complexfemalecharacter | (no subject)

She had been hoping to actually grab his leg, but the yelp is satisfying enough and she smirks as she follows Steve over to the fire pit. There are fold up chairs somewhere in their packs, chair that seem too light to be properly secure, but they're made for camping, so she figures that has to be their purpose, and once she's found them and unfolded them both, she settles into one.

"I'd make it," she agrees as Steve coaxes the fire into being. "Would've stood a better chance before I started sleeping with the hot jock, but I'd still make it. My dry, self-deprecating humour and tendency to read feminist literature makes me the unlikeable surprise survivor. Robin would be the proper final girl."

She's gorgeous, funny, smart and insecure. It's everything everyone always wants in the final girl.

"Shit, you're right. You'd both make it," Steve says as he gets up and grabs the cooler and bag holding their food, dragging them over towards the fire before retrieving the other chair and plopping down next to her, close enough that their thighs touch. "Rest of us are doomed."

He opens the cooler and pulls out two bottles of beer, handing one over to Maeve before setting his own on the ground. After a bit of rifling through the pack, he unearths a pair of retractable cooking sticks that were in the shit Hopper borrowed.

"Wieners first?" He hands Maeve a stick and then pulls a pack of hot dogs out of the cooler. "Processed meat parts cooked over an open flame. Can't say I never spoil you."

"Please don't ever use the word wieners again," Maeve says as she takes the stick from Steve, attempting to micmic his accent on the word. It's halfway decent, though she still sounds too English to properly say it and it sounds even more ridiculous coming from her mouth than it does his.

She can't help but laugh and once there's a hot dog on her stick, she carefully pokes it out over the fire before she turns slightly to root around in the cooler looking for the beer.

"So is this camping?" she asks, handing Steve two cans so he can open them. "Drinking and processed meat on a stick?"

"Wieners," he says again, this time trying to mimic her attempt to mimic his accent. They both end up laughing, and Steve slumps back in his chair as he holds his stick out over the fire, taking a long sip from his beer as he playfully knocks his hot dog into hers over the fire.

"Pretty much," he admits, turning his head to smile over at her. "You're not used to relaxing much, are you?"

It makes sense, given what he's learned of Maeve. She didn't have an upbringing like Steve. Yeah, his dad was a dick and his mom seemed more interested in her wine bottle than him most days, but he never had to worry about anything. Food, clothes, a place to live, money for activities-- these things were all just handed to him. Maeve had to work so hard for everything all of the time.

It makes him happy that she can have calmer moments now. Especially ones shared with him. "And later, I have it on pretty good authority that you'll have several orgasms in a tent. That should be fun."

"I relax just fine," she protests with a laugh. "I just usually do it with a book."

She had brought a book. For a few minutes, she had considered bringing two, then thought Steve might take that as an insult. She wouldn't mean it that way, she just really loves reading. That she's here at all indicates how much she likes Steve, too. Maybe even loves him.

That's a terrifying thought, though, and one she's trying not to explore.

"Orgasms are very relaxing," she agrees, then tilts her head against her chair, looking over at him, wearing a teasingly innocent expression. "Were you expecting some, too?"

“I would never expect an orgasm,” he volleys back, because it’s true, and also because he knows who he’s talking to, and he likes every opportunity he has to show her that he isn’t a meatheaded jock. “But I definitely wouldn’t say no.”

He smirks at her, biting his lip as he looks her over with a bit of heat in his gaze, and then turns his attention back to the task at hand. The hot dogs seem cooked enough, so he leans over to grab the bag of buns and draws his stick in closer, closing a bun around the hot dog to pull it free. It rests on his knees as he grabs another bun to do the same to Maeve’s, handing it over to her.

“I thought our phallic dinner might get you in the mood,” he teases, laughing happily as he unearths a bottle of mustard. “Is it working? Are the wieners getting to you?”

"I thought we agreed you'd stop saying wieners," Maeve answers, reaching over to kick him lightly with her toe as she tries not to laugh. She shakes her head when he offers her the mustard and instead just bites into her hot dog.

