#no but seriously my cabin was the cool senior girl cabin when we were getting ready for activities and square dancing me + my co-section | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

hawkinshellfire · 3 years

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Right Where You Left Me

Chapter 1 - Willow

Wait for the signal and I'll meet you after dark Show me the places where the others gave you scars

Leaning back in his chair, Hopper stretches his arms up over his head and peers to the far side of the classroom. Two rows behind him, on the left, one of his best friends, Joyce Horowitz, was scribbling down a note furiously, her brow furrowed as she focused on what their science teacher was explaining up at the blackboard.

He extends his left arm and hurls a wad of paper in her direction, smirking when it hits her in the side of the head and forces her to look at him. She brushes the note to the side of her desk and shakes her head, choosing to ignore him rather than give in to the childish game he loved to play in this class.

As expected, Hopper balls up another wad of paper and tosses it at Joyce; this time it hits her on the cheek before falling onto her notebook. Reluctantly, she looks over at him and cocks her head while she mouths, “cut it out.”

Hopper holds his hand to his ear and mouths back, “what was that?” Adding fuel to the fire, he lobs a third piece of paper at her.

“I said cut it out!” she exclaims far louder than intended. The rest of the class turns to stare and Mr. Benson stops speaking, folds his arms over his chest and marches over to her.

“Something you wanted to share with the class?” he asks.

“No sir,” she whispers, gaze locked on the notebook in front of her.

“Very well. Mr. Hopper, please leave Ms. Horowitz alone. Save your antics for when you’re outside my classroom.”

“Yes sir,” Hopper replies.

They sit through the rest of the class and listen to the biology lesson, but as soon as the class is dismissed Joyce runs up to Hopper and scolds him with a swift smack on the forearm.

“Why do you have to cause problems? Mr. Benson is going to think I don’t take his class seriously.”

She waits as he gathers up his books and trails behind him as they begin to make their way down the hall.

“Oh c’mon Joycie, you know I’m just teasing you. Loosen up, have a little fun,” he smirks down at her.

“I have plenty of fun,” she protests.

They walk down the hall side by side and Hopper tells Joyce his after school practice is cancelled and that he can drive her home. He’d been driving her home ever since he received his license and his parents gifted him a car, but football season often meant he had to stay late and Joyce had to either walk home or take the bus.

Hopper waves to a few people as they continue down the hall, and fistbumps a tall dark-haired senior that brushes past them. She’s telling him about the latest book she’s devoured and while she knows he’s listening to every word, she can’t help but notice that he has the attention of several of their peers and he could just as easily brush her off to greet them.

She and Hopper had been friends since they were kids. Having met on one of the first days of school, they formed a quick bond that had yet to be severed. Joyce didn't get along very well with many other girls and had a difficult time making friends due to her introverted nature, but something about Hopper drew on her extroverted instincts and she found herself comfortable and open with him.

Sometimes, she envied the way everything came so naturally for Hopper. He got decent grades without studying, was a member of the Hawkins High football team and constantly had a slew of girls desperate for his attention. In addition to that, he seemed to know just about everyone. While Joyce could count the number of friends she had on a single hand, Hopper was always saying hello to strangers and other students she’d never seen before, and she was sometimes left wondering if he knew them or if he was just being polite.

There are times when his popularity feels overwhelming to her. Moments at parties where he runs off to greet someone new and she’s left feeling insecure about not knowing many others, or moments like this when despite knowing he cares about what she’s telling him, she can’t help but notice others noticing him.

She always wondered how their classmates perceived their friendship. She wasn’t exactly the most popular member of the junior class while Hopper practically ruled the school and she knew that seeing them together must be odd. Sometimes she wondered if Hopper felt obligated to remain her friend, but that fear went away the moment she caught his eye while she spoke and she can tell he cares about what she has to say.

They reach the cafeteria and part ways, Hopper, to join some of his teammates, Joyce to a few of her friends from her photography club.

“See you after school?” he smiles.

“Don’t keep me waiting,” she smirks back.

He sits down with a group of boys at a table along the far wall and is immediately pulled into a conversation with the two students next to him while he unwraps his lunch. Joyce makes her way across the room and settles at her usual table, where Josie and Eli are already seated and eating. Each of them looks up and greets her with a smile, and Joyce plops herself down and pulls out a book and her lunch. She begins reading while she eats her peanut butter sandwich, enjoying the silence amongst her group. One of the things she liked most about this group was that there was no pressure to socialize. Sometimes they would spend the lunch hour having heated debates, sometimes they talked about their classes or latest projects, and some days, like today, they all sat in silence, immersed in their own little universes.

In Joyce’s case, that universe was contained within a 256-page paperback. Turning the page, she glances across the room and catches Hopper’s eye. He smiles at her and nods before returning to the rowdy group of boys bustling around the table.

“Has anyone ever told you that you’re insanely short,” Hopper smirks as he approaches his car. Joyce is leaning against the passenger side door, leather-clad arms folded over her chest.

“Has anyone ever told you that you’re insanely tall?” she fires back.

“At least once a day,” he remarks with a shit-eating grin.

“Are you going to unlock the car or are we just going to stand out here and chit-chat?”

“You hate my company so much, huh? ” he grins as he teases her and rounds the car. Once he opens the driver's side door, he lunges across the cabin of the car and flips the lock open on her door. Joyce tosses her book bag onto the floor and climbs in, fastening her seatbelt at the same time as she pulls the door shut.

“You really should just fix the locks,” she complains.

“Do you have a spare few hundred dollars lying around?”

“You don’t know that I don’t.”

“Yes I do,” he remarks. He puts the keys in the ignition and they listen as the car roars to life. “You’re forgetting I know everything about you, Joycie.”

And he did. He knew just about everything there was to know about her.

“I hate that nickname,” she reminds him.

“That’s why I use it.”

“How would you like it if I started calling you Jimmy?” she teases, rolling down her window and allowing her armrest in the vacancy as he backs out of the parking lot.

“You’d sound like my mom. Please don’t.”

“Hmmm, I don’t know, it has kind of a nice ring to it.”

“Do you have any plans later?” he asks, changing the subject.

“Just some homework, why?”

“Are we still on for tonight?”

“Only if I can call you Jimmy,” she beams. Joyce loved teasing Hopper. He did this thing where he scrunched his eyebrows and his cheeks turned a bright pink shade that made doing it all the more fun, and so she often pushed until he got flustered. She wasn’t single-handedly to blame for the teasing that occurred in their friendship, Hopper enjoyed pushing her buttons right back and as a result, most of their conversations began as quick-witted jabs and teasing remarks.

“You’re not going to drop that anytime soon, are you?”

“Absolutely not. You’re cute when you’re bothered.”

“I’m not cute , Joyce.” His cheeks darken and he does his best to stay focused on the road signs ahead.

She knew he hated being called cute so she called him cute often.

“Right, sorry. You’re very manly.” Her response is mocking and said with a chuckle but it seems to relax him all the same and she shakes her head. “Speaking of manly things, why was practice cancelled today?”

“The coach is out. Something about his son being sick. We’ll be back tomorrow.”

“So what are your plans for the evening? You can come over to study if you want?”

“Can’t. I told Benny we could work out at his place before grabbing something to eat. Want me to bring you anything?”

“I’m alright. We’re supposed to be having pasta.”

Hopper grimaces but does his best not to outwardly show his reaction. He can’t remember the last time Joyce’s mom actually provided dinner for her daughter. The few times he’d stayed for supper, he and Joyce were the ones to prepare the meal from the limited supplies in the pantry. It wasn’t that her mother couldn’t cook, she was just hardly ever home. Joyce’s father, a character if Jim had ever seen one, tended to take out his anger in unconventional ways and as a result, Joyce’s mother often offered to work extra hours, leaving Joyce to fend for herself.

“You sure? I could grab a burger.”

“It’s fine Hop.” She places her palm on his wrist and gives it a gentle squeeze, something she’d done since they were kids when she was trying to reassure him that she really was alright.

They reach her house and Hopper pulls the car into the driveway before she unbuckles and reaches for her bag.

“Thanks for the ride, see you later?”

“See you later.”

He waits until she’s inside before backing out of the driveway and heading to Bennys.

“28… 29… 30.”

It’s a chant he does over and over again in his head as he pumps his arms up and down, hosting his body weight from the cool hard pavement lining Benny’s garage. The two boys were nearing the end of their workout but Hopper refused to slow down. He needed to be in his prime for the upcoming home game if he wanted to impress the coach and be made the quarterback in his senior year.

After wrapping up with the weights and rinsing off, Hopper and Benny head to the local diner, a favourite hangout among their friends and meet up with a few more teammates for burgers.

“Hey, Hopper, who are you taking to prom?” The question is directed at him from across the table by one of the junior linebackers named Mitchell and it catches him off guard.

“I hadn’t thought about it,” he shrugs. He bites into his burger and continues to speak with his mouth full, “someone hot .”

The group erupts in a chorus of hollers and begins talking about one of the seniors who’d recently been caught with a student from a rival school beneath the school bleachers. Not one for dramatic gossip, Hopper finishes his burger and flags down the waitress to place an order to go. Once the takeout container is ready, he stands and slips into his letterman jacket.

“Where are you going so early, you got a hot date or something?” one of the boys calls at Hopper.

“Sorry guys, I’ve got plans,” he says. He grabs the food and slips his keys from his pocket, weaving through the crowded diner towards the exit. He can hear his teammates calling out after him, vague things about using protection on his “date” but he tunes them out. He balances the food on the roof of his car while he fumbles to unlock it, the dimly lit parking lot only covered by the faint neon lights lining the diner window after sunset. He knows he may be early, but there’s only so much team bonding he can handle and tonight, all he wants to do is unwind with his best friend.

As he approaches Joyce’s house he knows that he’s early. The porch light is still on, illuminating the driveway so he lingers near the cul de sac across the way and wishes he ordered himself a shake while he waited.

They had this routine, he and Joyce. Her parents insisted on Joyce having an early curfew, so he’d begun coming by after her father turned off the porch lights, indicating that he’d gone to bed. Hopper would usually wait a few minutes before pulling into the driveway and flashing the headlights. Joyce’s bedroom was the only one at the front of the house, therefore she was the only one who would see Hopper’s headlights.

Once she knew he was parked outside, she would pop the screen off her window and shimmy out onto the roof over the porch, where she climbed down the trellis at the side of the house and down to his car.

They’d been safely sneaking Joyce in and out for months, but each time they did it part of Hopper panicked that her dad would catch them and he’s certain the metallic taste that takes over his tongue will never go away as long as she was sneaking out of her father’s home. She always insisted that things would be fine and they wouldn’t be caught, but his pulse raced every single time they did this.

Tonight, he waits five minutes after the porch light is switched off before he pulls into the vacant driveway and flashes his headlights. While waiting for Joyce, he drums his fingers on the steering wheel and hums to himself. When she finally appears in the window, she’s wearing an oversized hoodie and a pair of baggy pants, her hair swept into a messy ponytail, situated on the top of her head. He watches with bated breath as she maneuvers down the side of the house and reaches over to unlock her door before she gets to the car.

“Where to?” she asks.

“Let’s go to the lake.”

“How was dinner?” he asks as they back out of her driveway.

“She ended up staying at work late.”

“Joyce.”

“It’s fine Hop, I made some scrambled eggs for us.” He knows the “us” she’s referring to is her and her father and he cringes at her grouping them together in the same term.

“Reach behind you,” he instructs. “I got you something.”

She does as she’s told and reaches around the seat, where her hand finds a white doggy bag. She grabs it and places it in her lap while turning to give him a look.

“Before you yell at me, it’s your favourite.”

Joyce debates lecturing him on how she can handle things on her own and doesn’t need his help, but the smell wafting out of the bag demands her attention and she resigns and decides it’s best to say thank you and enjoy the food.

“With the extra sauce?” she asks slowly.

“Exactly how you like it,” he nods.

She reaches into the bag and pulls out a foil-wrapped burger that she immediately begins to unwrap and snack on. She didn’t need Hopper to look out for her, but who was she to say no to one of her favourite snacks on a late-night drive? She would yell at him for trying to be a hero, tomorrow.

When they arrive at the lake, Hopper pulls into his usual spot on the lawn just in front of where the shallow water meets the shore. He cuts the engine and flips the headlights on, allowing the fog to dance among the white shadows that lead a dim path to the lake.

It’s a clear evening, but the warm mist rising off the lake creates a haze that makes the area feel like it’s secluded from the rest of the town. Hopper reaches into the back seat and fishes out a blanket that he lays down in front of the car and motions for Joyce to join him. She does, sitting opposite him on the small plaid square with her legs crossed, the dewy droplets from the fog illuminating her face in a way he would describe as perfect in the headlights. He wasn’t blind to the fact that his best friend was beautiful, but he wasn’t vocal about it either.

