When Joyce returned later that night, she found the pair on the front porch. Hopper was seated in a chair from their dining room table, El sideways in his lap. Her pajama bundled legs hung over his knees, and though the man had her sitting upright, she was fast asleep against him.
"Hey," the woman greeted simply, leaning against the side of the cabin.
Jim had dark circles under his eyes, but mustered as much energy as he could to smile wearily at her. "Hey. How was Melvalds?"
"Slow. We always are on Sunday's. How's she been?" Joyce asked, gesturing to the sleeping child.
"Is she finally out?" the man said, looking down at El for confirmation. "Thank God. Her cough has been really bad. Being outside is the only thing that's helped."
"How much has she slept?"
"Off and on all day, not longer than an hour or so at a time though."
"And what about you?"
He laughed then, slightly jostling the girl who was practically dead weight. "No idea. I don't remember the last time I had an uninterrupted night's sleep."
"Why don't you rest for a while? I'll sit with her."
Jim wanted, really did intend to tell the woman no, but the offer of even the slightest possibility of sleep was too tempting. The last time he was this tired was when Sara was a newborn, and he'd been equally as terrified. But he'd had Diane, and now-to an extent, he supposed-he had Joyce. "Let me try and get her in bed."
The woman held the door for him, and Eleven groaned and coughed in his arms but didn't wake up. Hopper used her double socked feet to bump open her bedroom door, slowly easing her into bed. The process was slow; the girl clung to him, so he had to sit on the mattress with her until her grip loosened and she relaxed into her pillow. Jim knew she was out again when he slowly stood up and instead of moving towards his recently vacated spot, El rolled in the opposite direction, quickly locating her bear and bringing it to her chest. He'd noticed early on that if the girl wasn't being held while she was asleep, then she wanted something to hold. Before he'd dug the bear out from under the crawl space, Hopper often found the girl clutching a balled up blanket or one of her pillows while she slept. He was aware that she was growing up and quickly approaching an age that was considered too old to play with toys, but El didn't know that, and if a stuffed animal offered her comfort, especially regarding sleep, Jim wasn't about to discourage it.
"What time is it? When do you need to be home?" The man asked as he shut Eleven's bedroom door most of the way.
"It's not even eight. I called Jonathan before I left and he's at home with Will, I told them I'd be back by midnight." Joyce explained.
Hopper's heart almost leapt out of his chest at the prospect of that much sleep. Hopefully El wouldn't wake him when she inevitably woke. Hopefully her cough wouldn't be too bad. Hopefully she wouldn't throw anything at Joyce.
And suddenly he was second guessing himself. "You know, you really don't have to, you should go home and see your boys, you've been gone all day."
"Hey, whatever you're worried about I can handle. And besides, if I can't, you'll be right here to help."
The man sighed. "I'm afraid she might hurt you. Accidentally."
"Hop, I really think everything will be alright. I'll come get you if I need anything and I'll wake you before I leave. Now go get some sleep!" Joyce said, pushing him playfully towards the back room he'd recently made his own.
"Okay, okay." he said, obeying. Before he closed the curtain that was his door, he smiled gratefully at the woman. "Thank you."
"Don't worry about it. Sweet dreams."
Hopper thought he'd have trouble falling asleep, that his racing thoughts about El would keep him awake, but his exhaustion was too overpowering, and he was out as soon as his head hit the pillow.
True to her word, Joyce dragged the remaining chair into Eleven's room and kept a vigil at her bedside. Hop had been right, her cough was bad. The woman opened the window in an attempt to bring some cold air in, and propped the girl almost upright, which eased her hacking slightly. El still had one hell of a fever, so Joyce periodically wet a washcloth and held it to her forehead, her cheeks, her chest. During one such occasion the child woke slightly, eyes fluttering open and landing on the woman with a frown. She wanted to speak, to ask where Hopper was, but she couldn't. Her throat was on fire, her head was pounding, she was freezing cold, her bones felt like they were made of rocks, and she was so, so itchy.
"Hi, baby," Joyce said, smoothing a stringy curl behind her ear and cupping her cheek. "Hop is here, he's just sleeping in his room. He needed a nap, too."
Apparently the information was sufficient enough, because El allowed her eyes to close, but not before placing her own hand on top of Joyce's to ensure she kept it there.
The next time the girl woke was less than an hour later, when Joyce was startled awake by an odd sound. She'd fallen asleep sitting in the chair beside El's bed, and could already feel the knot in her neck when she raised her head. The lamp was still on, but it took Joyce a minute to spot the girl under the covers, moving frantically underneath them. At first she thought Eleven was trembling from fever, but when she pulled back the blankets, she found the child furiously scratching her skin, her fingertips red with blood. Her breaths came sharply and her eyes were closed tight; she was still asleep.
"Shit," Joyce muttered to herself, searching for the washcloth that was somewhere in the bed. She found it and ran it under the cold bathroom tap, retrieving the lotion next to the sink before returning to the bedroom and quickly snagging the child's blankets. Eleven lay in a tight ball in the center of the mattress, the sheets flocked with specks of blood as she scratched her skin raw. Her whole body was covered in spots now, many of them bleeding. She was forced to stop itching, however, unable to continue when she began shivering violently.
"Can you try to sit up for me, honey?" Joyce asked as she dabbed at some of the blood on her bare arms, legs, and stomach. El's eyes finally opened and she took in the scene around her. Joyce was with her in her bedroom, which meant Hopper was still sleeping. Her skin felt like tingling sparks trying to ignite a fire, and as much as she wanted the man to be here with her, she knew how tired he was, too. With Joyce's help, El managed to weakly pull herself upright, but only for a second before collapsing back onto the pillows.
