Author's note: So I wanted to post on Millie's birthday, because, well, it's Millie's birthday (and also David Mazouz's and Martha's, but shhh), but for that to happen I had to operate a miracle - as we like to say here in my little land - and so did my beta, and okay, the 19th is already over in Brazil, but you have to understand that I simply HAD to watch that episode of Big Little Lies, that's how it works in the rare times that an episode is exhibited in your country at the same time as it is in its original country. ANYWAY.
I also had to adapt some of what was already planned for this chapter, but I'll go in more details next chapter.
Welcome to the second third of the fic, you guys! I can't thank you enough for all the love you're showing for this crazy little story of mine, and I really hope you stick around a little longer. I have no idea how long it'll take for me to write and post the next chapter, but please, have faith in me?
So yeah, that's it. I hope you enjoy ^^
FALL
"Now, here, you see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that."
Lewis Carroll – Alice through the looking glass
6. the domino effect
September, 1986
Nancy Wheeler
Nancy's roommate was one of those extremely religious do-gooder girls, even though she was really nice. She was a nursing student who wanted to work with the Red Cross and she had no chill when Nancy talked about her boyfriends, even if, well, she was coming from Utah.
She was from a rare breed of Catholics in her area, but even with the heavy amount of polyamory displays she had grown up with, she still couldn't wrap her mind around the fact that Nancy had two boyfriends, let alone that said boyfriends were pretty faithful to each other as well.
That being said, Nancy's roommate, as one would assume, absolutely hated Nancy's spring break pictures. To be fair, not many people had seen those pictures, but they were very beautiful, and Jonathan had made sure to print copies to the three of them. Her favorite, the one she asked him to give her a larger version, featured her, Steve and Jon in Steve's bed during one of those hot, hot Orlando nights, when the curtains were open and they could smell the breeze of the ocean and their skin was dotted with sweat even though they were all naked. So hot, that instead of urging them to stay at a safe distance from each other, they actually tangled more in a sandwich of limbs and love. A whole lot of love.
Nancy hung that photo on her wall, where she could see it every day and remember that she was one lucky woman, with two men who loved her so dearly, same way she loved them.
That wasn't the photo she kept with her, though. The one that was constantly among her planners and papers, and the one she was looking at that moment was much less erotic and very lovely – an odd-angled and slightly unfocused picture they asked a random anonymous to take of them in front of the castle at Disney World. She touched their smiling faces, Jonathan with those sunglasses that said 'I don't like this heat business' and Steve just being his best goofy self with a floral shirt that screamed 'TOURIST', even if he was living there for almost a year.
She had just gotten back to class, hardly a month in, but she missed her boys – her men. She missed them. If they were there with her, at that very moment, they'd make things so easy. Jonathan would be the so calm, as always. He wasn't much of a talker, so he'd take her hand and kiss her fingers, maybe mention something, anything but the task at hand, just to distract her.
Steve, on the other hand, would be the ball of energy. He was pro-active and loud, and he would be stringing her into arguments she could use to convince this man that she was the right student to help him in his project, making her remember every single monster they had killed, or the details of that time she had actually stepped in another dimension, or anything that would make her case stronger.
Either way, both of them would tell her that she's got this.
She flipped some of the pages in her folder, still keeping the picture visible. Mr. Vogel was the head of Southern Maine's archeology department and even though many people pegged him as a weirdo, he still did a hell of a job. His most personal project, though – and the main reason people thought he wasn't so right in the head – was about the multiverse. That was where Nancy had found those theories about ley lines and versequakes, reading his articles.
"Ms. Wheeler?" the secretary called, and Nancy closed her folder looking up at the woman. "Mr. Vogel will see you now."
Nancy nodded and gathered her things, bag hanging on her right shoulder, and followed the secretary through the open door. She had only entered in the archeology department once, but the shelves filled with ancient artifacts and rocks (she learned in her first day that the word 'rock' was banned in there, but she could call it whatever she wanted, as long as she didn't say it out loud) still impressed her. The secretary knocked on one of the open smaller doors.
"Carmine, the student is here," she announced and gestured for Nancy to come closer and she did, getting inside the packed room where a middle aged man was sitting behind a desk analyzing a book with a magnifier.
Professor Carmine Vogel was an Irish man with dark features and grey hair. His name always made Nancy bite down a laugh when in contrast with his physical characteristics, because he was neither red nor looked like a bird, but who was she to judge parents' choice of names. He pointed at the chair in front of him and she sat down, only then noticing that the secretary had left.
"You're the kid who's been bugging me about following me in my research, huh?" he said, still not looking up and Nancy cleared her throat.
"Yeah, that's me." As soon as she opened her mouth, he looked up at her. He seemed surprised to see her, as if he expected someone else, which was strange, because she was pretty sure she had given him her name at least more than once. "Nancy Wheeler," she said, offering her hand.
After a beat too long of consideration, Mr. Vogel dropped the magnifier and shook her hand as briefly as a handshake could be, making her feel weird. She made a mental note to tell Mike that he wasn't nearly as close as a "nerd stereotype" as he thought.
Nancy sighed, realizing that she would be doing the bigger part of the talking and just went with it.
"I've read your articles, and they got me so curious," she said, opening her folder again. Her photo was there, but she ignored it. "I like how you connected the rips in the universes with the ley lines, that one got me thinking for a long time. I even started pinpointing some things in my own map, and." Mr. Vogel was looking at her without blinking and that was a little unsettling. He had really deep black eyes. "I'm sorry, is there something wrong?"
The professor shook his head, finally blinking, and opened what she supposed was a smile.
"Pardon me, Ms. Wayland-"
"Wheeler," Nancy corrected. Seriously, it didn't even sound alike.
"Wheeler," he corrected immediately. "I guess I'm surprised to see you. You look like you should be in the pre-med course."
Nancy felt her cheeks burning a little and shrugged.
"I'm a biology minor," she said. "I was going to try medicine, but… things happened and I changed my mind. You see," Nancy sat straighter. "The multiverse theory you wrote with your friend from Ireland was the first article of yours I came across in a really intense time of my life and I was just fascinated, because that meant-"
She stopped short, afraid of talking too much. The theory that man wrote meant that perhaps Hawkins wasn't the only place in this country – this world – where monsters were being found. But she couldn't reveal that to him, not like that. She needed to have some sort of leverage with him, because whether she liked it or not, he had a big name in the archeology community and she had to be careful.
"I mean, I've heard about multiverses before but just in sci-fiction. And I know that a lot of sci-fi stuff comes from real physics theories, but I never thought that parallel universes could be such a close reality, you see? And as I've read article after article I knew what I should really be studying."