“It’s so peaceful here.” It’s an observation she makes every time they come out to the lake, but her relaxed facial features and dropped shoulders are one of the reasons he so often selected the lake as their late night drive destination. It was rare to see Joyce so relaxed and he would do just about anything to allow her to be in a comfortable state of mind like this all the time.

“How was your workout with Benny?” she asks.

“Good. Not at good as a real practice would have been but I think it did the trick. How was homework?”

“Oh you know, an English essay can only be so thrilling.”

“You love writing essays,” he reminds her. “You used to help me with mine, remember.”

“I remember,” she smiles softly. She goes quiet for a moment, lost in a memory; a large oak desk and pre-teen Hopper anxiously chewing on the end of his pencil while she worked on outlining his history essay. They were in his family office after school. It was one of the first times she’d been invited over to his house, as they usually hung out outside. She remembers thinking their friendship wouldn’t last. Hopper had recently taken a huge interest in sports, hence her helping with his essay, and he was bound to outgrow their friendship in the coming years.

He never did, and now here they were years later, sprawled out on a picnic blanket beside Lovers Lake, still best friends.

Joyce watches as Hopper shifts himself closer to her and mirrors her stance by folding one leg beneath the other. The light from the vehicle reflects in his eyes and for a brief moment, she’s lost in a sea of blue and emerald. She knew he was attractive. Hell, there was a reason half the senior girls were after him. But in small moments like this, she found it was easy to forget that she told herself her childhood crush on Hopper was long gone. She would never tell him this, but in the quietest of moments, while he sat and listened to her speak, she found herself drawn to him in a magnetic sense that made her question her own feelings.

Tonight, she swallows that thought and forces herself to focus on the moon's reflection across the still water.

She couldn’t have feelings for her best friend. It would complicate and ruin everything.

“Hand,” he demands. His voice grounds Joyce and she forgets about her wild train of thoughts and focuses on the boy in front of her.

She extends her palm to him and angles her body so that her torso is perpendicular to his.

He hooks his thumb, much rougher from the years of helping his father cut wood, around hers and joins their hands. This was a “game” they’d been playing together for years and Joyce was no stranger to how it worked. It was another die-hard habit they’d picked up as kids. When one of them had had a long day, they would sit down in the grass on Hopper’s lawn and link their thumbs, fiddling them back and forth like a relaxed thumb restless match while they asked each other questions designed to distract them from the real world.

“Current favourite song?” she asks.

“Lame, you know the answer.”

He moves his thumb to the left of hers, then back to the right.

“It changes every five seconds!”

“Fine, it’s Back in the USA.”

“I knew it,” she boasts.

“Favourite sentence from your essay?” he asks.

“Ou,” she takes a moment to think it over. “Alright, I’ve got it. ‘Though men may have a predetermined fate, we can not, by any means, move through life as if our actions are so predetermined that they do not matter’.”

“You wrote that?”

“I did,” she says proudly. “I liked the essay topic.”

“What would you want your last meal to be?”

“A nice steak,” he nods.

“Tell me your biggest fear,” he says softly, thumb narrowly avoiding hers as they continue the pointless thumb wrestling match between them.

“That’s a loaded question. I asked you what you would want your last meal to be, those two things aren’t even on the same playing field.”

“You could’ve asked something harder.”

“Being alone,” she admits quietly.

He locks eyes with her and instead of moving his thumb in the usual to and fro pattern, he hooks it around her hand and presses down.

“Joyce.”

A silent conversation passes. She’ll always have him. He’s told her thousands of times. She believes him, for the most part. Though, her deepest fear is that after school he’ll move on to a bigger and better life and she’ll be left on her own to fight against the scariest thing she knew, life.

“I know,” she smiles.

Hopper was the only person she let herself be vulnerable like this with. At school, she came off as tough and uncaring. She liked it that way. She liked that she wasn’t perceived as someone who needed anyone .

Hopper releases her hand and lays back on the blanket to look up at the sky. It’s cloud-filled and unclear, but something about the darkness calms him.

“The guys asked who I’m planning on taking to prom,” he tells her.

“And? What did you tell them?”

“That I wasn’t going.”

“Yeah. Right, ” she smirks and rolls over to face him. “Jim Hopper, one of the most popular kids in school isn’t going to prom. I think the world would end.”

“You’re so dramatic,” he groans, pulling himself up so that he’s seated with his back to the lake. He wraps an arm around his knees and drops his head in her direction. “Besides, I didn’t really tell them that, I told them I was taking you.”

A smirk breaks out across his face at her initial panic but she recovers quickly and begins to laugh. “Get out of here, you know I wouldn’t be caught dead at prom.”

“Not even with me?”

There’s a serious undertone in his voice that makes her wonder if he’s still joking around, but she quickly forces herself to dismiss the thought and smiles at him. “Not even with you, Jim Hopper.”

“What if I asked you in some ridiculous way? You’d have to agree to go with me.”

“I wouldn’t go to prom if you paid me,” she reassures him.

“You’re telling me that if I did something crazy, say,” he scampers to his feet and steps towards the parked car, “climbed up on the hood of the car…” He’s standing on the hood of his car now, arms outstretched while she watches with an amused expression.

“And yelled, ‘Joyce, will you go to prom with me?’ that you’d turn me down.”

“I’d turn you down before you even had a chance to hop up on the car. Now get down before you hurt yourself and your coach wants to kill me.”

She reaches up and takes his hand while he effortlessly jumps down and rejoins her on the blanket.

“You’re a heartbreaker, you know that Horowitz?”

“And you’re insane.”

“You should come to prom,” he says.

“Why? It’s not like I’ll know anyone there besides you and I’m sure you’ll have your hands full with your date.”

“It’ll be fun, I promise.”

“I don’t think so Hop, maybe next year.”

“At least think about coming? For me? It’ll be so much more fun with you there.”

“I’ll think about it, but I’m not making any promises.”

Eventually, the cold begins to seep through Joyce’s jacket and Hopper offers to drive her home. She watches as he packs up the blanket, rolling it together and tossing it into the back seat of his car, and she thinks about what he said about prom.

She hadn’t any interest in going. It wasn’t like she had many friends and the few she did have wouldn’t be caught dead at a school dance. Even though she knows he was joking, she finds herself wondering what it would be like to go with Hopper. People would stare, probably whisper and she’s sure she would hate it. What she wouldn’t hate, she dares to let herself think, is being in his arms while they shared a dance. She’s quick to rain-in and dismiss the thought, but it still popped into her mind and a vision of them, wearing ridiculous outfits while they danced to a jazz band version of a trashy song, doesn’t displease her.

She shivers, the overwhelming sensation that normal people didn’t daydream about their best friend rippling through her tiny body.

“Cold?” he asks, noticing her quivering next to the passenger side door.

“Yeah,” she replies automatically. Cursing at herself for getting carried away with an unrealistic, absurd fantasy, she climbs into the car and folds her arms across her chest.

As Hopper begins to drive back to her place, she finds herself fascinated by the way the moonlight paints him in a faint shade of yellow. He catches her staring and smiles. “What?”

“Huh?” she replies, tearing her gaze away as quickly as possible.

“You’re staring.”

“Oh nothing,” she sighs, “just tired.”

“Does that mean you don’t want to drive around some more?”

“I never said that.”

They drive around for another hour, talking about everything and nothing. On a particular stretch of abandoned road that lies between the edge of the town and the woods, Hopper even lets Joyce drive his car. He’d taught her to drive years prior, but she hated to when other cars were on the road and so she reserved practice for late nights like this, with Hopper in the passenger seat and the moon being the only other light aside from the headlights.

When Joyce begins to yawn, Hopper drives her home. She lingers in the warm cabin of the car, laughing at a story he’s telling about Benny. Her hand falls to his arm as she laughs, and rests there until the cold evening air crashes through the open car door and she announces that she should get going.

She waves from the porch before climbing the trellis and back towards the window she escaped from hours prior.

Hopper smiles to himself, watching as she moves silently against the night sky and waits until she’s safe inside before he begins his own journey back home.

I'm begging for you to take my hand Wreck my plans

#jopper #stranger things #highschool AU #multichapter

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7deadlycinderellas · 4 years

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No more math and history, summer time has set us free ch1

Ao3 link

Camp Durrandon was the same as it had always been. Two lines of sixteen cabins, separated by gender and age, and two more lines of staff cabins in behind. The mess hall, the showers, the sports field, the drama barn, the campfire circle, the stables. They were all the same. The lake gleamed in the summer sunshine, the canoes tied and floating. The trees spring up behind the camp buildings, the forest the same as it had been for a hundred years, as it would be for a hundred more.

Even as she climbs out of the bus, Arya can’t believe it’s been four years.

The three buses pull into the front, in order of the distance of their departure; King’s Landing, Old Town, White Harbour. Standing around, Arya feels like a tree rooted in place. The majority of the children milling around her are in camper yellow, their names and cabin numbers currently being written on their backs by the blue clad unit counselors. Arya spies her brother Bran, carefully guiding his wheelchair down the bus ramp, in his CIT red.

Arya feels somehow both perfectly in place and out of place. Sixteen years old, despite her small size, her jean shorts and purple shirt mark her for what she is this year, a junior counselor. The picture on it, of the horses below the seven pointed star, tells of what. Horseback riding this year.

On one side is her sister Sansa, seventeen and in purple like her. Her shirt, unlike Arya’s, bears an image of mummer’s masks, she’s teaching drama this summer. On her other side is Meera Reed, an old friend. Eighteen and in the green worn only by senior counselors, she puts her hands on her hips and addresses Arya.

“I can’t believe you betrayed me. You always said when you could come back to camp, you’d teach archery with me. I’m stuck with another Mormont this year!”

Arya smiles.

“Lyra had a foot in ahead of me, the Mormonts have run archery here since we were campers. And there's another one after her, so there might be another coming too.”

Meera still looks miffed, but they drag their bags to check the list for which staff cabin is theirs this year.

Sansa’s going to be in Cabin 2 with Margaery, the drama senior counselor, and the aforementioned Mormont. Arya feels a pinch of heartache. When she was younger, she always shared a cabin with her sister, even when they should have been in separate age groups. Meera’s finger spots their names, they’re in Cabin 3, right next door.

“At least we’re in the same cabin,” Arya wheedles, “Who’s our third?”

Meera runs a finger down the list.

“Ygritte.”

Arya’s surprised. She had heard from Jon that she was planning to return to camp that year, but she still hadn’t been sure if she would get to see her at all.

Well, since it turns out the list says Ygritte’s the senior riding counselor, she’ll get to see her a lot.

Cabin 3 is a short walk up a hill, under a tree.

“I don’t remember the staff cabins being this far from the mess hall,” Arya complains.

Meera laughs.

“It’s been four years Arya, you might have forgotten a lot of things.”

The cabin contains three cots with trunks, a table, and a small bathroom. Arya throws her duffel on her cot and starts unpacking as fast as she can. She cringes at the sight of her two pairs of jeans. The Stormlands are extremely hot and humid in the summer, but you can’t ride horses in shorts, so she’s stuck.

“I’m going to go check on things in the stables,” she tells Meera, “And then down to the waterfront.”

“Will you make it to orientation?”

“I’ll try, but it’s not like Brienne can send me home if I don’t.”

“Don’t test her, she might,” Meera warns.

With a laugh, Arya leaves the cabin. The stables are in back of the camp, next to a trail that leads into the Mistwood National Park that the campgrounds are a part of.

They are much as she remembers. Dusty wood and the ever present smell of animal and leather. She stops to pet Nan, the old mare she had learned to ride on all those summers ago, on the nose, before she continues her search.

She doesn’t find what she’s looking for, but before she leaves, she runs into Ygritte, literally. The senior green pairs well with her flaming red hair.

“Didn’t see you there, sorry,” Arya’s voice rushes, as her breathing returns to normal.

Ygritte raises an eyebrow.

“So I take it I get you as my underling this year?”

Arya laughs. Ygritte’s only twenty, but always seemed to Arya like she was so much older than her.

“And cabin mate too. Don’t worry, we gave you the bunk closest to the bathroom. “

“I’ll be up there, I just had to come down and see old Crow here for a bit,” she tells her, rubbing the old black gelding on the nose.

There’s a long silence, which Arya breaks with a cough.

“Has Jon written to you since he shipped out?” she asks. There’s no reason to beat around the bush.

Ygritte smiles sadly and shakes her head.

