you would describe eddie munson as 'misunderstood'.

your friends would call him, among other things, a queer, a satan worshiper, and a failure.

certainly more...intense adjectives.

you didn't honestly condone their asshole-ery, but you never made an effort to stop it, aside from a few light punches to the shoulder and quickly-thought excuses as to why your group- the basketball team- should leave whatever place you were as soon as they spotted eddie.

how did eddie react to this? the only natural way, really.

developing a fat crush on you.

he was too far gone for his own good, especially because you'd only ever spoken once or twice- once for a science assignment (the rest of your friends had groaned in sympathy when your pairing was announced, and, embarrassingly, he'd cried in the bathroom over that)- and the other time because you'd literally bumped into him, and helped him up instead of kicking him in the ribs.

so maybe he was a little bit gay, and maybe a couple of the insults had been accurate. not warranted, gods no, but accurate.

you thought he looked fine. maybe a bit more than fine, maybe a bit more fine than all of your previous girlfriends or flings or what have you, but you weren't gay. you weren't queer- lord have mercy, your friends would freak out and you'd immediately lose any semblance of weird high-school-social-credit that you had so carefully built up over the years.

but you were a little bit drunk at bar where corroded coffin happened to be playing, and your mind was just fuzzy enough to let that thought slip. hmh. he did look pretty in the dim, blueish-reddish (which was, as most know, called purple, but you were distracted at the moment) light.

his hair was long enough that you could delude yourself into thinking he looked like a girl when it was dark.

the gig had long finished by the time you came up to him- not really certain of what you were going to say. he'd had that effect on you since you'd met- and you didn't know why. you chalked it up to contrasting interests.

you blinked yourself out of your own thoughts when you realized you were standing right next to him- or, more accurately, standing in front of the table he'd camouflaged himself next to.

eddie did not know what to make of this development. you had never approached him- purposefully- before.

"he-llo," he said warily, tucking one of his legs underneath him- almost curling in on himself. instinct. "s- uh. what's- what's up, man."