"I'm sorry sweetie, I know you're cold. I'll be quick." she said, dabbing lotion on the worst of Eleven's bumps.
The girl flinched at the cold substance but soon found it soothing to her raging rash. Joyce finished just as Eleven started coughing, a dry bark that hardly left time for her to breathe. The woman didn't want her to choke or throw up, and she didn't want her to wake up Hopper, either. When a few sips of water and further pillow propping didn't help, Joyce forced El to her feet and they stumbled to the open window, the girl taking shallow breaths of fresh, cold air. It took a few minutes of Joyce patting her back and soothing her softly before Eleven started to feel better, slowly collapsing into the woman when she could no longer stand. Together they slid to the floor, backs pressed against the wall below the window.
Joyce finally spoke when El's coughing had mostly subsided. "Do you want some water, sweetheart?"
The child nodded into her shoulder, only her wheezing breaths audible. The woman helped her the short distance back to bed, attempting to pass her the cup on the nightstand. Instead, El pushed herself up on one elbow and opened her mouth, waiting for Joyce to tip the glass forward for her.
And Hop thinks I coddle the boys, the woman thought as she helped the girl drink slowly, taking raspy breaths between each sip. She leaned back into her pillows when she was finished, eyelids fluttering tiredly.
"You can go back to sleep, honey, I'll be right here." Joyce told her, feeling the child's forehead and cheeks for a fever. El was warm, but not too bad; she'd just take one of the blankets off after the girl fell asleep.
Her throat was too raw to respond, so Eleven could only nod and find the woman's hand, squeezing it once before letting her eyes close again. She rested peacefully for another hour or so before Joyce decided to peel herself away to check the time. She was putting on her coat and looking for paper to leave a note when Hopper pulled the shower curtain that served as his door aside and stumbled out, rubbing sleep from his eyes. He peeked in on El without even really seeing her before acknowledging Joyce's presence.
"How long's she been asleep?" he nearly muttered before taking a long drink of water straight from the kitchen tap.
"Maybe an hour or so, she's been awake off and on since you went to sleep."
"Thanks again for staying with her, I appreciate it. I needed the nap." the man said as he sat heavily at their rickety little table, lighting a cigarette.
"I'm off tomorrow, I can watch her so you can go to the station." Joyce offered.
Hopper just smiled and ran a hand through his hair. "I'd seriously be screwed without you, you know."
"You don't have to keep telling me." she said, patting his shoulder before checking in on El again one more time.
She hadn't expected the child to have moved, but upon opening the door, saw her legs thrashing underneath the covers. Joyce thought maybe she was scraching herself again, but when she sat beside the child, she instead found her in the middle of a nightmare. She was crying out, trying to speak but unable to form the words.
"El, sweetheart," Joyce said as she sat on the bed next to her. "You're just having a bad dream."
Hopper overheard and was at the foot of the bed immediately, trying to calm the girl's restless legs. "We're right here, kiddo, you just gotta wake up."
The child shot upright suddenly and scanned the room frantically, as if someone important was missing from it. The words tore painfully from her throat before she had time to consider them. "Where is she?"
"Where's who, baby?" Joyce asked, hugging the girl as if to prove that she was there.
Eleven was focused on the woman who's arms were wrapped tightly around her, and wouldn't have spoken again had she noticed the man at the end of the bed. "My sister."
A strange expression overtook Joyce's face before Hopper's voice startled her back to reality. "Your what?"
The girl glanced at him fleetingly, fearfully, before burying her face into the woman's lap. The adults exchanged concerned looks and tried to get El to open up again, but she'd glued herself to Joyce and resorted to a catotonic state that was pretty typical following a nightmare. This one shook Jim though; Eleven had never, ever mentioned a sibling. He'd never even considered the idea, but now here it was, creeping into his head, just another thing to worry about regarding this damn kid. Why hadn't this occured to him sooner? Of course there had to have been other children at the Lab, why the hell else had she been labled with a number? They had to keep track of them somehow without establishing a connection.
Eleven. His mind reeled at the number. That meant there were at least ten others before her, and who the hell knows how many after. How could he have been so blind, so inconsiderate? He hadn't even asked her-though he didn't fault himself too hard on that one. On the rare occasions he'd questioned El about anything regarding the Lab, she either provided him with very little information that raised more questions than it answered, or she said nothing at all and closed off completely. It was late and she was sick and exhausted, but Hopper knew that this could not go undiscussed. Jim was overwhelmed with more emotions than he could name; he cursed under his breath and left the room, taking his ciragette out the front door with him.
Joyce stayed with the child until she was sure she was alseep again, tucking her in with a forehead kiss and a sigh before switching off the lamp and closing the door halfway. She took one last look around the cabin, making sure she wasn't forgetting anything. She glanced at the time, almost eleven-thirty, and stepped outside to find Hopper hunched on the porch steps, nursing his cigarette as if it was giving him oxygen.
"She's asleep." Joyce said as she sat beside him, deciding that she could spare a minute or so. The cabin was only about a ten minute drive from their house.
"Remember when I said I felt like she was hiding something?" the man said, passing her the cigarette and looking into the woman's equally worried dark eyes.
She took the cigarette with a nod, but waited a minute before speaking again. "If there's anything I've learned in the last year, it's to be patient about stuff like this. Took forever for Will to really open up about what happened and how he felt, and he is not El." She took another puff before passing it back to him. "Don't push her on this one, Hop. I wouldn't even ask about it, especially not tonight."
Though he wanted answers more than anything right now, Jim sighed and nodded in understanding. Questioning El in this kind of state would be fruitless, and she was apparently nervous enough about it already.
"You're right, Joyce. You usually are."
She smiled and tapped his cheek before stepping off the deck. "Every woman's favorite words."