AN: Hello readers! Welcome to the first chapter of stranger Things one shots! I'm so excited to write longer, better fics for everyone! I'll talk more at the end, but I hope you enjoy! Let's just say, I went skiing and I got inspired.

Summary: After Max gets a random letter from her dad, she is reminded of something she used to do.

OR

The Party gets Steve to take them on a ski trip.

DISCLAIMER: I DO NOT OWN ANYTHING!

Dear Maxine,

I know I've been a crappy father the last couple of months, shitty even. I'm sorry. I've been upset and trying to move on from losing you. I hope that Hawkins is better than you had previously imagined, and that you make some really great friends. I understand that it's hard, but I want to give you something to remind me of me. Maybe you don't want to remember, and that's okay, but I want you to have fun. In here, I have included money for you to buy a snowboard and boots. There is also some money that you can buy lift tickets with. I know you love snowboarding. I hope you're having a great time.

Merry Christmas,

Much Love,

Dad

Ever since she was little, Max has loved snowboarding. It was like skateboarding, but just a tiny bit cooler. She was actually incredible at it, despite living in California. Contrary to popular belief, the Sunshine state has a ton of places to snowboard and ski. So every chance he could, Max's dad had taken her to the mountain. She actually had snowboarded first, and then learned to skateboard from that. She didn't plan on snowboarding ever again. How could she? There would never be any money if Neil kept drinking this much. She had rented up to this point, but she was done growing now and could finally buy her own gear. With the money her dad had sent her, why not? She didn't want to go alone though, so one night at Mike's house she brought it up.

Dustin was eating a bag of chips that he had stolen from Mike's pantry and refusing to share it with Will. El was sitting on Mike's lap, laughing at some joke he had said. Max snuggled into Lucas and popped the question.

"Have any of you nerds snowboarded?" She asked. The boys seemed surprised with the question, but Max was more surprised with their answers.

"Yeah," Will said, "well, I ski. Dad used to take me before he left. I actually used to race." Max starred at the quiet boy, mouth agape.

"Yeah, I actually ski too," Mike said.

"I haven't in like, years," Lucas responded, "but I liked it."

"Me too," Dustin mumbled through chips.

"What is snowboard?" El asked, her face was scrunched up. Her vocabulary had greatly expanded since she had closed the gate more than a year ago, but she still had trouble with some words.

"It's like a skateboard, but without wheels and you use it on snow," Max explained, beating Mike to the explanation. El's face lit up. The previous summer, Max had taught El to skateboard, and the girl was now a bit of a pro.

"Well, my dad just sent me a letter," the boys gasped at this, and she could have sworn that Lucus's eyes were falling out of his sockets, "and he sent me money to buy a board and gear. It's something we used to do. I was wondering if you'd like to go on a ski trip?" after the shock had worn off, the boys were immediately on board, (haha, the pun was unintended), and they were planning the getaway.

So maybe that's why Steve Harrington ended up spending Winter break with six teens and a bunch of skis in his car. When they had asked if he had liked skiing or snowboarding, he had been eager to tell them many stories of when he would snowboard with his uncle, and obviously he had been a little too eager. So now Dustin was his co-pilot, Lucas, Max and Will sat in the middle seat, talking about some X-men comic book, and if he looked really hard, he could see the figure of a sleeping El draped over Mike, who was also entering the argument, in the back seat. He had long gotten a bigger car, and even though he was often teased about it, how else could he be a mother of six without a mini van? His bigger question was how all the parents had agreed to this trip. Even Hopper had been eager to let El rent a pastel pink snowboard for the season, (though Steve suspected that was because Jonathan was also going to be out of town, and he wanted some alone time with Joyce). The boys had also rented skis, but Max's snowboard was definitely the coolest of the bunch, with it's pac man pattern on it. Steve's snowboard had also begrudgingly emerged from his garage, it's red flame design and all its glory with it.

"Get off at the next exit," Dustin said, looking at the map.

"Ay ay captain," Steve said, exhausted out of his mind before the trip had even officially started. They were staying at a hotel right on the mountain, so they could get an early start the next morning.

"Lucas!" Dustin yelled, "pass the popcorn please!" The popcorn was quickly passed to the seat, but not before El's quiet, "we need to stop," quieted the car.

"Why?" Steve asked, and he'd be lying if he said he wasn't worried "is everyone okay?"

"I'm fine," El said with a giggle, "I just need to pee, it's been three hours." Steve couldn't help the snort that escaped as he pulled over at the next McDonalds.

A not so quick three hours later, the party arrived at the hotel. They teens unpacked the car, as Steve attempted to sweet talk the lady at the front desk into upgrading them.

