Chapter Text
One thing about Nancy that is at the core of who she is, she will never stay down for long. She may have had to choke through telling the group about all the horrors Vecna showed her, omitting the night Barb died, but then she was right into plotting mode. Nancy refuses to allow Vecna to be right, to win.
They have a plan now. And as much as she hates Max being the bait, she knows she cannot volunteer herself. Nobody can shoot like she can. Nancy is their best bet at ending Vecna. So she has to lead the offense team, not be the distraction.
Nancy now being cursed as well complicates things. The sinking disgusting feeling of someone creeping in the edges of your conscious Max described makes a sick kind of sense to her now. Max mercifully has a tape of Africa and Eddie has another walkman in their trailers. Vecna must have been livid he couldn’t sacrifice Max and is spitefully trying to grab someone else as a target. Nancy is pissed, ashamed at herself. She’s got so much baggage she was ripe for the picking. And at the same time most of it started with Vecna. How is that shit fair?!
Eddie’s plan to get them to War Zone is a Hail Mary but Nancy admits it’s a pretty good one. Nancy saddles into the passenger seat next to Steve as they go blaring off towards their best bet at stocking up on all the firepower they need to end this. A calm before the storm seems to wash over the stolen Winnebago.
Nancy’s thoughts consume her as she lets her eyes get hypnotizing by the road flying by. She’s haunted by what Vecna showed her. How she gave into sin with Steve as Barb was being viciously murdered right outside. Knowing it happened and seeing it before her own eyes are two very different things. It makes her heart and stomach feel like they’ve been lit on fire. How she was lost in lust over being there for her friend shouting out for her. And Barb paid for Nancy’s selfish desires with her life. Now Vecna is planning on ending her family, their whole town, the world. But then there was Steve, through the red circular portal in her mind. Holding her lifeless body and fighting with everything he had to bring her back. He always fought for her.
Thankfully Steve is playing Africa lightly out of the vehicle’s stereo system or she surely would be pulled into another vision with the way her brain is beating her to a pulp. Ever her protector and, unfairly to him, a reminder of her guilt.
She has to distract herself so she asks Steve, “How’s it handle?”
“Not half bad… considering this is a house.” Steve’s joke lands and Nancy feels a small smile take over her features. How does he manage to do that? How does he always cut through her anxious spiraling thoughts and pull her back to the light so easily? How does he make her feel things she doesn’t want to? This is a big reason why she pushed him away when they were dating. She didn’t want to feel good, she wanted to punish herself. It feels insanely impossible how easy it has become this week to separate their horror show of a history and the feelings he’s stirring up in her now. So much has changed and occurred in their past two years apart that it feels like a strange mix of familiarity and feeling like they’re getting to know someone new.
Steve looks over at her reaction, surprise and relief loosening his shoulders. She looked so broken when she emerged from Vecna’s vision. Whatever she saw was horrible. And he can take some guesses to some of the things Vecna taunted her with. It makes his stomach twist up into white hot knots. The thought of him invading her mind and her being vulnerable to his violent attacks has Steve on a crazy kind of edge. And he just wants to escape these feelings for the both of them.
He finds himself talking without thinking, “Yeah. It’s silly but I- I’ve actually. I’ve always had this dream that I’d have this really… really big family. Like five… six kids.”
“Six,” Nancy interrupts him with shock and humor lacing her tone. Steve is encouraged that her face hasn't twisted back into that pained expression she was wearing 5 minutes ago. He’ll do anything to keep the lightness on her face.
“And… And every summer, I figured all of us Harringtons, we would pack into something like this. And just see the country.” Nancy’s eyes look mesmerized by what Steve is saying. What started as Steve thinking he’s sharing a silly dream has taken on a different meaning.
Steve keeps rambling without thinking so long as Nancy keeps her gaze on him like that. “You know, the Rockies, the Grand Canyon. Maybe Yellowstone. End up in some beachside town in California. Spend a week parked in the sand. Learn how to surf or something.”
As he trails off Nancy finds herself wrapped up in the picture he painted. It’s not at all what she expected Steve’s dream life to sound like. She always took him for someone who loved Hawkins and the small town life and wanted to get caught up in the every day community and routine of really setting down roots. This little adventure he’s been thinking about is lighting a spark in her. Nancy guesses she always thought there were just two paths, her parents’ prison of a life or being the badass career woman she will become. But is there an in between there? Steve seems to have thought about it, why had this never occurred to her. She means it when she says softly, “That sounds nice.”