Plus, it'd give her a hell of a heads up if she ever came across another monster in her hometown, as it seemed to be where they were headed. Not that they had much information about the actual monster, that was El's job, but it was good to be prepared.
"Passionate, I like it," Mr. Vogel said, even though he didn't look so excited. "Tell me, Ms. Wheeler, where are you from?"
Nancy raised an eyebrow. Did that matter?
"Uh… Hawkins, Indiana," she answered and the professor leaned back on his chair.
"Hawkins?" he asked suspiciously. "Are you fucking with me?"
Frowning, Nancy shook her head, and then she turned to her bag to get her driver's license to show him. He took the license from her hands and only after he took a closer look at it he seemed to show some real interest in Nancy.
"You know what I noticed when I started to research ley lines based on your maps?" she asked, trying to keep her voice calm and under control. "That in America, almost every Department of Energy facility is set in a city crossed by a line."
Mr. Vogel sat a bit straighter.
"What do you know about the DEO, Ms. Wheeler?" he asked, and she could feel the suspicion rise in the small room.
"Everything," she answered simply. "What do you know about them, professor?"
He smiled.
"Everything what, exactly?" he asked, not answering her question.
Nancy shrugged.
"Did I stutter?"
He narrowed his eyes.
"Pretty pre-med student sent to spy on me, is that it?"
"Please," Nancy replied. "Don't think so highly about yourself, professor. I'm on a solo mission here. I want to work alongside you to figure out what the DEO is unable to do."
"And that would be…?" the professor asked. Nancy smiled.
"I don't know, am I in or out?"
"Do you have a project?"
Nancy nodded and took a block of 15 pages with her project. She looked at it for a moment, and then sighed and handed it to the teacher.
"A step in the Vale of Shadows?" he read the title. "What's your point here?"
"Read it, you'll like it. Probably," Nancy guaranteed closing her folder. "And perhaps we can help each other. Heavens knows I need some help."
Mr. Vogel turned the first page and Nancy smiled. She fixed the strap of her bag on her shoulder and got up.
"My info is in the back of the cover, if you want to contact me," she told him.
Nancy turned her back to him and left the room not knowing why she was so nervous before, nor why it worried her so much that the professor was so big in his community. She could stand up for herself, as usual. All she had to do was be a little more confident.
She stopped in the first public phone she found and checked the time. It was safe to call him now, so she picked up the phone and dialed the Orlando number hoping to find Steve home. He answered on the second ring.
"'Sup?" he greeted and Nancy shook her head.
"What did I tell you about phone greetings?" she asked and on the other side of the line Steve laughed.
"Hey, babe! How was the meeting?"
Nancy sighed.
"I don't know. I went a little overboard, I guess."
"If you're admitting that I think it's safe to assume that you went a lot overboard. What happened?"
She sighed again. She needed to stop doing that, because it was annoying.
"It's just… he was so suspicious, it's weird. But also, gotta know that he's tapping into something the government wants to keep hidden and all, I get that. Am I making sense?"
"You totally ain't," Steve told her and despite herself, Nancy chuckled.
"I guess I have mixed feelings about him, because I don't know where his knowledge about the multiverse comes from. Don't say quantum physics."
There was a beat of silence. And then-
"Damn, then I really don't know what to say!" he replied. She couldn't tell if he was being sarcastic. "Did I tell you about the amount of suffering I'm going through in Physics 3?"
"I still don't understand why you have to learn that in order to be a Marine," Nancy confessed.
"Because!" Steve answered a little exasperated. They've had that conversation before. "We all have professions inside the Marines, babe, you know that! Also because I'm trying to find my way into one of those DOE facilities and you know that part too."
"Yeah, but this is too long term, Steve!" Nancy exclaimed. "And there's a monster about to invade Hawkins right now."
"'Right now' right now?" he asked, probably to make sure. Nancy sighed.
"We need to find a way to find out what they know, because we're empty handed here," she continued. "All we know is that people who disappeared when the demogorgon came are coming back, probably out of those disgusting cocoons. Steve, I even saw Barb."
There was a noise on Steve's side, as if he had choked on something and then he coughed several times before talking.
"Barb as in your friend Barb?" he asked, his voice a little off from the coughing. Nancy hummed, confirming. "How the fuck?"
"You're the only one who knows, I didn't tell anyone else," she rushed to say. "Not even Jon. But we found three cocoons during summer, and Henry from the movie theater and Dale are back to their daily lives as if nothing happened."
Steve hummed.
"And it didn't, if you think about it, right?" he observed. "Follow me in it. Will vanishes, the DEO tries to fake his death, it backfires, kid comes back. They give the community the perfect excuse with Barb: another runaway teenager. But the others? It could've just been an impeccable timing to skip town – all adults, all with an excuse to leave. No one ever knew what happened to them. They could make their alibi whatever they want."
"Right, but they were dead," Nancy stated. "How did they come back?"
"I guess that's what we have to find out," Steve said very calmly. Nancy frowned.
"Did you find our lead?" she asked and he hummed.
"I did, he's in Jacksonville scared to death," he informed, and she rushed to remove the cap of her pen and start writing down on the back of one of Vogel's articles. "Couldn't get much out of him, but he recognized El's mom and another woman from New Jersey. You think Jon can go try and find something out with her?"
"I'll ask him," Nancy said nodding. "And you keep trying too, okay? You know how to call me in the dorms if you find anything."
"Don't worry, boss," he joked making her roll her eyes.
"Steve?" she called again before the call would end. He was listening. "What's the woman's name?"
[...]
Elle Hopper
When she opened her eyes, the sun was just a faint light across her window. Clock said it was almost six and it had been a little over three hours since Callie last ate. El blinked a few times trying to decide if she wanted to go back to sleep or if it'd be a good idea to get up.
The past few weeks, she and Will were getting up early to run in the forest between their house and the lake trailer, because she didn't want to let go of the routine she had in camp and he wouldn't let her walk those woods alone. It helped with her cardio for games, even if she hadn't been playing hockey since the class tournament at the beginning of the month, and it was good distraction for him. Principal was right, sports were helping El with the "anger issues," so she might as well go along with it.
However, it was Saturday morning, and she didn't exactly feel like treating Saturday the same way she treated the other days of the week.
Callie made a small noise, deciding for El what to do with that morning, and she sat up on her bed and stretched yawning. It was really early and it was starting to get cold at night, so she was wearing the flannel PJs Joyce had given her for Christmas last year.
