El is on some serious

by JaceHerondale21

With Hopper tracking down a sick psycho mauling and killing animals for the last year, he's never around, so El turns to smoking weed to get attention from him. AU where El has no powers, and so the Upside Down is never discovered. I will explain why El is still with Hopper, and not her mom, later in the story, so chill the heck out.

9. Uncle Murray, giver of bruises

Begin ch.9

He and El had a blast, both with annoying Hopper, and hanging out with Murray. The epic month-long grounding was totally worth El's face when she saw Mike emerge from the trunk, halfway through the car ride so Hopper couldn't turn back.

(Begin Flashback)

May 1986, rural Indiana, 1 year ago.

"Mike!" El tackled him with a hug. "I thought your parents said they would ground you for a month if you came on the trip!" "Did they change their mind?" "Nah, I snuck out." "Won't they ground you, though?" "Yeah, buuuut ... I decided it would be worth it to make you happy, plus, they can't ground me right now, can they?" "No, I guess they can't, can they?" Mike leaned in for a kiss before Hopper slammed the brakes, smashing his face into the window. "OK, I'm going to stop you two RIGHT THERE. If Mike is going to be alive and in possession of certain parts of the male anatomy, you two are going to follow a few rules. Number 1: You listen to me. I know these woods and the rules that EVERYTHING that calls this place home follows. Rule Number 2: You do NOT under ANY circumstances engage in ANY form of PDA other than hugging, holding hands, and kisses on the cheek when I do not have a clear line of sight on you!" El leaned over and whispered to Mike, "That's so he can shoot your ass if you start getting too handsy for his tastes." "Something you want to share with the rest of the class, El?" Hopper ground out after Mike snorted out a laugh. "No thanks, I'm afraid that it'd just go over your head, Daddy Dearest." El said, her voice dripping with fake honeyed sweetness. "ELEVEN JANE HOPPER! You stop that disrespect RIGHT NOW or I will turn this car around, so help me." "Okay, OKAY! Jeez, DAD. I will do my best to contain the everflowing wellspring of teenage snark inside me from roasting your ass any further." Hopper ground his teeth, and said warningly "El ." "What? I just stated the facts " El said innocently. Hopper swerved into a tight u-turn and headed back for Hawkins. "Alright! Sorry, jeez, sorry I damaged your fragile male ego so much!" El shouted. "I'm sorry what was that?! I'm sure I misheard what you said, El, right?" Hopper said as he floored the accelerator. "I'm ... sorry." El ground out. "For?" "Being an asshole." "Alright then, didn't kill you to be respectful for once, did it, kiddo?" "No." "Then why aren't you more respectful?" "Two reasons. One, two-way street, DADDY. Two, you want it, EARN IT." "Excuse me? You didn't say what I thought you just said, did you?" "Is feeding, clothing, not going on murderous rampages because of, and resisting the constant urge to shoot the boyfriend of, a disrespectful brat of a teenage daughter not enough to earn your respect?" Mike, having moved to the front seat so Hopper could "keep an eye on him", "accidentally" bumped the gear into park, making Hopper smash his face on the wheel. "Oops." Mike said to a furious Hopper, not very apologetically. Hopper said, "Alright! Turning the car around! Nope! I'm not going to just sit and take this shit." "Oh, fuck." said El. "What? Why are you worried? He won't kill YOU, and he won't kill ME while you are around to be a witness." "He doesn't have to kill to teach a lesson, Mike." "We're going to the place where I spent that year without you. Hopper sent me there when I first started smoking weed to learn "respect" or something like that. As you can see, it didn't stick, although ... I did get grade A ass-kicking skills, soooooo yeah. It wasn't a complete waste of Hopper's time. It was worse, cause I was the same, except I got in more fights, and won all of them. I have to go into the bar complexes for a real fight, and really, no one who isn't drunk or arrived less than 5 seconds ago will fight me anymore." El said to Mike. "So, maybe I missed something, but you spent the year without me learning KARATE, while I didn't even know if you were DEAD or ALIVE? Why the HELL didn't you call m-," Mike got cut off because Hopper grabbed his face and said, "Because Murray and I wouldn't let her, that's why. Blame me if you want, but not her. She kept trying to sneak to the phone to call you, and run away to go visit you." "Now if you could let me just drive so we DON'T DIE, I'd appreciate it." "So, who's Murray?" Mike asked El. "My 'uncle.' He's extremely eccentric, paranoid, and damn near certifiable, but he's good people." "However, he will sweep you for bugs upon entering, so be prepared for a shit welcome." El replied. "Yayyyy, this just keeps sounding better and better." Mike said sarcastically. "You have NO idea," El replied. "He also gives unsolicited, blunt, sometimes crass, rude, but strangely accurate relationship (romantic and otherwise) advice at random, so be prepared for him to psychoanalyze the shit out of you at any time. He does it mostly when he's fed up with people BSing themselves and each other. Or he'll be fed up with constant bickering." "I remember once when she came to visit me (she was sworn to secrecy), she and Hopper were arguing about whether I should get to talk with you guys, and Hopper said he didn't even want you guys to know I was with him and Murray. When they started arguing for the third time, Murray basically hit the nail on the head with everything he told them about the motivations at play, then he basically just told them to either go have sex (he actually said to 'tear off each others clothes and get it over with'), or to shut up and stop disturbing his peace." El said, giggling. "El! You do NOT tell that story! EVER!" Hopper shouted at El. "Too late," Mike and El gasped out while almost suffocating from uncontrollable laughter. "If I start hearing that story from others, Mike, you're dead, understand?" Hopper said tersely. "Ohoho Okayyyyy," Mike got out in between bouts of laughter. "You guys won't be laughing in a couple of hours, so get it all out now. Oh boy, am I looking forward to beating the shi-, I mean, training my daughter's boyfriend self-defense, as a trust and respect-building exercise, you know, having some guy bonding time, right, Mike?" Hopper asked Mike. "Oh and you guys won't really be near each other, cause we'll be training from 5 am (breakfast) till around 10 PM, then dinner, after dinner, lights out. Then, El will have the guest room, Murray gets his room, of course, I'll take the pullout bed. Wouldn't want anyone starting rumors would we now, Mike? I mean, I know for a FACT that you would never engage in any kind of foolishness with El, but I'll just make sure no one starts rumors." Hopper said to Mike and El. "Wait, where I am sleeping?" Mike asked Hopper. "You will be on the floor next to the pullout bed, which is where I will be sleeping." Hopper replied. "I do hope you brought your sleeping bag, Mike." A terse "I did," was Mike's only response to Hopper's comment. "Glad to hear it." Hopper then stomped on the accelerator, bringing them to well above 25 miles over the speed limit. "Whoah, whoa! Slow down there, Hopper! You're gonna get us all killed!" Mike screamed at Hopper. 'Kid, you ain't seen nothing yet," was Hopper's only acknowledgment of Mike concern about the safety of driving 80 mph on a 50 mph road.

