I Chose You | Dustin & Billy | Stranger Things 4.5

He’d wanted to find it after waking up but he didn’t have a car anymore, and the distance had been way too much for his shattered body to handle. It still was. Thankfully, Steve had been kind and trusting enough to lend him his beloved BMW. Francis, he’d called her.

She purred under the gentle pressure of Billy’s foot, even as he made sure not to push her too hard. It felt strange to drive a car again. For the first few minutes, a wave of motion sickness crept up on him, which passed quickly.

Billy had taken a different route to avoid being seen by Dustin, and parked near the back entrance of the cemetery, far enough that the kid wouldn’t stumble across the BMW when he arrived. If Dustin knew Billy or Steve had followed him here, he’d turn right around and throw a wrench in his plans.

Stepping out of the car, Billy lit another cigarette. He still coughed — ten months of forced abstinence had wrecked whatever tolerance he used to have — and started wandering into the cemetery.

He kept his eyes forward, wouldn’t let himself look at the graves. Not yet. Not at the rows of headstones waiting quietly in the earth, not at the thought creeping in behind them:

That he should be beneath one of them.

Weeks ago, that idea had consumed him. Constant. Smothering. But it had faded, little by little, replaced by fragile hopes, by distractions… by the warmth of certain feelings around a certain someone.

Still, the shadows stretching between the headstones felt wrong. Watching. Waiting.

A reminder. A warning.

Billy forced himself to imagine trees instead — just trees, nothing more — and the tension in his chest eased, if only a little bit.

Alright now… Focus.

Where the hell should he even start? Could he find Eddie’s name before Dustin showed up?

The bottle of paint remover felt slick in his hand, scrubber and rag stuffed awkwardly into his jacket pocket. The cemetery was empty, strangely so for a Sunday. Especially now. Only a few weeks after the so-called earthquake, there should’ve been mourners everywhere. Fresh grief. Fresh flowers. Instead, there was nothing.

The deeper he walked, the quieter it got.

Until it didn’t. Laughter.

Billy stopped, brows furrowing as he tried to place it.

More laughter. Sharp, reckless, and totally wrong in a place like this. The kind of laughter dumb kids make when they were doing something really stupid. The kind Billy used to make when he was up to no good.

He scanned the area and spotted them in the distance, half-hidden behind a thin line of trees. His feet carried him closer — slow at first, then faster — until he could make them out clearly.

Three… no, four kids. Jumping around a headstone. Shoving each other around like a bunch of hooligans, laughing like idiots. And then the words reached him.

“Look at that! That’s right, asshole, you burn in hell!”
“Serves him right, the murderer!”
“Whoa, they were right! The red paint looks just like blood!”

Billy froze and went still. Then his expression hardened, jaw tight, nostrils flaring, teeth bared. He ripped the cigarette from his lips and strode forward like a hispanic mom loading up her throwing-shoe because her dumb kids forgot to flush the damn toilet, only that these weren't his kids, so he was ready to kick some asses.

“HEY!”

The shout cracked through the air and the kids didn’t hesitate. Knowing the trouble they were in, they bolted immediately, leaving brushes and red paint behind. He didn't bother running after them. 

“Yeah, that’s what I fucking thought,” Billy grumbled. “Pieces of shit kids don’t know what’s good for them these days.”

He stopped. Grimaced. God… He sounded like his dad. The thought twisted in his gut, but he shoved it aside and turned back to the grave upon his arrival. And then, he saw it. The name carved into the stone, and the words scrawled all over it in dripping red blood— no, paint.

BURN
EDWARD MUNSON
IN
NOW AT PEACE
HELL
1966 - 1986

Well… at least those little shits had led him straight to it. 

Billy frowned, mouth twisted. Now at peace. Really? No beginning, no end. Just a sentence above the years — clean, empty, wrong. As if that was enough to sum up a life. They hadn't even bothered with birth or death dates. Not that it mattered... Not with the bright red scribbles smeared across the entire damn thing.

