Stranger Things belongs to The Duffer Brothers and Netflix. I own nothing.

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PROM NIGHT

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May 12th, 1989.

Dustin sat on his motorcycle for a moment longer after parking next to the side walk, resting his elbows on the handlebars from his Vespa and trying to gather some courage.

There she was, Stacy, a few feet away from him and talking to a bunch of girls outside Truvy's Designs, looking incredible as always and also there he was, asking himself for the tenth time that day why he hadn't had the guts to ask her to be his date for prom.

It wasn't like it was the first time he failed on doing it and that was, probably, what annoyed him the most given that it had been his last chance because, after all, his prom night had finally arrived.

The last chance, the last dance and the last time he could ask her to go with him. Okay, he knew that the probabilities for him to go with Stacy, the most popular girl on school, to prom were very little, – or inexistent –; but not even asking her turned any possible chance he may had to put a bouquet on her wrist, into none.

The boys kept saying she was a waste of time. Max – a bit more aggressive – said she was a waste of air and El simply offered a sympathetic smile, not knowing what to say. In time his friends started to grow tired of giving him advice and he understood why they were tired, because he knew his obsession with Stacy lead him to a dead end.

"Well…" said Will, trying to offer some consolation when Dustin came back to their table at lunch to inform his friends he hadn't had the courage to ask her to be his date. "It doesn't mean you lost all hope, you know? Maybe you could at least ask her to dance with you one last time."

That gave Dustin a little more hope (and fears). He knew he might end up rejected like he always did. He knew Stacy wasn't the sweetest girl in the world and if he'd had a little more self-respect he wouldn't have to deal every year with her phony smile, her not-so-gentle rejection and her eye-rolling, every year since 1984 when he'd ask her to dance and she'd say no. Still, he should keep trying, right?

Yeah! He shouldn't be worried; he refused to lose time being negative because only a true warrior put up a fight even if such fight kills him. He wouldn't surrender, not now not ever.

Dustin sat up from his Vespa and checked his clothes, looked around him and then to the group of teenage girls a few feet away waiting for another girl, willing to talk to Stacy and ask her to, at least, save a dance for him.

He begun walking towards the group of teenagers, their laughter coming clear and their conversation took shape while he kept on walking in, what it seems, the longest sidewalk ever created. But he was going to make it, he wouldn't be intimidated. He was a lion, a good catch, he was even the best dancer in the party – although it didn't said much –; and besides, Harvard was waiting for him in September, a fact that made his mom unbelievable proud, sharing the good news to every single person in Hawkins, even if no one asks.

"Okay, Dusty. You're smart and she knows it because she always wants to borrow your notes. You're tall; you have wild curls and terrific hair to make braids, according to El. Hell! Even Steve told you that any girl would fall for you with these shiny blue eyes. Now you go in there and ask Stacy to save a dance for you because, if you wait until tomorrow, she's gonna look so gorgeous you won't even remember your name. Come on, just a few more feet and… crap!" –Dustin was talking to himself trying to grow a pair when the girl for whom he was crazy about, turned around causing him to panic instantly, run to the first door he could reach and hide inside the nearest store he could find.

He never expected he'd see such image when he stepped inside RadioShack.

"Oh my God!" he growled, raising his voice and his hands in the air, causing Mike and El to jump. "Are you guys Siamese twins by mouth or what? Jeez!

Both teenagers, one pressed against the counter while holding the other by the shoulders with both arms and a leg wrapped around him and the other, with both hands on her butt-cheeks; moved away from each other just a bit after Dustin busted them. They smiled, they weren't embarrassed anymore when their friends catch them making out but, they both felt a little self-conscious given that Dustin is the one who caught them the most.

"The store is empty." Eleven pointed out, aside from the three of them and climbed over the counter, sitting on it next to the cash register and resting her back against the wall and crossing her legs, like she always did every time she was there.

Dustin snorted.

"Right, so an empty store it's all that it takes for you guys to have a 'quickie' basically in public?" said the teenage boy, walking towards them and resting his elbows on the counter.

That made them blush but Mike immediately took control by washing his little embarrassment and punching his friend on the shoulder.

"What are you doing here anyway, Dustin? Weren't you supposed to be renting a tux?" asked Mike, even though it didn't bother him.

