When Mike was 9
He was not happy.
He had just found out his parents were moving to some armpit of a town called Hawkins. He'd already heard the catch phrase for it: "Where nothing ever happens."
And that would probably be for the rest of his life, all of it taking place and ending in that town.
He would miss all his friends. "You'll make new ones." His mother said. Just the way she said it made it sound like a standard phrase parents use from a book or something.
The other one she like to use on him and Nancy was, "you can talk to me."
No mom, I can't. You wouldn't understand what it's like to be nine years old, in a new town, a new school, with no friends.
He was the Dungeon Master of his D&D group. He liked creating adventures for his friends. He almost always surprised them with his ideas. They probably never heard of the game in Hawkins. And that was assuming you could find any kids to play it.
And it's not like he could sit in his new basement and listen to music. He thought the music being played on the radio sucked. He had never been in to music anyway, he was more into books and movies.
Movies. Where was he going to find friends who liked the Lord of the Rings books, or the Star Wars movies? If they'd even heard of them. He couldn't find Hawkins on the map. They probably didn't have a theatre. Or a decent video store. Probably had crap for rental if the town had one. He'd never see another good movie again. Forget about a good bookstore.
At least he'd be able to ride his bike to school. His mom told him that the town was small enough that most kids walked or took their bike. Mike practically lived on his bike.
She also told him that it had a basement. He'd have to sleep in his room at night of course, but the basement could totally be his for him and his friends. All the friends he didn't have yet. People didn't go to small towns to raise their kids. There were no opportunities for kids, why would parents move there? He hoped his dad was making a million bucks at his new job to uproot the whole family like this.
It was pissing down rain when they moved to Hawkins.
"Perfect." Mike said. "Looks like the town is going to make its own gravy."
Mike was sitting in the sofa in the basement going through the Dungeon Masters guide when he heard the doorbell. Nobody was going to answer he was alone in the house.
He gave off a huge exaggerated sigh and ran up the stairs with his book to get rid of whoever was at the door.
As soon as he opened the door, the curly haired boy and said, "Greetings, I am the Bard, this is our Ranger, and this is our Cleric."
The "Ranger", swatted his arm and said, "he may not even know the game dumbass." The boy referred to as the Cleric, smiled and shook his head like he'd seen this played out a dozen times before. Mike liked the three of them right away.
He held up his book, "...and I'm the Paladin, and a Dungeon Master, " Mike smiled.
The curly haired boy looked at the other two, "See? I know a nerd when I see one. I'm Dustin, this is Lucas, and this is Will."
Mike stuck out his hand to shake theirs, "I'm Mike."
"When do you think you'll be ready to start the campaign?"
Luca swatted Dustin's arm, "He didn't even say he'd do it, we've known him for less than a minute, you've already asking him about a campaign."
"We can play this Friday if you want, I can stay up late on the weekends."
"We can too, we can't stick around right now, we are on a mission." Dustin said. The other boys nodded and they said their goodbyes.
When Mike closed the door behind them he smiled to himself. It looked like he'd just made three friends. He'd been in Hawkins less than a week and he already had three friends. Things were looking up.
The next morning, Mike got up early, his plan today was to bike around Hawkins and get the layout of the town. Maybe check to see if they had a theatre, or a bookstore.
He was about to grab his bike leaning against the wall when he heard a soft crying. He looked over to see a boy sitting on the driveway. He wearing a blue jacket with his back to him. He had very short hair, parents probably made him get it buzzed every second day.
Mike went over to see if he could help, he could tell when he saw the boy's bike laying on the driveway what had happened. The chain had come off and the peddle spun around throwing him off.
What he hadn't expected was the boy to be wearing a pink dress. And not be a boy at all, but a pretty girl. She had very short buzzed hair.
She was crying over her scraped knee.
He knelt down in front of her, and said ,"does it hurt really bad?"
Her bottom lip quivered and she nodded her head.
"Don't move, I'll be right back. I promise."
Mike ran to his basement door, and into the laundry room to grab the first aid kit.
He ran back to the girl, knelt down in front of her again, and opened the kit up. He dabbed some alcohol from the kit on to some gauze. "Ok this might sting a bit..."
Mike looked around, "Um, ok, give me your hand."
She held out her hand and Mike took it and held it gently. "Ok just look at me ok?"
She looked at him with eyes wide, still brimming with tears.
Mike lightly padded her knee with the gauze, she winced a bit, but kept looking at Mike. He smiled at her, "juuuuuust about done. It wasn't bad at all. Knee scrapes look much worse than they really are. They're also my specialty, " Mike smiled at her and put a large square cloth bandage on her knee.
He leaned down and kissed her knee, "see all better."
The girl's eyes got very wide, and she had a surprised half smile on her face.
He immediately blushed, "um, uh, sorry, I always do that for my little sister Holly when she scrapes her knee or even her elbow… she always has me kiss her knee. She says it makes her feel better. Um, my name is Mike."
"I'm El. My knee does feel better. Thank you Mike."
Mike was still holding on to her hand. When they both realized this, Mike blushed again, and this time El did also. "I should give you back your hand."
El smiled, not quite in a rush to take her hand back. Mike looked away a little embarrassed.
"Uh, I can fix your bike chain too." Mike ran to his bike, that had a bike repair kit strapped to it. He came back put her chain back on, and tried to fix it so it wouldn't be loose and slip off again. He was unable to, he'd have check out a book at the library on bike repairs. If this town had a library.
"Um, I was about to ride around town to, I can double you on the back until you're bike is fixed?"
El looked at him for a second or two and then nodded. She walked with Mike to his bike.
"Ok hold on to me tight, I ride pretty fast." El slipped onto the bike behind Mike and put her hands around Mike's waist.
Mike felt exhilarated. He had a pretty girl holding onto to him really tight and he was biking around town. After awhile he he could tell she had rested the side of her head against his back.
He just smiled the entire time.
El never told Mike that her bike had been fixed the next day by her dad. El was never going to tell Mike. He was always so nice to her.
She asked to be doubled on the back of Mike's bike almost every day of the summer, and back and forth to school and he always said yes. She really liked Mike, she wouldn't tell him of course. She didn't want to ruin it.
Mike didn't care that he couldn't peddle as fast as he used to. He had another friend. He liked El a little more than a friend, but he'd never tell her that. He was happy to have her holding on to him when the rode around.
When Mike was 9, he met El.
His life would never be the same.