“He hasn’t written us either,” she assures her. Arya’s memory of Jon leaving home in his uniform, promising to write them all about training and what he’s being taught. He’d enlisted the day of his eighteenth birthday, and had been gone since.

“I wouldn’t expect him to,” Ygritte admits, “I know the WAF takes training seriously, we used to go past the airfields all the time on long rides.”

Ygritte was from the north like them, but the far north. The far, far north. The part where you could ride on a road for hours and hours and never pass a single town. She lived on a sheep station. Arya still wasn’t sure why she even came to summer camp, it seemed to her like her normal life was like camp.

It’s with a curt nod that Arya leaves Ygritte to whatever it is she was doing.

The waterfront remains the same, the rocky shore and the dock, the lines of canoes. The posted signs every few feet, of the strictly enforced rules.

Arya steps in the lake, just far enough to get her feet wet. The feeling of the cool water and algae collecting on her toes is one she’s missed terribly. It had been far too long.

Her reminiscing is interrupted by a whistle that makes her jump and trip onto the ground.

“No swimming!” a voice behind her yells.

She stands back up, rubbing her bruised backside.

“I wasn’t swimming, I was standing-”

She turns to where the other voice is coming from, her own freezing up in her chest.

Taller than before, and broader than ever. His hair wasn’t quite as long, but his blue eyes are just as bright.

Completely unbidden, Arya feels a smile sprout upon her face.

“Gendry Waters,” she says, sauntering towards him. Her insides are doing an energetic dance, but she’s always been strangely confident around him. He’s wearing the red and white t-shirt and trunks marking him as a lifeguard, the ultimate authority over the waterfront. “This place must be hard up if they gave you gainful employment.”

He grins, wolfishly, and her stomach does a series of increasingly acrobatic flips

“Arry,” he says, his voice disbelieving, “Never thought I’d see you back here. You look-”

“The same?”

Arya knows that’s not completely the truth. She was a skinny little shrimp at twelve, and had been the victim of an utterly terrible haircut earlier that summer. She still wasn’t exactly tall or womanly, but she thinks she looks less like a little homeless boy than before. Shirt color aside, she’s even dressed exactly the same.

“I finally started showering regularly and brushing my hair of my own accord. Sansa was so pleased.”

She eyes the whistle and shirt, and whistles herself.

“You’re the lifeguard now? What happened to Anguy?”

Gendry chuckles, and Arya feels the memory of the goofy old lifeguard, the one who so often looked the other way for their group’s little pranks.

“Anguy got the boot last summer when he got caught with a girl in his cabin.”

Arya raised an eyebrow. Anguy was charming and decently looking, he’d always had girls all over him.

“How was that strange, it can’t have been the first time?”

Gendry inhales roughly.

“It’s been a few years since you were here Arya, Anguy was twenty-two last summer...the girl he got caught with was only seventeen.”

Arya feels her lungs deflate.

“Classy as always I guess.”

There’s another pause, but it’s a comfortable one. She was always so comfortable around him, despite the reminder of how many years it had been.

“What else have I missed?” she asks.

Gendry puts his hands behind his head, chewing on his lip while he thought it over.

“Lommy and Weasel haven’t come back for a few years. Hot Pie skipped a year, but he’s working in the kitchen this summer.”

“Really?” Arya asked, surprised. Hot Pie had always been large and very fond of food.

“I worked in the same restaurant he did in King’s Landing this past year, and I let him know there was an opening here and he jumped at it. Wants to go to culinary school after he graduates.”

Arya laughs, thinking of the boy who’s greatest asset to their group being his ability to sneak them all extra snacks working in a loud kitchen.

“What about you?” Gendry asks.

Arya feels her stomach drop.

“What about me?”

“Have all of the illustrious Starks returned to camp for real this year?”

Arya pauses too, and hugs her middle.

“Sansa and I are junior counselors- she’s in the drama barn, I’m at the stables. Bran’s a CIT, Rickon’s the only of us who’s still an actual camper.”

Gendry’s eyes fade for a moment, so she continues.

“Jon joined the WAF as soon as he finished school, they haven’t even given him leave. And Robb is trying to work out the mess that is Dad’s company…”

Her voice trails off. Talk of the company always meant having to talk about Mum and Dad being gone, and she’s not ready to repeat all of that, not even to Gendry.

“Seven hells,” Gendry curses, “They’ve really got Jon up there flying planes?”

Arya smiles.

“We don’t know yet, he might end up a navigator or a mechanic or something. Not all of them can be pilots.”

Arya’s chest is warm. It’s such a pleasant feeling, and like being back at camp, it feels like it’s been too long since she’s felt this way.

“Gendry!” a voice says. Arya turns, and sees the source, a girl perhaps a year her junior with dark hair in CIT red, “We’re going to be late for orientation.”

“I’ll catch up to you, Shireen!” He yells after her. He turns and points down the path, and the two of them begin to walk side by side.

“Who’s she?” Arya asks. She doesn’t recognize her. And after attending Camp Durrandon from the ages of eight to twelve, she expects to.

“My foster sister, she’s never been here before.” Gendry replies. His eyes look a little haunted at the words, and Arya’s heart aches, remembering his stories of having to spend his childhood being bounced around like a pinball. It was only through an outreach ministry that he had even been able to attend camp.

When they speed up, Arya’s eyes go wide seeing the side of Shireen’s face which is angry pink and puckered, as though she had been burned.

Her mouth starts to open involuntarily, but Gendry grabs her hand and squeezes it.

“Don’t say anything. Please.”

And with a deep breath, Arya keeps her words to herself. Gendry looks surprised, she understands. She could never do that before.

They file in among the crowd for orientation, colorful dots among a sea of yellow. Up front, at the flagpole stands Beric Dondarrion, the camp owner, and Brienne, in Arya’s childhood the indomitable head girl’s counselor, now the activities director.

She’s got a clipboard and her whistle, and she’s making the same announcements that precede every camp session. Arya knows them by heart: no wandering outside camp by yourself, no going into the forest, no screwing around at the waterfront, lights out at 9. As an activity counselor, Arya has extra responsibilities, namely the upkeep of all the horses and the stables themselves, but also extra perks. Among them, better pay, and that once lights out came, no one much cared where they stayed.

Brienne leads the group around camp, showing them the cabins, the waterfront, all the activity areas. The tuck shop selling overpriced candy and t-shirts. The bathrooms, showers and laundry.

Orientation ends at the mess hall, a glorious smell emanating from within. Only the kitchen is actually inside, the line moving past several service windows ending in the open salad bar. The rest of the hall is long wooden tables under the cover of a white canopy, printed with the seven pointed star.

Fried chicken on the first night appears to still be the tradition. Arya plunks two drumsticks on her tray along with a heap of potatoes, before moving along the line and joining the others at the staff table.

Gendry’s barely poking at his food as he keeps turning to where Shireen sits. The CITs sit out among campers, they’re being trained on making sure they behave. Arya’s eyes follow his, and when they recite the grace of the seven before eating, Shireen looks completely bewildered.

Arya catches Gendry’s eye curiously. He reaches under the table and squeezes her hand.

“Please don’t ask here, I’ll tell you later.”

Later, when the welcome sundae bar comes out, she returns the words. They stand to get in line, when Bran rolls in front of them, leading his cabin to the line.

“I’ll tell you later too.”

Once the meal has winded down, Brienne stands and leads everyone to first-night campfire.

The smell of the wood smoke fills Arya’s nose, and she breathes it in. It smells like burned marshmallows and coming home.

Missandei has apparently become the campfire leader, sitting at the microphone holding her guitar. Arya is pleased. Missandei speaks five languages and knows lots of songs in all of them, not just the goofy ones about the Maiden and the Smith.

Arya spares a glance across the fire to where Gendry has sat down next to Shireen. It suddenly occurs to Arya where Shireen’s confusion might come from. If it weren’t for the grace before meals and the silly songs at campfire, you could forget quite easily that Camp Dundarron was run by the United Westerosi Church of the Seven. Arya frowns. Even in the north, where more than half the population attended other churches, most people still recognized the symbols and prayers.

Eventually, Missandei’s voice quiets, and Brienne claps to alert time to return to units.

When they make it up the hill toward cabin 3, Ygritte takes off. She’s on first patrol that night, and gets to walk around shining flashlights into each cabin to ensure lights out is being followed. Arya changes into her pajamas, sweat shorts and a t-shirt with the logo of the White Harbour Direwolves, a local baseball team. It used to be Jon’s, and nearly comes down to where Arya’s shorts end. Laying back on her bunk, Arya asks Meera,

“Do you think Brienne still has that weird saddle Jojen used to have to use?”

“The one with the seat belt and the extra straps? Probably, they didn’t have to get it special or anything, I think it’s been around since the older Tyrell’s were here.”

That makes sense. Margaery’s older brothers both had been to camp years before any of them, and she’d heard that Willas kept riding years after he’d been thrown from a horse. Arya’s face turns pensive. She wonders where it’s ended up.

“Trying to get Bran riding again?” Meera asks.

Arya nods.

“There’s a ranch that does therapeutic riding up further north from us, but we haven’t been able to work out the logistics of getting him there yet. I thought maybe if I could get him excited about it again, he would push us more at home to figure it out.”

There’s a pause, and Arya asks something that’s been bugging her since they got off the bus.

“Why didn’t Jojen come back this summer? You said you’ve been here every year.”

Meera’s quiet for a minute.

“He ended up in A&E at the end of the school year. He’s on a clinical trial now to see if a new anti-seizure medication works for him, and can’t be too far from a hospital for monitoring. He was so upset when I left.”

Arya’s chest tightens. She hadn’t meant to poke a wound.

Once Ygritte returns and flops onto her bunk, Arya stands.

“I’m going out for a bit.”

“Heading to the kissing tree?” Ygritte asks with a smirk.

Arya snorts, and ignores the fluttering in her chest. She’s referring to the tree behind the stables, next to the sign where Mistwood Park starts, and the property line ends. It’s one of the only parts of the camp that can give you a modicum of privacy.

“Just to the pier.”

Ygritte's rolled onto her stomach and is out already. Meera shrugs. She’s pulled out a book and has it open against her knees.

“Don’t worry, I’m sure you’ll make it to the kissing tree eventually.”

Arya leaves the cabin, huffing, and wishing she had never confided in Meera years ago about the last time she had snuck out the pier.

It was an easy enough walk. Their little crew, the Brotherhood Gendry had called it once, would sneak out after lights out. Hot Pie would sneak them all extra snacks, and they would plot itching powder revenge and sprees of short sheeting.

The last time they had done it, it had just been the two of them.

Halfway there, she wonders if Gendry will even be here. It’s been four years, they can’t have kept it up that long, really?

But there he sits, at the end of the pier, feet dangling in the water. Arya’s chest tightens at the sight, the moon is reflecting off his dark hair, shorter than he used to wear it.

She tries not to think too hard about the last time they’d come out here, that night that it had been just them. “Sansa’s gone off to the kissing tree with Joffrey,” she had told him, huffing. “She won’t shut up about it, and won’t believe me that he’s mean to all the other kids.”

“Let that be her problem. I’ll help you sneak into his cabin and drop stink bugs in his clothes.”

Arya had giggled at that. It seemed appropriate. She had still felt huffy though. Ever since Sansa had met Joffrey that summer, she hadn’t wanted to spend any time at all with her.

There’s something else too.

“Why does everyone make such a fuss about kissing anyway?”

Arya had gotten her period earlier that summer, and questions like that had started coming to her more and more. Most of the other girls, even Sansa and her friends, had been so nice about it too, actually answering her questions instead of laughing and leaving her behind. It had been a change, like those silly pamphlets they got in school had described, but Arya, somehow, didn’t feel any different at all. Most of the time.

Gendry had shrugged at that.

“Cause it’s fun, I ‘spose.”

Arya had pouted. Not that she’d assumed he’d never kissed a girl, he was fourteen after all, and that seemed so much older than twelve.

“If it’s so fun...can you show me?”

Gendry was taken aback.

“How come?”

Arya huffed even further.

“Cause I want to know!”

Gendry had looked back and forth, half looking like he was worried someone was going to sneak up on them, half like he was certain this was a prank.

“Promise you won’t push me in the lake?”

Arya thought from the outside it must have looked like a first kiss from the movies, with the clear blue lake in the background and the moon hanging overhead. It made her feel that way too, giddy, warm, her heart racing.

That was the last time she saw Gendry. All of the Starks were gone from camp in the morning. Arya sits beside him at the end of the pier, tucking her knees up to her chest.

“Which of us should go first?”

After a moment of silence, they both stick out their fists.