She got up and pulled the curtains, almost tripping on the box where she had put all the things Mike had given or lent to her while they were together, and the things that reminded her of him. That box was there since June and she still didn't come around to giving them back yet. The envelope with the birthday card and ring he had sent to her was recently added to the top of the pile and El had been denying to even look at the box.
El went to Callie's crib and saw that the baby was awake already, but quiet. Not that she wouldn't start wailing with hunger soon, but at the moment, she was silently laid on her small mattress, under her soft purple blanket looking up at the solar system mobile that used to be Jon's and then Will's hung above her head, blue eyes following the planets around its solar axis. El touched Callie's rosy cheek and smiled at the way the baby pouted and moved her little arms, and then she put her mind in the kitchen only a couple of rooms down, opening the fridge and getting a bottle out, getting a pan and filling it with water to boil and heat the bottle before she even got there.
Hop was sitting by the table with a mug of coffee looking beyond exhausted. Her doing domestic things using only her mind had become normal for him over a year ago, so he barely looked up to see the stove being turned on by its own. Those little domestic tasks were teaching El how to multitask, which was more than she ever did at the labs, and something she struggled with when she was away.
"You okay?" El asked, getting in the kitchen and checking to see if everything was in the right place, the bottle inside the pan with the water that was slowly starting to boil. Hop sighed.
"Just a long night, baby," he replied, finally looking up. El leaned against the sink. "We found another cocoon. Well, some teens from Indiana stumbled on it on the other side of the labs. Who knows what the fuck they were doing around here, but it scared them to death."
"To death?" she echoed. "They died?"
Despite everything, Hop smiled.
"It's just a saying," he explained. "Funny how there are things you still don't know."
El sighed.
"I've been reading a lot, and watching a bunch of TV, but I still miss on a lot," she confessed and Hop nodded sympathetically.
"But," he said pointing at her. "You have many, many friends, and that's the best way to pick up on social skills, so go El!"
She chuckled and then looked at the stove. Milk was about ready.
"You should rest, dad," she said, getting a kitchen cloth to wrap the floating bottle of milk with and then turning down the stove before getting closer to him. "Can't have you tired tomorrow."
"What about tomorrow?" Hop asked, and El stopped short, suddenly terrified that he had forgotten, and then he smiled. "I'm joking." He guaranteed, making her breathe relieved. "Of course I didn't forget about tomorrow, baby, the big day! We gotta be up early, so don't you go tiring yourself today either, huh?"
"I won't," El said. Sunday would be the last day of tryouts in Ohio for kids her age, and her last shot to make it to a team. She didn't get a call from any other team she tried for the past month. "Go get some sleep, daddy."
She kissed Hop's cheek and then headed back to her room, where Callie was starting to get a little antsy. She put the bottle down and picked up the baby, cradling her in her arms like Joyce taught her, and Hopper passed by their room going to his. Outside, the dogs were scratching at the door, so she opened it to let them in. El finally started feeding Callie and casted an interested look at the rocking chair by the window, but the dogs went all the way in the corridor and it caught her attention, so she went to take a look and saw them sit in front of the bathroom door.
Frowning, El got closer to the door already knowing who was inside. She tried to reach out, and even though it was harder without a bath, they were close enough and had a strong enough connection for it to work out at some extent. And she didn't like what she felt.
"Will?" she called quietly. She knew that he would hear. "Do you need help?"
He didn't answer. He didn't even move. It was quiet in the bathroom, but not in a good way. The dogs laid down in front of the door so El leaned against the wall and slid down to the floor, careful not to distress Callie. She would wait as long as it was necessary for Will to come out.
And it took a long time. Callie finished her bottle, and that kid was a slow eater. El put her to burp, and after that the baby still wanted to suck on something else, so she held to her big sister's hand and sucked on her knuckle while El waited for Will to get better. When Joyce got up, almost an hour later, that was the scene she faced – El on the floor with the baby and the dogs in front of the bathroom door.
"What are you doing?" she asked frowning. El looked up at Joyce.
"She really needs a pacifier," she said, letting Joyce take the baby from her arms.
"Tell me about it!" the woman said. "But what are you doing?"
El looked at the bathroom door and Molly cried. She reached out and patted the dog's fur.
"It's Will with the migraine again," she said. "He won't let me in."
"Can't you just open the lock?" Joyce wondered and El shook her head.
"He won't let me," she replied. She was stronger than Will, everyone knew, but that wasn't the only factor in that situation. "And I don't want him to force it."
She got on her knees and got closer to the door again, now with her arms free, palms against the wooden door.
"Will," she called. "Please, let us help."
"You can't help," he said, and even though his voice was really low, she still could hear him.
"What did he say?" Joyce asked.
"We can try," El replied to Will. "All you have to do is stop fighting us. Please, open the door."
For a second, it seemed like he wouldn't give in and El held her breath waiting for the worst. Will's migraines had been pretty bad the past couple of times, so bad he'd been feeling really sick. And then, when she was starting to think that there was no way they could get him out, the door unlocked and cracked open.
El stepped back, giving space for Joyce to go check on her son, and even though the smell was faint, her nostrils still burned with the acid smell of vomit, which worried her more. Oh, Will, what is happening to you?
As if they could tell that space was necessary, the dogs stepped behind El and as soon as the door was completely open they saw Will on the floor between the tub and the toilet bowl; he was covering his eyes with his arm and he wasn't moving, because it'd hurt more if he did. Joyce gasped and gave Callie to El again, rushing to aid her son.
"Jim!" she called a little desperate and then kneeled by Will's side, touching him with worried hands. "Will, baby, what are you feeling? Tell me what you're feeling."
Looking to be useful, El knocked on Joyce and Hopper's room and then opened it. Hop already had sat up on the bed and looked at her.
"It's okay, I didn't get to sleep yet anyway," he said, trying to sound funny, but he just sounded too tired for humor. Joyce called again. "The migraine?" El nodded. "We gotta take him to a hospital."
"I'm not sure hospitals will help," El told him quietly, and Hopper frowned.
"Do you know something?"
She shook her head no and stepped aside to let him pass.
"Dad?" she called and he looked back at her. "Can I skip school Tuesday to go see my mom?"
He narrowed his eyes, watching her.
"We'll talk about it later," he answered, and then joined Joyce in the bathroom to help her get Will to his room.
El called the dogs and decided to stay out of the adults' way for a while, just until they figured out what to do. She got Callie's chair and went with her and the dogs to the kitchen, where she decided to make some cocoa and Eggos that she ate with strawberry and honey before she'd go for her morning run. Maybe, if she went away for a while, when she'd come back Will would be feeling better.