"I'm sorry sir, but I can't do anything." She said.

"You're telling me that you don't have one room in this whole damn hotel that has three beds? The kids want to be together."

"That's not what I said, but I can't upgrade you without extra pay-" the lady was cut off abruptly as six incredibly loud teenagers walked into the room, each weighed down with gear.

"I'm not paying you extra, but trust me, if you knew what these kids were capable of, you'd pay ME to give them their own room.'

"I'll see what I can do."

Seven room keys and several elevator ride later, let's just say it was El's first and she had fun, and they were in their room. The kid's room connected with Steve's room, but lord knows that that door will be shut momentarily. The kids were chatting it up when he cut them off.

"Alright shitheads, listen up," He said, "I'm not looking in here to check on you guys, unless I hear a weird noise, but as far as I'm concerned Little Red and El are sharing a bed, and you boys will split the other two. I don't care if that changes, but I promised the chief that no one would lose their goddamn virginity tonight, and I'm keeping my promise." He stared hard at mini Wheeler, who was already leaning against the headboard of a bed with El practically on his lap. The boy blushed a dark red, and Steve wished he could have caught the reaction with Jonathan's camera.

"Vir-gin-ity," the girl sounded out, "What is-"

"I'll explain it at another time!" Mike said very quickly, as the rest of the room exploded in laughter.

"Oh will you now Mikey?" Dustin asked, making Mike's face flush again. Sometimes that boy was just too easy to tease.

One hour later, everyone was in bed and Steve was closing the door.

"Alright, actually sleep okay?" He said, "tomorrow is a big day. Goodnight shitheads."

"Night Steve," The room echoed back to him.

Lucas, Max, Mike, and El had long awaited for Dustin and Will to fall asleep before making the switch. Mike and Max switched places. Max crawled into bed with Lucas, who whispered a quiet, "night MadMax", before pulling her into a tight hug and falling asleep. Mike and El chatted in soft whispers for a bit before falling asleep in each other's arms. Needless to say, Steve woke up Dustin and Will first and they embarrassed the hell out of the couples the next morning.

"Why do I have to wear this?" El asked as Mike pulled a fleece over her head.

"So you don't get cold," Mike replied, zipping it up and kissing her nose.

"But I'm already wearing clothes," The girl pulled on the pink long underwear shirt and pants she was wearing. (For all of you who don't ski, long underwear is literally a long sleeve shirt and leggings that you wear UNDER your coat).

"Yeah, but it's going to be colder than you're used to," He pressed a kiss to her lips this time, causing her to giggle.

"If you guys would stop sucking faces, we could be at the lift all ready!" Dustin yelled from the other side of the room.

"Dustin, I swear to god, SHUT THE HELL UP!" Mike screamed, "And no, actually we couldn't have, because the mountain doesn't open until 9." Max and El giggled at Dustin's failure to come up with a comeback.

Ski pants make quite a bit of noise, not to mention that, for some reason that no one could understand, Dustin kept dropping his poles, but the Party was able to make it out of the hotel without a noise complaint being filed. They got on the first shuttle that came in, and rode it to the lodge. They set their stuff out, and began the long and tedious process of putting on boots and helmets and gloves. For the most part they were fine, but Will's left boot just refused to go on to his foot. After Steve had held the boot open and Lucas had pushed down on Will's shoulders, his foot finally made it in. The girls and Steve had it easier, snowboard boots were slightly less like jail cells for your feet.

"Alrighty, we have to meet El's instructor on top of the bunny hill at 10 am," Steve said as he looked at the conformation papers in his hands. "Who's ready?" A chorus of "me"s followed after him as they marched outside.

"Oh my goodness, we are never going to get off this thing," Dustin moaned. They were halfway up the magic carpet ride. Magic carpet rides are the slowest things that had ever been created, Dustin was sure of it. At the top, they met El's snowboarding instructor. He was a nice man named Eddy, and he seemed to find it funny that Steve had to watch all the kids. With a final farewell to El, the group made their way to the nearest chairlift, eager to start the day.

El decided that she liked snowboarding. At first all she did was fall on her butt, and she was sure that a decent sized bruise was forming on her elbow, but after a bit she was boarding exceptionally well. El had a talent for being able to analyze and copy, and it obviously worked to her advantage on several occasions. By the end of the three hour lesson , El had blown Eddy out of the water. They had quickly moved past the bunny hill and had just finished a fairly difficult blue diamond. She loved the chairlift, and would always snowboard as fast as she could just so that she would get to ride it again. The look on Mike's face as he watched her come down the blue was so filled with pride, you would've thought that she won the Olympics.

