Steve Harrington Had The Tendency To Fall In Love Too Quickly. The First Girl He Ever Loved Was Named

Steve Harrington had the tendency to fall in love too quickly. The first girl he ever loved was named Patricia Hartley. She was in his 5th grade English class and had golden brown hair that was always tied back in a light blue ribbon. Steve had never kissed a girl before her. He figured he loved her because when he kissed her he got butterflies. Falling for her was like being caught in a wave. A gentle push, a moving current. He loved her for 3 months. When school let out for summer, Patricia gave Steve a tootsie roll and told him that she just wanted to be friends and she didn’t care for kissing. There was no heartbreak. Like a wave, Patricia was present, something to sweep you off your feet, but fleeting. She moved to Nebraska after middle school.

There were girls after Patricia. He liked their fancy hair and got butterflies when he kissed them, but no girl could have ever prepared him for Nancy Wheeler. The first time Steve laid eyes on her, he was infatuated. Tommy and Carol teased him for liking her, to them she was too square, too nerdy. That seemed to be exactly what Steve liked about her. She was unassuming. He didn’t have to be a douche to impress her. His love for Nancy felt like fireworks. Something that was loud and hit him all at once. He knew he was hopelessly in love with her but he didn’t care. She loved him back and everything was perfect. Just for a moment. Just until Jonathan Byers.

Steve had never loved a girl as much as he loved Nancy Wheeler, and no girl had ever made him cry as much as she had. When Steve was in love with Nancy, he could see his entire life waiting for him. He saw himself as a husband and father to a completely nuclear family and that was fine with him. He held comfort within the expectation of the ordinary. When Nancy broke his heart, Steve had to rethink everything. Instead of having a firm plan for his life, he crumbled. Nancy was his compass, and now he was completely lost. The people Steve loved had always been expected. He went into every relationship knowing what he wanted and knowing where he was going. Billy managed to throw him completely off track.

Billy Hargrove was an enigma. He was loud, aggressive, and a pain in the ass. Billy was the complete opposite of both Patricia and Nancy. But somehow, between the nights of endless conversation at the quarry and the shared smoke breaks at school, Steve fell in love with him.

Billy was a flame. All consuming in his blankets of heat and intensity. A destructive force who knew no bounds. When Steve first met Billy, he was perplexed. This presence was unlike anything he had ever experienced. It was confusing and frightening. Though Billy could be destructive, Steve began to learn that he could also be kind. His heat became a soft warmth, it flooded Steve’s brain and flowed to his fingertips. The first time Billy kissed him was in the front seat of his camero. The kiss was sudden; full of desperate hands and welcoming lips. Billy had always been the flame, but for the first time Steve felt like there might be fire inside of him too.

Although Nancy broke Steve’s heart, Billy managed to shatter it completely. Cold tiles, flashing lights, and black blood. Steve had seen what happened from afar, but he did not realize the severity until he ran closer. Billy wasn’t breathing. He was choking. He was in so much pain. The blood was everywhere. Steve tried to help but the hole in his chest was too severe. After everything Billy’s body had gone through, there was no saving him. He had already given up. The boy lying on the floor was once someone Steve had loved. He always fell in love too fast. Never considering the possibilities. This boy would hold him, envelop him in his warmth, touch him with needy hands. The monster had done too much to him. The boy he loved was now a figure lying amongst pools of soiled blood. Steve reached out to touch the hand he once held, caress the face he once kissed, but he was so cold. Billy’s skin didn’t even feel human. The fire had finally gone out. How could someone constantly filled with heat be so cold? His battered flesh now unrecognizable. Steve’s choked sobs were interrupted by arms dragging him away.

“We can’t leave him here!”

“There’s nothing we can do.”

“We can’t leave him with that monster!”