“Dragon, wolf, stag!”

Arya wins, though she still doesn’t understand how stag beats dragon.

Gendry leans back against the pier, face staring upward at the stars.

“The day I got home from camp, my foster dad kicked me out. I was just glad my things were already packed and I didn’t have to throw everything in a bin bag. The woman I was sent to next was...the worst one yet. There’s still an active court case ongoing because of her. After that, I got sent to live with Mr. Davos, and him, me and Shireen have been together for three years.”

Arya nods. She’s still sitting with her knees pulled up against her. She can’t see his face.

“That was one, now it’s your turn.”

One. She only has to tell one story, or one secret. That was how these always went.

“We all left camp that morning because Beric got a call that my father had died of a heart attack.”

Gendry bolts upright.

“Life went to chaos after that. There’s more...a lot more...but that’s just my one for tonight.”

Gendry starts to lean forward. Arya’s still hunched over. His hand reaches out to rest on her back, but hesitates. Arya pushes herself back ever so slightly and his hands lingers softly against her back, the warmth going through straight to her skin. She swallows roughly, a single tear running down her cheek.

“It’s late,” she says. “We should be getting back.”

Gendry nods, though she can’t see him.

“Yeah. Swim tests are in the morning.”

Arya chuckles.

“I almost forgot about swim tests.”

“So you’re just going sleep in tomorrow, not get your clip and then spend the whole summer in a life jacket at the waterfront?”

Arya sticks one foot in the lake and uses it to fling a bit of algae at Gendry’s face.

“Your name may be Waters, but if you think I’m going to give up the title of summer-wide lake zombie hunt queen, you’ve got something else coming.”

#game of thrones #A Song of Ice and Fire #fic #gendrya #summer camp au!

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suffering-and-happy-about-it · 5 years

Text

Time After Time (The Eighties Blasts Collection, Part 1.)

Description: Jim Hopper died as a hero. But with that, one certain problem rises up - who will now lead the cops of Hawkins? Hopper thought of that - he decided to write a letter, naming his niece, nineteen-year-old student of Indianapolis police academy, Y/N Hopper as a sheriff deputy in a letter. But anybody in the town doesn't have a clue that being a cop in Hawkins is way more dangerous than it might seem.

NOTICE: This is an AU where Hopper had a brother which he doesn’t talk to, but still has a great relationship with his niece (more like father-daughter relationship). Nothing else would be changed.

Pairing: Steve Harrington x Hopper!Reader (eventually) - the story is more driven by the relationships in the gang.

A/N: Every chapter will probably be named after one ICONIC 80s song because I am trash for them. Also, I will call Johnathan John bcs I am sick of writing such a long name over and over again.

Warnings: Grief, losing a loved one, bad family background for the reader, Will, Johnathan and Joyce leaving Hawkins.

Word count: 3.7 K (Sorry guys, I had fun)

Tagging: x

Master list: The Eighties Blast Collection

Try to ask your parents about living in the '80s. Or no, you don't have to ask them at all - they would definitely tell you that it was way easier, better and safer back then. Maybe they would be right if you don't remind them about Doug Clark and Carol Bundy for example. Serial killers aren't such things in our age.

But there was one particular town in Indiana where it wasn't exactly a pleasure to live during the '80s. There was like... Everything from novels and movies had happened there - strange disappearances of children, mutates crawling from another dimension, possessed shirtless white boy with a mullet running around, kidnapping people and basically killing the; even murders bated by U.S. government and experiments on people.

It was a true science-fiction to say at least.

What was the town’s name? Hawkins. Hawkins, Indiana with a population of thirty thousand people - may be more or less, nobody exactly knew since such a crazy shit was happening out there.

Your beloved uncle Jim, to which you went every holiday for the whole two months, has lived there since forever, except for his rather short time in New York - and you found your way to love the city as well. The people there were always the same - same shopkeepers, same employees in the restaurants, same stores and groceries. You dreamt about working alongside Jim since you were just a little kid. While other girls wanted to be princesses and astronauts, you just wanted to be a cop.

So it hit you when you were in your room at the police academy, listening to George Michael and read a magazine, laying down on the bed. At your nineteen, you were one of the best cadets that ever got into the police academy before reaching the age of 21. Jim was so proud that he cried when you called him.

But when the sergeant who led your training called your name through the silent halls, you knew that something had to happen. And when you sat down behind the desk, looking her in the face, you knew it isn't anything nice.

And when she told you, oh boy, you couldn't but chuckle unbelievably. No, you weren't happy or amused with what sergeant Brown told you - but you couldn't believe it.

“Jim Hopper is dead? Is it... For sure? That must be a mistake. You're shitting me right now.” - You told her, not even caring about the rule not to curse around your authorities. And Mrs. Brown fully understood what you're going through at the moment, so she didn't say a word about that. Your breath stuck in your throat as you got up to walk around the room.

“Miss Hopper, I can tell you for certain that I am not joking.” - The woman on the opposite side of the table looked you in the eyes. - “I am sorry for your loss, yet Mrs. Byers sent us an official document where Jim Hopper named you his deputy sheriff, signed and stamped two weeks ago.” - She took the document out of the envelope and looked you in the eyes, putting it in front of himself so she could read from it.

“But I’m too young to be a deputy.” - You mumbled and took the document seriously naming you to the function into your fingers, reading it word after word. Jim was looking forward to having you by his side as a cop - so when he learned about the Russians in a facility below Star Court, he wrote two letters and one document - one for Eleven, a girl who he adopted and you liked, one letter addressed to you and a document naming you the deputy, so he was sure that the Hawkins city is in good hands when he's gone. You never saw the letter though.

Only the official document made it.

“And we do acknowledge that. You're too young, you haven't even finished your studies, Miss Hopper, this is a rather unpleasant and special situation. And for that, we will transfer you to an academy nearby Hawkins, so you can finish your training there while you will be helping at the police department.” - Mrs. Brown smiled at you a bit. - “We also acknowledge that you loved your uncle and to continue with his legacy means everything to you. Hawkins department is out of policemen anyway.”

---

So it was done. Your grief over Jim was deep and it took too long for you to acknowledge that he won’t come to his cabin hidden in the woods a small while from the big oak next to the road to Denfield, just fifteen minutes away from Hawkins.

When you told the locals about the cabin, it was in a horrendous state - the windows were missing, there were holes in the ceiling, the door were broken apart and... It was a hellhole. It needed a lot of repairing and almost everything was broken inside, including almost all of the furniture, but you managed somehow.

Especially the broken windows and broken ceiling would cost a fortune if there wasn't for the good people of Hawkins who collected money and old, non-used things from their homes. They started one month before you came so it was almost done when you were about to roll into the town - but you could do the rest by yourself.

You let Hopper's old armchair just in the place where it always was, in his trail, and you left El’s room untouched as well, you only cleaned it up. People from the town were helping you with the renovations by all kinds of small gifts, ranging from canned and normal food to shampoo, helping you paint and paper it from the inside, giving you their old equipment like the TV or a refrigerator, even a VHS player.

On the day when you came back to Hawkins in an old Chevy from the 70s’, with all your things packed in boxes stored in your car’s trunk, you immediately went to Joyce’s house. Joyce was something like your auntie - you, Nancy Wheeler, her son Jonathan and Steve Herrington always played by the woods she had behind their house. She always made you the best cupcakes, played with you, talked to you and when you were too caught up in playing, she called you to have lemonade or some snacks - but that was too long ago for you to even properly remember.

You remembered only small bits from your evenings at the Byers' house, but the feeling of Joyce is a nice, calm and sweet person always remained inside your head.

Once, all of you were only kids and you were in Hawkins only for two to three weeks every summer - so, naturally, your friendships with the old party didn't exactly last in the form it was ten years ago. All of you got into puberty and since you were studying the police academy, getting there after the senior year of your high school, you didn't really hear much about any of them.

Plus, after you left Hawkins, you found yourself new friends in New York, so... It was no wonder, really. Everyone was just living their life the best way they could.

Although, when you heard that Joyce and her boys are you about to leave Hawkins for Maine, you tried to speed everything up only to tell her your goodbye before she actually goes away. When you got out of the car, 99 Luftballons by Nena practically screaming from Chevy's radio, you could only see a half-full moving truck and a load of kids out there.

At least, you weren't that late, were you?

You could recall some of them - like Eleven, a girl living with Jim who you got to know the spring of 84’ when you got released for a weekend lasting holiday to celebrate Jim’s birthday. She was cool as fuck, having some kind of psionic abilities. Jim almost killed both of you when he found out that she had shown you some tricks, but you found that extremely cool. You two had built a pretty good and strong connection over the course of your visits at Hopper's.

You were able to recall Mike Wheeler and Will Byers as well since you knew their siblings - and these boys just couldn't be more similar to Jon and Nance. But there were a few kids you didn't have a single idea who they might be.

“I’m here to help. But I’m late, I guess.” - You leaned into the doorframe and smiled a bit at Joyce’s back. She was running around the whole house cluelessly and tried to pack while the others were doing the actual job. She looked at you standing there in an old flannel shirt and cool jeans which can be bought only in cities or big malls. You looked... Certainly not happy, tired, your eyes red from crying, but good and fine as hell. - “Guess you can say that I am a Hopper, right?” - You smiled as she walked to you to give you a tight, motherly hug, humming into your ear.

“You are so big now. I remember you barely reaching my waist, darling.” - She cracked up a bit and you were almost sure that she is about to cry - and if she would, you would be a crying mess as well. You cried almost the whole way to Indiana. You just stopped yourself to cry again? Oh, boy.

“That happens over time. Guess Jonathan isn't the smallest nor youngest now as well, huh?” - You joked, walking to one of the boxed in the hallway. Just with that, Jon accompanied by Nancy walked into the doorframe, holding another two boxes.

“Someone left a started truck outside and is playing pop blasts... Y/N?” - Jonathan asked unbelievably when you turned around to face him. He looked tired as hell just by the looks, but he still sorta got his rebellious expression, just as you were used to. And Nancy? She was breathtaking now. You almost jumped at both of them to hug them firmly with a giggle.

The old party was getting back together.

“I can't believe you're here!” - Nancy laughed to your ear. Both of them had the best childhood memories from the times you were there - like jamming to literally every ABBA or the Rolling Stones song, riding bikes through the neighborhood and just the best fourth of July festivals. - “Also, I'm so sorry about...”

“I know, I know. It would be nice if you stop reminding me.” - You answered a bit louder than you plan to, so Nancy just shuts up. You were immediately apologizing, but she shook her head with her typical Wheeler smile. She totally got what you’re feeling at the moment, it wasn't even your fault really.

“Wow. I haven’t seen you since... Forever.” - Jonathan took your shoulder to his palm and smiled at you. - “I wish we could just sit down, have a cup of tea and talk about what is going on now.” - Nance agreed with him, leaving you in the hall with panicking Joyce; until another person came by.

“Is that... Is that you?” - A fourteen-year-old girl came there in an old shirt which you knew that belonged to Jim. You immediately softened when you saw the teenager, kneeling down and opening your arms for her. You closed your eyes as El leaned to you and hugged you tightly.

“Yeah. I know.” - You mumbled into the crook of her neck quietly, letting her put her head on your shoulder as both your palms smoothed her back and her ponytail. She was such a baby girl since the day uncle Jim introduced the two of you. - “Listen up, baby. Let's get moving with the packing. You can introduce me to your friends and your boyfriend, sounds good?” - You got up, drying off her tears as you tried not to cry as well. You needed to make you both occupied.

“I would appreciate if you'd help the boys with Will’s room.” - Joyce looked at the both of you with her hands on her hips. - “Not that I don’t believe them, but I am afraid that Will’s and the other children’s packaging skills aren't exactly on point, if you know what I mean.”

99 Luftballons subtly changed to Take On Me by A-Ha as it continued to blast through the quiet neighborhood. You and Eleven walked to Will’s room just as Joyce asked you to, leaving Nancy and Jonathan as they were.

And oh boy, there was a kind of war between four boys and a redhead girl going on, tees of every color were flying everywhere as they laughed and ran throughout the back of that house. It made you smile, wishing you could just join along. They were so young and careless and you loved it.

But as soon as they noticed you, an adult standing in the doorframe alongside El, they hid the tees and pants behind their backs and only whispers and giggling could be heard.

“Joyce was right.” - You stepped in, picking up the clothes from the ground while looking at Will. His haircut wasn't the best and he looking alike Jon when he was a small boy. - “You guys can't pack clothes for shit.” - You mumbled as you watched every one of them.

The redhead watched you without a clue who you could be, but the others knew your face. Not too well, but they had definitely seen you around a few times before.