They'd been right. The paint looked like blood. It clung to the carved letters, dragged down the granite in uneven streaks that caught the light like something alive. Like it had been poured, not brushed. Like it had bled. But it was fresh. Easy enough to remove.

Billy stared at it for a second too long.

Then he took a drag from his cigarette, filling his lungs with smoke instead of the clean air around him, and dropped to his knees. The smell of the remover hit immediately: Sickly sweet at first, like apple juice, then sharp enough to sting and burn its way into his sinuses, making his eyes prickle. He welcomed it. Better that than the smell of damp earth. Of flowers left for too long.

Billy poured some of it onto his brush before pressing it to the stone, starting with the B. The bristles scraped harshly against rough granite, dragging through the red. It smeared before it lifted, thinning into pink streaks, stubborn and ugly. Billy leaned into it, jaw tight. Focused on the motion, the pressure, on something that could be fixed.

Footsteps broke through the quiet. Fast. Heavy. He hadn't even finished scrubbing off the first letter. And then—

"What the fuck do you think you're doing?!"

Billy recognized Dustin's voice before the words even landed. He didn't turn.

"The hell does it look like to you?" he muttered, dragging the brush harder across the letter.
"Stop! Get away from it!"

Dustin lunged at him, grabbing his jacket, yanking again and again. Billy barely moved. He just shifted his weight, extended one arm without looking, keeping Dustin back like it was nothing more than an inconvenience. The cigarette hung from his lips, bobbing with each breath, ash threatening to fall.

The brush kept moving. Scrape. Drag. Scrape.

"Stop it!" Dustin shouted. When that didn't work, Dustin shoved him, but Billy still didn't move. The brush dragged over the red-stained letter like it was the only thing in the world that mattered. Dustin ripped it from his hand. Billy took it right back and continued. 

Another shove. Billy rocked forward, caught himself, and kept going. 

"Fuck off, Billy! Stop!" 
Billy huffed a quiet breath through his nose. "Relax, Henderson. Didn't know cleaning a rock needed a fucking permit."

The red thinned under the bristles. Another shove. Harder. Dustin was breathing heavier now. Rough. Frantic. 
"It's not just a rock! Stop it! You have no right!"

The boy's words cracked. Billy felt that, somewhere under his ribs, but ignored it. Another push. Another shove. They started to land. Sharp, persistent. He nearly lost his balance once, his head coming dangerously close to the stone, but he caught himself again, stayed put, and kept scrubbing.

"Don't touch it, Billy! This is my job!"
"Are you getting paid?"
"No—"
"Then it's not your damn job."

Dustin's backpack hit the ground with a dull thud that felt like a bomb in Billy's ears. Then the shoves turned desperate. Sloppier. Angrier. The more the B faded, the more Dustin fought, and hit, and pushed, until—

"PLEA-EASE! PLEASE STOP! PLEASE! PLEASE, BILLY!" he begged, voice cracking, breath hitching, the words breaking apart on their way out. The next shove never came. He just... stood there. Small. Shoulders slumped, like a little boy who'd gotten lost and didn't know how to find his way back. 

Billy slowed. Didn't stop... but slowed. His body forced a deep breath into his lungs, the smoke burning him inside. Suddenly, the cigarette tasted bitter.

"Please... Stop it already... Let me do it alone! I have to do it alone..." Dustin sobbed. No more anger. Just begging.

Billy's hand stilled, grip loosening. The brush hovered against the stone. For a moment, all he could hear was his own breathing, the faint crackle of the cigarette, the distant rustle of the wind crossing the trees. At last, he stood up slowly and dropped the brush without a word.

The echoes of the boy's desperate screams were heavy in his chest. Reminded him of those nights leading up to July 4th, woke him up. Billy pulled the Marlboro from his mouth again and stepped back. 

Dustin didn't hesitate. He sank to his knees immediately, hands shaking as he dug through his backpack to grab his own supplies and start scrubbing. His movements were frantic — uncoordinated, driven by something spilling over inside him. The anger was gone, burned out somewhere between the shove and the sobbing please.

Billy watched from above, tense and unmoving. 

