Stevehharringtcns​:

zccming​:

it wasn’t uncommon to find max mayfield skating the streets of hawkins at night. whether she be getting off work late, or needing to clear her head, there was a high chance she’d be lurking around somewhere once the sun had set. tonight, it had been the latter. her supernatural past had been weighing on her mind more than usual and something that always seemed to clear it up was taking to the streets while they were still. she could zip by on her board without judgement from onlookers. it was the best in summer and there wasn’t a trace of a chill. and now, with billy back, it was a nice place to escape from his…well, everything. 

her peace had been rudely disturbed when she neared the skatepark and could hear kate bush echoing through the streets. max instantly came to a stop. fuck. she couldn’t spot a clock anywhere, so she was clear on that front. other than the goosebumps on her skin, nothing seemed to be wrong. since when was she so skittish? mostly irritated, but still slightly scared, she followed the sound of the music, holding her board in her hands as a weapon. when she pulled up on the park and saw cole, she dropped her guard and yelled at him, “fucking asshole! you couldn’t have stopped by my trailer or something?” 

but it wasn’t his fault. he didn’t know. max had only disclosed so much. prior to her lashing out, he actually looked kind of excited. “hey…” she breathed out, setting her board down, then sitting on it. while she might’ve been a wreck in billy’s wake, at least cole looked good. healthier than she’d ever seen him, like someone had straight up injected a shot of life into his veins. slightly bitter, she rolled her eyes, “wipe that smile off your face, you look dumb.” max made quick work to pull out a lighter and held out her two fingers for cole to place a cigarette between them, “what’s up with you, montgomery?” 

xx.

Cole shook his head when Max yelled at him, throwing his hands up in faux exasperation. “Everytime I come by your trailer, you yell at me for being too loud or waking up your mom,” he countered, though he turned the volume on his boombox down. “You’re the asshole,” he corrected, the hint of a smile still on his face. As she got closer, Cole studied her face. Max looked irritated, beyond her normal homeostasis of annoyance. He didn’t dare ask what was wrong and risk having his head bit off, but Cole shot her a concerned glance. 

Following Max’s lead, Cole sat next to her on his board. Rolling his eyes, he placed a cigarette in her hand, taking a puff of his own. “Not true. I have it on good authority that my smile is irresistible,” he quipped. Cole glanced upwards at the stars, mulling over her question. He knew Max, of all people, wouldn’t be freaked out by the news that Adam was back... but he worried that she might ask too many questions, try to figure it out. Head still tilted upwards, Cole spoke: “It’s Adam. He’s back.” 

Blowing out a cloud of smoke, Cole diverted his gaze to his hands. “And I don’t know why or how, but I don’t exactly want to go poking around into it.” His words were hurried, his fear of losing Adam again apparent in his tone. “But I figured you would get it.” Cole shrugged, stretching his arm out in front of him so he could study the lit end of the cigarette. A beat passed in silence before he finally asked, “What’s up with you, Mayfield?” 

adam jacob richards & walden cole montgomery

“he was my north, my south, my east and west, my working week and my sunday rest, my noon, my midnight, my talk, my song; i thought that love would last for ever: i was wrong.”

― w.h. auden, stop all the clocks

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As he began blinking awake, Cole’s memories from the fucking carnival from hell began to resurface. He saw Lucas crumped on the ground, Jack shoving him away, Adam yelling at him to leave him the fuck alone. But then he woke up and the first thing he saw was Adam, their arms intertwined, blonde head bobbing up and down as he snored. Cole squeezed his eyes shut. Was it a dream? Why did he remember a bomb? An explosion? It was all making his head hurt. 

Cole must’ve fallen back asleep, because the next time he opened his eyes, Max was there. She was holding his other hand and mumbling something. He shifted, trying to sit up, and instantly regretted it. Pain shot through his abdomen and he groaned. His movement caused a barely-cold icepack to shift off of his ribcage; had he broken a rib? 