By the time she finished eating, Hop already had come to take Callie to his room with him, so she went to her room and put on some comfortable clothes and sneakers for the run, tied her hair in a ponytail and got the Walkman and tape Jonathan had given to her for her birthday.
"I made breakfast," El said stopping by Will's door. Joyce was sitting by his side on the bed, but he had his back to the door as she stroked his hair lightly with a wet cloth. The room was dark and the air stuffed. She just looked at El and nodded, and then the girl went to her run.
Jonathan had made her a different mix this time, filled with jazz and blues and things he was getting used to listening to now that he was in New York, and it gave a different rhythm to her run. She ran through the usual path she and Will liked to take to get to the lake house. It passed about a mile behind the Harringtons', and then they had to follow alongside the lake to get to the house, but they never got too close because the property was theirs, but there were other people living there. When they were feeling competitive, they'd make the way in twenty minutes, but El had this blues song playing and she was in another mood.
She got to the lake's deck in half an hour and the sun was starting to peek from the top of the threes on the water. For a few minutes, she let herself breathe and think of all the things she heard last night when she tapped her supercom with the police's radio, the things about a group of teenagers scared to death because apparently a man came out of a massive cocoon found near the DOE labs almost on the edge of the city. She thought about it and about Nancy showing her a map of Indiana filled with weird lines and how one of those lines passed exactly on the edge of Hawkins, and how it seemed to matter.
But more than that, El thought about how she wanted Mike to be wrong. Everything about his campaign, though not accurate, dangerously resonated reality and if he was right again, she didn't know what to do.
The sun warmed El's skin and almost made her smile, but then she remembered that Will was home burning with fever, unable to go outside because it pained him, and so she turned on her tracks and ran back home, this time with ten fewer minutes in order to get there as fast as possible.
Joyce was in the kitchen staring at an unlit cigarette between her fingers, a mug of coffee going cold in front of her. She had quit smoking during her pregnancy (even though each day of it she claimed it'd been the hardest thing to do, because she was constantly stressed), and after Callie was born, she just didn't want to pass the smoking smell to the baby, but El wouldn't judge if she went back to that habit soon.
"How's he doing now?" El asked catching Joyce's attention. "Did he eat?"
Joyce sighed and then shook her head no. Will not eating meant that he still wasn't well enough to keep any food down. He lost some weight lately, and El knew that he was telling everyone it was because he was exercising with her, but she suspected it wasn't the only reason. And if Will wasn't healthy, strong enough, then he wouldn't be strong enough to fight when the time came.
El went to his room again. He still wasn't moving and he still had his back to the door, but she could hear his breathing now, which was more than before. She crossed the dark room with the heavy curtains to look at him and saw that there was a bowl with water on the floor, that his fingers were touching it even though his eyes were still closed. El kneeled down by his side and touched his wrist, causing him to shiver a little, startled. She held his arm with both hands, leaned against his bed.
"Will," she said softly.
His lips moved but she couldn't make out what he was saying. He was burning with a fever and the humid cloth that Joyce had put on his forehead had fell between the bed and the nightstand, so El treated to get it and use the water in the bowl to wet it again and then place it back on his forehead, all without using her hands. He needed to know he wasn't alone.
"I've got you," she told him. "You're not alone, I've got you."
With closed eyes, he still mumbled, and slowly, patiently, she was starting to make sense of what he was saying.
"…Or dream - dream again -, dream of a silence, a dream silence, full of murmurs - I don't know, that's all words -, never wake - all words, there's nothing else -. You must go on, that's all I know."
Samuel Beckett. Will's copies of The Trilogy were the most beating down books El had ever seen, and she only read them once, afraid they'd fall in crumbles in her hands, but those last words always stuck with her as the closest to understanding literature she's gotten.
"I can't go on," Will said, his voice cracking. El held his hand tighter, her fingers touching the water too.
"You must go on," she said back.
His eyes cracked open just the littlest bit and looked for the source of the voice and the smallest of the reliefs passed by his body when he focused on her. Will shivered.
"Hey, twinsie," he said, and this time El really smiled. Hi, brother.
El took a quick shower and spent a long time trying to tie her hair the way Jennifer had taught her, trying to give it some volume. Last time she cut her hair was November, and it was getting long again, but she wasn't sure she wanted to cut it off again. When she was happy enough with the result, she chose a pair of jeans that was a little ripped on the knees, a red loose top and her black Chucks before going back to Will's room to choose one of his jackets. She picked a leather one of The Clash that wasn't too big for her.
"What are you doing?" Will asked, his voice weak and El looked at him smiling.
"Getting ready for work," she answered. She knew what he was going to say – that she didn't have a job today, and that she should be getting ready for tomorrow, but before he could say anything she already was out of his room.
Joyce was in the living room cleaning, probably because that was the only thing she could do as she waited for Will to get better.
"I'm going downtown," El informed and Joyce looked at her confused. "I'll see if Solomon lets me work in Will's place today."
"What?" the woman exclaimed, dropping the cushion she was changing. "Why?"
"I have nothing to do today!" she explained. "And I know we can't lose money, so I'm going. Plus, if I'm Will's replacement, they can't replace him. Right?"
Joyce frowned.
"I don't know where you got that idea, but okay, see if it works. But know it might not."
"I know, mom," El replied with a smile and opened the door. "I'll be back in a few hours."
El got Will's old bike from the shed. He'd been hardly using it since he outgrown it a little, and now he was more of a roller skates person anyway. She cut through Mirkwood and made it downtown in a record time of eighteen minutes. On foot, it'd easily be a half hour walk. El left the bike in the alley behind the store and got in through the back door.
"Byers?" she heard Solomon call from the store.
"No," she replied. "Hopper."
Will's boss's head appeared on the door that separated the back to the front of the store and he was frowning under all that hair.
"What the hell?"
"Will is sick," El told him. "Can I stay in his place today? We really need the money."
Solomon seemed to consider for a moment, and then he stepped in the back room, his confused frown turned into a worried stare.
"He's been getting sick regularly. Maybe he shouldn't be working."
El panicked a little inside, but kept her front.
"Please, don't even think about it! He loves this job, and I promise you he doesn't want to quit at all. Just let me work when he's not here, so we can keep the money?"
The boss sighed.
"What do you even know about music, Ellie?"
El shrugged.
"I live with Will and Jonathan Byers, I dated Mike Wheeler. My best friend is Dustin Henderson," she argued in her favor and Solomon sighed again. "I'm a jock."