He... hadn't meant to make him cry. Only to not let him get away with this behavior. But it was never just about a misbehaving teenager, was it? It was about so much more than a kid not letting him clean a rock with a name on it.

Dustin poured his own paint remover over it.

"You're gonna waste it like that," Billy said quietly.
Dustin didn't even look at him. "Shut up."
Billy did. He stood there, cigarette hanging loosely between his fingers, and watched the nose of the ash grow longer, fragile and trembling until it finally broke and fell into the grass. Normally, being told to shut up would've pissed him off. Now... it didn't.

Just watching him like this, he could feel it in his own bones. The grief, the anger, the guilt. It pressed in on him, tight and suffocating. God... Feeling another person's energy like his own was not a skill Billy was particularly glad to have. It used to mean survival. One more day without arguments, without a belt whipping his back. Today, it only made things feel heavy.

The sound of scrubbing filled the space between them. Wet, erratic, too hard in some places, too soft in others. No rhythm to it. But grief didn't have rhythm.

Billy took one last drag and almost — almost — put the cigarette out on the headstone. He stopped himself, used a nearby tree instead. Dustin spoke again before Billy knew what to say.

"You didn't even know him. You have no right to step anywhere near his grave."

Billy bit back his tongue. It wasn't really a grave, was it? Steve had told him they'd had no way of retrieving Eddie's body from the Upside Down. After Dustin told his uncle what had happened — leaving out the bat monsters and other dimensions — Eddie was finally declared dead, and this memorial was erected. No body. No coffin. Just a marker. A memory people could touch... and vandalize. 

Billy wondered, briefly, what his own would've looked like if he'd died last year. Would his father have carved his entire dumb name — William Kenneth Hargrove — into a perfect, polished stone? Or would he have reduced him to initials — W. Kenneth Hargrove — just to erase the part his mother had given him?

Would there even be anything buried beneath it?

His earring? Probably not. Neil hated that thing.
His necklace? Definitely not. Used to be his mother's. 

Funny how even in death, everything still came down to what the living wanted. Billy glanced back at Eddie’s headstone. He hadn’t known him well, but he doubted Eddie would’ve chosen something this bland and lifeless.

And if it had been Billy?

He let out a quiet breath. His dad probably would’ve picked something just as bad. Something stiff. Pretentious. Like 'gone but not forgotten'.

"I did know him, Henderson. Not like you, no. But I did," he said.
"No, you didn't," Dustin retorted. "You probably made his life hell for being different."
"I did not."

Dustin shook his head and kept scrubbing. "I don't believe a single word out of your mouth."
"Fine. Don't. I don't care enough to waste my breath trying to convince you."
"Does Steve believe any of that bullshit?"

Billy hesitated, lips pursed. "He does."
Dustin's movements halted. Then, he scoffed a bitter laugh. Billy furrowed his brows at him.
"What's so funny?"
"You didn't deny that it's bullshit."

Billy rolled his eyes. His mouth twitched into a faint smile of disbelief. "And you're cherrypicking what you wanna hear."
"I'm not," Dustin denied. "I'm just observing. You're bullshitting Steve with that act of yours and he believes your lies because of how dumb he is."

Hargrove shut his eyes. That hit harder than the shoves, prompted him to take a deep breath. But defending Steve here — like Steve had defended him earlier — wasn't going to help.

"Man..." he uttered instead. "Do you kiss your mom with that mouth?"

Suddenly, Dustin tossed his brush aside and shot to his feet, his glare cold and dangerous.

"If you hurt him, Billy, I swear to god—"

Billy flinched, but wouldn't back down. "Quite an attitude for someone who insulted him five seconds ago."
"Shut up, you’re no better yourself! You beat the shit out of him and now you’re acting like friends?!"

"We are friends. You don't have to like that." He looked at him, his gaze calm and sincere. "And I have no intention of doing anything that's even close to how fucking stupid that was."
"You could've killed him!"
"I know."
"Does Steve know that, too, or have you given him permanent brain damage?" Dustin snarled.
Billy remained steady, expression hardening. "One does not outrule the other, am I right?"