“This is Y/N, Hop’s niece.” - El pointed at you and the redhead nodded. Any of the teenagers couldn't understand how could you be related to Hopper in any way - he was the old douche, probably ugly, fat and a really unpleasant person most of the time. But you were young, pretty and seemed to be a really chill person.

“These are my friends.” - She pointed at the redhead and a boy alongside her. - ”Max and Lucas.” - She pointed at Will and Mike who you knew. - “Mike and Will.” - And then she pointed at a boy with curly hair who was smiling at you and to be honest, scaring you like shit. - “And this is Dustin.”

“So, who’s the lucky one?” - You smirked at El and the way Mike’s cheeks reddened, you knew that he’s the one. She smiled at you without giving you a proper answer.

You somehow managed to make the kids pack the things before dismantling the furniture in Will’s room with Jonathan’s help. You two were left alone as the others started to move all the boxes into the truck, having quite the space to talk.

“So you and Nancy, eh?” - You smiled at him wickedly when you started to dismantle the bed. - “Or was I dreaming?”

“Yeah. You haven't been in the town for a while. A lot of things have changed.” - Johnathan chuckled in response and handled you the wrench you needed. You rose your eyebrows.

“You could at least call me. Would that be such a problem, mister Byers?” - You teased back and finally took the head of the bed out.

“We thought you’re too busy living your best city life and forgot about the villagers. Hopper was updating us about your wellbeing pretty well. Heard you got to ILEA? He was proud as hell.” - Jonathan smiled.

Yeah. Uncle Jim was the most supportive person on the whole planet when it came to you or El. You were both his little baby girls - and if someone tried to fuck your dreams up, he would be a literal pain in their ass. So, naturally, he spread the news about you studying on ILEA to everyone he actually listened to him. Joyce and Karen Wheeler were throwing with pride, lemme tell you.

“Yeah. I got to Indianapolis, but they transferred me to the midwest since I have my new job here.” - You sighed and helped him with the wood from the side of the bed. - “Gonna study in a program of correspondence course while having my practicum here. Hawkins is apparently in need of fresh cops.”

“No way you're going to be the sheriff. That would make Hop so proud.” - Jonathan smiled at you softly and you smiled back at him.

“He actually planned on me being the deputy. You really don't have many cops here, eh? Taking in a person who had barely finished their studies? Joke's on you.” - You started to dismantle the wooden legs off the sides. You and Jonathan were actually a good team when it came to manual work.

“We do have cops. But Hopper was the only one who wasn't bribed and actually done his damn job.” - Jon looked at you for a small while. You will be a good cop. He could feel it.

“It will be quite a change from Indianapolis.” - You sighed with a shy smile.

“I was wondering what you’re doing in the evening?” - Jonathan asked all of a sudden, his question followed by your furrowed face. - “We’ll be gone, but I don't want Nancy to be alone. If you want to... Accompany her, I will be glad.”

“Oh, sure. If she would like to, no problem. We can borrow some VHS tapes to watch movies in the evening or whatever. Mrs. Wheeler gave me their old player.” - You nodded. There was one question which was making you furrow, so you leaned over to Jonathan, making him stop the work, quietly touching his shoulder.

“I need to ask you something. It’s pretty... Personal to me.” - You exhaled loudly and your body shook completely on its own.

You were all emotional about Jim passing away and even if it was more than a month since you got the news, you still fought the urge to cry. You tried to shake it off as Jonathan caught your palm in his as well. - “How did uncle Jim die? Nobody wants to tell me, they only told me that he had passed away. Was he shot? Or...” - You curled into a ball and closed your eyes. Jonathan looked around the room and gulped.

You didn't have to know this. You didn't need to know any of this. He wasn't feeling good at that moment and you could feel it. He didn't want to give you an answer, because he somehow felt that it would only hurt you even more.

“All I will tell you is that Hopper died like a real hero. That man might be a pain in everyone's ass, but he sacrificed everything to save the others. He saved all of us and I think that he saved everyone in this town. But if I would tell you, you would think that I’m crazy.” - Jon said quietly, interrupted by Joyce standing in the door. She clearly didn't hear much, since she didn't have any idea you even asked about Hopper. She was smiling, as usual, and she was really glad that the bed was dismantled.

“Oh, honey.” - She kneeled down to you and Jonathan, nuzzling you to her side, ruffling your hair, kissing the temple of your head gently. She was a true mom to everyone - even for a girl that spent only two months in Hawkins during the summer holiday. Even to a girl she hadn't seen in years.

She was something you never had, so you leaned into the touch of her small, warm palms, calming words and slow, caressing movements. Then you sat back up, smiling at her, drying your tears off.

“Can you get it to the truck?” - Joyce looked at Jonathan as he stood up. He nodded without any further thinking.

“I need to give Y/N something. I talked to El and we agreed on it.” - She smoothed your cheek and kissed the other one tenderly. So, you followed her thought the empty house, thinking about your memories.

You could name the exact spot where Steve almost killed himself when he jumped off Jonathan’s bed onto the heating, hitting his forehead into the heater. You could exactly see their old sofa where you braided Nancy’s hair and you could say where the dinner table always stood. Hopper always sat there while he drank coffee with Joyce and her man. Lonnie was really fine... At times, before he left. He was a douchebag overall, though.

The sweet memories made you smile again until you approached the gang consisting of children only standing there in a circle with Eleven in the middle, holding a box named ’HOPPER’ in big, dark green letters. It was almost like a cult initiation. You were sure it was one.

“I want you to have it.” - El said quietly and put the box on the ground, opening it. It was an old police uniform; the one which belonged to Hopper. It was dirty and smelled pretty bad, still having his sheriff’s badge on it. You took the shirt into your palms, caressing it between your fingers as other tears rolled down your cheeks. Then you looked at El.

“Are you sure, baby girl?” - You asked and tried to contain your emotions as everyone was watching you with a sad face. El slowly gulped, getting on her knees as well, but then she nodded. She looked happy at that moment, contained with happy memories at Hopper.

“She wanted to keep it, but wouldn’t be for too much on use since it would only lay in the cabinet. You can wear it for work. Maybe it is too big for you and you will definitely need to wash it, but it has your name on it already, see?” - Joyce pointed at the small golden badge with Hopper on it in black letters. You leaned your head into her shoulder. A true legacy. - “I know he would want you to keep it. It will look good on you after you wash it.”

“If you say so, Joyce.” - You smiled a bit, taking the box from El’s hands, fetching it into the trunk of your car. You stayed there until the very end, looking at the kids saying their last goodbyes. It made you cry as well, it was so sweet.

Even Joyce hide behind the truck to have a little moment to herself. She hated when she saw her boys or their friends sad and crying. Joyce Byers was just the most amazing woman and mom you had ever met.

Even if you didn't expect it at all, you got hugs as well. The one from Will was a shy, quick one with that shy boy’s smile painted on his lips. Jonathan couldn't be as much different from his brother as he was - this boy held you firmly for a few seconds, he actually hugged you so tight you couldn't breathe for a second and screamed loudly with laughter.

“Better watch it here or I will come back and kick your ass.” - He said jokingly, patting your shoulder. You opened your mouth and laughed too, hitting him gently as well. - “Sure. Keep on dreaming, Byers, because that's not going to happen.” - You patted his shoulder as well, bringing him in for one last quick hug - then you left him, so he could say goodbye to Nancy.

Eleven came to you after she kissed the soul out of Mike’s tall and slim body - she hugged you tightly. You maybe weren't exactly the closest, but you were something like sisters from one point of view.

That was the magic Jim Hopper could do when he wanted to. He was bringing people together. He brought El and Mike so close he couldn't stand him anymore. But your bond would make him happy.

“If something, you can always call me.” - You looked her in the eyes as she continued crying. She was such a lovely girl. - “I know you would rather talk to Max, but I’m here too. I’ll be waiting for a call at Hop’s old number, okay?” - You asked and she nodded, unable to speak in words. But her tears were giving you an idea of what the was feeling.

“And we repaired your old room. You will be always welcomed in that house.” - You kissed her forehead, snuggling her closer again.

When they were leaving, you stood there with Nancy and the remaining kids, watching the cars leave, not even waving. Most of you were still crying your eyes out, so you were too dazzled to actually say goodbye. Just minutes after the cars disappeared, you looked at Nancy.

“Need a ride home? The kids are taking the bikes apparently.” - You asked and took the keys to your car out of your pocket. Nancy nodded, smiling at you with the typical Wheeler smile. - “Also, if you want to, you can stay the night at my place. You would feel less alone and the cabin would feel less scary.” - You smiled at her when you both were sitting in the car.

“I guess so. It would be fine to talk to you after such a long time. I miss our summer adventures.” - Nancy said shyly and you stopped yourself from starting the car, looking her in the eyes, holding the steering wheel in your palms.

“I do too. So, off to the supermarket and VHS store it is, I guess.” - You looked into the mirror showing you the space behind the car and started the old Chevy’s motor.

#stranger things #joyce byers #jim hopper #eleven #mike wheeler #nancy wheeler #max mayfield #dustin henderson #will byers #jonathan byers #lucas sinclair #stranger things netflix #after series 3 #time after time #cyndi lauper #inspired by

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hannahberrie · 6 years

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Everybody Talks | Chapter 7: Telephone II

Fandom: Stranger Things Pairings: Mileven Rating: K WC: 5450 Summary: In the aftermath of Jennifer's party, El struggles to come clean to her loved ones.

[AO3] Chapter Selection: [1][2][3][4][5][6]-7-[8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][Epilogue]

[A/N]: I probably should have said this earlier, but small disclaimer: in this AU, I don't imagine Hopper and El living in the cabin. They have a small, comfortable house, still kinda on the outskirts of town though.

In the winter of 1980, the laboratory that El was raised in was shut down.

The morning that she learned this was completely ordinary. At least, it had been, up until Hopper had approached her, holding a copy of the Chicago Tribune.

“You see this, kid?” He asked, passing the newspaper to her.

El sat up on her bed, taking the newspaper from him with a puzzled look on her face. She scanned the front page article, mind working so fast, she was hardly digesting the words she was reading. The big stuff stuck out to her though. Government conspiracy. Experimental malpractice. Hundreds of arrests. Complete shutdown.

“It’s over?” She whispered, looking up at Hopper in disbelief.

“Yeah, kid,” Hopper knelt before her, smiling warmly, “It’s over.”

“We’re safe?”

“We’re safe. They can’t hurt you.”

No more bad men.

El let out a shaky breath, eyes starting to well with tears. Hopper pulled her in for a tight hug, and she collapsed into his arms.

The following fall, El started 6th grade at Hawkins Middle. She knew no one, nor how to get to know someone, and yet, everyone knew her.

People talked. They talked about how Hopper had left for Chicago when he was 18 to become a big-city cop. They talked about he supposedly married. They talked about the daughter he had, the daughter he then brought back to Hawkins with him years later. The daughter that was then inexplicably sheltered for years, never leaving the house, never daring to venture into the public.

It was all half-truths, pieces of the story that didn’t fit, but were instead shoved together to fit an easy-to-understand narrative. In reality, El’s history was messy. It was dark, complicated, and something that she could never tell anyone.

And yet, people still talked. El was their enigma, their ghost story. She saw it in the scrutinizing stares they gave her when she walked into school for the first time. She could hear the whispers follow her throughout the entire day — new girl, weirdo, shut-in, freak.

By the time the day was halfway through, El had already grown so sick of it all. The stares, the whispers, the rumors. She thought that things would be different, that all the other kids would readily accept her. That they’d see her as being just like anyone else, as being normal.

She was naïve, blissfully naïve.

After pretending to not hear another round of judgmental snickers from some girls in her class, El just couldn’t take it anymore. During lunchtime, when all the other kids were filing into the cafeteria, she’d dashed out the back doors and ran as far as her legs could take her.

Considering that she’d spent most of her life sitting around indoors, her legs didn’t take her that far.

She made it to the soccer field, stopping beside the rows of metal bleachers. She hunched over, breathless, hands grasping her knees.

This was a mistake. She was a mistake, and she didn’t belong here, and soon everyone would find out just how different she was and—

“Hey!”

El jolted upright, frightened by the sudden noise.

She looked over to see a girl eating her lunch on the bleachers, completely alone. The girl’s hair was long and vividly red, and she was wearing a yellow sweatshirt and jeans. As she and El stared at each other, the girl took a bite of her sandwich.

“Hey,” The girl called out again, mouth full, “You’re that new kid, right? The one everybody’s talking about?”