"Okay, you made your point," he cut her. "We can try having you here today, as a test," he said and she smiled. "And only because your baby sister is the cutest baby I've ever seen. If you do well, we'll talk. But just know it's hard to top your brother, he's the best salesman I've ever had."
"I'll let you know charm runs in the family," El said, taking off the jacket and heading to the front of the store. She stopped at the door and Solomon shook his head. "Where do I start?"
"We got a bunch of blues albums a couple of days ago from Detroit," he told her. "And we still didn't put everything in place yet. The boxes are behind the counter, you can start with them." El nodded. "Ellie," Solomon called again. "Will's been getting sick a lot lately, even when he actually makes it to work. He fakes well, but I notice. You don't think… he's got some cancer, do you?"
Nothing like that, no, El thought, but the words failed to come out, in part because he kind of did have some sort of cancer, if one looked at it clinically. It just wasn't something medicine could treat. So she shook her head denying it.
"It's just a high fever, don't worry," she guaranteed, and it was easy to tell that Solomon didn't completely believe her, but at least he let it go.
El needed a little over an hour to finish putting all the albums in their places in the blues section and another forty minutes organizing the sales table by artists. There was a bunch of old and diverse stuff in that table and she was having fun. At the end of her second hour, still no clients around, Solomon asked her what she wanted to eat and he ordered burgers from the new steak house that had taken over Benny's old place, and they took turns eating in the back.
Her first client came after lunch bringing along a talkative six year old that El adored.
"Ellie!" Holly exclaimed as soon as they crossed the front door. El smiled.
"Where's Will?" Mike asked frowning and El looked at him.
"He's got a fever," she told him, giving away as little detail as possible. "So I'm the replacement."
"Fair," he commented and then looked down, because Holly was desperately pulling his hand trying to catch his attention. "What is it?"
She raised her arms, reaching for him.
"I can't see!" Holly exclaimed, jumping in place to emphasize that he should take her in his arms and Mike did so and put her sitting on the counter. "Much better."
"You know you're getting too big for laps, right?" he argued and his little sister shook her head so seriously it was funny.
"I'm not," she assured and then turned to El. "Your hair is really pretty today," she said taking one of El's strands in her tiny hand.
"Thank you, Hol," El replied. "Maybe I can teach you how to do your hair like this someday, huh?"
Holly's eyes lit up.
"Would you?" she asked and El nodded.
"Of course!"
"Cool!" Holly exclaimed prolonging her vowels. "Oh, Ellie, it's good you're here because I have a serious question for you."
"Oh, wow. Okay," El stood straighter. "Shoot."
Holly sat straighter too, head high. She was in business mode, and the only time that happened was during-
"What's your favorite Star Wars movie?" she asked and El smiled. She knew it.
"Easy. The return of the Jedi," she answered and Holly seemed satisfied with the answer.
"That's my favorite too," Holly told El. Not that she didn't know it already. "I'm hoping you and Will still want to participate with us, right?"
"Holly's Halloween?" El asked and the little girl nodded. "Of course we want to! Hol, it's an honor to be part of your plans."
Holly smiled and blushed, but she quickly shook it off, going back to her professional posture.
"Great, because you're my Leia and Will is my Luke. I need you both. The fantasies will be inspired by episode VI, and if you have trouble finding anything, my mom can help, okay?"
El nodded.
"Yes, ma'am," she said. "Everything will be perfect for your favorite night."
"I hope so," the little blonde sighed. "Everything's been so weird."
El and Mike exchanged a look and then looked at Holly again. El clapped her hands.
"I assume you guys came here to find some neat music for the best night of the year, huh?" she said going around the counter. "Now, I know you already have the whole Star Wars soundtrack, so why not put something else in the mix, what do you think? We got a bunch of new stuff this week."
"Suggestions, Ellie?" Holly asked crossing her legs Indian style on the counter.
"You betcha!" El replied excitedly. "In fact, I saw something today that you might like, Mike," she said sorting through the blues section. "I thought it'd take longer to arrive because it's really clique-ish, but…"
She found the album and showed the cover to Mike, who raised an eyebrow impressed.
"Eddie Guitar Burns?" he exclaimed taking the album she was offering. "How do you know about him?"
"Jonathan," she explained. "He made this jazz and blues tape for me and I can't stop listening to it. In fact!"
El opened her hand and Mike placed the album on her palm. She walked to the record player and got the record out, checking to see which side was A or B before placing it and the needle in the exact place she wanted. As soon as it was set, she started talking again.
"One of the songs of the mix is here."
She hit play and the disc started to circle, and then the song started to play. You got to love me with a feeling, baby, Big Ed would start singing, and run your fingers all through my hair. It was the kind of song Lexi would call "sexy" and El couldn't help but to start dancing.
Holly giggled and El took Mike's hand, leading him to dance too.
You got to hurt me with a feeling, baby, and let me know that your love is real. If you don't have that feeling, and then this love affair ain't going nowhere…
Suddenly, they were too close and the lyrics were too personal, and even though El tried her hardest not to look in Mike's eyes, that's what she ended up doing – and regretting immediately.
They stopped dancing and just stood there in the middle of the store, one of his hands on her waist, the other holding hers, and her other hand was on his shoulder and for a second it was like old times, except that El soon remembered Spencer Hall in her beautiful black dress standing this close to Mike and she had to step back.
"I think…" Mike started and looked at Holly, who was looking from him to El and frowning. "Uh… I will take the album. And we can come back another day to find more music, right Fozzie?"
Holly nodded, but it was easy to tell that she wasn't sure he was talking to her. El turned off the music and got the disc for Mike in silence, then, finding it best to stay quiet before she could say something stupid – like how she had a box filled with his things by her window that she wasn't able to be rid of because she still wanted him back, even though she shouldn't have to.
He paid for the album and helped Holly down from the counter.
"You have the tryouts tomorrow, right?" he asked already half turned to the door. El nodded. "Nervous?"
"Very," she answered and he smiled.
"You shouldn't be. You're great."
"Thanks," El said and Mike nodded.
"You did finish the writing exercise, right?" he asked and she swallowed.
"It isn't for Monday, is it?" Mike shook his head.
"Wednesday," he told her and she nodded relieved. She could postpone that torture for a couple more days.
"Yeah, sure," she replied, though she had to admit it wasn't very convincing.
"Okay," Mike said taking Holly's hand. "I guess I'll see you soon. Good luck tomorrow."
"Good luck, Ellie!" Hol exclaimed and El smiled and waved.