Back then, he'd had every reason to be suspicious. A classmate hanging around with kids at a stranger’s house late at night, lying about where his sister was — of course it had set off alarm bells. And yeah, he hadn’t been in a good place. Not even close. Could it have been handled without violence? Definitely. But none of that changed what had happened, and he wasn’t about to argue about it now. Not when Steve had already forgiven him, and Dustin clearly hadn’t. It would only make things worse.

Dustin scoffed again, shaking his head like he couldn't even stand to look at him.

"You two being friends or whatever... You think that changes anything? You don't get to just decide you're different now."

Billy didn't snap back. "I know what I was, Henderson," he said quietly. "I'm not that guy anymore."

Dustin stepped closer again. His eyes were red, still wet, burning with something that refused to settle. 

"How would I know that? Huh?" he demanded. "How would Steve know that?"

Billy held his gaze, didn't look away. "You wouldn't," he said. "And neither would Steve, even if he says he does. I'm not expecting either of you to know that."

"Right..." Dustin huffed, glancing him up and down. "Then don't get any ideas."

Billy rolled his eyes again, shook his head. "What ideas?"
"You know what I mean."
"I'm afraid I don't follow."
"Don't give me that crap, Billy," Dustin argued. "I saw the way you were looking at him."

The look Dustin gave him then was sharp. Cutting. Like he was something to be stepped on and crushed. A spider. A bug.

"Are you in love with him or something?"

Billy blinked, caught off guard for half a second, then steadied. "What does that have to do with anything?"

"He deserves someone so much better than the likes of you."

That one landed. Billy let out a quiet breath through his nose, something tired flickering behind his eyes. "Yeah, believe me," he uttered. "I'm aware of that."

Dustin faltered, just barely.

"I don't want to hurt him," Billy added. Dustin's expression twisted. "And all the others?" he shot back. "Did you want to hurt them? Kill them?"

Billy held his breath, swallowed a lump down his throat. But he didn't look away.
"Never."
"But you did!" Henderson's voice broke, rising. "You killed them! You hurt Max! Terrorized her!"
"I know." 

It came out flat. Immediate. Billy's jaw tightened, teeth pressing into the inside of his cheek hard enough to sting. 

"Do you ever think about it?" Dustin asked, quieter now — but sharper. Billy paused, tried to remember how to breathe.

"... Every day."

The words sat between them. Heavy. Useless. Dustin's face hardened, disappointment settling in where anger had been. It wasn't enough. It would never be enough.

Billy saw it. The quiet weight sitting on the boy's shoulders, getting heavier instead of lighter. He nodded to himself with pursed lips, accepting it: The calm but wrenching realization.

"Doesn't change anything for you," he said. Not as a question, but an observation. "Even if you believed me."

Dustin let out a humorless scoff. "Wow. Finally something out of your damn mouth that I agree with."

Billy took a deep breath, nodded again. "Yeah." A pause. Then he stepped closer, just enough to close the space between them, turning slightly toward the headstone without breaking eye contact.

"... And do you know why that is?" he asked flatly. 

Dustin shook his head. "Don't care."

Billy's voice dropped. "Because it doesn't change the fact that I'm still here... while Eddie... is not."

And those words... They hit. Dustin's breath hitched — sharp, uneven. Shaky. He pressed his lips together until they were white, chin trembling.

"You damn... asshole..." He swallowed hard. "You fucking bastard..."
"I know."
"It's not fair," Dustin choked. "He lost everything... He died for this town, for me — and it didn't even matter! Max still— Vecna still—"
"I know..." Billy agreed. Again.

His voice had lost its edge completely. The image of Max in her hospital bed, covered in cables and casts, plagued his mind.  

Part of him wanted to tell Dustin the truth; That he'd seen everything while he lay trapped in that coma. Steve nearly getting torn apart by those bats. Wheeler and Buckley pinned to the wall by vines. Eddie… choosing to stay. Choosing to draw them away. Choosing to die for it. 