El blinked at her. It was the first time that day that someone was actually talking to her, not about her. She wasn’t sure what to do.

“Um, hello?” The girl asked, raising an eyebrow, “Do you like, speak English?”

“Yes!” El replied quickly, moving closer to her.

“Yes, you’re the new kid, or yes, you speak English?”

“Both?”

“Oh. Cool.”

El nodded. A moment of silence passed before she hesitantly asked, “Why are you here?”

“Uh, ‘cause I kinda go to school here?” the girl replied indignantly.

“I meant outside,” El amended, cheeks flushing red. “Why are you alone?”

The girl shrugged. With a couple more bites, she finished off her sandwich and moved onto a bag of Red Vines. “I dunno,” she replied, slipping the licorice in between her teeth, “It’s nice out here. There’s no annoying mouth-breathers.”

El nodded, thinking back to her scornful classmates. “No mouth-breathers,” she echoed.

“Hey,” the girl took another Red Vine out of the package and held it out to her. “You want one?”

El smiled gratefully. She stepped up and onto the bleachers, taking her seat beside the girl.

“I’m Max,” the girl said, handing over the licorice.

“I’m El.”

“El?”

“Like...Eleanor,” El said carefully, remembering what Hopper had instructed her to say.

Max snorted. “That’s so dorky.”

El frowned a bit and looked away.

“But…I guess it’s still better than Maxine.”

El smiled. She glanced back up again and held back a giggle. “Maxine?”

“Yeah,” Max replied with an eye roll, “Don’t tell anyone, okay? It’s so embarrassing.”

“Okay,” El replied, adamantly meaning it. She took a bite of the candy as the two girls stared at the empty soccer field together. The tangy sweetness of the licorice was addictingly delicious, and it wasn’t long before Max was handing her a second Red Vine.

“So, how do you like it here so far?” Max asked, glancing over at her.

El hesitated. “I thought things would be different,” she finally admitted, “I wanted...I thought I would fit in.”

“Why?” Max asked incredulously.

“I want to be normal.”

“Please.” Max made a dismissive snort. “Being normal is lame.”

El eyed her warily. “It is?”

“Totally. All those ‘normal’ kids all dress the same, talk the same, act the same, annoy me the same — it’s just so boring.”

“Boring,” El echoed resolutely. By the amount of scorn Max used to describe the ‘normal’ kids, El realized that she definitely didn’t want to be boring.

“Exactly,” Max nodded, taking another bite of licorice, “So, like, don’t feel bad about not fitting in. That’s a good thing. That’s what makes you cool.”

“I’m cool?” El asked hopefully.

Max shrugged. “I mean, I don’t really know you, but yeah, you seem cool.”

El felt her shoulders sag in relief.

“Screw those other kids for acting like brain-dead morons around you,” Max continued. “Like, screw all of them.”

“Yes,” El smiled, a new surge of confidence swelling within her, “Screw them.”

When El awakes, her head is still ringing. She opens her eyes, but her vision is kinda blurry and everything looks like those posters of shapeless amoebas that hang on the walls of the Biology classroom.

Biology...school...Mike...the party...

El gives a small gasp and sits up in bed quickly, though immediately regrets it. The ringing in her head crescendos to a screeching halt and the sudden movement causes her head to pound. She winces, covering her face with her hands.

“You’re up,” a voice says.

The sudden noise causes El to flinch, which only makes her head hurt more, and she groans slightly.

What the—?

El carefully opens her eyes, blinking as she adjusts to her surroundings. She realizes that she’s in Max’s bed and still wearing her party clothes from the night before. The lights are off and there’s an old quilt draped over her. The clock on the nightstand reads 8:00 AM, though a quick glance out the window reveals that it’s still a little dark outside.

Max is sitting at the edge of the bed dressed in an old set of pajamas, watching her. Her eyes are slightly bloodshot and her hair is a disheveled mess. She looks like she hasn’t gotten much sleep.

“Max?” El asks. Her throat feels hoarse and she has to cough a couple times to clear it. “What happened? Are you ok?”

“Me?” Max laughs in disbelief, “Seriously? What about you?”

“Me?” El frowns.

“Are you okay after last night?”

“What happened last night?”

“You don’t—?” Max stops, hesitates. Her gaze drifts away from El for a moment, and El can see her start to pick at the threads of the quilt “What do you remember?” She carefully asks.

El frowns and tries to focus as best as she can. Memories start to come back as static-filled images, jarring, fragmented.

Jennifer’s house. Music. Mike’s face, coming in out of focus.

“We went to the party,“ El says slowly, “And…Mike was there…”

Max watches her silently, a worried look on her face.

Noise. Flashing. Falling.

“And…I think…someone might have gotten hurt,” El continues, “I’m not sure. There was a lot of yelling.”

Max still isn’t saying anything.

And then…darkness.

El starts to feel anxious. “Why can’t I remember? Did something happen?”

Max opens her mouth to reply only to shut it again a second later. She drags a hand through her loose hair, causing it to tangle even more at the ends. “It’s…complicated, El.”

“Max,” El repeats, “What happened?”

Max swallows, takes a deep breath.

“Max!”

“I’m sorry, okay?!” Max finally bursts, “It’s all my fault! We were at the stupid party and then some rando spilled a drink on me, so I went to the bathroom to clean myself off, and I left you alone! Then Greg McCorkle — you know, that one asshole senior? He gave you this drink or something, I don’t know what was in it, but whatever it was, it was really bad. It totally messed you up, and you were acting all weird and drugged-up and spaced out. Then these two drunk wasteoids got in this fight and we almost got hurt, and then you accidentally used your powers!”

Max’s impassioned ramble takes a minute to fully set in. As El begins to process all the words, a horrible, sickly feeling tightens her gut. “W-what?!” She asks, staring at Max unblinkingly. “I…I…used my powers? At the party?”

“Yeah,” Max nods grimly. After speaking so quickly for so long, she sounds slightly out-of-breath. Despite this, she continues. “One of the guys that was fighting like, threw a lamp, and it was about to hit us, and you…you stopped it. Then the lights started flashing, and there was this noise, and then it was just…dark. All the power in the house went out, and then you passed out, and then Mike totally started freaking out because your nose was bleeding and you weren’t moving or anything, but then I pulled you outside and Billy drove us back home.”

“Mike?” El swallows thickly. Her hands start to shake, and she clenches them tightly. “He was there? He saw?”

“I’m not sure,” Max hesitates, “But he might have. I mean, he saw a lot of you. You were kind of hanging over him all night. Like…saying he was your best friend, and trying to cuddle him and stuff.”

No, no, no, no.

The room starts to spin. El feels like passing out again. She remembers the last time she’s ever felt this lonely, this afraid.

She was in 7th grade. It was an accident. She’d hadn’t meant to use her powers in front of Max, but she’d just gotten so caught up in the excitement of spending time with a real friend, that she’d lost control. They were in Max’s room, joking about something frivolous, and El accidentally laughed so hard, she’d fallen out of her seat…

…and levitated in place.

She hadn’t meant to, but she had, and then Max started asking questions, and El had to answer them. Max, of course, promised that she’d never tell anyone, but that didn’t stop the overwhelming sense of panic that set in afterward.

Later that day, when El returned home recounted this all to Hopper, he was furious.

“What did we talk about!?” He shouted, his voice so loud it made her ears ring. “You’re not supposed to tell anyone!”

“I’m s-sorry!” El sobbed, nose running, voice hiccuping, eyes tear-filled. “I’m s-so s-sorry!”

She was afraid. Afraid of losing her only friend. Afraid that the bad men, somehow, would come back. That she’d lose her life as a normal kid just as she’d started to live it.

The fear had completely engulfed her, much like it was now.

Back then, Hopper had softened, pulled her into his arms, and held her until the tears stopped. He’d apologized for yelling, and El had promised to never tell anyone else.

Right now, even though Max is here, El feels that same overwhelming, isolating fear once more.

“Max!” She whispers, voice cracking, “I r-ruined e-everything! N-no one is s-supposed to know about m-my powers!”

“I don’t know if they do,” Max wavers, “Nobody was really looking at you when your powers went off. The lights were so bright and it was crowded and—“ Her voice trails off, and her gaze falls towards her lap, “It was crazy.”

The news doesn’t make El feel much better. Even if her powers are still a secret, that doesn’t change that she still completely embarrassed herself in front of everyone, in front of Mike. He’s probably never going to speak to her again.

Her eyes start to sting, so El squeezes them shut tight and leans back against the headboard.

This is all my fault,” Max mutters, looking forlorn, “I shouldn’t have left you alone!”

“It’s not your fault,” El mumbles.

“It is! If I hadn’t left you alone, you wouldn’t have talked to him, and you wouldn’t have gotten—“ Her voice breaks off mid-sentence, and El suddenly notices how much it’s shaking, wavering.

Max isn’t a crier. When she gets upset, she glares, scowls, and yells. Out of their 4 years of friendship, El has never seen her shed more than a single tear. And yet, El knows that in this moment, Max is dangerously close. She doesn’t want El to know it, but she is.

“Y-you got hurt and it was all because of me,” Max continues, keeping her head low, hair obscuring her face from view. “It was my idea to go to the party, and I was the one who took us there, and—“

“Max!” El wipes the tears from her own eyes and crawls across the bed, enveloping her friend in a close hug. “It’s not your fault.”

Max doesn’t hug El back but doesn’t move away, either. “It is,” she mumbles.

“It isn’t,” El negates. “You kept me safe.”

Max is silent for a moment as she keeps her face rested on El’s shoulder. “I just feel like a shit friend.”

“You’re my best friend.”

Max gives a half-hearted snort. “Last night you said Mike was your best friend.”

El feels her face heat up, but she tries to brush the feeling aside. “You are,” She insists, “Not Mike.”

“Well,” Max says with a small sniff, and now her voice sounds a little hoarse too, “One of us better break it to Wheeler, then. Because I’m pretty sure he’s off writing like, Star Wars-themed friendship vows, or something.”

El giggles for the first time that morning. The feeling of just being able to laugh again rushes over her with a comforting reassurance and she finds that she can finally breathe again.

Max giggles too before pulling away. She tucks her hair behind her ears and El notices that her eyes are a little red from tears.

“God, look at us,” Max sniffs again, wiping at her eyes quickly, “Crying like a pair of babies. Let’s never do that again.”

“Yeah,” El nods, then pauses. “…Max?”

“Yeah?”

“I don’t want to go to any more parties.”

Max laughs shakily. “Agreed. That party was completely stupid anyway. It was just a bunch of wasted mouth-breathers.”

El gives a faint smile at the use of the old, but never inaccurate, insult. “Yeah,” she murmurs.

They fall silent for a moment. Outside, the sun is starting to rise. Its warm light gently peeks in through the windows, filling Max’s bedroom with a soft glow.

“Well,” Max says, letting out a slow, heavy sigh, “The good news is that it’s just us right now. My parents went to that lame potluck and I don’t know or care where Billy went.”

“Ok.”

“But!” Max adds, more excitedly, “I can make us breakfast! I asked my mom to buy some Eggos for us!”

“Really?” El perks up.

“Yeah!” Max nods, crawling out of bed. “I’ll go get them ready.”

El nods and follows her out of bed, but when Max heads to the kitchen, El goes into the bathroom.

She turns on the light and steps in front of the mirror, staring at her reflection scrutinizingly. Her mascara has smudged off, leaving black trails running down her cheeks. There’s still a red blotch under her nose, the remnant of her nosebleed.

With a heavy sigh, El leans over the sink and washes it all away, scrubbing her skin until her face is left clean and raw.

The rest of the morning passes by easily. After washing her face, El changes into a simple t-shirt, denim jacket, and jeans, not wanting to stay in her party clothes any longer. Max and El watch TV and eat waffles on the living room couch until 10, when Hopper stops by to pick El up and bring her home.

“I’ll see you tomorrow, ok?” Max says as she hugs El goodbye.

El only nods, grabs her bag, and follows Hopper out the door. While she was feeling better earlier, being around her dad is making her anxious all over again. She doesn’t want to tell him about the party, and yet she’s paranoid that he somehow already knows about it.

Despite the sunlight, it’s still a typical, chilly October morning. El sees her breath fog in front of her as they walk, and the rising mist reminds her of the nicotine smoke plumes from last night.

She bites down on her lip.

They board the police cruiser.

“So, how was the sleepover?” Hopper asks as El buckles herself in.

“Fine,” El mumbles, slumping back in her seat.

“Just fine?”

El nods.

Hopper eyes her. “What’d you girls do?”

El has to stop herself from snorting aloud. If he only knew… “We listened to music,” she mutters instead.

“All night?”