"Thanks, guys," she replied, her voice was a little weak. It was barely two and already such an eventful day.
El had to prepare her mind, because there was so much more to come in the following days; she only knew how to begin: by waking up at 4 a.m. the next morning and going with Hop to Ohio to find herself a team, and even so her plan only covered Sunday and she didn't know how to handle the rest of the day yet.
Near the closing hour, and after a couple of successful sales that got Solomon nodding impressed, their last customer arrived. El didn't see her come in because she had gone through the back to take the trash out, but as soon as she crossed the door, she heard her.
"Then what happened?" the girl asked.
Solomon sighed dramatically.
"Maria Alessandra, I don't know."
El went to the front of the store and saw Lexi leaning on the counter. She had her long, long black hair loose on her shoulders and a blue beret on and she looked at El with a mix of confusion and surprise.
"Lexi?" El called, and her friend smiled. "You're looking for Will?"
"Yeah," she answered. "I just had my last class of the day and he usually walks me home. What happened?"
"He's got a fever," El told her and Lexi nodded.
"Did he check on that immune system? Because he gotta," she said and El shrugged.
"I'm just about leaving," she told Lexi. "I know it's not the same, but I can walk with you today."
"Really?" Lexi exclaimed, sounding genuinely glad. Truth was, the two girls barely had time together lately – and even before that, in part because El was still trying to avoid Lexi, but she knew she would have to let it go eventually, right? She nodded.
"Sure. Just give me five minutes."
Lexi nodded and spent that time going over the sales albums in the central table of the store. When the clock hit five, she went outside and waited for El on the sidewalk, and then the two girls started the walk home together.
"I have fruit rollups, you want some?" Lexi offered awkwardly. Because of the gymnastic classes she always carried a big bag with all kinds of stuff. At first, El thought about refusing the rollups, but she was a sucker for sugary treats, so she accepted one.
"Sometimes I think I might want to work in a candy factory, like Willy Wonka's," El confessed staring at her delicious fruit mix and Lexi chuckled.
"Why?" she asked. "I mean, you could be anything." El sighed.
"Yeah, but sometimes I just want for things to be boring, you know? To have a simple life in a cute cul de sac house with uneventful winters."
"Uh," Lexi scoffed. "Like Mike's house, you say?"
"I didn't say that," El replied too fast and Lexi raised an eyebrow. "And he doesn't have uneventful winters."
"Ellie," Lexi said stopping. El stopped too, balancing Will's bike with one hand. "It's okay if you still like him, you know?"
"I'm not talking about that," El said firmly.
"Why not?" Lexi insisted. "You know I still think that you two breaking up was bullshit! What's wrong with admitting that it was a mistake?"
"He moved on, Lexi, and so am I!"
"The fuck you are," she said scoffing again and El started walking again, but she stopped less than two meters after.
"You want to know why I didn't call during the summer?" she practically screamed to the girl catching up with her. "Because I blamed you. I still do."
Lexi stopped short, mouth ajar.
"Me? You blame me for your breakup?" she exclaimed baffled. "Me, who told you all the way that you shouldn't listen to Jennifer freaking out? You ghosted me instead of the girl who kept raising doubt about your feelings for your boyfriend just because she couldn't admit to herself that she fell in love with a geek?"
"Yes."
"In what kind of messed up planet does that make sense?" Lexi screamed too, hands in the air.
El swallowed.
"Jennifer didn't tell Mike," she explained trying to control her voice. "You did."
Lexi put her hands on her hips and frowned.
"I told him so he wouldn't freak out," she said and this time El was the one who scoffed.
"You went behind my back, Lexi, and you caused the exact opposite!" El said, feeling the control escape her. She really should put her life in order, because she was starting to lose it. And by 'it' she meant 'sanity'. Was this what being a teenager was supposed to be? "I was gonna tell him. But instead you did, and there went all my chances of getting him to see clearly. You fucked it up for us, Lexi, and I had a real hard time letting it go."
Lexi seemed balanced, maybe because El hardly ever put that many words together so angrily.
"I never wan-" she started, but El cut her off.
"I know you didn't." She assured. "But it was exactly what happened. I know you thought you were in the right to tell him because you're friends with the boys now, but you don't know Mike."
El had to take a deep breath and then another. That wasn't what she had planned for that end of day, and the sun was starting to set. They weren't even halfway home yet and she wouldn't pass through Mirkwood at night, so add another ten minutes to her ride home.
"Ellie, I'm sorry," Lexi said to El's back, because she already was pushing the bike down the street again. "But it was very fucked up of you to shut me out like that. You think I don't know you only called me in my quinces because Nancy Wheeler told you so? Were you really going to completely ignore the most important day for me?"
"I don't know," El replied without looking at her. "Maybe."
They walked in silence for several minutes, no one daring to open their mouth and start another argument. El wondered if that was what Karen meant when she talked about girl friends drama last New Year's Eve. And she knew that she was being a little irrational, because Lexi was awesome and she really cared about her, but there were some things that blurred all the edges, making you not see straight. They reached the park in front of Lexi's house.
"I'm sorry I snapped," El said staring at the front wheel of the bike. "And I'm sorry I'm such a shitty friend."
"Well, I do have a really hard time understanding you, because you're so damn mysterious, but I'm sorry too," Lexi replied and they looked at each other and smiled.
"I didn't want to flip out, but I'm having some real trouble with English and writing and it's driving me a little mad," El continued. "Also, I didn't get selected by any hockey team so far, which makes me think I'm a fraud, and even if I get something tomorrow, if I don't get my grades up by midterms I'll be cut anyway, and it's really fucking hard to shake off the two Fs I already have."
"Where did you get Fs?" Lexi asked shocked. "Writing?" El nodded. "That's bullshit."
"No, it's not," El corrected. "I suck, Lexi. Like, I'm really fucking terrible at it."
"But you're such an avid reader! And you're musically talented. What the fuck?"
El shrugged, leaving the question hang. They stopped in front of Lexi's house and so she hopped on the bike. Lexi touched her wrist lovingly.
"You know what, focus on one thing at a time," she advised. "It's what I try to do when I see I'm about to break. First the tryouts tomorrow. And once you get in a team you have an extra reason to try your best in school too."
El balanced the words in her head and nodded.
"That's actually good advice," she commented and Lexi smiled.
"I know, right?" she exclaimed. "I should start charging."