Dustin shrugged and, for a moment, he looked a lot like the child El met under the rain.

"I was but when I pulled over I saw Stacy in the corner and…"

"Ughh!" this time it was Mike and El's turn to growl. She shook her head and bit her lip, getting tired from all of it and feeling a little sorry for her friend too and Mike hid his face in his hands and sighed, feeling tired as well.

The other boy raised his hands in the air for the second time, this time he also opened his mouth in surprise for their reaction, although he didn't blamed them. He also complained every time he found his friends kissing next to his locker and he couldn't open it and he always made fun of them when they were caught, especially when they were acting particularly passionate. Some things are better off buried under the carpet.

"Hey, this is serious! I was about to do it this time and then she turned around and I panicked." explained Dustin, feeling a little betrayed too. "You two are my best friends, dammit, give me an advice!"

Mike looked at his girlfriend sitting on the counter and taking the bag with the magazines she bought on her way to his job, licking a lollipop and opening a magazine by the middle on a make up article, focusing on it.

"Don't look at me, honey. It's your turn." said the girl, a tiny smile on the corner of her mouth behind the lollipop and letting Mike take care of their friend and listen to him, for the tenth time that day.

xx

And thirty minutes later…

Mike huffed.

It wasn't like he didn't like having his friends at the store. Of course he couldn't spent a lot of time with them when his friends went to say hi when he had his shifts on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday, but he could always managed to take five minutes and talk to them between customers and his different chores. His boss is great and he always treated Mike like a friend too so it didn't bother him when the teenage boy had his friends over.

On Saturdays, when El visits him and spends the afternoon with him; sometimes his boss sits and chats with her, asking her to try and convince the Chief – since everyone knows she is Jim Hopper's kid – that he should investigate if there were aliens living among them. El always nodded and said yes, even thought she knew Hopper would never agree and Mike could never hold a snicker every time his boss started to tell his girlfriend about those fishing trips when he was young that he could-have-sworn he saw a UFO.

He never remembered El's name (Jane), even after all those years, he just called her 'Mikey's girl'.

That Friday Mike was working to compensate the next day he wouldn't go to the shop because he had prom, so around five his boss left him in charge and went home, given that he had his grand-kids visiting. Mike sighed, he was bored already and all he wanted was to close the store at eight and pick up El to have their date at the ice cream shop and then go to the movies; but suddenly, like sent from the sky, the door bell chimed and there she was, carrying a couple of feminine magazines in a paper bag. The sun shinning on her back making her glow and looking beautiful with her ponytail, her pink shorts and that blue tank top he loves.

Mike gave her a wide smile and she smiled back, behind a lollipop.

"Where's everybody?" El asked, taking the lollipop she'd been eating and pushing herself up to the counter so she could kiss him.

Mike leaned to make it easier for her and also to grab her by the waist, making her climb through the register desk. She laughed.

"I think they sensed you were coming and let you have me all by yourself." he joked in between kisses, hugging her, both standing behind the counter and pinning her up against it, leaving a trail of kisses from her lips to her shoulder.

El sighed deeply, enjoying his warm lips and gave a few whimpers when he bit her neck. "Oh I love your customers, they are so nice sometimes. I missed you." she whispered, – even when they saw each other less than two hours earlier –, and she wrapped her arms around his neck and claimed his lips back again.

Having Eleven pinned against the counter, closing his arms around her tiny waist while she was practically hanging from his shoulders and they kept kissing with the intensity that being alone in RadioShack allowed, Mike and El found very interesting the idea to get passionate right there. Mike found himself moving his hands down from her waist to her hips and the way she kept kissing him and eating her lollipop in between kisses, making her lips taste like cherry and looking a bit red too, made Mike feel like he was starving. Maybe that was it, that new kind of closeness they've been experimenting lately that made him bolder too, since she told him when he came back from his interview on MIT the year before that she wanted to start touching him. They had been experimenting with this new fire, this heat wrapping them tighter and growing stronger every day, that woke a new kind of love in them: it was lust and animal desire. But when Eleven held his face and moisturized his lips with the lollipop and did the same with her lips, Mike lost his grip. He grabbed and squeezed her butt, lifting Eleven up and she moaned in his mouth, wrapping a leg around him when he sat her up on the desk and they started making out like if their lives depend on it… until Dustin cut them off.

