven’t done it like this before,” Chrissy admits; Eddie snorts and tucks the front of her skirt into her waistband so he can see her pretty cunt. Arousal shines between her legs; he can’t wait to taste it. 

“Yeah, and I’d never been fucking deep throated, Chrissy; now fucking get down here so I can eat your pussy.” 

“Bossy,” she mutters, but grips another one of the art shelves and lets him urge her down to his mouth with his hands on her hips. 

“You like it,” he retorts, and she sputters a little laugh before sighing, “Yeah.”

The yeah melts into a moan; Eddie moans too. She’s slippery against his mouth, wet down her thighs. She’s close, too; nearly got off from letting him pull her hair, fuck her mouth. He squeezes her ass through the pleated skirt, pulling her harder into his mouth; she squeaks, then groans softly as he fucks her cunt with his tongue.

“You don’t need to—feels so good, Eddie, but I’m so wound up,” Chrissy whimpers, hips pushing against his tongue. “Please, please, I wanna come, please, please, please—” 

He tips his head backward, breathing hard through his nose, then squeezes her ass again in acknowledgement as he goes back to work between her thighs. 

Those thighs start to shake almost instantly when he holds his tongue flat, moves it over her clit. That’s good, but not enough—he wants her legs to stop fucking working. Eddie tries a soft kiss around her clit, then a sucking pull—

That’s it, he thinks triumphantly; her thighs shake harder, then give out entirely. Her cunt falls against his mouth with her full weight as she pants and shakes and shivers; Eddie groans and keeps sucking, only able to feel-see-smell-breathe-taste-touch her, and nothing else. It’s fine. Oxygen is overrated.

“Holy—oh my god—Eddie—”

When she comes, he can feel her cunt pulsing against his chin; her entire body spasms as she falls apart above his mouth, and she chokes out his name. 

His lungs heave like bellows when she shifts off his face to his abdomen, falling back into the cradle of his bent knees; he can feel the wetness of her pussy against his stomach. Shit. Give him another ten minutes and he could be ready to go again, he swears.

Chrissy’s hand finds one of his, lacing their fingers together, and she lets out a deeply pleased sigh. “Wow. That felt really good.” 

Eddie chokes out a laugh. “Back at you, Cunningham.”

Her thumb strokes his; he shifts until he can smooth his other hand up and down her thigh. He likes fucking her—he loves fucking her—but he likes these quiet moments after too, when he can touch her, hold her. A few times, she’s even fallen asleep, all bundled up against him; it’d been a heady thing when he’d realized she liked him, trusted him enough to be comfortable like that.

Speaking of—she’s starting to look a little sleepy now, each blink coming and going slowly. As he watches her, she lets out a little yawn and melts further against his bent knees.

Eddie squeezes her leg; when that doesn’t get a reaction, he slides it further up her thigh and tries again.

“Hey. Don’t fall asleep in the art closet.” 

Chrissy hums and stirs a bit. “But it was so fun in here.” 

“Agreed,” Eddie says. “Hand me your panties.”

It takes them a bit to get their sea legs again, but in short order her skirt is smoothed down, his jacket’s dusted off and slipped back on, and her panties are tucked away in his pocket.  

“Where’s your bag?” Eddie asks. Her hair’s pretty fucked up from his hands; he tucks the strands behind her ears, trying to smooth it down. 

“In my locker. Walk me there?” Chrissy takes his hand, puts her other on the door handle. 

Eddie doesn’t move. “Uh—baby, it’ll be a fucking miracle if no one heard our performance in here. Probably should split up if we don’t want to tempt fate. You want the head start?”

His girl rolls her eyes, stands on her tiptoes, and pecks him on the mouth. “No.”

“Okay,” he says slowly. “You want me to go first?”

“Still no,” Chrissy says, and opens the door. 

“Holy shit,” Eddie says, trying to pull back, but you don’t make captain of the cheer squad by being a weakling. Chrissy strong-arms him out into the hall.

It’s empty, thankfully, and he lets out a breath as he slips his hand out of hers. “Jesus. Somebody could’ve been out here, Chrissy.” 