They hugged and said goodbye, and El felt a lot better about Lexi now that she'd gotten everything that was on her chest out. She went home and arrived just in time for dinner, and the best part was that Will was up and talking, and he sat to eat with them. He thanked her for replacing him when she handed him his check of the week and they all sat together to watch a Hallmark movie, but El barely made it to the first forty minutes. Hop had to carry her to her bed and set her alarm to 4 a.m.. Good thing she had prepared all her hockey apparel the previous day, because it'd be a stress to put everything together last minute.
By the end of the weekend, the two hour drive back was of excitement and happy songs. El got picked for the same team as Jennifer, which meant that she had company to come and go in every practice. Hop was all the way talking about El being "drafted", but she was picked last, so the wording felt a little strong.
She wouldn't tell him that, though, especially because with all the excitement, Hopper let her skip class Tuesday to go to Indianapolis to see her mother. El also guessed that it wouldn't be a good thing to kill the mood by giving him her second F of the semester for him to sign, so that was postponed too.
Between busy weekends and a hellish Monday with almost crying crisis in the middle of fifth period, El made it to Tuesday practically unscathed. She woke up early to catch a ride with Joyce to the bus station and sat outside with her English/writing notebook to try and come up with that damn essay due tomorrow.
It was simple narrative, at least a thousand words about a naughty kitten which wasn't exactly long or supposedly hard, but she simply didn't have it in her, El was sure. She couldn't bring herself to put the words together and create a story, it was just so damn hard for her to simply talk to people, let alone write!
Growing up, she didn't have books and enough interaction to develop that part of her brain. They taught her how to read and write, had her develop her linguistics cognition, but they never, ever pushed her to create for herself, never allowed her any imagination. After a while, she just didn't know what to imagine.
El flipped the pages of her notebook until she found the paper she was supposed to fill in case she decided to quit the creative writing class. She had gone as far as filling all the blanks, but she still hadn't brought herself to ask for Hopper to sign it, just like the last essay she failed and was shoved somewhere down her backpack. She wished she could do the same with English too. Why couldn't she just take Spanish? It was so much simpler.
A man sat by El's side and he smelled weird, so she looked up at him. He was all dirty, with ratty clothes and for some reason he looked familiar. He was trembling, as if he had a cold, and El observed him for a while, not really bothered with the smell. That too was familiar.
His mouth was moving, but there wasn't any sound coming out. Despite the warm sun outside, he kept rubbing his hands on his arms and then his stomach, and it occurred to her that maybe he was hungry. El had saved some Eggos for the trip, but she could make more when she got to her mother's, so she reached for her backpack on the floor and got the paper bag with the waffles and offered it to him. The man didn't show any sign of reaching for the bag, just rocking back and forth manically, and it worried her.
"Are you hungry, sir?" El asked, trying to keep her voice soft so she wouldn't startle him. "You can have my Eggos."
As if her words had turned the volume up, the man's words started to make better sense too and she could make out some.
"…it is, as always, plotting, scheming, working, fighting. Plotting, scheming, working, fighting. Communism isn't sleeping; it is, as always…"
El frowned, goosebumps going up her arms and spine and a worry beyond herself. She knew those words, knew where she heard them. They had followed her through every test they ran ever since she was really little.
"Sir?" she called again.
The man rubbed one hand with the other shivering, his words unrecognizable again as he shivered more and more, so El dared to reach out and touch his shoulder and, as expected, he jumped at the contact, grabbing the bench they were sitting on for dear life.
Immediately, everything got cold, as cold as his body felt under her touch, or more, and El watched with wide eyes the bench turning into ice inch by inch. She got on her feet with a jump, afraid of being iced too and unsure of what to do. At that very moment, the bus for Indianapolis stopped right in front of them and a couple of people got out, including the driver. The man kept talking.
"Can't get warm because it's a cold, cold war and the cold war isn't thawing," he said and El shook her head.
If she focused, she'd look at her watch and know how much time exactly she had until the bus would start off to Indianapolis, but at that moment all she had in mind was to put her things back in her bag and get as far away from him as possible, an instinct almost physical of stepping back, like when-
El paused in shock, letting her copy of Emma fall on the ground noisily. The man stopped talking and she looked up at him again, dread taking over her body. His eyes locked on hers and recognition washed over him, making him, for the first time, look normal, even if he was the center of an ice bomb and everything around him was frozen. He blinked and his hands relaxed on the bench.
"Eleven," he said looking right at El and she had never in her life levitated something so fast like she made that book come back to her hands, her stomach tight with tension. "Gosh, how have you grown," he continued tilting his head a little. He frowned. "How long has it been?"
The wind blew softly, bringing along a whisper. El looked around and up at the trees across the street, and down the streets where people fixed the front of their stores or looked for a place to go and whispered.
They were coming.
"It got me," he said looking down. "The monster. I thought I died."
"We all did," El said. Except that she didn't, really. Papa never told her. And he was one of the nicest with her back in the labs.
He looked up at her again and smiled. Now that she was actually looking at him, he looked healthy, strong. He was just dirty, and the smell… it was something like… blood. El swallowed.
"Shepherd, what happened?"
Shepherd didn't answer and looked down the street, his eyes taking in the place he was in. The driver of the bus came back with a cup of coffee in his hand and opened the door to let the people in. And then Shepherd smiled.
"It's okay," he said. "They're coming for me."
That didn't sound good, to be honest, and El heard his name in the wind again. They were close. The driver turned on the bus and her guts told her that as far and as safe as possible right now would be her mother's home in Indianapolis, and so she rushed to hop in the bus the way it was planned all along, hoping that the forty minute drive would pass in a jiff.
El jumped off the bus in a neighbor community, the closest stop to the Ives's home, and she had never made that distance so fast, running for dear life through the busy suburban streets until she reached the odd neighborhood her family spent their whole lives in. Aunt Becky's car wasn't in the front because she was working and El left the door open as she rushed inside, leaving jackets and backpacks on the way to the back yard, where her mother would most likely be, shouting for the woman who could provide her some answers.
"MOM?" El called over and over and she almost collided with Terry on the way out the kitchen door. The woman held her shoulders with both hands, to help her keep her balance.
"Jane!" Terry exclaimed. "I thought you'd come after class."
"Mom, you have to tell me what's going on," El said right away, no small talk this time. "I know that you know, so please, please tell me what to do!"
"Baby," Terry sighed and pushed El's sweaty hair back lovingly. She was so out of breath, and if she hadn't been doing all that cardio work with Will, there was no way she'd be standing in front of her mother right now.
El's heart tightened with the thought of Will. He was fine now, but…
"Please, mommy," she pleaded and Terry gave her the faintest of the smiles. There was a streak of dirt on her neck and El suspected that she was working on her garden.