With a weak smile, Cole turned his gaze to Max. “Tell me you’re not crying over me, asshole.” His throat was painfully brittle, and he attempted to swallow to make it easier to speak up. “The fuck did you do to me, Maxine?” he asked, a piss poor excuse for a joke, and squeezed his eyes shut again in an attempt to stop the pounding in his head. 

WHO: max mayfield & @loverboymontgomery​ WHAT: max checks on cole WHERE: hospital </3

max had been lingering in the hospital for around twelve hours now and had no intentions of leaving any time soon. herself, dustin, and max, worked in shifts, using steve’s room as base. she was in and out a lot, mostly to cry, but sometimes to check on the status of her other friends who had been admitted last night. it was nearing ten-thirty in the morning when max took a break. she went to cole’s room first, after a nurse told her he woke up between now and her last break. anything that stood between her and that door got shoved out of the way or fully knocked over until she was on her knees beside his bed. 

unfortunately, cole was out again when she entered his room. she clocked adam’s close proximity, who was also asleep. not wanting to disturb them too much, but at least see how cole was doing for herself, she took the hand of his that wasn’t occupied and grabbed it with both of hers, then set her forehead on top of it. she sat like that for a second, listening to the chorusing of the heart monitor. all good signs, all good, but still, she found herself wanting to cry again. max rubbed her lips together, then whispered, not intending for cole to hear her, “hey, fucking…stupid shithead…” she mumbled, “i leave for one night and you land yourself in the hospital? geez.” she laughed wryly, a tear slipping out. a life without cole flashed across her mind. it wasn’t one she was interested in seeing. this blows, she thought. sitting up, max wiped the couple of tears that snuck up on her, then rubbed her tired eyes, “i’m glad you’re okay…” she continued in her quiet tone, “and i’m so kicking your ass when you get out of here.” 

tessacallovvay​:.

Mr. Sarcastic, as always. Good to know somethings hadn’t changed since high school. And, just like high school, he was doing his own… thing here, at this dingy little music store. Yawn. Tapping her nails on the counter, Tessa smiled, “Just wanted to chat, that’s all. About that little kickback you were at.” She said, glancing discretely around. She’d already talked to Sinclair about what had happened, but there was something that didn’t sit right with her about his answers. It made sense, but… it didn’t feel right.

“What sort of gross prank were you pulling that night, hm?” Tessa asked. She’d asked Lucas and he’d freely admitted to it, though he’d sworn he’d worked alone. She wanted to test a little theory of hers.

xx.

A humorless smile pushed up the corners of Cole’s mouth at her question. Well, at least he wasn’t completely crazy. The recurring nightmare he’d been having about Adam, though... that made him feel like his mind was splintering. Had he hit his head hard enough to cause hallucination? Or insomnia? He supposed both were possible, though the doctor Lucas had taken him to had assured him that the symptoms of the concussion would be gone in about a week. 

Cole’s eyes snapped up to Tessa’s face and offense crossed over his features. A prank? She couldn’t be serious. “You’re fucking with me, right?” Cole scoffed. “Tessa, why the hell would I throw myself into an open grave and give myself a concussion for a prank?” He wasn’t going to go so far as to say something pushed him into the grave, although that’s what it felt like, but he certainly hadn’t fallen in on purpose. 

“elio elio elio elio elio elio elio”

@goldenboyrichards

Eyes of Timothée Chalamet

mmuscles​:

so, yes, thad was late, but he had to scour town for decent enough tools to get this repair on the road. he doubted that cole had anything that would suffice and he wasn’t gonna half ass this job, but truthfully, he didn’t think cole would notice. he pulled up to the montgomery residence, motley crue’s girls, girls girls, blaring as he put the car in park. the sound stopped when he took the key out of the ignition, grabbed the tools from his backseat, and made for the garage. of course cole commented on the fact he was late, which caused thad to place a hand on the side of his head, dragging it gently after him in a bro rough housing kind of way as he head for the garage. 