NEW PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT/AN: THE WEED THAT EL SMOKES IS 80'S WEED. THAT HAD WAY LESS THC, SO WHILE IT WAS STILL BAD FOR YOU, IT WAS SIGNIFICANTLY LESS SO. NOW WEED WILL MESS YOU THE HELL UP. DONT DO IT. Also, I can hear you saying, "But if it was still bad for you, and El claims to get extremely high every day, how is she not getting messed up?" The answer is that she smokes in public, never in private. She only does it to provoke Hopper. When she doesn't want to do that, she doesn't get high. She was EXTREMELY exaggerating her drug usage there to make Mike look bad. Also, some characters, (not main ones) will use some harder drugs. Honestly, that will probably only be ecstasy. THAT IS A DEADLY AND EXTREMELY ILLEGAL DRUG. EL ONLY PRODUCES IT BECAUSE SHE IS BEING THREATENED WITH SERIOUS PHYSICAL HARM. THE CHEMICAL PROCESSES THAT PRODUCE THIS DRUG ARE JUST AS OR MORE DANGEROUS AS THE USAGE OF THIS DRUG. IT IS FOR SURE MORE ILLEGAL THAN THE USAGE OF IT. LIKE, DEA BLACK-OPS UNITS WITH MACHINE GUNS KICKING DOWN YOUR DOOR IN THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT ILLEGAL. Simply put, don't use or produce any illegal drugs, and I KNOW you know not to, but just DON'T, okay? Ok, I'll step off my soapbox now. That was mainly for legal reasons. I DO NOT ASSUME ANY LEGAL RESPONSIBILITY FOR ANY CONSEQUENCES ARISING FROM YOUR PRODUCTION OR USE OF ANY ILLEGAL SUBSTANCES.