"I made some lemonade," she said. "Why don't you go sit down while I get us some, huh?"
Processing things slower now that the adrenalin was wearing off, El nodded and looked over the back porch, where there was a rocking bench. She stumbled toward it feeling lightheaded. With the whole thing with Shepherd, she didn't even eat the food she'd brought and now she regretted leaving the backpack inside the house.
"The front door," El said sitting down. "It's open."
She heard the sound of the door being shut loudly and then her mother's small kitten jumped on her lap without warning. El was still so not used to cats liking her that it took a moment for her to relax and start petting him. He had a black collar now with a tag on it, and he was really sweet, even when he bit her with those sharp little teeth.
"Casper," El read on the tag. "Like the friendly ghost?"
"I used to love those cartoons when I was little," Terry said, showing up with a tray with two glasses of juice and some sandwiches that she set on the wooden box improvised as a table.
"But he's black and white," El observed and her mom shrugged.
"So?"
They smiled and then Terry got the glasses of juice, offered one to El who gladly accepted it. The drink was extra cold, which helped her body temperature to drop faster after all that running. She chose a sandwich – even though they were all the same cheese, tomato and mayonnaise flavor – and only started talking again when she already was halfway through it, feeling that her ideas were all in place.
"Do you remember Roscoe Grayson?" she asked and Terry froze, avoiding looking at her for a second too long. "Nancy's boyfriend, Steve, met him in Orlando earlier this month. He recognized you in a photo."
Terry said nothing, so El decided to continue.
"He also recognized a woman he called Moira Flint, do you know her?" she took a sip of her juice without taking her eyes off her mother, who just stared at her. "She lives in New Jersey now, apparently, and she's a medium. Jonathan consulted with her, said she seems legit."
No response.
"You obviously heard the calls, knew about the incubators," El continued. "You knew they were coming, that's what you meant when I came here before camp, wasn't it?"
El bit on her sandwich again and chewed slowly, going over everything she gathered.
"The incubators," she said, mouth half full. "They were there, but they are showing up here, and everyone think they're cocoons, but that's not quite right, is it?"
Her glass was empty, so she put it back on the tray, used the free hand to pet Casper again.
"Those people were dead, mom, I saw them dead and gone," El said firmly, looking at her mother. "But those incubators brought them back, transformed them. Didn't they? And that's not the work of an ordinary monster."
"Nor an ordinary person," Terry spoke for the first time and El stared at her.
"I need you to give me more, mom," she pleaded. "What is going on? Who are they?"
Terry raised an eyebrow.
"You tell me," she nodded and El drew in a breath. She didn't want to say it, as if saying would somehow make it real. She sucked it up.
"Mike called it the Thessalmonster," she said and her mother hummed with a little humor. "What's funny?"
"That's the same dungeons thing you kids used before to figure out what was going on, right?" Terry asked and El nodded. "Yeah, he liked to create those fantasy worlds in his head, but there wasn't such a thing as D&D in our time."
El frowned.
"Who's he?"
Terry shrugged and patted El's knee.
"No one important, sweetheart. Why do you think I'll have any answers to your questions?"
"Because you're my mom and you know everything," El replied. Terry smiled and shook her head. Casper jumped back to the ground, already tired of the women's company. "Mom, I really need help. Those people, the ones who are coming back, they were taken by the Demogorgon. Like Will."
"And?" Terry encouraged. El sighed.
"And he's sick. He was fine, but he's sick now and we don't know why. It's something medicine can't help with, I'm certain. But…" she looked at her mother sadly, and Terry touched her face with care, her thumb tracing her cheekbone softly. "Why is he sick, mom?"
Terry hummed again.
"Oh, my beautiful Jane…" she sighed. "Why did you come here and tell me all those things?"
El shrugged.
"I just thought…" she looked down, stared at her mother's necklace. It was one of those necklaces with that little case where you put photos. Terry had never shown her the photos she'd put inside. "I think it's all connected, that's why."
Terry nodded and El looked at her again.
"Even your friend-"
"Brother," El corrected.
"Brother being sick?" the girl nodded. Terry offered her a sad smile. "Then I'm afraid you already know why this is happening to him."
If she listened closely, El would be able to hear her heart breaking in a million pieces. She wanted so badly to be wrong, the way she wanted Mike to be wrong, and the way she wanted everything to be a bad dream like the ones that were becoming rarer and rarer in her sleep.
No such luck.
"What do we do, mom? We can't lose him."
"You're right, you can't," Terry agreed. "And the best part is, you still have time. The turning, it's a long process. There's time."
"You think?" El asked, for the first time feeling a little bit of hope.
"I know, baby."
El breathed. How did such trivial thing became such a challenge?
"Now think," Terry continued. "What stopped the change before?"
The girl frowned, trying to remember.
"I wasn't here," she said, going over all she heard about the year she was M.I.A. and they all had to face monsters alone. "There was a demon, a… displacer? That attacked their friend Max, but she wasn't hit." El stopped, wide eyed. "Oh, my God. The displacer's venom! It was supposed to kill a person, but Will didn't die. It neutralized the thessal!" she held her mother's hand. "Am I right? Please, tell me I'm right."
"You might be on the right path, yes," Terry said smiling to her daughter.
"If we get some more displacer venom, maybe we can help Will."
"You can buy more time, for sure, but I don't think it'll solve the problem," Terry said, making El's hope falter a little. "You'll still have to find a way to stop him from turning, and I'm afraid I don't know how."
El sighed.
"Yeah, me neither," she confessed.
"Hey, Janey," Terry called softly and El looked at her. "You'll figure it out, baby. You're smart, and you can do this."
El took a deep breath and let it out slowly. She was still hungry, so she got herself another of those sandwiches.
"I just really want for everything to be fine, you know?" she said looking at her own hands, and Terry rubbed her shoulder.
"I know, sweetheart," she said. "And it's that will you have that will push you forward to a solution."
"You think?" El asked pouting.
"Baby, I'm certain," Terry guaranteed, and that felt like enough for now.
There still was a lot to be done, but if El had learned one thing in her life it was to take one step at a time. That was the only way to keep walking – one step at a time.
"Now," Terry interrupted El's thoughts. "Tell me about that creative writing class you're taking."
Before she could stop herself, El started to laugh, and if she sounded a little hysterical, well, it was because she was desperate.
"Oh," she said, struggling to catch her breath. "Oh, boy. It's going to shit."
And despite herself, Terry laughed too.
a/n: just fyi, the quote Shepherd keeps repeating is Nixon's. Thank you for reading and I'm waiting for your review ^^