Billy swallowed. In the end, he said nothing. Because if it had been him — breaking apart like Dustin did when Eddie died in his arms — he would’ve hated knowing someone had been watching.

Dustin dragged in a shaky breath, like his lungs didn't want to cooperate.

"And you..." he went on, words tumbling now. "You lost so much blood, so damn much... Your wounds were so much worse than Eddie's, and you lived because people were there! Because they helped you! I couldn't even get to him— I couldn't— I couldn't help him in time—"

His voice cracked completely. "I left him there... Just left him to rot..."

Silence. Billy felt something crack and twist in his chest, almost like the titanium plates on his ribs were starting to complain.
"Yeah," he muttered. "Life doesn't really do fair."

Dustin shook his head violently. "No— You don't get to say that!"
"A bunch of surgeons saved me," Billy cut in, still calm. "You're a smart kid, Henderson. But you're not a surgeon. You couldn't have saved him that night. Not on your own..."

The boy let out a broken sob. Just one. Then another. He turned away, pressing his hand against the headstone like he could anchor himself to it. Like it was something solid that wouldn't disappear if he held on tight enough. Like it was the shoulder of a friend he had lost, wanting nothing more than for that touch to be real. If only for a moment. More sobs shook through his body. 

"I tried..." he whispered. "I tried..."

Billy didn't move. Didn't interrupt. He just stood there, watching the kid fall apart in front of him. Feeling it in his own guts, whether he wanted to or not. It pressed on him. Heavy. Deep. He had to hold his breath again, his own tear ducts clenching painfully.

Not too long ago, Billy would've felt pathetic for it. Not anymore. Now, it felt real. Alive. Like a truth he knew he had to accept eventually, even if it hurt.

After a while, Dustin's breathing evened out. Barely, but enough to speak.

"Do you know what it's like," he said hoarsely, "looking at you?"
Billy bit his lip. "... Yeah. I think I do."

Dustin laughed. It wasn't real. "I gave you my blood," he said. "Mine." That one didn't come out angry. Or loud. It came out like a fact. Billy's gaze dropped, then slowly lifted again. Something in it had softened and cracked open. 

"I didn't even have to," Dustin went on. "We all did. It was my idea..."

Each word felt heavier than the last. 

"They said you lost almost all of it. Six liters." He let out a shaky breath. "We made up the rest. Me. Them. All of us. If we hadn't..." Dustin's voice wavered. "If I hadn't—"

He looked up then. Right at him. His blue eyes faltered with emotion, oozing with truth. He gazed into Billy's eyes like he was hoping for absolution.

"In a way," he hesitated, "... I chose you."

The world seemed to go quiet around them. The birds stopped singing. The wind stopped rustling through the trees. And Billy just stared at him, feeling it land. Not like an accusation.

Worse.

Like something unfinished. Like a question Dustin didn't know how to ask. And it's so much heavier than 'you should've died', because between the lines, Billy heard the truth: 'I saved you, and I don't know if I made the right call.'

His throat felt dry. So dry.

"You shouldn't have had to make that choice," he said, barely above a whisper.
Dustin swallowed a lump down his throat. "Eddie didn't get one."
Billy promptly shook his head. "He did."

Dustin stilled, stared at him.

"He chose you," Billy said. "He chose to stay. To fight. To risk it. Because in that moment... taking that risk mattered more than all the other bullshit he'd risked before. All that running, being scared, ducking away... What did that do for him? Nothing. That night, he had this last chance to be himself, to be who he wants to be. To feel like this entire fucking chaos... meant something. Sometimes that's all it is. One moment. One choice that... means more than everything that came before. And y'know, sometimes... sometimes in order to stick to that choice, you do the stupidest thing in the world that you know will put an end to it all. Even if it ends you."

Dustin's voice came out small. "Is that why you...?"

Billy didn't let him finish, just nodded. Dustin's face crumpled slightly, like that answer, that truth, hurt more than anything else.

"It's not fair..." he whispered again. "If I'd done something different... If I hadn't gone through that gate first... If I hadn't—"
"Stop."

Billy stepped closer, head shaking violently this time. "That wasn't on you. You didn't kill him, kid."