“And?” she says. “If someone was out here, waiting for us to come out. Were you gonna run away, leave me here alone?” 

“What? Fuck—no!” 

“Then stop leaving me alone,” Chrissy says, and she might as well have slapped him. 

“What?”

She sighs. “I’m tired of this, Eddie.” His heart stops, then resumes beating when she says, “Sneaking around, pretending we aren’t together. I hate it.”

“I—I know it sucks,” Eddie says. “But we’re almost at the end of the line. If we can just make it a couple more weeks—” It’ll be easier in the summer, spending time together, and they’ve talked about him finding a place in Chicago when she starts at the University of Illinois. If they can just—

“No,” Chrissy says, setting her mouth. “I’ve let you have months, Eddie. I want to be able to sit by you in the library, like today. I want to be able to say hi to you in the hallway; I want to hold your hand and hug you and kiss you in front of people.”

“No, you don’t.”

“Yes, I do. Didn’t you like it, studying together? Didn’t today make you think about what it would be like to be together all the time, not just stuck watching each other across the room?” 

He stares at her, at the stubborn look on her pretty, still-flushed face, and he gets it now. The library, the hallway, the lunchroom—all the teasing. Even just now, in the art closet. She’d been trying to break his resolve. “Yeah, of course, but Chrissy—fuck. You know it would be a shitshow, being with me.” 

She shrugs. “Maybe. Maybe not.” 

“You know the squad might turn on you,” he tells her, desperate for her to understand. “Maybe all the jocks. And you’ll probably have to kiss Prom Queen goodbye.” 

Chrissy shakes her head. “I don’t care.”

“You might.”

“No,” she says, narrowing her eyes. “I won’t.”

Eddie scowls back. “You might.” 

She lets out a little growl. “Eddie! I won’t!“

“Kelly did,” he retorts, and Chrissy blinks, then frowns again. 

“What does Kelly have to do with any of this?”

He feels instantly stupid, bringing the other girl up. He hadn't really meant to. But Chrissy is still frowning at him, so Eddie shrugs uneasily. “You know. I told you how people reacted when Grant took Kelly Carmichael out.”

She tilts her head. “Yeah. And?” 

“And—” Eddie lets out a frustrated huff. “She—she’d seemed really into Grant, you know? Smiling at him, passing little notes and stuff. But after he took her out and people lost their shit—” He sighs roughly. “It didn’t matter that she’d liked him. It wasn’t worth all the stares, the shit-talking.”

“Okay,” she says slowly. “But I’m not Kelly. And you’re not Grant.”

“I know, but I don’t—I don’t want that to happen with us. For us to go public, and have it be too much. I don’t want you to—”

Regret it. Regret me sticks in his throat, but that’s part of it too.

Fuck, he wants to give Chrissy what she wants. Anything, everything. It blows his mind that what she wants is him, and badly enough that she’d fight him for it, do everything she’s done today to try to convince him. 

But Grant had been a sad sack for months after the Kelly stuff, and they’d only gone on a single date.

Eddie’s head over heels in love with Chrissy Cunningham. It would break his damn heart if it backfired. If he lost her.

“Change your mind,” he finishes.

He thinks that makes sense too. It does, doesn’t it? It’s happened, historically; it’s not of bounds to think history could repeat with them.

Except...for some reason, Chrissy’s looking at him like he’s batshit crazy. 

“Of course I’m not going to change my mind,” she says. 

Desperate now, he asks, “How can you be sure?”   

Her brow creases. “What could anybody do to me that’s worse than being apart from you?”

Eddie blinks. “I—” Vice versa, he understands the sentiment. Being with Chrissy is worth anything somebody might try to do to him. Hawkins’ goons could wreck his car, give him a black eye and some broken ribs, sabotage O’Donnell’s final exam so Eddie can’t walk at graduation, and none of that would matter if Chrissy still wanted him. 

For her to feel that way about him—his chest feels funny, like bubbles are popping inside of it or something, and Eddie can't help but ask, “You sure?”