“Yeah. On...MTV.”

“What kind of music?”

“Cyndi Lauper.”

“You like Cyndi Lauper?”

El shrugs.

Hopper eyes her. “So that’s it? You just listened to music?”

El nods.

“Nothing else?”

“Nothing,” El repeats, not looking at him.

“Humph,” Hopper snorts, but proceeds to start the car. The engine revs to life, the radio starts to play, and the cruiser backs out of Max’s driveway.

As Hopper drives, El leans her head against the passenger’s side window. The cool touch of the glass feels comforting in an odd sort of way, and she resigns herself to watching the trees as they pass by.

A few minutes pass before either of them speak again.

“Hey kid — I busted some of your classmates last night,” Hopper says teasingly.

For a second, El feels her heart completely stop. “What?”

“Oh yeah,” Hopper nods, sounding a little too smug about the whole thing, “At the Hayes’ place? We gotta call at the station about a bunch of teenagers raising hell, starting fights, trashing the place. When we showed up to break it up, the whole house was a complete shit hole.”

“Oh,” El says quietly, keeping her gaze trained out the window.

“Apparently, it was some kind of big house party,” Hopper continues, “A lot of high schoolers.”

El stays silent.

“Did you hear about it? This party thing?” Hopper presses further.

El can feel his gaze on her back, but she doesn’t turn to look at him. “No,” she lies, keeping her eyes on the trees.

“Really? It seemed like everyone from your school must have been there.”

El closes her eyes. “I don’t know,” she mutters, not quite sure what she’s even supposed to be knowing in the first place.

“You don’t know what?”

“Dad,” El whispers, voice sounding strained, “I’m tired.”

She knows he’s eyeing her, studying her, and more than likely suspecting her, but nevertheless, Hopper relents. He lets the conversation drop and doesn’t question her further, and El allows herself to relax once more.

The rest of the drive home is silent, accented only by the radio and the sounds of passing cars.

When they pull up in front of the house, Hopper walks El inside the house before he has to leave for work.

El takes her bag and starts to move towards the stairs, but Hopper stops her in her tracks.

“El,” he says, and El stops because he’d used her name (not ‘kid’), which always means that he has something important to say.

El turns and looks over her shoulder at him, meeting his gaze for the first time this morning. “Yes?”

Hopper pauses for a moment, studies her face. “You know…you know you can tell me anything, right?”

El blinks at him.

“I know I’m the sheriff, or whatever, but I’m also your dad. I don’t want us to keep things from each other. I want…I just want you to trust me.”

“I trust you,” El says truthfully.

“So, if something was wrong, you’d tell me?”

El doesn’t know if he knows or not. He’s suspicious, at the very least, but El isn’t eager to fess up. How would she even begin to explain it, how much she had completely, royally screwed up?

Her eyes start to water again as she questions how many times she’s going to cry this morning. She wants to come clean, and yet, as Hopper’s eyes soften, she has the feeling that he already knows.

She should tell him, but she can’t.

Instead, El drops her bag, steps forward, and wraps her arms around Hopper in a close hug. Her nose buries itself into his chest, taking in the comforting scent of coffee and cigarettes.

Hopper hugs her back tightly, brow furrowed in concern. As El starts to shake, he raises a hand to cup the back of her slicked-back hair, gently smoothing down the many flyaways she’s accumulated ever since last night.

It’s a silent answer and an unspoken reconciliation.

After what feels like forever, Hopper lets her go, tells that her everything’s ok, promises that they’ll talk more about this later, and leaves for work.

The house seems numbingly silent without him.

El grabs her bag and trudges up to her bedroom. She tosses her bag aside and flops onto her bed face-first, burying her face in her pillows.

Evidently, this proves to be a bad move, as El accidentally flops right onto the pillow that conceals her yearbook. The bulky object pushes up through the pillow and knocks against her head.

El sits up, rubbing her forehead with a scowl. She picks up the pillow and moves it out of the way, revealing the yearbook underneath.

She stares at it. It stares right back.

She knows she shouldn’t, but old habits died hard, and screw it, she wants to see him.

She picks up the yearbook quickly, flipping to his page with practiced fingers.

His picture looks the same as it always does. Bright-eyes, a slightly awkward smile, a collared sweater, and wavy dark hair.

Cute, cute, cute, cute.

She’s spent what’s probably an absurdly unhealthy amount of time looking at this photo, hoping that one day he’d notice her, that he’d actually like her, despite how aloof and weird she was.

And then she had to go and screw everything up. She’d had her chance with him and lost it.

With a frown, El shuts the yearbook and hides it under her pillows again.

The empty silence of the house makes itself known again, so El tries to distract herself. With a flick of her head, she turns on the TV, trying to find something to watch, but all the shows on are boring, considering that it’s a Sunday afternoon. She next tries to listen to music, but that only makes the ringing in her head come back, and she starts to get a massive headache.

She trudges back downstairs to the bathroom medicine cabinet, retrieves a couple of aspirin, and moves into the kitchen to get a glass of water.

The kitchen is a mess, as it often is. Hopper hates doing dishes and consequently doesn’t wash them until they run out of plates to eat off of. They’re piled up in the sink and El can’t help but shake her head in displeasure. A frying pan is left dirtied on the stove and the coffee pot is still filled with leftover coffee. The kitchen table still has an empty coffee cup on it, as well as a precautious stack of books, newspapers, and —

— the Yellow Pages. ��

El gets her water and takes the aspirin. As she swallows it down, her gaze lands on the yellow book.

She can hear Max’s voice in her head, and it’s infuriating.

“Call him.”

But—

“Are you really going to just keep moping around like a total bonehead or actually do something?

According to Max, Mike was worried about her. To be fair, if El had seen Mike pass out and start bleeding at the nose, she knew that she’d probably be losing it, too.

She doesn’t want him to worry.

“Then call him.”

El takes a deep breath.

She finishes off her water, sets the glass down in the shamefully messy sink, and grabs the Yellow Pages. Before she can talk herself out of it, she takes the book and runs back up to her room.

She sits on her bed, grabs her phone, and turns to the “W” page.

Wheeler, Ted and Karen.

For the second time, El dials the number with shaking fingers.

Please don’t hate me, she mentally pleads, heart pounding in her chest. Please, please, please don’t hate me.

The phone picks up on the third ring. El braces herself for another awkward introduction with his mom, but this time, it’s Mike who answers.

“Hello?” He asks eagerly.

El wasn’t ready to talk to him so soon. The fact that he answers takes her by surprise, and she momentarily has to remind herself how to breathe.

“Hi,” She replies shakily.

“El!?” Mike gasps, “Is that you?”

El swallows. “Yes.”

“Holy shit!” Mike exclaims, sounding shocked, “El! Are you okay? What happened last night? I was so worried about you! Like, I was up worrying all night! I wanted to call your house, but Max said that your Dad didn’t know that you went to the party, so I didn’t want to get you in trouble, or anything! After you left, it was so crazy, the cops showed up, I think your Dad was there, and we all had to take off. I wanted to bike to your house to check on you but I didn’t know where you lived and Dustin said that would be kinda creepy, but I just wanted to make sure that you were okay and—”

He’s impossibly considerate.

But he doesn’t hate her.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Mike finishes, sounding worried.

El chokes back a laugh, feeling utterly relieved that Mike is even thinking about talking to her after everything that happened. “Yes, I’m okay,” she says, voice shaky, “I…just…uh…got scared.”

“It was really scary! No, it was like, totally insane, actually! Do you remember everything that happened?”

“Kinda.”

“So, did you see what happened to the lights? And the lamp?”

Shit.

El’s breath hitches. “The lamp?”

“It was flying,” Mike says breathlessly, sounding awestruck, “I saw it! Right above my head! It came right at me and just stopped!”

El remains silent.

“I saw it happen, I know I did,” Mike laments, “But I don’t know if anyone else saw. They were all freaking out about the dumb lights.”

“I don’t know,” El finally mumbles. “You might have been seeing things.”

“I wasn’t! I know what I saw! I’m not crazy!”

El falls silent again.

Mike does too.

For a moment, there’s nothing but crackling white noise. Then, hesitantly, Mike asks, “You believe me, don’t you?”

El swallows.

What is she supposed to say?

If she says yes, she’ll be confirming that something weird happened at the party. She’ll be spurring on more suspicion, more questions, more rumors.

If she says no, Mike will be heartbroken. He’ll think that El is judging him or that she doesn’t trust him, neither of which is true.

She doesn’t want to call him a liar.

She doesn’t want him to know she’s a freak.

So what does she want?

“El?”

Him.

“I believe you,” El replies, fingers clutching the receiver tighter.

“Really?”

“Yes.”

Mike gives a relieved sort of laugh, and El can almost see the dorky grin he probably has on his face now. “Thank you! I told the other guys, but they didn’t believe me! Lucas said I was probably wasted, but I wasn’t! I wouldn’t! Not while you were—“

His voice stops abruptly.

El frowns.

“Shit, I’m sorry,” Mike groans, “I didn’t mean…”

“It’s okay, Mike,” El assures him, “I’m sorry.”

“…Wait, what? What are you sorry for?” Mike asks, sounding completely confused.

“For acting so…” El hesitates, “Stupid.”

“You weren’t acting stupid!” Mike protests, “The whole thing wasn’t even your fault! That other guy, Greg, or whoever, was being an asshole!”

“I guess,” El admits, still feeling a little embarrassed.

“What kind of guy even tries to get girls drunk at parties?” Mike continues to rant, “Like, how messed up can you be? It’s idiotic! You’re like, the coolest girl ever and he shouldn’t have done that to you! I should really get him back for doing it.”

El tries to holds back a laugh. “What would you do to him?”

“I dunno,” Mike admits, “I mean, I’ve never really been in a fight before, not a real one.”

That isn’t surprising to El in the slightest.

“I know!” Mike continues excitedly, “I could like, get him to buy test answers off of me, and then totally get him busted for cheating on a test!”

“Mike!” El exclaims, torn between laughter and indignation, “Then you’d get in trouble. Again.”

“I don’t care — it’d be worth it,” Mike contends, “He deserves it!”

“Mike, it’s okay,” El insists, “Really.”

In reality, it isn’t. What happened to her at the party wasn’t okay, but then again, most of what had happened to her growing up wasn’t okay, either. Regardless, El knows that none of this is Mike’s responsibility. She doesn’t want it to be.

“Are you sure that you’re ok?” Mike asks, “Like, are you really sure?”

“I’m sure.”

“You promise?”

El flushes pink as she thinks back to their hallway conversation earlier that week. “I promise,” she affirms.

Though they haven’t known each other long, El knows that Mike wouldn’t lie to her. Though it’s a simple word, ‘promise’ means something important, something special.

She might not be able to tell him everything about herself, but she can still promise to believe and trust in him.

It’s not ideal. She hates keeping secrets. It feels like lying, and she doesn’t want him to think she’s a liar.

Regardless, for now, it’s the best that she can do.

#mileven #mileven fanfiction #stranger things #stranger things fanfiction #berrie fics #everybodytalks #lovecolesprouse #miss-sad-marshmallow #wrongirish #lonewolfhard #bbc-radio-phan #ontariokid #strangerstxrdust

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ladyfenring · 7 years

Text

don’t stop believin’

For @rumaan, for getting me into this ship in the first place <3

Steve wasn’t sure what he hated more: Nancy feeling sorry enough for him that she was trying to set him up with another girl, or all of the girls that Nancy deemed worthy of replacing her. It wasn’t that anything was wrong with the girls specifically--they were all very nice, very pretty, and very smart, and under any other circumstances, Steve would be perfectly charmed by them. It was just that he wanted to meet a girl...organically. Not because his ex-girlfriend felt sorry for him and was throwing every available female his way.

Thankfully, there were only so many girls in Hawkins, and it didn’t take long before Steve had gone out with almost everyone Nancy tried to throw his way. He was relieved--now he could finish out his senior year without sucking it up through another awkward dinner and movie.

...or so he thought.

Graduation was only a month away when he agreed to give Dustin a ride to Hopper’s cabin so that he could visit El. A couple of the other kids were there, as well as a girl Steve had never seen before. She was pretty, in a terrifying sort of way. Her black hair was edged in purple, and part of her head was shaved. Her eyes were dark, rimmed in thick, smudged eyeliner, and her clothes were definitely not from Hawkins. She looked like she was in a punk rock music video on MTV.

“She’s my sister,” El announced. “Kali.” She pointed to Steve. “That’s Steve. Our babysitter.”

“I’m not...really her babysitter,” Steve said. “Just. Theirs.” He pointed to the boys.

Kali didn’t look impressed.