Dustin let out another broken sound. "But I saved you..."

Billy's gaze lowered. There it was again: That weight. That choice.

"That was long before Eddie. And for the record?" he said, voice rougher now. "I wanted to kick your dumbass and shake the stupid out of you when you told me about your blood. I didn't ask for it. Didn't ask any of you to do that shit, hurt yourself for me after I made my choice to—"

Billy didn't finish that sentence, just stared for a second. "But I'm not blaming you," he added instead. Dustin stared at him once more. Confused. Lost. 

"You made a call. And for whatever reason you did it at all... whether or not to actually save me, or because of Max, or so you could pat yourself on the back for trying since none of you thought I'd make it anyway... I still don't take that lightly. Not for a damn second, Dustin. Ever."

His eyes were clear and open in a way they rarely were. Billy didn’t usually let anyone but Steve look at him like that. Not closely. Not long enough to see anything real. But now, he held Dustin’s gaze. He needed him to understand that despite everything he’d said before, this wasn’t indifference. This wasn’t him brushing it off, or not caring enough to waste his breath trying to convince him.

And yet, this wasn’t about what Dustin thought of him. It was about what Dustin thought of himself. About the choice he’d made. And Billy knew exactly how terrifying that kind of choice could be.

Dustin breathed in, then let it out like dead weight. It looked like a quiet spark of relief.

"You made a choice. Same as he did," Billy said, nodding towards the headstone. "Same as we all did. Eddie... You... Me... Steve."

Henderson looked away at the mention of Steve's name. It wasn't avoidance. It was lingering disappointment. Billy saw it in the way the folds etched into his forehead, a sense of stillness bleeding into his eyes.

"You don't have to like the fact that Steve decided to help me," he said. "Hell, I don't even like it some days. But you know how he is. Once he makes a choice, he sticks to it, no matter what. You can't stop someone from making a choice that matters to them. Not even if it's unfair..."

Images of golden and bright hair whipping in the wind crossed his mind. The smell of sunblocker. The glistening polish of a new surfboard. A warm hand on his cheek. Billy swallowed the memories away and rubbed his eyes.

"And if you make a choice that matters a lot to you one day," he continued, "I really hope no one's giving you shit about it just because it's difficult for them to deal with."

Dustin's expression kept switching between sorrow, bitterness, confusion. He lowered his hand from the headstone, looked at the engravements, gaze following the trail of the blood red paint. 

"What if he decides to sacrifice himself for you?" Dustin croaked. Somewhere beneath the blue in his eyes was a lingering flicker of resentment. 
"I won't let him do that kind of bullshit."
"God damn hypocrite..."

The corner of Billy's mouth twitched into a brief smirk. He wasn't wrong. All this talk of people making choices that matter to them, and yet he would stop Steve from doing something as dumb as throwing himself into the fire for him. Neil would tell him to practice what he preaches.

However, this was about the future. Not the past that couldn't be changed anymore.

"You won't lose him, kid... Not because of me."

For a long second, Billy watched him, waiting for an answer that never came.

"If you gotta hate me," he said quietly, "go ahead." No bite. No sarcasm. Just the truth. "I can take it. If it helps you feel better, go for it. Call me names, call me out, be an asshole to me — I don't care. If that's what it takes for you to stop letting it all out on Steve... I'm fine with that."

Dustin took a breath, words stuck on the tip of his tongue. Billy waited until he was ready. 

"I don't know what else to do with this... anger in me," the boy croaked, still avoiding his eyes. His shoulders sagged. "Everything just sets it off."

Billy nodded. His words sounded familiar. "It's yours," he said. "The anger. It's yours alone. Don't know about you, but for me... that was the only thing that was ever really mine... Until it wasn't."

Finally, the boy looked at him. All harsh features softened into something new, like the mask finally broke and revealed a glimpse through the cracks. Still, he remained quiet. Like he was looking for more in his ocean blue eyes.

"Make that anger yours again, Henderson. Do something with it. Something like that." Billy nodded towards Eddie's vandalized name on the headstone once more. 

