The first time Hopper really realized their relationship was different was at the Snowball of '84. It was 10:05 pm and the dance had been over for 5 minutes. Most of the middle schoolers had already come out of the gymnasium, that was, all except for any of the 6 kids Hopper and Joyce had been waiting to see.
They were on the verge of going inside to drag their respective children out, when the group finally appeared. El looked around for Hopper and found him leaning up against Joyce's car, so she figured they still had some time. They said goodbye to their other friends, and Will, Mike, and El made their way over to the two parents.
"How was it?" Joyce asked Will with a smile.
"It was okay."
He shrugged and walked around to get into the passenger seat of her car.
Hopper didn't need to ask his kid how it was. He could see the happiness written all over her face as she walked towards them. Besides, she'd barely given a glace in his direction, not taking her eyes off the damn kid. Their fingers were clasped together and once they got near him, she stopped and turned around, wrapping her arms around Mike's waist. El had really enjoyed dancing with him, being close to him, touching him.
Joyce raised her eyebrows and Hopper rolled his eyes with a head shake. He said a quiet goodbye to Joyce, and when El still hadn't let go of Mike, he cleared his throat loudly.
"El, come on. It's time to leave." He heard a dramatic sigh escape her lips. "You can see him again next weekend for Christmas, remember?" Hopper reminded her.
El smiled a little at that.
"Next weekend," Mike also promised her softly. He didn't want to let go of her anymore than El had, but Hopper was staring at him so intensely that he thought he was going to burn a hole right through his head.
"I had a lot of fun," El sniffled, blinking quickly. She didn't want to cry. She didn't know why she even felt like crying because she'd been so happy all night long. In fact, she was sure she'd never been this happy in her entire life.
"Me too," Mike whispered back. He knew he should let go of her before Hopper were to come over and physically pull her off of him.
He dropped his arms from around her, and though he started to pull away, El leaned up and kissed him on the lips. Not quickly like they had earlier on the dance floor. This time, it was slow and purposeful. When she pulled back, she gave him a huge smile.
Mike wasn't sure what his face looked like, but he made a conscious effort to not look at Hopper. However, that was hard to do because suddenly, he was there towering over the two of them.
"Say goodbye," Hopper muttered, putting his hand behind El's back to guide her away with him. She shrugged away from him, completely unphased.
"Bye Mike," she smiled, giving him one last hug before they parted. "Oh wait! Do you need a ride home?" Her eyes were hopeful.
"No. Nancy's going to take me," Mike shrugged sadly.
"Oh," her voice dropped, clearly disappointed that she couldn't spend just a few more minutes with him. "Okay. Well, see ya."
"Bye El." Mike smiled at her, despite the glare he was receiving from her father.
Mike stayed outside and watched her until she was safely in the police Blazer and they were out of the parking lot.
El sat and stared out the window quietly the entire way home, with what could only be described as a lovestruck grin. Hopper knew that the dance in itself was a huge deal for her. It was her first time getting to go out and do something that real teenagers did. And while he wanted to yell at her for kissing the kid, El was so happy that he couldn't allow himself to even bring it up.
They were just kids and doing what kids do, he had told himself.
That was until the kissing never stopped.
Opening Christmas presents?
Kissing.
Valentine's Day?
More kissing.
Watching tv?
Even more kissing.
Helping redecorate El's bedroom?
Entirely too much damn kissing.
That was when he literally thought he was going to lose his mind.
Honestly, there was absolutely nothing wrong with the boy except for the fact that he and El spent every waking minute together, either in person, on the phone, on the Supercom, in El's head…you name it.
Hopper desperately waited for her to do something wrong, any damn little thing, that he could punish her for by taking her privileges away. But she wasn't stupid. She followed all the rules…at least up until that day when he came home and found those dirty white shoes sitting next to the front door and El's bedroom door shut.
He didn't bother taking off any part of his police uniform like he usually did when he first got home.
He could only see red as he stormed across the room, flinging El's bedroom door wide open.
Thank the baby Jesus they were both still fully clothed, though from what he saw, Mike was practically on top of his daughter, and he had to dig his fingers into the doorframe to keep himself from physically throwing the kid out the front door.
"You need to leave." He spoke with a calm that made even El's eyes go wide.
El quickly pointed to her open bedroom window.
"I'm sorry. The wind blew the door shut and I just forgot to open it," she quickly excused.
After the first time he caught the two of them kissing in her bedroom, he sat down in front of them on El's bed and gave such an awkward talk that he was sure that the boy would never kiss her in front of him again just to avoid another conversation like that.
At least, that was what he'd hoped.
Yet here they were.
"Chief, it's really not what-"
"Out. Now," Hopper interrupted, pointing to the front door.
Mike sighed and collected his shoes, knowing there would be no proving their case when Hopper looked like he did right now.
After Mike left, Hopper paced the floor for a minute, but couldn't bring himself to speak to El right now. He knew it would only end in an argument, hurt feelings, and possibly, things getting physically destroyed.
He turned and walked to the front door, slamming the screen door open.
"Where are you going?" El called, running out on to the porch behind him. He thought she was probably just worried that he was going to follow to kid. While that was tempting, he had needed to see someone else.
"Out," was all he managed to grumble, stomping back through the woods to his vehicle.
At Melvald's, the bells on the front door rattled as a customer entered the store. It was slow this evening, and Joyce had been stocking boxes when a familiar face stormed past her, stopping to lean up against a shelving unit.