But that was before.

Now, half hour later, Mike was leaning on the counter's marble, supporting his face on one hand, mouth hanging open while he was trying his best not to fall asleep, and his other arm resting on his girlfriend's legs while she made a quiz to find out what pet suits her. All of that while Dustin kept on going, talking non-stop about the girl he liked and walking to the door to check if the girls were still on the dress shop next to them.

"I know I was too chicken to ask her to be my prom date but, being Stacy, maybe I should ask her to save a dance for me for tomorrow, right? Because, now that I think about it, every year I ask her to dance with me when we're already there, maybe that's my mistake. She probably just thought I had nothing better to do or…" Dustin kept rambling, building this fantasy in his head where Stacy wasn't the jackass she actually is.

Mike sighed again and looked up to Eleven, sitting comfortably and reading her magazine.

"El, if you love me, do me a favour, would you?" whispered Mike, almost desperately.

She nodded and caressed his hair, burying her fingers tenderly under his soft locks, eyes still glued to the magazine.

"Kill me." he pleaded and rested his head on her chest, surrendering, causing her to start giggling and leaving the magazine behind while Dustin was still watching the dress shop, hoping the girls hadn't left yet.

Eleven, amused, looked at Mike and wrapped a lock of his hair on her finger while she run her hand on his jaw line and his neck when he rested his head on her legs. He can be so pretty.

"I can't, you are my date for the prom. Besides, I kinda like you already…" she joked, trying – and failing – not to laugh outright.

Mike smiled and pressed his head now on her chest again, burying his face and breathing her in, trying to wash all of Dustin's words from his tired brain. It wasn't like if he didn't like to support a friend who needed him, because he always been the first to step up and offer a hand, an ear or a word if they needed but, this Stacy thing had been going on and on non-stop for months… and the last four years.

Eleven held him there for a moment, caressing his head and then she cupped Mike's face and leaned to kiss him because he is just the sweetest guy in the world, the best friend for all of them and simply because she loves him, because she understood how he felt – since Dustin got her like that too a couple of hours ago – and also because it had been over thirty minutes since she kissed him and that was unacceptable.

"I can't see if they are still there or if they left." yelled Dustin from the door. "How much it takes to pick a fucking dress?"

Mike shrugged.

"I don't take that long when I have to buy clothes, do I?" asked the girl, caressing Mike's cheeks with her fingers and he shook his head. She smiled and kissed him again.

Actually, Eleven could easily spent a whole hour just to pick a shirt but even Mike with only seventeen years old, knew that there were certain things never to say to a woman. A life time of living with his mom and two sisters made him smart enough.

It wasn't lying, it was survival.

"Hey, stop making out for a minute, would you? I don't know if they left or…"

"She's still there, Dusty, stop worrying." said El, exasperated. "I can feel her lack of talent from here."

Dustin rolled his eyes and came back next to them and Mike laughed, cupping El's face and kissed her deeply.

It wasn't something they talked about openly but they all knew that she begun to despise Stacy since their sophomore year when they both auditioned for a school play and the casting guys picked the other girl. They picked Stacy only because one of those guys were sleeping with her but El thought that it was really unfair because, even when it was just a school play and she wasn't as talented as Meryl Streep, she knew she was better than Stacy, who apparently learned acting from a tree.

"Hey, you horny pieces of shits!" called Dustin again, clapping his hands.

They both growled.

"For the love of God, Dustin, stop! I don't know what to tell you anymore." said Mike, sick of all that bullshit. It wasn't that he didn't care, he just simply couldn't understand how Dustin, being as smart as he knew, couldn't realize that Stacy was a bitch, "I'll tell you the same thing I've been telling you all these years: Stop trying. Don't do it."

Dustin was dumbfounded.

"That's not an advice!"

"Look, it's not that I don't care, you know that. Besides you know how she is, why do you want to expose yourself like that again?" asked Mike, holding El by her sides. She got back to her lollipop and her magazine while the boys talked.

"Maybe she'll change her mind. Tomorrow it's our prom night after all, our last dance."

"And if I keep eating this, the dress won't fit." said El, completely out of topic.

Mike and Dustin looked at her and snickered.

