Chapter Text
Steve Harrington arrives in New York, bags bursting at the seams. But his confidence? Not so much.
The taxi idles by the curb, exhaust coughing into the chilly March air. It feels like the cab itself was judging him. Steve stands on the sidewalk, clutching his duffel bag in one hand and a crumpled piece of paper in the other. Jonathan Byers’ address, written in Jonathan’s scribbled handwriting. He’d stared at it a million times, like reading it over and over again might change it into something familiar.
This was it.
This was where he was supposed to be.
The building looked old. Not the charming, ivy-covered kind, but the worn-out, seen-better-days kind. Brownstone, narrow steps, a buzzer panel with faded labels and names scribbled in pen. Next door, a laundromat hums, and on the corner, a bodega sported a faded Yankees sign. Somewhere above, a radio plays something timey and sad — maybe Springsteen. Maybe not. The whole block smells of cold concrete and cigarette smoke.
Steve shifts his weight, letting out a breath.
“Okay,” he mumbles to himself, “Cool. Totally cool.”
The driver pokes his head out the window. “You good, buddy?”
Steve blinks, then nods, fumbling a bit. He digs into his jacket pocket, hands over some crinkled bills, and grabs his last box from the trunk. The boxes were haphazardly taped, some marked ‘STEVE’ in Robin’s blocky handwriting, others just ‘BOOKS’, or ‘MISC’. One said, ‘DON’T LOSE THIS’, and Steve honestly couldn’t remember what was inside.
The cab pulls away, tires hissing on the wet gravel.
And just like that, Hawkins feels another million miles away.
Steve lingers for a moment, gazing up at the building. Jonathan lived on the third floor. No elevator. He’d mentioned that on the phone two days ago, almost like an apology.
“Hope that’s okay.”
“Yeah, man. Totally. Love stairs,” Steve had rattled off, because that’s what he does — always smoothing things over, making it easy, pretending the weight of things doesn’t bother him.
He takes the steps two at a time at first, high on adrenaline and a buzz of excitement. But when the boxes start digging into his arms, he slows, breath coming in silent gasps. Hawkins hadn’t really prepped him for this many stairs. By the time he was at the third floor, his shoulders ached, and his hair was already getting frizzy from sweat.
Apartment 3B.
He sets the boxes down, wipes his hands on his jeans, and pauses.
This was the moment that kept playing in his head — the knock. The moment it stopped being a ‘maybe’ and became real. The moment Jonathan opened the door, and Steve actually had to be there, his entire life packed into cardboard and duct tape.
Before he could overthink it, the door opens.
Jonathan stands there in socks, wearing a beat-up NYU sweatshirt and jeans that had seen better decades. His hair was longer than Steve remembers, curling a bit at the ends, like he’d given up trying to tame it. A camera strap hangs loosely around his neck, as if he’d forgotten it was there.
For half a second, they just stare at each other.
Then, Jonathan’s mouth quirks into a small, surprised smile. “You actually did it.”
Steve scoffs. “Wow. Warm welcome. Really makes a guy feel wanted.”
Jonathan huffs out a quiet chuckle and immediately steps aside. “No, sorry — I just — yeah. Come in. Please. Before Mrs. Kaplan downstairs starts yelling at you for breathing.”
Steve raises an eyebrow. “She sounds lovely.”
“She’s not,” Jonathan says, deadpan, reaching for a box without asking.
Steve follows him in, mumbling something about more boxes downstairs.
The apartment was… smaller than Steve expected. Not tiny, but narrow, like every inch had been squeezed out of the city. A short hallway led into a combined living space – a couch, a coffee table piled with film magazines and notebooks, a tiny TV teetering on a milk crate. The walls were covered in photos: black-and-white shots of city streets, fire escapes, faces caught in mid-expression. Some were framed, some were just taped up, angled and holding on to the old paint for dear life.
It smells like coffee and old books.
Jonathan carefully sets the box down and glances back at Steve, suddenly a bit unsure. “Uh. Sorry. It’s kind of a mess.”
Steve looks around, then back at him. “Are you kidding? This is… legit.” He waves a hand vaguely. “Very tortured artist. Very New York.”
Jonathan rolls his eyes. “You just moved here. You’re legally obligated to say that.”
“Hey,” Steve says. “I lived in Hawkins for twenty years. Let me have this.”
Jonathan smiles again, softer this time.
They stand there, awkwardly hovering, until Steve clears his throat. “So. Where do you want my stuff?”
