Ok so remember how I said this was going to be two parts? Well, now it’s going to be three 😅Wayne really took over for a while, and it was getting long, so this is a bit of an interlude before the boys reunite and kiss it better.
Thank you as always @devondespresso for being so patient with me while I work on their giveaway fic. Hope you enjoy some time with Uncle Wayne!
Also on Ao3
Part One, Part Two
He regrets it almost as soon as he does it, the running.
Not even for the right reasons, but because it reminds him so much of that night. A minute ago all he could think about was Steve, Steve, Steve. Steve is going to know. Steve is going to know about how you failed Chrissy. He’s going to know how much of a coward you are.
But then all he can feel is the cold air in his face, and all he can hear is the wind in his ears, and he may as well be 19 again, running away from a crime scene. It doesn’t matter that he’s wearing shoes this time and he’s running down an unfamiliar road instead of into too familiar woods, the fear and the shame are the same.
Maybe not quite the same, there are no murderers chasing his tail here, but the loss he sees looming behind him is its own kind of stringent fear maker.
But even he can’t run forever, and this isn’t his backwater town, it’s Steve’s. He makes himself stop. He ran in the wrong direction, away from Main Street and down some stretch of road he doesn’t recognize. Hawkins is the type of place where payphones are still on every stretch of road with any kind of traffic, just in case someone gets stuck, and Eddie spots one about 20 feet ahead.
He drags his sorry ass toward it. He doesn’t have a plan, but turning back feels like it will kill him. Any step closer to that little family he knows he won’t be welcome back in after tonight will make the steps feel like walking on coals.
Eddie is dialing the number before he even realizes he’s in the phone booth, quarters in hand.
“Hello?” a gruff voice answers. He’s probably woken him up at this hour, the old man goes to bed before 9:00 PM these days.
“Wayne?” Eddie doesn’t recognize his own voice
A sigh, the kind that means Wayne is committing himself to being fully awake. “Yeah kid, it’s me. You wanna tell me what happened, or you need’ta wait?” Wayne always knows when something is up with Eddie. He never needs to say anything. Too much of his childhood was spent in black moods and ill situations for Wayne to not be familiar with every kind of unhappy Eddie can manifest.
“They found out. Dustin found it. Everything.”
“Thought you were done running, son.” Because of course, he knows. Probably knew it the second he opened his mouth.
“Shit Wayne, it wasn’t just…it wasn’t just that. It was everything, everything. Rehab, the playgirls, the goddamn christian propaganda pamphlets they pass out at the bus station. Layed out on the kitchen counter like a fucked up diarama for a presentation about every sin Eddie Munson ever committed.” Any other time, Eddie would be reaching for his notebook, writing down potential song lyrics, but music is the farthest thing from his mind.
“Eds.” Wayne tries to slow him down, get him to take a breath.
“Dustin knows. Steve is going to know, shit!” he closes his eyes, bangs his head a little just to the side of the keypad, bangs a weak fist on the glass walls surrounding him. “He probably already knows by now!”
“Eddie.”
“So yeah! I fucking ran!” he finally takes that deep breath. “I just…wanted to live in a world where Steve still loves me a little longer, because as soon as he sees that shit, it’s gonna be him running for the hills.” It wouldn’t be the first time, is left unsaid between them.
“Well, that don’t seem very fair, does it son?” Wayne asks.
“Yeah, no shit old man. None of it was ever fair.” His words are harsh, but there’s no heat behind them, no anger. Just cold resignation.
“Wasn’t talking about you, boy. We already know what the town done wasn’t fair.”
“What?”
“That Steve fellow seems like a nice young man, and it seems to me you didn’t give him a chance to react before you high-tailed it out of there.“ Eddie doesn’t have a response to that, so he stays silent.
Wayne lets out yet another sigh. Maybe this is what he’s talking about with the gray hairs, and then the no hairs.
“Look Eds, I know life was never easy, and it’s scary letting people you love see the worst of ya when you aren’t ready, but you can’t just run when you think someone isn’t gonna like what they see,” Wayne says, voice and timber the same ones Eddie uses when he needs someone to listen, to understand. “You keep doin that, you’ll never give them the chance to prove you wrong.”
Wayne has always known how to speak to the most stubborn parts of him, the ones that protect the softest parts.
“Fuck.”
Wayne just hums, letting Eddie scrape himself off the metaphorical floor on his own time.
“He totally saw me run out that door. He’s going to be pissed.”
“Don’t be too hard on yourself son. You know Jesus dumped half the world’s sins at your feet when the load got too heavy. Your Steve seems like a nice boy, I think he’ll understand once ya ’splain yourself.” Eddie can’t help but smile. Wayne has never been this enthusiastic about any of Eddie’s previous partners. It settles something to know that Wayne seems to approve, even if the two have never met face to face.
“Ok, ok. I can do this. He deserves to hear it from me.” Eddie says, his heart rate going down for the first time since he walked into the Henderson house.
“And you deserve the benefit of the doubt. You ain’t done nothing wrong.” Wayne’s voice is firm even through the static of the phone line. He’s always going to be on Eddie’s side, and it means more than he can say. “Say it, Eds.” He’s also a giant pain in the ass.
“And I deserve the benefit of the doubt,” he says, dragging the words out like a petulant teenager even as he smiles. “You happy, old man?”
“Peachy.” Eddie can hear his uncle’s why grin through the phone. God, he really needs to visit again soon. “Now you get on back to your boy, figure this out.”
Eddie looks back out toward that long stretch of road. He probably made it at least a mile from the Henderson house, which means it’s going to be a two mile walk back to his apartment to change out of his now sweat-drenched clothes and call Steve. He may be resigned to talking this out instead of running for the hills, but he would prefer it there weren’t two extra Hendersons watching while they talk about the many skeletons in Eddie’s closet.
“Yeah, I guess I’d better get going.” He takes a deep breath, lets it arch his back and lift him off his toes a little, and lets it go. “Thanks, Uncle Wayne,” he whispers.
“Anytime, son,” Wayne responds. He waits, patient as ever, for Eddie to be the one to hang up. Just in case. Eddie listens to his breathing for one more moment, closes his eyes, and puts the phone back on the hook.
He’s got one hell of a walk ahead of him.
divider from @thecutestgrotto