"Good point." said Dustin and then looked back at Mike. "The thing is that I'm hoping that after all these years, since it's our last dance, maybe she happens to say yes, you know?"

"Or maybe she rejects you one last time and manages to ruin you own prom, have you thought about that? Do you really want to spend another half-enjoyed dance because she let you down? Dustin, we love you and we told you the same thing over and over like a thousand times. Stacy is not good enough for you."

El looked at Mike while he said that and then at Dustin. She knew that what he said may seem extremely cruel but she also knew her boyfriend was right. There were many things Dusty didn't know or didn't want to accept. Sometimes El wondered whether to tell her friend what she overheard Stacy saying about him on the bathroom but when she told the rest of the party, they agreed to never tell him that because that would break his heart.

Finally the boy sighed. "Thanks." he answered and got back to the door.

Mike looked at his girlfriend, asking what she thought of what he said and she offered a little smile and squeezed his arm delicately, telling him without words that, even if he seemed rude, at least he told him the truth.

"Oh shit, shit!"

Dustin run away from the door back to them, panting and panicking and, before neither Mike nor El could ask what was going on, two teenage girls walked inside the store. He got so desperate to look casual, afraid they might have seen him that he took one of El's magazines and pretended to read it, not even realizing he held the magazine upside down.

"Hello." said Stacy when she walked through the door with her best friend, Jennifer Hayes.

Dustin's dream girl stayed on the furthest corner of RadioShack, pretending to be interested in batteries with a fake smile, clearly finding unnecessary to go and talk with her classmates. Jennifer sighed and walked towards them with a much more sincere smile, taking a paper from her purse.

"Hi, boys, Jane, how are you?" greeted the blonde girl and gave Mike a paper note. "I'm sorry to interrupt guys but, Mike, my mom left her camera to fix and she sent me to pick it up. The one with a broken flash light?"

Dustin pretended to keep reading the magazine, holding it so close to his face his nose was pressed in between pages. Mike smiled and nodded, taking Jennifer's note and went to find the Olympus he fixed two days ago. Eleven simply looked at the girl in front of them with interest and the way she kept gazing at Dustin, then she looked at Stacy pacing around the store and then back to the other girl, now looking right back at her.

"Trying to find some ideas for tomorrow night?" asked the girl, offering El a kind smile.

El smiled back, shy but sincere. She nodded.

"Me too. I bought like five magazines; I still don't know whether to wear my hair up or not. Which colour is your dress?"

Eleven looked around, making sure Mike was nowhere in sight, nowhere near so he could hear it, then she whispered. "Black."

She wanted to surprise Mike, being that other than the Snowball dress, she always wore pink or yellow dresses for school dances. Jennifer lifted an eyebrow in surprise and El, for some reason, felt flattered so she gave her a small smile. The other girl smiled back as if they were sharing a big secret and then put her attention back at Dustin, noticing the upside down magazine, yet she didn't say anything.

"Hi, Dustin." she said with the biggest smile Eleven had ever seen on Jennifer's lips and then she blinked, thinking she was hallucinating.

Dustin looked up from his magazine, barely looking at her. "Hey Jenn, how are you?" greeted the boy politely and then, not being able to stop himself anymore, he looked back at Stacy pacing near the door and he waved a hand to her. She waved back with the fakest smile in the world causing Eleven to look at her with narrowed eyes, Mike – who came back with the camera in hand – to roll his eyes, hating the way that girl treated his friend and then Jennifer, sent her a meaningful look, nagging her for such lack of respect. Stacy simply shrugged and waved her hair, turning her back on them.

Jennifer huffed and turned to look at the others, thanking Mike for fixing the camera while he cashed her out and she turned to Dustin, even though she talked to the three of them as well.

"Are you guys excited for tomorrow? I can't believe that tomorrow is finally our own prom! It's amazing how time went out so fast." she said with the same enthusiasm of a classic teenage girl who had been dreaming about her prom night for four years. Mike and El smiled back at her, mainly because she was nice and she seemed to be pretty honest with the way she kept smiling at them.

Yet Dustin kept spying on Stacy behind the magazine and El wanted to punch him.

"Jenn, let's go! I need to go to the drugstore!" Stacy complained, holding the doorknob. The other girl sighed.