“So...sister, huh?” Steve said, feeling rather out of place.

“It’s a long story,” Kali said. Her accent was...well, he couldn’t really place it. English? Maybe? Definitely not American. That only deepened the mystery.

Steve bobbed his head. “Cool. Cool, cool, cool.”

He didn’t stay for much longer--Jonathan would be swinging by later and giving all the boys a ride home, and Steve had the distinct feeling that Kali didn’t...approve of him? Somehow? So he drove home, wondering how these two girls could be sisters.

He didn’t think much more of Kali until a few days later, when Nancy came up to him at school with That Look.

“No,” he said sharply. “I am not going on another date, Nancy.”

“It’s not a date!” she insisted. “I just wanted to invite you out to a...small gathering.”

“A small gathering?” he repeated skeptically.

“Mike said you met El’s sister, Kali,” Nancy said. “She’s our age, and she lives in a city...Hopper’s cabin in the middle of nowhere can’t be much fun for her, even if El is there. I was thinking, maybe we could take her out this weekend? Show her there’s life in Hawkins?”

Steve knew that that was not actually Nancy’s intent, and that she was actually just trying to set him up on a date with one of the only girls in Hawkins he hadn’t yet gone on a date with--even if she was only visiting. But he couldn’t very well say no, or else he’d sound like an asshole. And he’d be lying if he said he wasn’t a little intrigued by the idea of going out in any capacity with Kali. He seriously doubted they’d be at all compatible, but seeing her out and about would definitely be interesting.

“What were you thinking of?” he asked, changing out the books in his locker.

She beamed. “Dale’s is having karaoke night on Friday.”

“And you think Eleven’s sister--who, by the way, looks like she could kick Alice Cooper’s ass--wants to go to karaoke?”

“It’ll be fun!” Nancy said insistently.

He sighed. “Sure.”

Nancy squealed. “Great! We’ll meet you at Dale’s at, say, seven?”

“Seven at Dale’s,” he confirmed, wondering if this was going to be a mistake.

On Friday night, Steve took extra pains with his appearance, trying very hard to look as if he wasn’t trying hard. He rolled up to Dale’s, along with what looked like half of Hawkins High and Hawkins High alumni, back in town for their college summer breaks. The place was jam-packed, livelier than it was at any other time of the year. Teenagers and twenty-somethings were catching up after months apart, lighting cigarettes and ordering drinks and laughing raucously. It took a while for Steve to find his friends--they were sitting in a booth, Jonathan and Nancy on one side with Kali sitting opposite them. She looked deeply unimpressed.

“Hi,” Steve said, already feeling that this was a mistake.

“You made it!” Nancy said excitedly. “Kali, you remember Steve.”

“We’ve met,” was all she said.

Steve shot Jonathan a look. Jonathan gave him a shrug and a small smile.

“So,” Nancy said as soon as they’d ordered their food. “Kali...how do you like Hawkins so far?”

“I haven’t seen much outside the cabin,” she said. “It’s...quiet.”

“Except for this place, right?” Jonathan joked.

Kali turned her unimpressed stare towards him. “Sure.”

Jonathan and Nancy exchanged looks and immediately started sucking on their straws. Steve felt a sick sense of satisfaction--he was always awkward on double dates with Jonathan and Nancy. Now it was their turn to feel awkward. Sure, he was feeling awkward too, but that was a small price to pay. All of the girls that had made Steve feel awkward, and Nancy had finally picked one that made her feel awkward, too.

The evening did not get any less awkward. All of Nancy’s attempts at small talk failed miserably, and when she and Jonathan got up to sign up for karaoke, Steve saw it for the escape attempt that it was. He turned to Kali. “I know you don’t like me,” he said bluntly. “But I just wanna say, from the bottom of my heart...thank you.”

She raised an eyebrow. “Why?”

“Nancy and I used to date,” he said. “And then she left me for Jonathan. And as if that didn’t sting enough, now she’s bound and determined to find a new girlfriend for me.”

Kali’s eyebrow remained arched. “Is that why she invited me out tonight?”

“Yup,” he said. “I don’t think she realized what a hardass you are, though, and now she’s afraid of you.”

Kali surprised him by smiling. “Good--I like when people are afraid of me.”

“Oh, then you should love me, because I’m absolutely terrified of you.”

To his surprise, delight, and mild terror, Kali laughed. Well, it was more of a light chuckle, but still. He’d made her laugh.

Nancy and Jonathan were determinedly socializing with the other patrons of Dale’s--though whether that was because they were trying to give Steve and Kali alone time or because they were afraid of Kali or if it was a combination of both, Steve didn’t really know.

“My sister’s friends can’t stop talking about you,” Kali said after their food had arrived. “How does it feel to be hero-worshipped by a bunch of little kids?”

“Feels kinda good, actually,” he said. “I don’t have any siblings, so, it’s kinda like having a bunch of little brothers and sisters.”

“Yeah,” Kali said. “Yeah, I get that.”

Steve was tempted to ask about El and how the two girls were supposedly related, but he somehow had the feeling that now was neither the time nor place. “So, where are you visiting from?” he asked lamely.

She quirked her lips. “Chicago. I run a criminal gang.”

“Oh my god, of course you do.” His head fell against the back of the booth. “You know I’m going to the police academy in Chicago in a few months?”

Kali let out a bark of laughter.

“Of course you are.”

“Maybe you can show me around.”

“Mm, maybe.” She sipped her Coke. “But my area of expertise is the seedy underbelly of the Windy City.”

“So, not the Sears Tower?”

Kali laughed again. Steve was feeling very pleased with himself. “Tell you what, Steve: when you get to Chicago, you let me show you the places I frequent, and I’ll do something cheesy and touristy with you. Though, you’d have to do something really bitchin’ to drag me to Navy Pier.”

“Hey, I can do...bitchin’.”

Kali laughed again, and he knew she was laughing at him, but...that was okay. He just liked seeing her laugh.

Struck with inspiration, he said, “I’ll be right back.” He slid out of the booth and made his way to the DJ, where there was a line of people signing up for karaoke. Steve wrote something down and then made his way back to the table. On the way, he ran into Jonathan and Nancy, who were chatting with a couple other people from their class.

“How’s it going?” Nancy asked eagerly.

“We’ll see in a little bit,” Steve said in his most cheerful voice, and then returned to the table with Kali.

The karaoke was...well, about what you’d expect. Lots of high school girls thinking they were rocking it, college girls who were reuniting and singing their old favorites, college boys doing an over-the-top “girly” song but secretly being really into it. Lots of high school couples unironically singing “Jack and Diane”. Jonathan and Nancy had just sat down after their own duet when the DJ called up Steve and Kali.

Kali turned flashing eyes on Steve. “What did you do?”

“Something I may regret,” he admitted, taking her hand and pulling her out of the booth. “Come on.” He had to pull her through the crowd and up onto the small platform which served as a stage. The DJ thrust two microphones in their hands.

“What the fuck is happening?” Kali demanded of Steve.

“Just follow the words on the screen,” he said, smiling at everyone in the bar. He knew most of them--or rather, they knew him--and they were shouting encouragement. The music started and the bar dissolved into excited screams.

“Just a small town girl,” he began, staring down Kali. “Livin’ in a lonely world. She took the midnight train goin’ anywhere.”

He waited for Kali to sing the next part, but when she didn’t, dozens of girls in the bar filled in,

“Just a city boy

Born and raised in South Detroit

He took the midnight train goin’ anywhere.”

Steve had had a feeling that Kali wouldn’t be as into the song as he was, so he decided to go completely over the top with his performance. He played an air guitar and did his best imitation of Journey.

“A singer in a smoky room

The smell of wine and cheap perfume

For a smile they can share the night

It goes on and on and on and on.”

Everyone in the bar started shout-singing with him now.

“Strangers waiting

Up and down the boulevard

Their shadows searching

In the night

Streetlight people

Livin’ just to find emotion

Hidin’ somewhere in the night

Workin’ hard to get my fill

Everybody wants a thrill

Payin’ anything to roll the dice

Just one more time

Some will win

Some will lose

Some were born to sing the blues

Oh, the movie never ends,

It goes on and on and on and on

Strangers waiting

Up and down the boulevard

Their shadows searching

In the night

Streetlight people

Livin’ just to find emotion.”

Everyone started dancing wildly to the guitar riff. Steve looked at Kali in the middle of his own energetic air guitar riff.

“You’re going to pay for this,” she shouted.

“I know!” he shouted back.

Kali gave him a look that clearly told him she thought he was crazy, and then raised the microphone to her lips.

“Don’t stop believin’

Hold onto that feelin’!”

Steve beamed as he and Kali sang the last verses, along with everyone else in Dale’s. Everyone cheered when the song ended, more for themselves than for Steve and Kali, and then the DJ was calling up the next pair. Steve hopped off the stage, holding out a hand for Kali; she hopped down on her own, brushing past his proffered hand.

“That was awesome!” Nancy exclaimed when they slid back into the booth.

“It was certainly something,” Kali agreed tersely.

Steve had a feeling that he was definitely going to pay for his little stunt later, but since they were in a room full of witnesses, he figured he was safe for the time being. He waited until Jonathan and Nancy were being gross again before he leaned over to Kali. “So tell me, was that worse than Navy Pier?”

Kali’s lips threatened to smile. That was good enough for Steve.

They didn’t stay at Dale’s much longer. When it became clear that Jonathan and Nancy were going to drive somewhere quiet and screw around (and not, as Nancy kept insisting, going to “help her mom with something”), Kali asked Steve if he would drive her home. Steve knew that that had been Nancy’s intention all along--not only would she and Jonathan get to screw around, but Steve and Kali would have their own alone time. But he was actually looking forward to giving Kali a ride home, even if it meant she was probably going to kill him--he liked being around her.

“So,” he said as he pulled out of the parking lot. “Is this the part where you make me pay?”

“Not just yet,” she said, leaning forward to fiddle with the radio. “God, doesn’t this town know how to play real music?”

“What’s your idea of real music?”

She considered him. “The Sex Pistols. The Ramones. The Clash.”

“The Clash?” Steve grinned. “You and Jonathan would’ve gotten along if you guys had started talking about music.”

“Do you know how pathetic you are?” Kali said suddenly. “You let your ex-girlfriend set you up on dates you don’t even want to be on, and now you’re complimenting her boyfriend’s taste in music? The same boyfriend, I might add, who stole her from you in the first place?”

“Jonathan didn’t steal her from me,” Steve said. “She did have a say in it, you know.”

“I hope you broke his nose at least.” When Steve didn’t say anything, she made a guttural noise of disgust. “Pathetic.”

“What would breaking his nose solve?” he asked reasonably. He didn’t want to tell her that last time he and Jonathan had gotten in a fight, Jonathan had punched his lights out.

“It would feel good! Don’t you ever do stupid, impulsive things because they feel good?”

Steve thought about it. “Uh. Huh. No, I guess not.”

“Pathetic,” she said again.

“What is--”

“Pull over,” she said suddenly.

Steve was surprised but did as she asked.

“Park the car. Turn off the engine.”

He did. “What--”

Kali surged forward, kissing Steve with an intensity that took his breath away. She pulled back long enough for him to mutter, “Holy shit,” before she had launched herself onto the driver’s side, straddling his lap and fisting his shirt in her hands. She kissed him again, and this time, Steve had the presence of mind to kiss her back. His hands ran up her hips, her sides, her back; she shifted and the horn gave one short blast.

“Jesus--”

“Come on.”

Kali maneuvered off his lap and into the backseat, tugging Steve after her.

“Is this you getting me back for karaoke, because I gotta say--”

“Oh my god, shut up,” Kali said before she kissed him again.

Later, when they lay in a cramped tangle in the backseat of Steve’s car, Kali muttered a curse.

“That fucking song is stuck in my head.”

Steve smiled. “It’s a good song.”

She made a noise that clearly told him she disagreed.

“Just a small town girl,” he started. “Livin’ in a lonely world…”

“Don’t you fucking dare.”

“She took the midnight train goin’ anywhere…”

“Steve.”

“Just a city boy.”

“STEVE.”

“It’s about us,” he said suddenly.

She sat up to look at him. “What?”

“I mean, you’re a city girl, I’m a small town boy,” he said, totally unperturbed. “And holy shit, there was singing in a smoky room with the smell of wine and cheap perfume!”

“You are so lame,” she groaned.

He wrapped an arm around her waist, pulling her back down to him. “For a smile we can share the night, it goes on and on and on and--”

She kissed him. “Shut the fuck up.”

#steve x kali #I am so HERE FOR THIS SHIP #fic by me #stranger things

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