Jonathan blinks, then seems to snap out of it. “Right. Yeah. Um — the second bedroom’s yours. I was using it as a darkroom slash storage slash ‘I’ll-get-to-this-later’ space, but I cleaned it up. Mostly. Now I just use my closet as a darkroom.”
“Mostly is my happy place,” Steve tells him.
They make a few trips back and forth, hauling boxes and bags up the stairs. It’s inefficient and a little clumsy, but neither of them suggest doing it any other way. At one point, Steve misjudges the hallway’s width and slams his elbow into the doorframe.
“Son of a —”
Jonathan winces. “You okay?”
“Yeah,” Steve says, shaking it out. “Just showing off my spatial awareness, in case you forgot about it.”
“Sure,” Jonathan says, unconvinced. But he looks amused.
By the time they’re done, Steve’s room looks like a small bomb of belongings had blown up. Clothes spill out of an overstuffed suitcase. A beat-up shoebox sat open on the bed, filled with cassette tapes and old letters. Steve flops onto the mattress with a groan.
“Wow,” he breathes, staring up at the ceiling. “I live here.”
Jonathan lingers in the doorway. “You don’t have to sound so shocked.”
“No, it’s good,” Steve says quickly. “Just — you know. New city. New roommate. New… everything.”
Jonathan nods, understanding washing over his face. He gets it. Of course, he gets it.
“Well,” he says. “Nancy’s probably going to call later. She’s been weirdly into this. She threatened to fly out herself to ‘inspect the area.’”
Steve smirks. “That sounds like Nance. Robin told me to call her, too, so she knows I haven't been murdered yet.”
“Give it time,” Jonathan says dryly. “The day’s still young.”
They both laugh, and the tension eases up just a notch.
Later, they sit at the tiny kitchen table, eating takeout lo mein from styrofoam boxes. The city hums outside the window – sirens in the distance, the low rumble of traffic, voices drifting up from the street. Steve wats like he hasn’t had a proper meal in days, which was… pretty accurate.
“Um,” Jonathan hums, poking at his noodles. “How was the drive?”
“Long,” Steve replies. “Went from cab to cab. There was no way I was putting my car through a 10-hour drive. She doesn't deserve that.”
Jonathan snorts. “Bet that was a pain.”
“At least I didn't have to ride with Robin,” Steve continues. “She'd make me stop at every historic marker. Did you know there’s a giant ball of twine in Ohio? She begged to come with just to see it. Honestly, I just didn't want her driving back by herself.”
Jonathan smiles into his food. He'd forgotten how considerate Steve actually was, underneath all his sarcasm. Not that he wasn't enjoying throwing it back at him.
There was a pause. Not awkward, exactly, but electric. Steve suddenly realizes how close they were sitting, knees almost touching.
“So,” Steve says, because silence was never his thing. “NYU.”
Jonathan lets out a breath. “Yeah. It’s… a lot. In a good way. Mostly.” He shrugs. “Everyone here thinks they’re going to change the world, or already has.”
“And you?” Steve asks.
Jonathan hesitates. “I think I’m just trying to figure out how to tell stories that matter.”
Steve nods, then, serious. “You will.”
Jonathan looks at him, surprised. “You didn’t even think about it.”
“I didn’t need to,” Steve says. “I’ve seen your stuff. Y'know, The Consumer and all that.”
Jonathan rolls his eyes at the mention of his previously picked title. But his throat bobs as he swallows. He wasn't expecting Steve to sound so… earnest. He looks down at the table. “Thanks.”
They clean up together, bumping into each other in the narrow space, sharing half smiles and apologies. It feels… domestic, in a way that makes Steve’s chest tighten unexpectedly.
Later, Steve lays awake in his new bed, listening to the unfamiliar city sounds. Somewhere in the apartment, Jonathan is moving around quietly, probably developing photos or jotting down notes for a class.
Steve stares at the ceiling and thinks about Hawkins – about the forest, the quarry, Family Video, how the past still clings to him like a second skin. About his kids; the little shits on the baseball team he used to coach, or the little shits that aren’t so little anymore. About how he’d said yes to this without really knowing what it meant.
He thinks about Jonathan Byers, and how his offer had sounded so laid-back, almost casual, when he’d said it back in ’89, on the roof of the WSQK, beer in hand.
“You wanna come live with me?”
Steve had laughed then. Dodged it. Pretended it wasn’t a lifeline.
And now, he’s here. And despite the slight tension when he and Jonathan sut too close or make eye contact, he feels... comfortable. That’s all he needed for now.