Title: Crazy, just crazy.
Author: Hopping Mad - Chrissy

Authors Note: So I've been doing a rewatch of Stranger Things Season One. I'm clearly a big Jopper fan, so of course my thoughts ran along the lines of... why on earth did they not hook up after going through so much together? Why did Joyce end up with Bob? So here is my take.

Chapter One

..

Joyce splashed cold water on her face and risked a look in the bathroom mirror. She hadn't left the hospital since she and Hopper had rescued Will from the upside down four days ago, and it was beginning to show. She was looking ghostly with dark bags under her eyes. Jonathan, bless his heart - had brought her fresh clothes to change into, but there wasn't a lot she could do about the oily hair or unhealthy sheen to her face. She didn't think it would be humanly possible to leave Will's room anyway, after all she was currently standing in the bathroom attached to his room. He had told her to go home, to get some rest - but the cot the nurses had brought in for her was good enough for now. She would only go home when Will did.

She would have plenty of time to recover once they returned home. She wasn't going to have a lot of money, but she was sure she could scrounge together some healthy meals an squeeze in some extra sleep before returning to Melvald's.

..

Jonathan swung by the station before heading home to start the cleanup. He wanted the house to be back in order before Will came home, and it didn't seem he would be able to tear his mom away from the boy's bedside to give him a hand. He didn't want to ask Nancy, he didn't want to go near her right now. She had chosen to take comfort in Steve's arms, and it made his heart ache. He wanted to be the one to hold her, to help her recover from their week from hell. He shook his head, clearing thoughts of Nancy from his mind. There was a time and place to agonize over the whole "Nancy thing" as he had dubbed it, and now wasn't it.

..

Hopper had only just sat down and lit his cigarette when Jonathan Byers walked into his office. The young man looked world-weary and pale. He waved the boy into the chair across from him with a grunt.

"What can I do for you?" He hoped his voice didn't sound as tired as he felt.

"I was just... Will is coming home tomorrow."

"That's great news, how is your mom holding up?" He had wanted to visit but didn't feel like he should intrude. He wasn't entirely sure Joyce wanted him around - now that Will had been found.

"She's... well she's happy. She won't leave the hospital."

"I bet," he sighed heavily.

"You could visit her, you know?" Jonathan pressed his lips together. "She's pretty lonely, I think some adult company would do her well." Hopper closed his eyes.

He and Joyce had been together in the latter years of school, and then slept together more than once when they had both been between relationships - but he didn't want to burden her with his company right now. They had a very strange friendship, one he wasn't even sure he could label as such. Once upon a time, before he left Hawkin's - he had been in love with the woman, but he had broken her heart on more than one occasion by making the stupid decisions, as a teenage boy is wont to do. He figured the time spent with her in the past week was due to necessity, rather than friendship.

"She probably doesn't want to see me," he shrugged. Jonathan looked as though he wanted to say more, but kept his mouth shut.

"I'm going home to get the house in order." Hopper chuckled at this, remembering the state of the Byers house.

"Oh boy, that's a job and a half. Do you want a hand?"

"That would be great." Jonathan looked relieved. He and Hopper were both similar in that they didn't have very many friends, preferred their own company. He needed the solitude more and more as he got older. Jonathan probably didn't have anyone else to ask for help.

"Let's get someone to come in and repair the wall, I'll call around and swing by after I've found someone."

"Sounds good. I don't even know what to do about the burnt carpet either, pull it up I guess. Not sure if the floor boards are gone too... or...?"

"We will find a way, don't worry." He waved towards the door. "I'll see you soon."

..

Hopper and Jonathan sat on the veranda, each with a beer in hand. It had certainly not been easy getting the house ready for Joyce and Will's return, but thankfully once they had lifted the carpet in the hallway and cleaned the floorboards beneath some of the smell had dissipated. The lights were all boxed up and put in the shed, and the house looked as it had before Will went missing. He had even picked up milk, bread and eggs on his way over, knowing that she wouldn't have even thought of buying food in the past week.

"Thanks, heaps your help, and for the food. I guess it's pretty obvious we don't really have the money for repairs." Jonathan gestured to the boarded-up hole in the wall. "Lonnie boarding up the wall must be the first thing he's ever done to the house." He laughed bitterly. "I'm sure he had an ulterior motive to being here, he was horrible to Will. He called him a fag, even to his face."

"Joyce told me." Hopper felt his temper rising. "Good thing I didn't bump into him while he was in town." He felt his hand curling into a fist of its own accord. He hated Lonnie with his entire being. Joyce had deserved so much better, that prick had broken her down and turned the whole town against her. It was hard to convince even his coworkers that Joyce didn't deserve to be known as the crazy, two steps from the edge mom living in the broken-down house with her two kids. There was so much more to Joyce than they could ever know, and it pissed him right off.

"I'm glad you helped her, you always end up saving the day." Jonathan sighed. "Sometimes I wish she had chosen you, not Lonnie."

"Has she... told you about us?" He frowned, he couldn't picture Joyce talking about relationships with her son.

"Nah, I saw some photos. I just guessed."

"Ah," he really didn't want to talk about this. "Well, good luck for tomorrow. Tell Will and your mom I say Hi." He tossed the can into the recycling bin on his way back to his truck and didn't bother looking back. He sometimes wished the same thing that Jonathan had just voiced, that somehow he and Joyce had worked out – and Lonnie had never laid a hand on her.

TBC.