"I'm sorry guys, we are in a hurry. Have a great night!" she said and when Stacy turned around, Jennifer took Dustin's magazine from his hands and turned it around, so he could pretend he was reading it a little more convincing.

The sweetness in which she spoke to him, didn't pass unnoticed for Mike and El.

"See you tomorrow." she whispered and then went to meet her friend who had just left without a word.

Then… Silence.

More silence.

And more silence until…

"HOLLY SHIT!" yelled Mike and El, looking at each other both stunned as if they had seen something incredible, and they did. "Jennifer Hayes likes you!"

Dustin looked back at the magazine in hand and then he shook his head, giving El her magazine back not even believing what his friends were saying. "What are you guys talking about? Jennifer has always been nice to me. To everyone, actually."

"Are you blind or stupid?" asked Mike, snapping his fingers in front of him. "Dude, you've lost so much time obsessing over someone as shitty as Stacy that you haven't notice the one that actually likes you."

"I think I've noticed something before, but I thought it was just Jennifer being… Jennifer. She always been nicer than Stacy. She is, after all, a human being and not a bi…"

"Hey, don't say that!" Dustin complained but his friends couldn't help but laugh. They didn't try to help it either.

This time they didn't growled over Dustin defending Stacy, they just kept on making fun of him, making kissing noises because, after all, trying to get him to think properly when Stacy was involved, was like trying to convince a brick wall to become smoke. Finally, after five minutes of mocking, Dustin checked his watch and decided to keep on moving.

"Well, I guess I should be going or I won't find a tux." he said and patted his friends on the shoulder. "What are you guys doing tonight?"

"Ice cream and movies." said Mike, making another receipt like the one he gave to Jennifer, this one to store.

"Yeah, we were going to see 'Pet Semantery' but there's no point on watching it since I'll get scared and Hopper won't let Mike stay tonight because we're all staying at his house tomorrow after all, so we decided to see 'Field of Dreams'. Karen suggested it, she said it's very good." said El all excited.

"We didn't decide it. You and my mom did, baby." said Mike, grinning.

El looked at him. "True, but you love when I plan stuff for us."

"Also true." said Mike, leaning to kiss her.

Dustin opened his mouth to make a comment but he thought about it for a moment, thinking about how ironic it was that they were going to watch a movie about baseball being that, metaphorically speaking, they hadn't make it pass second base yet. There they were, his friends, kissing innocently but, even when they used to make out literally in front of everyone, he knew that after all that time together, they were still playing.

He thought about making a joke about it, maybe tell them to learn how to play the fucking game already and have sex so they could spare him another awkward moment like the one he had to witness last summer. They hadn't talked about it, he didn't knew if they knew that Dustin had walked to the living room that day to find El on her bathing suit straddling Mike on Lucas's couch and heard her moaning while Mike had his mouth on her breasts. It had been just a split second when Dustin walked back to house, the rest of the party enjoying the sun on the backyard, that he went to ask Mike and El to make lemonade when he saw his friends getting to second base and he immediately turned around and went back with the rest of the party.

Maybe they knew he knew, maybe they had all came to an unspoken agreement to never mention it.

"Have fun, guys!" Dustin finally said, waving at them and walking out of RadioShack.

Mike and Eleven waved back but they kept on kissing, just some innocent pecks until they noticed no one else seemed to be walking in anytime soon, so El sit up on the counter, holding Mike with her knees and he smiled at her right before he claimed her neck with the same wild desire that had been consuming them before Dustin interrupted that afternoon.

oOoOoOoOoOo

Hi everyone!

I'm finally back with a new story! Like I said before, I've been preparing this story which was going to have three chapters but now it may be more, since I had to split the first chapter in two. Next part will come by weekend too, probably earlier.

I know its rated M and it doesn't makes sense right now… but it will.

IMPORTANT: To all those beautiful followers from my Mileven one-shots 'WEIRD STUFF', I need to remind you that, after I'm done with this new story, I'll get back on that serie because there's a lot more to come. Actually it took me a lot to write this one because I had so many new ideas for Weird Stuff. I hope to see you guys there when I return to it, and also to see you guys in here too.

To everyone who reads this new story, please leave a comment if you want the second chapter to be published because, as many of you already know, I'll keep writing as long as I have feedback.

That said… I'll see you soon!