"What's the matter?" she asked setting the items down, her eyes wide with worry when she saw Hopper's expression.
"I can't handle this anymore."
"Handle what?" she asked, still worried.
"The two of them. I'm going to kill him," he said shaking his head.
Joyce smirked realizing now who he was talking about and went back to stocking. This wasn't the first time she'd heard a tirade like this.
"I want them to break up," he went on.
"That's harsh." She pointed her finger at him when she said it. For the most part, she was on El's side when it came to her and Mike. The kids were pretty innocent and so sweet together. Plus, Hopper had a tendency for overreacting. He wasn't good at seeing El growing up.
"They're spending entirely too much time together," he went on, getting up to pace the aisle.
"But it's just kissing right?"
"Yeah, but it's CONSTANT. It's constant." He leaned forward over the shelf, using his hands to try to prove his point.
Joyce just shook her head and rolled her eyes with a sigh. Hopper picked up a ball up off a shelf and threw it in the air, pacing again. "I just came home to find them in El's bedroom with the door closed."
"And?" she asked, stopping what she was doing to turn to look at him.
"They were on her bed." Hopper didn't elaborate, until she just looked at him with raised eyebrows. "You know, making out or whatever," he groaned.
Joyce set down the packages in her hand and came over into the aisle he was standing in.
"They're teenagers, Hop. You can't just force them apart. They aren't little kids anymore," she told him with a knowing look. "Hell, remember what you were like at that age?"
"Yeah," he scoffed, running a hand through his hair. "A little too well. That's the problem." He leaned back against the shelving unit, starting to look a little more defeated rather than angry.
"What did you say when you found them?"
He sighed. "Nothing really. Told him to leave." He paused, but then added, "And then I left too."
Joyce stepped closer and touched his arm.
"Listen, we close at 8. Why don't you come over for a drink or something, okay?"
He puffed his cheeks out. "Yeah, yeah," he finally agreed. "That'd probably be a good idea."
This was why he came here. Joyce could talk him down from the ledge, even though she didn't always tell him what he wanted to hear.
It was only days later that Hopper realized just what the extent of the kissing had really meant to the two kids.
The Starcourt mall was in shambles and the mutated Demogorgon beast screeched so loudly in front of them that Hopper couldn't even hear the barrage of gunfire. It didn't matter anyway; guns were useless, and if anything, just pissed it off even more.
Hopper glanced in Mike and El's direction and could see what Mike had been thinking. Before he could get to him to stop him, Mike leapt in front of El, shoving her out of the way just as the Demogorgon reached its slimy appendage towards her.
It was an incredibly stupid move. Mike had no chance up against that thing, and even though El could fight better than any of them, when Mike saw El in trouble, he abandoned all logic to protect her.
The boy went flying backwards across the room and El's face dropped, turning her attention to Mike's limp body laying against the wall. Hopper could only manage to see her mouth screaming the words, "no," again and again. They'd been in battle for too long, and El was already so exhausted. Hopper felt his heart sink, knowing what was about to come next.
That's when men dressed in protective suits and yielding weapons that looked like nothing he had ever seen before came bursting in from all angles, pointing what looked like a special kind of laser beam at the Demogorgon.
Hopper instantly collapsed to the ground covering his ears from the piercing sound. He tried to keep his eyes on El but the lights from the beams were so intense that he had to close them, along with everyone else who had not been wearing one of the protective outfits.
His ears were ringing so badly that he almost didn't realize when it was finally all over.
By the time he could focus on anything, he quickly scanned the room and found El already in the corner, draped over Mike's body. He stumbled over to her at the same time as the military men who briefly touched her before they were forced backwards by an invisible hand. She was exhausted but had mustered up enough strength to protect her and Mike for a few seconds.
Hopper knelt down next to her and Mike, looking him over for any obvious injuries just as he opened his eyes. The corners of his lips instantly turned up when he saw El there with him.
"You're okay?" Mike rasped, looking around the room to try to comprehend what had happened.
"Yes," El whimpered, pulling her eyebrows together with a relieved smile. Mike tried to sit up, but she pushed him back to the floor so that he wouldn't further hurt himself. He tried again anyway, and this time Hopper stepped in.
"Just stay where you are kid. We're going to get some help in here," he reassured him, looking to the military men who were now surrounding all the injured kids strewn about the room.
El took Mike's face in her hands, ignoring everything and everyone else. Tears streamed down her cheeks, and blood actively dripped from her nose.
"I love you," she whimpered, bending down to kiss him on his forehead, his cheek, and then finally, his lips. Mike kissed her back, not caring one bit that she was covered in tears, dirt, blood, and now snot.
He just cared that she was okay.
"I love you too El," Mike whispered back, tears falling down his own cheeks now. El rested her forehead against his, and though she was smiling, her shoulders shook with heavy sobs.
Their little exchange had been so quiet that no one else in the room except for Hopper had heard it.
Watching the two kids who would sacrifice everything for each other suddenly made him realize that maybe constant hadn't been a bad thing after all.
Yes, they were young, and yes, their relationship was intense, to say the least.
But he was able to see now that maybe this was something he didn't have to be so afraid of. El and Mike were not like he was at 15.
In fact, they weren't even like any adult couple he had ever known.
Perhaps constant had just meant that if anything were to ever happen to him, El would always have someone who loved her and would try to protect her just as fiercely as he would.
Constant meant she would never have to fight this darkness alone.