“Eddie,” Chrissy says, exasperated. “Yes. I don’t care if they pour freaking pig’s blood on me at the prom.”

“They might,” he says darkly, but she ignores that.

“Know why?”

Grudgingly, he asks, “Why?”

“Because,” Chrissy says, slowly and deliberately like she’s trying to communicate to someone in another language, “I love you.”

Eddie stares.

Chrissy raises an eyebrow, staring back.

That…huh. 

Huh. 

He—

Huh. 

It’s possible he fell asleep, he supposes. Abernathy’s end-of-the-day history lecture could’ve sent him into dreamland, and Eddie could be dreaming all this up right now. 

Except—Eddie’s got a great imagination, it’s true, but he’s pretty sure even the dirtiest part of his psyche couldn’t have come up with Chrissy figuring out how to enthusiastically deep throat him in a supply closet.

Which means—Chrissy really did say she loves him. 

Which means—

“Oh,” he says. There’s about a million of those bubbles inside him now, popping frantically in little bursts of joy.

“Uh huh,” she says dryly. Her other eyebrow goes up after another minute of him staring. “That all you have to say, or...” 

“So, I know you’re sick of me asking if you’re sure, but if I could just ask one more time,” he starts, and Chrissy rolls her eyes, grabs his face in her hands, and pulls him down into a kiss.

Her mouth fits against his so perfectly, her bottom lip pressed between both of his. She kisses him deeply at first, then softens, pressing gentle little kisses to his mouth, sweeter than sugar. He wraps his arms around, pulling her closer; Chrissy lets out a pleased sigh against his mouth, then murmurs, “Of course I’m sure. You think I blow just anybody in the school’s art closet?”

Eddie laughs, kisses the corner of her soft, pretty mouth. “I hope not,” he says, and she tugs sharply on a lock of his hair in retaliation.

“What about you?” Chrissy asks, drawing back enough to look at him. “Jason’s probably going to throw a fit when he finds out we’re together. Are you going to change your mind?”

“Absolutely fucking not,” Eddie says, then remembers he probably needs to tell her. “Because, uh. I love you too.” 

“Oh,” Chrissy teases, dimpling at him. Her nose wrinkles, and he kisses that too even as he flushes a bit. 

“Shut up.”  

“Make me,” she says, tipping her chin up in challenge, eyes glittering with mischief and—well, obviously, he kisses her again, right there in the middle of the hall.

Eddie walks her to her locker on the way to his, then drives them over to Benny’s for a peanut butter banana malt. 

He doesn’t run in and get it to go like he usually does—they sit in a booth, two straws in the shake at Chrissy’s insistence. 

“It’s cute,” she tells him. “Like we’re in the movies.” She’d put on fresh lipstick in the car, and she leaves a bubblegum-pink lip print on the straw when she takes a sip. 

Eddie drinks out of that one too, grinning at her when she squawks. “Tastes better through this one.”

Their feet are tangled together beneath the table. When Eddie lays his hand palm up on the chipped formica, Chrissy gives him hers. 

Two tables over, half a dozen Hawkins High students pretend they’re not gawking.

“How long do you think it’ll take to get through the school?” Chrissy asks, taking another sip of the malt. 

Eddie snorts. “Oh, homeroom, easy.”

“No way. At least sixth period,” she bets. Her thumb rests on his pulse point, rubbing little circles, and she tilts her head, considering him. “Is it bothering you? That they can see us?”

He would be lying if he said the nerves were gone, but Eddie shakes his head and tells her truthfully, “Nah. The more witnesses, the better.”

“Oh, really?” she asks with interest, smile blooming like a sunflower. She looks so damn happy to be holding his hand and sharing a shake, and Eddie feels like an idiot, thinking of how many days he could have been making her smile like that. It’s alright, though. It’s on his to-do list, from now to forever.

“Chrissy Cunningham loves me,” Eddie says, squeezing her hand. “Everybody ought to know.”

Chrissy beams, leaning across the table. “Then let’s make sure they get the memo.”

Eddie leans forward too, capturing her mouth in a cool, sweet kiss—and if anybody says a thing, neither of them pays any attention at all.