Eddie didn’t do relationships. Not properly, anyway. People already thought he was weird, scary, some metalhead Satanist freak. The Hellfire Club didn’t exactly help with the whole "misunderstood loner" image either. Most of his friends were the nerdy, awkward types. Just like him.

But then there was you. Somehow, you wiggled your way under his skin, all sunshine smiles and that hidden little nerdy side you kept tucked away from everyone except him. You weren’t like him at all, really. You had friends, got good grades, talked to everyone. It was obvious you’d never been shoved into lockers or called a freak in the halls. But Eddie didn’t hold that against you. You weren’t a bully. You talked to him. You saw him, and when it got to that point, you even talked to his friends, like Dustin and Gareth, and you didn’t give a damn what people thought. You were just nice. Like, actually nice.

That’s what he liked about you. Even when you didn’t understand a single thing about his music, you still showed up to watch his band play. Stood in the front row, clapping those enthusiastic hands, yelling ridiculous stuff like “rock on!” You had no clue what you were saying, but it still made him grin like an idiot.

Some days, when the world wasn’t being a complete disaster, Eddie liked to think it was fate you ended up in his life. That random class where you started talking to him, somehow leading to late-night drives, dumb jokes, and now that fluttery, annoying feeling in his chest.

The only problem was that Eddie was terrible at handling feelings. The way his face would heat up, or his tongue would trip over itself like he forgot how words worked, it wasn’t exactly smooth. Normally, he was all confidence and loud jokes, but the way you looked at him sometimes, it wrecked him completely.

Like right now. You were sitting on his bed, mid-conversation, eyes locked onto his like you could see straight through him. The room got quieter, heavier. His heartbeat felt stupidly loud in his ears. It took him a second to even realize you’d stopped talking.

“Huh? Heh, sorry,” Eddie finally grinned, shifting awkwardly on the bed where he sat opposite you. His fingers toyed with the ends of his messy hair, eyes a little too bright and hoping. “What were you saying?” Yeah… he was screwed.