"Why does it taste better than usual?" she asks, her mouth full. That seems wrong. They haven't done anything, they've just cooked them over a stupid fire outdoors, but somehow it tastes so much better than when she makes them at home as a quick and easy meal.

"Is this why people like camping?" she asks. "Food tastes better?"

Maeve seems so pleased to be eating a store-bought hot dog that she roasted over a fire, and Steve finds himself smiling at her. She is so much more low-maintenance than other girls that he’s dated. He isn’t constantly trying to impress her, and she doesn’t demand that he put her up on a pedestal. They can be themselves around each other, truly and without judgment. Steve’s never had anything like that before.

The closest that he ever came was Nancy, but he always felt kind of dumb around her. She never made him feel like that on purpose, he doesn’t think, but it was there. Maeve is smart too, much smarter than him, but she’s never made Steve feel like an idiot for it.

“Most things taste better when cooked over an open flame, I think. That’s why barbecue is so awesome,” he tells her, smiling over at her and licking mustard from the corner of his mouth. Once he’s done with his first hot dog, he leans over at pulls a small tin from his bag, popping it open and pulling out one small gummy. He puts it in his mouth and then holds the tin out for her to take one if she wants. “To enhance both the s’mores and the orgasms.”

"Are we more likely to get eaten by a bear if we're stoned?" she asks with a small smile, reaching out to take one of the gummies from Steve with a grin. She pops it in her mouth before sinking down in her chair, feeling strangely warm and content and comfortable. She reaches across the space between the chairs and takes Steve's hand for a moment, squeezing his fingers in hers.

"Right," she says. "How do we make s'mores? I've never had one before."

It seems like the sort of thing a parent might teach someone to make. The only thing Maeve's mum taught her how to make was beans on toast and then she'd passed out and Maeve had burned herself.

“Aren’t you supposed to play dead when you see a bear?” Steve asks. “I know you’re not supposed to run, so moving slowly would probably work in our favor. But I don’t think you need to worry.”

They’re at a campground, not out in the middle of the woods, and he still isn’t sure if there are bears in Darrow. Still, he’ll lock the food up before they go to bed, just to be safe.

“What?” Steve looks over at Maeve, stunned by her admission, but then he realizes that he probably shouldn’t be. Her mom doesn’t exactly sound like the type of person who would have shown her. “Well, we need to fix that right now.”

He lifts her hand to kiss the back of it and then lets go to dig all the supplies out of his bag, ripping open the marshmallows and popping one into his mouth. He takes Maeve’s hot dog stick and spears two marshmallows on the end and then does the same to his own. “Okay, first we roast the marshmallows.”

As he holds his stick out to let the marshmallows hover just over the flame, he rips open the box of graham crackers and holds a pack on his knee. “They’re so good, babe. Just messy, sticky blobs of awesome.”

"Do I look like I know what we're meant to do if there's a bear?" she asks in return, though she's mostly just watching Steve as he puts the marshmallows on the stick where her hot dog had just been. She hopes it doesn't make the marshmallow taste like processed meat.

But then, she has to trust him here. He's the only one of the two of them who's done this before.

"Right, so how much do we roast them?" she asks as her immediately catch fire when she dips them too close to the flames.

"Uh, well. It's a personal preference," Steve says flatly, watching Maeve's marshmallow get fully engulfed in flames. He grabs her wrist and directs the stick towards his face so he can blow it out before she gets the idea to whip it off of the stick.

He bites the charred marshmallow off of the stick, cheeks bulging as he sticks two fresh ones on the end of it. Once he swallows, licking the corners of his mouth, he nods a bit and lets go of the stick.

"Try to keep them a few inches above the flames, and turn it a bit," Steve says, lifting his own stick to show her, keeping one eye on it as he pulls a chocolate bar from the bag and rips it open with his teeth. "You kind of want them golden brown, but a little char isn't so bad."

