Friday, Feb 1st - Day 1

Nancy poked her head into Mike's room. "Mike, school. You're late… again. We go through this almost every morning Mike."

"I'm up," Mike said throwing off his covers. Friday, He just had to get through today and enjoy the weekend. How long could the day possibly last?

"Why don't you get an alarm, like every other kid your age?"

"It would keep waking me up."

Nancy just looked at the ceiling for help and shook her head. Mike was impossible.

They heard a loud thump from Holly's room and then Holly starting to wail. Nancy left quickly to see what happened.

Mike trudged downstairs to the kitchen. Holly had stopped crying by the time Mike sat down. "Michael, you'll have to make Eggos yourself today. You're dad and I are away this weekend with Holly, she needs clean clothes. " his mother said, passing him by with a laundry basket.

Ted was reading the morning paper, oblivious to his family.

Mike had really wanted scrambled eggs like he usually got on Friday mornings. He didn't know how to make them, and relied on his mother's cooking skills.

Nancy came downstair with Holly, looked at Mike and said, "She pulled down her doll shelf and they were all over the place. Crisis averted."

"Can you make me some scrambled eggs, Nancy?"

"Make them yourself Mike."

"Thanks Nance, I'll make sure to return the favour when you need it the most. I just hope you'll be desperate when you ask me. Karma is a bitch." Mike went to the freezer to get the Eggos. There were only two left in the box.

"Language." Mike looked at his dad, who still had his face buried in the paper. The almighty Ted speaks. Who knew he could talk?

Mike ate his Eggos. He didn't use syrup, he preferred it on scrambled eggs.

Mike went down to the basement to brush his teeth. He liked to use the basement bathroom for that. The upstairs bathroom was always busy in the mornings. Mike was sure he spent most of his time in the basement. He practically lived in it. He found he had to open a tube of toothpaste from a new box.

Lucas was coming up the driveway when Mike stepped out outside. "Hey Mike," Lucas said. He was adjusting a strap on a new backpack he'd gotten for Christmas. It came loose in his hands.

"Ah, shit, it snapped. Why do they even allow pieces of shit like this to be sold in stores?"

"Tell your mom that," Mike smirked at him.

"I can probably fix it. Just the stitching gave way. It didn't snap like I thought."

"Did you learn how to stitch in Home Ec class?"

"Are you going to be like this all day? Screw you Mike." Lucas didn't talk to him for the rest of the morning.

Without their bikes it always took longer to get to school. Sometimes they had to walk over unplowed streets and sidewalks. Today wasn't too bad but it definitely wasn't as quick as riding their bikes.

Either way the Party always met at the bike rack. Dustin was waiting for them. "Heads up, Troy and James are around somewhere." No sooner had he said that when the two of them rounded the corner of the school and spotted them. Mike could see that El Hopper was farther behind them. Great she gets to watch them all being humiliated.

Mike had a major crush on El. Her locker was right next to his, but it might as well have been an empty void in the wall, because she didn't know he existed. Maybe she would notice him after seeing the sight of fresh blood on his face. He'd take a punch for that. Just to be noticed by her. He'd take two punches for that.

"What would Friday be without a fresh bruise?" Dustin said, trying to be funny, but it was delivered with a big sigh.

The three of them waited for Troy.

"Hello frogface," Troy said to Mike.

"I'll take frogface over whatever dogshit for a face you use." Mike was not feeling especially careful today. Oh well, in for a penny, in for a pound. And a pounding it would be…

"What did you say frogface,"

"I'm sorry, did I stutter? I think I compared your face to dogshit."

Troy looked back like he couldn't believe what he'd just heard. Then he punched Mike in the jaw and ran off with James.

"Damn," Dustin said, "that was ballsy and stupid at the same time."

As they walked towards the front doors of the school, Lucas tripped on an untied shoelaces, he fell face first into the grass, inches from there the sidewalk pavement started.

"Whoa, you guys could have had matching jaws," Dustin said, "chick magnets for sure."

"Hey Dustin, how about you take the next punch from Troy," Mike said.

"Don't be a little asshole. When you decide not to be, we'll do lunch." Dustin walked off.

Mike was at his locker when El came up to hers. She always wore a wristband her left wrist. It was a pink one today. But he saw that she had quickly changed it to blue. She looked at him and said, "hi."

Mike was in a foul mood. "Oh it's 'hi' today is it? Today is the day you decide I exist in your world? Well, hello to you Princess El, how is your day going? Mine is really shitty right now, but thanks for asking." El looked hurt and Mike immediately regretted what he said. Too late to take it back now. El didn't look at him again. She closed her locker and walked off.

Shit.

Mike had to sit beside El twice in a regular school day. Once in home room, and once in Mr. Clarke's Earth class.

She was already sitting there when he sat down beside her. She ignored him. "Sorry for being such a wasteoid, having a bad day before it even starts."

El continued to ignore him,. "Ok, so nothing new today, I'm back to not existing in your world. Well, I tried to apologize. Sorry I wasted your time. Won't happen again." Mike couldn't help his self-destructive comments. Mike didn't even bother to see if El looked hurt at all. It was clear she didn't like him, and even clearer that the 'hi' she had said at the locker , were the first and last words she would ever say to him.