It’s like a hazy dream, a beacon cutting through all the darkness. Pulling them in and blinding anything beyond the warm feeling of imagining sand in their toes and sun on their backs. For just a few moments.
His response is more earnest and casual than she would have guessed, “Yeah?”
Her confirmation slips out of her, completely wrapped up in this moment, “Yeah.”
Their gazes are locked in an entirely different kind of trance. A magnetic warmth. And then reality snaps back into place and suddenly the world around them starts turning again. Nancy tries to shake it with a practicality joke, “Well except for the six kid part. That sounds like a total nightmare.”
“If only I had some practice,” He gestures to the teens in the back.
It makes her laugh lightly, “All right. Fair. That’s fair.”
She can see Steve’s thoughts turning as he pretends to focus back up on the road. Her smile falters. What is she doing here? She can no longer ignore the incessant thumping on her rib cage from just being in the orbit of this grown version of Steve. She shouldn’t be allowed to feel this way. When they were together after Barb she couldn’t separate the happiness of being with him and the crushing shame of her self serving nature. She hurt Steve and cheated on him with Jonathan because of it.
And it’s been months since her and Jonathan stopped lying to themselves about their perspectives aligning and compatibility and let each other go. But she’s been too chicken to tell a single soul. Because she’s deeply embarrassed. She blew up her life and she doesn’t get a redo on it. Even if Steve is looking at her like he wants one. That isn’t fair and she doesn’t deserve it. She recalls the mortally wounded look in Steve’s eyes in that alley when she couldn’t tell him she loved him. And now what? She’s just going to fall back into Steve’s arms like all those obstacles aren’t real, like they are nothing. When in fact they’re like a giant wall between them.
The universe seems to have not gotten the memo that they’re in a horror film not a chick flick. Robin and Steve can’t seem to avoid their disastrous love lives imploding on them in the middle of all this Vecna crap. Steve runs after Robin in War Zone, having just witnessed the end to their debate on Vickie’s sexuality. A spectacularly shitty answer in the form of her making out with some guy right in Robin’s face.
He finally catches up to Robin by the bear traps, grabbing her gently by the arm to slow down her fleeing. “Rob, hey, I’m sorry.”
Robin turns on him, tears in her eyes, “It’s fine. I knew I didn’t have a shot. I told you she doesn’t like boobies.”
Steve feels guilt hit him in the chest. Robin would never blame him but he is the one who got her hopes up. He was just so sure. Idiot bravado coming in to mess things up as usual and his best friend was caught in the crossfire this time. “Rob I’m really-”
A swift blur of green movement catches his vision from across the room. It’s Jason and he’s just grabbed hold of the barrel of the gun in Nancy’s hands. “Fuck, Rob!”
That’s the only explanation Steve gives for cutting and running away from their very important conversation. Because Nance is in danger and he won’t sit by. Steve rushes their way and as he gets in earshot he hears Nancy say firmly, “Let go.”
Steve grabs the barrel himself from behind Nancy and rips it out of Caver’s hand before letting go once it’s safely back in Nancy’s grasp only. Steve’s voice is low and authoritative over her shoulder, “She said let go man.”
Shock overtakes Jason’s features as he takes in Steve, filthily covered in dirt and his angry neck lacerations peeking out of his shirt. Steve didn’t think of how to explain how roughed up he looks. He was only thinking about backing up Nancy.
“Harrington, what- are you guys here together. What happened to you,” Jason looks between them, brows furrowing, grappling to connect the dots and failing.
“Let’s go Nance,” Steve slaps some cash down on the counter for the clerk and ushers her away from Jason, letting her take the lead out of the store. He scans the store making sure all the kids and Robin are escaping the Jock goons as well.
Their heart rates have long since calmed down from their escape from War Zone as the group works in a secluded field off the woods. Steve is rambling about Vickie to Robin. He just can’t seem to wrap his mind around what they saw. He’s still so sure Vickie is into girls like Robin. It just doesn’t make any sense.
“Steve,” Robin’s voice cuts through his rant, “I don’t care. And I don’t understand why you do either with everything that’s going on. Honestly this feels like the perfect time for that little pull of the rug because in the face of the world ending, the stakes of my love life feel spectacularly low.”
This halts Steve’s fast moving thoughts. She’s right. If he’s being honest, he knows why he’s fixating on this. He’s clinging onto helping Robin so he doesn’t obsess over Nancy.
“Yeah…” Steve’s gaze finds Nancy across the field, practicing shooting with Max. “But, I still have hope.”