"Don't judge me," Maeve says with a laugh, jokingly flipping Steve off at the look he gives her burnt marshmallows. "I've never done this before. How was I supposed to know they'd catch on fire like they were doused on bloody petrol?"

Despite her words, despite the finger she's just flashed Steve, she has her lips pressed into a smile. The weed is working a little, she's feeling light and mellow, and she's having fun. Fun and camping are not words she ever thought she'd put together, but she suspects a lot of it has to do with Steve.

"And then what do you do with the chocolate?" she asks.

"I wouldn't dream of it," Steve says with a laugh, once again relieved at how easy this all is. He doesn't have to be such a try hard with Maeve, doesn't have to be the cool guy. She probably wouldn't even like the guy he tried so hard to be, but she does like who he really is when he's just being himself.

"I'll prep the rest. Just hold my stick and try not to let the main ingredient catch fire," he says with a grin, holding his own stick out for her to take. After glancing at the marshmallows and deciding that they're out of danger, he opens the graham crackers and the chocolate, breaking both in half and assembling the s'mores on his knees.

"Okay, reel them in." When Maeve draws the sticks in close enough, Steve sandwiches one of the marshmallows between the graham crackers while it's still hot enough to melt the chocolate, then hands to to Maeve in exchange for the other stick. Once he has his own s'more, he sets the sticks down and drops back into his chair, looking at her excitedly.

"Okay, now take a bite," he tells her happily, pausing to await her reaction before biting into his own. "And then you'll have officially had the American camping experience."

"I feel like I'll have to pee in the woods before it's properly the American camping experience," she answers as she takes the creation from Steve, all toasted marshmallows and melting chocolate between the crackers. It's going to be a mess, she can feel it, but she's mellow enough now that all she does is lean forward so she doesn't get the chocolate all over herself as it melts.

She takes a big bite, getting chocolate on her lips, the corner of her mouth, then looks over at Steve with her eyebrows raised.

"It's good," she says through a mouthful, then laughs. "It's really good."

"Oh, now you're gonna tell me that British people never pee in the woods?" He jokes, watching her with interest as she bites into the s'more. Maeve isn't really one to emote when something makes her happy, but he thinks that he's getting to be able to read her pretty well by now. Her eyes widen the slightest bit when she bites into it, like she's pleased, and Steve grins at her before taking a bite of his own.

"Told you," he says with his mouth full, smiling with slightly bulged cheeks as he reaches for Maeve's face. "You've got chocolate on you."

What he means to do is wipe it away with his thumb, but what he doesn't realize that there's a glob of chocolate on his thumb, and all he manages to do is smear it across her chin. He swears under his breath but can't help laughing a bit as he looks at her, rushing to chew his bite and swallow. "Oh, I didn't help at all."

"British people are much too refined to piss in the woods," Maeve agrees, then makes a face when Steve smears his thumb over her chin. She can feel it, the sticky chocolate, and she licks her lower lip, all the while knowing it isn't going to help at all.

"You've made a mess," she complains, half-hearted, sounding mellow and stoned. "Now a bear is definitely going to eat me. I'm all covered in chocolate. What bear could resist?"

“Definitely not this one,” Steve replies, baring his teeth and holding one hand up like a claw before leaning over to drag his tongue across Maeve’s chin, biting gently at it while making nom nom nom sounds. Laughing, he takes her chin between his thumb and forefinger, holding her still as he licks the chocolate and marshmallow from her skin, only sitting back once it’s all gone.

“There’s a joke to be made about eating out of your honey pot,” Steve tells her, also sounding mellow and a little horny, but that’s sort of his default setting around Maeve anyway. “Sweet, sweet honey.”

"You're fucking ridiculous," Maeve answers, sprawled back in her chair and trying to glare at him, all while she attempts to hide her smile. It turns out to be significantly more difficult when she's stoned.

She stretches her leg out and kicks Steve's foot lightly, feeling lazy and comfortable. She's also pretty sure she's still sticky, but isn't especially inclined to do anything about it.

Unless. "Is there a lake?" she asks suddenly.