"Don't share it with anyone. Fuck'em. No one should get a single crumb of it because of how much it's yours. And if you feel like... damn, I have way too fucking much of that crap, I don't know what to do with it... Make an exception for me with that no-sharing rule and gimme some of it. Let it out on me. Like I said, I can handle it. But don't be a dick to Steve like that, man. If you have to be, take me as his... placeholder or whatever. I'll print out a mask with his dumb face on it if it helps."

Dustin scoffed, but it mixed with something more real. An actual chuckle. One that made him tense up his lips, like he was trying to hold it back. Billy grinned triumphantly.

For a while, it was silent again. The soft winds from earlier were beginning to sharpen slightly. Billy waited for him to say something at first. Eventually, though, he simply allowed the silence to roll over them. 

Dustin moved, bent down to grab the cleaning brush he had tossed away earlier. He poured some paint remover on it, got on his knees before the headstone, and scrubbed all over the vile red words again. Billy just watched. Contemplated.

The boy's movements halted and he turned towards him with a sour face.

"Are you gonna help me now or what?" 

A beat. Billy could barely believe his ears. He arched his brows and curled his lips again.

"Thought you'd never ask."

He picked up his own brush, pulled the rag out of his jacket pocket, and knelt next to Dustin.

"Don't think this changes anything. It's still my job."
Billy smirked. "Right. Of course."

When they were done, they both straightened up in front of Eddie's grave, admiring their work. The stone was clean again. No red, no smears. No trace of what had been done to it.

For a moment, neither of them spoke.

"There," Billy said at last. "Was it really that hard to share the job?"
"Shut up."

Billy huffed a quiet laugh. Dustin's mouth twitched — just slightly. Not quite a smile, but close.

"We're meeting Will, El, and Hop later. At the Squawk," Billy added. "Gonna go over everything. You coming? We could use your brain."

Dustin shook his head, eyes drifting back to the headstone. "No... I wanna stay a bit longer."
Billy nodded. "Yeah. Alright. You know where to find us."

He started stuffing the brush and rag back into his jacket when Dustin handed something out to him. Looked like a crumpled piece of paper. Billy frowned upon taking and unfolding it.

"What's this?"
"My notes. From last night at the MAC-Z," Dustin said, a little quieter now. "I don't know if there's anything useful on it, but... since I'm not coming..."

Billy glanced over it, then back at him. The smile that tugged at his mouth was faint, but real.

"Thanks."
"Don't get used to it."
"I would never."

He gave Dustin's shoulder a brief, somewhat awkward pat before turning to leave.

"Billy?"

He stopped. "Yeah?"

Dustin hesitated, looking down for a second... and when he looked back up, there was something different on his face. A grin. Not sharp. Not held back. Just... real. Billy blinked and frowned, caught off guard.

"You know how you didn't deny you were bullshitting Steve?" Dustin teased.

Billy sighed, rolling his eyes. "We really doing this again?"
"There's something else you didn't deny."
Billy raised a brow. "Oh yeah? And you gonna tell me, or—"
"You didn't deny that you're in love with him. You only asked what it had to do with anything."

He froze. The words hit before he could prepare for them. Heat rose to his face, fast and unmistakable, and yeah, there was no way Dustin missed that.

"I—"
"I won't tell him," Dustin cut in. 

Silence followed. Thick, but somehow unthreatening silence. Billy stared at him for way too long. He'd thought that Dustin letting him help with Eddie's headstone was already an offer of truce. Now, he wondered if that little promise came closer to it.

His gaze dropped, and something in him softened. He let out a small breath.

"Oh... well, about that..."

When he looked back up, the smile on his face had changed. Warmer. Gentler. Real in a way it hadn't been before.

"He already knows."

For the last time that day, Billy looked at the headstone, eyes resting on the phrase in the middle.

NOW AT PEACE

And somehow, he felt that, too. At least a little more than before coming here.

Perhaps it wasn't too stupid after all. Eddie deserved peace after the hell he'd gone through. And so did Dustin, the little shit.