“Not everything has a happy ending.” Steve busies himself with focusing on making the cocktails, not wanting to let his complicated feelings for Nancy drag him into a hole he can’t crawl out of. Robin catches his eyes on Nancy and chuckles before continuing, “I’m not talking about your complicated romance. I just have this terrible feeling, gnawing feeling that it might not work out for us this time.”
Steve’s gaze turns back to Robin, “What, you think we shouldn’t be doing this?”
Robin contemplates for a second before answering, “I think we’re mad fools, the lot of us, but if we don’t stop him who will?”
Steve finishes up prepping the Molotovs with Robin before he decidedly stands and makes his way over to Nancy in the middle of the field. Max sees him coming and scampers off.
Steve reaches Nancy, “I figure it’s time I learn how to shoot.”
Nancy’s serious hollow expression gives way with a quirk of her lips, “Now? I hate to break it to you, but one shooting lesson probably isn’t going to make a big difference.”
Steve shrugs, “I have to start somewhere don’t I?”
Nancy doesn’t hand the sawed off shotgun over to him right away after she sets up some tin cans as targets, “Always point the gun down until you’re ready to aim, don’t load until you’re ready to shoot unless going into a combat situation. Let’s work on your stance.”
Being someone who was captain of various sports teams in his years, it feels foreign to be the one taking instructions. But he knows how important it is that he takes as much of this in as he can. She tells him to stand firm shoulder width apart, front foot pointing at his target and knees slightly bent. She helps him position the gun into his shoulder pocket over the leather jacket he grabbed from War Zone. “Keep your footing and your hold tight, the looser it is the more painful kickback and less accurate your shot will be.”
He banishes any thoughts of how attractive he finds her badass side and focuses up. He runs down what she told him in his head like those mental checklists she loves so much before taking in a deep breath and firing on the can. The kickback does buck him more than he expected but they both find, in surprise, he knocked the can over. He didn’t quite hit it, but he grazed close enough that it fell off the log they had it on anyway.
Nancy encourages Steve to practice some more, and he manages to hit it once, before they call it quits. Not wanting to waste any more ammo. Nancy shows Steve the safety as they take up seats on the wooden box crates.
Steve watches Nancy staring off, her eyes glazed over and fear flushes through him. He double checks her headphones are still hanging from her neck in case he has to press play on her Walkman. It wouldn’t matter. He’d sing Africa until his vocal cords fell out if that’s what it took to keep her feet on the ground.
He can’t believe that the song worked. Nancy was obsessed with that Toto album. He’d played it on purpose that night, softly in background.
“Nance,” Steve checks in.
Nancy breathes in through her nose sharply, “You know I don’t think you’re bullshit right?”
Steve’s brows knit together. Of course he knows exactly what she’s talking about. That Halloween haunts his nightmares. But what he doesn’t get is why she’s saying this now. She continues, “It’s just- Vecna showed me that night and seeing it play out. It was never you, it was always me.”
Now she has lost Steve. “Nance, you were hurting over Barb. I should have stayed with you no matter what you said.”
Nancy looks at Steve for the first time in this conversation. “No, not Halloween. Your pool party…”
Steve’s heart rate accelerates until his stomach bottoms out and he feels like he’s about to keel over and vomit. He drags in deep breaths to try and steady himself so he doesn’t dry heave onto the grass. Vecna saw those memories? That night they had sex for the first time. His skin is crawling and it hurts. It hurts so badly. Nancy leans over and grabs his bicep, concern flooding her eyes. He has to get it together for her. Whatever he feels, she feels it ten times worse. That was her first time, her best friend. How violated he feels having that night that was important to him invaded and ruined pales in comparison. It doesn’t matter.
“Steve,” She’s checking in. She wants to know if he’s okay. He pulls her into him, tucking her head against his chest. He doesn’t care if this is crossing lines with her boyfriend. This isn’t about romance.
“Nancy, I- I am so sorry. It never should have happened like that.”
Nancy pulls back to look at him and it feels like something inside her breaks into a million pieces. “We didn’t kill her. I did. I was her best friend. I was supposed to be there for her. You barely knew her. And I left her to die. Because I just wanted you. I was selfish and Barb paid for it.”
Steve wipes the water falling on her cheeks and forces her to look into his eyes, “Nancy we didn’t kill her. You didn’t kill her. Vecna did this. And we’re going to make him pay. You are going to wipe him off the map. You hear me?”
Nancy’s eyes widen and she wants to believe him. She really does, but it’s hard to. She still feels responsible.