FAMILIAR ↳ STEVE HARRINGTON

fifty-three.

Steve had been bouncing his leg in absolute anguish and anxiety for the past hour, his back starting to ache from sitting in the chair for so long. After serving ice cream for about an hour and a half, with no sign of Christine or Officer Mustache he had given Robin the reigns and decided he needed to sit down, his stomach starting to turn with worry. What kind of lunch lasted for almost 3 hours?

He had been chewing on the inside of his cheek fit about thirty minutes now, his eyes glued to the Russian alphabet and the translation of the message that was still up on the whiteboard. He figured that he could decode anything that was spelled in Russian by now, because he had been staring for so long he almost thought he had it completely memorized.

"Is he...alright?" Erica whispered to Dustin who was sitting in the booth beside her, the two of them waiting impatiently for the after hours to come so that they could get their plan started. Dustin looked where she was looking, seeing Steve through the back window and then looking back at her.

"Why do you ask?"

"Because he hasn't blinked in 3 minutes and I'm starting to think his ass is glued to the chair. Listen if your guy isn't gonna be able to-"

"He's fine. He's just anxious."

"What's he anxious about? He's not the one crawling through a bunch of air ducts to get into a secret room with a bunch of heavily armed men." Erica said in a semi hushed tone, Dustin shaking his head at her and trying to calm down her sass.

"Not that. He's anxious because the girl he likes is out on a date with another guy and she's not back yet." Dustin explained, gesturing towards the doorway with an obvious look.

"The girl he likes? Well why is he just sitting there and not doing anything about it?" Erica asked, giving him a questioning look as she ate some of her ice cream. She had been eating ice cream for almost three hours now, and she still wasn't getting tired of it.

"Because he is in deep denial of the fact that he's in love with her." Dustin said with a longing gaze, seeming as if he was telling a story. Ericas lip curled up in some kind of disgust, the girl blinking a few times before speaking.

"Oh are you talking about Christine?"

"So you see it too?" Dustin asked, looking over at her and dropping his head into his hand.

"I mind my own business when it comes to people I don't care much about but it's almost embarrassing how much those two make them googly eyes at each other. It almost makes me sick. Actually I'm feeling a little like I might vomit just thinking about it." Erica said, the disgust still on her face as Dustins mouth opened.

"Okay ew. Don't do that. But yeah I know. I mean look at him, he looks like his dog just died." Dustin said, both of them looking back at Steve who had finally moved, the boy hunched over the table with his head in his hands.

"Sometimes it amazes me how dumb a person can be." Erica said, nodding her head as she looked away from the depressing site of Steve Harrington.

There was a lull in customer activity, Robin leaning against the countertop behind the register and turning her head slightly to look at Steve who was now halfway laid out across the table in dramatic fashion. She fully turned, figuring maybe she should check on him.