Mike managed to avoid answering any questions in Math class, but he heard all the answer. He was paying attention, but trying to avoid any interaction with the teacher. He was also avoiding Max Mayfield's glare. He knew she was El's best friend, and didn't like him either. And going by the glare she was giving him, she was super pissed.

When class was over Max marched over to him, "any particular reason you're being a mouthbreather to my best friend, Wheeler."

Mike immediately got his back up, "who told you my name? It couldn't have been your best friend, she doesn't even know I exist. Doesn't matter anyway, I tried to apologize, but I'm back to not-existing in her world. For the brief time I did, it was such pure bliss, I almost couldn't stand it." Mike tried to sound as sarcastic as possible.

Max just looked at him without saying anything. She spun on her heel and walked off.

Well, let's get this next class over with. Mike thought. Ordinarily he looked forward to all of Mr. Clarke's classes, but with El as his lab partner, it was too painful to be sitting next to her, only talking about the lab work. Not being able to just talk to her. What he wouldn't give to be able to talk to El Hopper. About the weather. Or about grass growing. The history of socks, anything, just to talk to her.

He knew any chance he had of that, ended that morning. Mike took in a deep breath and sighed. Perfect Friday so far. Let's see what the rest of the day brings shall we? Mike's internal sarcasm was going to leak out today, even more than it had already, he could just feel it.

El was once again seated at their desk before he got there. He wordlessly opened up the shared lab book and then remembered it was her turn to write. "Sorry, it's your turn, I'll write if you don't want to."

El looked at him, shook her head, "no, I'll do it, we don't want to lose marks." She took out her pencil and started writing the date and lab title. She put too much pressure on the pencil and the tip broke.

"Um, El. I'm having a bad day." El's pencil tip broke again. Mike gave her his pencil, "I didn't mean to take it out on anybody." He looked down, "especially you… my best friends Lucas and Dustin are already pissed at me, even your best friend, who I don't even know, is pissed at me. My day hasn't even started yet. That's a new record for me. Best Friday ever. " Mike rubbed his jaw looking glum. "So… I'm sorry."

"Mike," she said, "why did you let Troy punch you?"

"Let?" Mike snorted. "None of us 'let' Troy do anything. He just does it and we can't stop it. One of us was going to be punched today. My day was going bad enough it might as well have been me, I thought, screw it, couldn't get any worse."

He looked up at El. Her eyes were big and round, probing his own. Mike thought he would pass out with how pretty she was. He was sure he teetered on his seat a bit. He swallowed, "and then my day did get worse at your locker. Really sorry..."

"Mike," he felt like she was looking much deeper into his eyes than he thought was possible, "I understand."

Mike was first in the lunchroom sitting at the Party table. Dustin and Lucas showed up a few minutes later. Neither one of them spoke to him.

"Um, sorry guys."

Dustin and Lucas shrugged at the same time. "It happens, Mike. Wouldn't be the first time for you this year. I don't know why you just don't talk to her?"

"To who?"

Dustin and Lucas looked at each other. "Uh, the girl you've been pining over since the school year started." Dustin said, "just a guess off the top of my head."

"I insulted her today, does that count?" Mike said.

"Probably not the best approach, did that make the lab go smoother? Did you at least apologize?" Dustin said.

"Yeah I did. She seemed to be ok with it."

"Well," Dustin looked like he was lost in thought, "this should cheer you up," he pulled out a bag of red translucent gaming dice. Mike perked up a bit. The dice looked cool.

"How did you get those" Mike asked.

"Saved up all summer, ordered from an ad in the back of Dragon Magazine."

Dustin opened the bag up. Started rolling the various combinations of dice, calling out the numbers as he rolled, "11, 47, 56, 65"

Somebody dropped a plate at the far end of the cafeteria and it shattered into a million pieces. Everyone in the room laughed.

The end of the school day finally came around, and Mike went to his locker. El was already there. He had caught her changing her wrist band back to pink. He saw that tattoo on her wrist. Ah, that's why she wears it. Mike thought.

He saw Troy coming towards him out of the out of the corner of his eye, he leaned a bit closer to El and said, "I'll try not to bleed on you."

She looked at him curious, but followed his eyes to Troy. Troy was being a jackass, and in a bizarre dance of un-coordination, slipped or tripped into an open locker door. His head collided hard with it, breaking his nose, and Mike as sure he saw a tooth flying out of his mouth.

Mike saw El's nose was bleeding, and handed her a handkerchief out of his locker. "Looks like I won't be needing this today." He nodded towards Troy, "that could have been my nose, but it would have been bruised and bleeding a lot more."

El looked a little sad, but she thanked him, and left. Mike went out to the bike rack, but none of the Party were waiting for him. Giving him space, he guessed.

El was there. Waiting to be picked up by her dad. Everyone knew that Chief Hopper was El's adoptive father. That kept her off limits to everyone. Mike couldn't help it though. His crush wasn't going away anytime soon. He wouldn't even call it a crush, it was way beyond that.

"What time is it?" El asked him.

"3:30...is your dad late?"

El looked at him and nodded.

At 3:45 Hopper's truck sped into view. Mike waited with El but they didn't talk much.

The truck stopped a few feet from where they were standing, Mike saw the window roll down, "sorry I'm late, kid," Hopper gave Mike a nod, "thanks for staying with her, Wheeler. Don't get used to it."

Great, he's met her dad and Hopper already doesn't like him. This felt like the longest Friday Mike had ever lived through.

Mike's Friday was just getting started.