Lucas, on the other hand, was not nearly as good as Max would've thought. He was fast enough, but he was almost constantly falling on sharp turns. Mike skied with a grace she never thought she could see on the lanky boy, while Will had been absolutely exceptional, going extremely fast with the control of a race car driver. Max was obviously an incredible snowboarder, but Steve wasn't so far behind her.

It wasn't until after lunch that they could all ski together. While El had been at her lesson, everyone else had thoroughly mapped out the mountain, marking the best trails on Lucas's trail map. Will and Max had been begging to go to the Terrain Park all day, but Steve was making them wait until the end. Now El and Mike were on the lift. It was a two person chair, which was almost perfect, but Steve had to go on with some random guy who seemed to have no idea what he was doing. El was staring at the ground below them, mouth agape in awe. She had never been so high up and she was sure she would never get tired of the view.

"Do you like it?" Mike asked her, staring at the believed to be angel beside him.

"Yes," She responded quietly, "but this is my favorite part." She continued to look below them, but grabbed Mike's gloved hand in hers.

"You- well" Mike began, "you're amazing!"

"Really?"

"Yeah! You're like crazy good!" Mike stumbled upon his words, "Especially for your first day."

"Max said that you were," She thought about it, "graceful."

"Oh, " Mike blushed, he wasn't used to receiving compliments. "Max was really good, and I think that you're right behind her." El finally turned to him, smile on her face. She was beaming and Mike's face was exploding with pride. She pulled off her face warmer and kissed him. He held her back, their lips pressed together.

"HEY!" A voice screamed behind them. They seperated and looked behind them, faces pink and not just from the cold. They saw Dustin in the chair behind them. "Let's keep it PG-13 okay?"

"Dustin!" Mike groaned, "can you stop?"

"Only if you two stop being all mushy," Dustin said, "it's seriously disgusting." Mike wanted to yell something back, but then El touched his arm, alerting him that it was time to open the safety bar and get off the lift.

By the end of the day, the Party had taken a total of thirteen runs, and was absolutely exhausted. El's favorite run was a blue named "Crazy Eight". It had lots of turns and was pretty steep. Obviously, Will and Max wouldn't stop chatting about how cool the terrain park had been. Steve and Mike had enjoyed everything, from the green "Easy Shmeezy", to the black they had taken, "Plunge". Lucas enjoyed the blue they had taken their first run on, "Dingleberry", as their were no sharp turns. Dustin enjoyed anything that the others fell on, and would have a good time making fun of everyone later. Walking into the lodge, they all got big cups of hot chocolate, which had become El's favorite drink late last winter when Mike had made her some in the cabin. They squeezed out of boots, and dragged boards and poles to the shuttle.

Once in the room, the teens all collapsed on their beds and they took turns showering.

"Are you sure you don't want to help her, Mikey?" Dustin asked, wiggling her eyebrows when it was El's turn. El was confused. Mike tackled him to the ground.

Everyone changed into their pajamas and then they called up room service. Steve had wanted to go down to the restaurant, but quickly discovered it was too difficult to get six exhausted kids out of their spots on the beds. They ate pizza, pasta, and waffles, (though El complained that they weren't as good as her beloved eggos), and watched The Grinch on the TV. El fell asleep on top of Mike, and Steve didn't even try to seperate Max and Lucas. He turned off the TV, said goodnight and went to bed.

The rest of the trip went smoothly. No one died, so Steve thought of that as a success. Lucas, however, almost broke his ankle on a black diamond, and El almost passed out after giving Max a boost on one of the jumps in the terrain park, but no physical harm was left on any of the kids. They all slept on the way home, comfortably falling on top of each other in the back seats. Steve got a large coffee at a drive through and popped in one of Jonathan's mixtapes to stay awake.

Needless to say, it became a tradition that would repeat itself for the next ten years.

AN:

WELCOME TO MY NEW FIC

So yes, this was longer than anything I have ever written before. I'm just getting used to writing Will, Dustin, and Steve, but I'm working on it. LMK what you liked and if you have any suggestions for new stories! I'm so excited to write longer, new stuff for y'all. There will definitely be some fluffier scenes, (Lumax, and Mileven), but I'd also just want to write some stuff with the Party. Just to let everyone know, in difficulty levels on ski slopes, it goes green circle, blue square, and the hardest is a black diamond. Because Hawkins isn't on google maps, I made up some trail names. (Did anyone realize that El's favorite included 008?).

Thank you for reading!

Much love,

Lex