“Yeah, but I make you laugh,” Steve breathes out lazily, leaning over to gently poke his fingertip at the upturned corner of her mouth. “Even though you try so hard not to.”

It isn’t a criticism, and he doesn’t say it like one. He isn’t teasing, either. He knows that Maeve keeps her emotions guarded, and she has good reason to do so. Steve does the same, to a lesser extent, but he wants to make Maeve laugh. She deserves to laugh, so yeah, he’ll go to ridiculous lengths to make it happen. He’s happy to do so, because he— well, he’s pretty sure that he loves her.

Well, that’s something to analyze when he’s not stoned.

“Yeah.” Steve pops the rest of his s’more into his mouth and chews, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand as he swallows. “It’s a ways over there,” he says, gesturing vaguely towards the East. “But I picked this spot because it has a neat lagoon type thing that the lake feeds into. Less crowded.”

He pushes himself to his feet and looks around, figuring out what they’d need to do before leaving the site. Put the fire out, probably. “Did you bring a suit?”

"No," she answers, then pushes to her feet and stretches. "Show me."

It's not that warm out, though she's comfortable right now. Getting into the water is going to end with her cold, she's certain of that, but at the same time, she doesn't care at all. She wants to get in the water, she wants to wash the chocolate off her face, and she wants to get a little cold if that's what happens.

It turns out, camping is sort of fun.

"The exact answer I was hoping for." Steve watches Maeve stretch and then picks up his beer to chug the rest of it before getting up to join her. He's pleasantly high, just relaxed and a little horny, and when he takes a deep breath, he appreciates the freshness of it in his lungs.

"Just a sec," he says as he gathers their bags. After zipping them up in the tent, he takes a stick and pokes at the fire, smothering the logs in the dirt until it's just smoldering. He grabs two more beers from the cooler and then joins Maeve, looking over at her with easy smile. "Let's do this."

It's getting a little late, with the sun just staring to set, so hopefully any families will be back at their campsites. There is a clear trail leading into the woods and Steve leads them along it, stepping forward to push aside a few overgrown branches for Maeve. When they get to the lagoon, there's a small group of people about their age on the opposite side, but they seem to be packing up.

"Looks like we got lucky," he tells her, turning to lift his eyebrows a few times and hand over the second beer to her.

"Looks like," she agrees with a small smile. She takes the beer from Steve, then sits down on a rock nearby and begins to unlace her boots. She's in no rush and she takes her time with them, then pulls off the socks she's wearing and shoves them inside. By the time she's done this, the group has started to wander back to their own campsite, laughing and talking as they go, and Maeve watches, waits until she can no longer hear them, then peels her shirt up and over her head.

She has no idea if they have towels, but she'd walked through Moordale's halls soaking wet before. She doesn't care if she has to walk back to their site the same way.

Standing, she shimmies out of her shorts and her tights, setting them all aside, then looks back at Steve, standing there in a black bra and a black pair of knickers.

As the group passes by, Steve gives them a lazy salute and takes another sip of his beer before wedging it upright into some gravel. He steps out of his sneakers and undresses down to his black boxer briefs, laughing a little when he turns to see Maeve standing there in her own black underwear.

"Look at us, matchy matchy," he teases, sauntering over to her as he looks her over, putting his hands on his hips as he leans down to give her a lingering kiss on the mouth. He keeps one hand on the curve of her hip and slides the other slowly up her back, dragging his fingertips along the line of her spine until they slide under the band of her bra, lifting to tug at the hooks a little.

"Can I?" He asks quietly against her ear, glancing around the space before pulling back to look at her with a bit of a heated gaze, coaxing her with his eyes as he bites his bottom lip.

"Well, I don't want to swim in it," she answers with a little grin, shivering at the warmth of Steve's breath against her ear. She would have without question, just jumped straight into the pool in her underwear, but there's no one else here. And if anyone comes by now, they're going to be in for a bit of an eyeful.

Which will certainly help Maeve's reputation.

She shifts her shoulders back and forth a little. "Get on with it, Harrington," she teases.