he called back as he moved to assess the damage, “are you drunk already, pretty boy?” thad wondered if cole really found him that insufferable, but quickly concluded that couldn’t be the case. he was…thad. and people loved him. he shook off the thought and began buffing feeling around the dents of the car, not entirely focused on conversation with cole, but still responding, “grab me one!” 

thad was pushing around on the crumped metal, seeing if any of the repairs could be done by hand when cole returned with the drink. gladly, he took the bottle, took a sip, but nearly spit it out as cole called adam his boyfriend. fortunately for his own pride, he swallowed the beer, then stood to meet cole at eye level, “yeah, i met him. no big deal.” he shrugged, and thad hadn’t thought it was, until now. adam wasn’t anything spectacular in thad’s eyes, but he could feel this conversation going downhill fast, so he diverted to another question, “is he really like, your boyfriend?” the idea of a guy so openly, so gently calling another guy that, well, it formed a lump in thad’s throat that he had no idea how to explain. it definitely wasn’t a bad thing, just different, in fact, thad felt kind of jealous that cole was so comfortable with the word. so, he set his beer down, and turned back to the car. 

xx.

A hint of an amused smile flashed over Cole’s face when he heard what Thad had been listening to on the way here. Motley Crue: Girls, Girls, Girls. A bit obvious, in Cole’s opinion, but for once he didn’t feel like picking a fight over something so small. That is, until Thad grabbed Cole by the side of the head. Wiggling out of his grip, Cole shot Thad a look. “Don’t mess up my hair,” he grumbled, fully knowing it was still wet and unstyled. It was the principle. 

“I’m not drunk,” he corrected, and watched as Thad inspected the car. Honestly, he was still surprised Thad even came. That was... decent of him. Since they’d met, and since Thad had kissed him, Cole’s sneaking suspicion that Thad wasn’t that bad had been on shaky ground. There were glimpses of decency, even kindness-- but Thad hid that behind whatever show he thought he was putting on. 

Cole hid his smirk behind the beer bottle, taking another swig. He didn’t tell Thad about Adam solely for his reaction, though he assumed it would be amusing. Resisting the urge to argue with him-- actually, Adam is a big deal-- Cole crossed his arms over his chest. Not helpful right now, probably. At Thad’s question, Cole was glad he’d held off. “Yeah, he is,” Cole said simply, words accompanied by the smile that always lifted Cole’s lips when he mentioned Adam. The stupid smile that he couldn’t banish even though things were so tense right now. “Since high school. He was... gone for a while, but obviously, he’s here now.” 

Pretending to inspect the passenger side door, Cole hazarded a glance at Thad’s face. As usual, his expression was unreadable-- guarded. “It goes without saying, but... not everyone knows.” 

who: Cole & @rcbinbvckleys​

where: hate to say... the hospital

Since Cole and Adam had cleared the air and sort of discussed what happened at the carnival, Adam had refused to leave Cole’s side for more than a few minutes. It was the comfort he needed-- to know that every time he woke up, Adam would be there, holding his hand. Luckily, Cole hadn’t had any visitors who were out of the loop-- Max and his roommate(s) Steve and Eddie were well aware, and when Jack had stopped by it was clear that Adam had told him.

When Robin walked in, Cole instinctively pulled his hand away from Adam’s. With a slightly nervous smile, he greeted Robin. “Hey, Buckley,” he said, his voice notably hoarse. Maybe he was paranoid, but Cole could’ve sworn that her eyes lingered on Adam, his proximity to Cole, the intimate moment she’d walked in on. “You know Adam? We were really close in high school. I’m friends with his sister,” Cole’s cheeks flushed and he knew he was stumbling over his words.

He changed the topic, partially to divert her attention away from the Adam equation and partially because he had been worried about her, since Max mentioned they’d both been separated from the group. “Are you okay? Max mentioned... something.”