As both Steve and Jane assured him, the Gate appears the next day.

It is a throbbing, pulsating red that opens just outside of the house. Jim stumbles toward it, dreading the fact that he has to leave the pantry nestled within the house that has become his sanctuary. He takes a deep breath and reminds himself that if he could survive the Upside Down, he can survive going through the Gate to get home.

The Gate is in Steve's pool. Jim snorts. That poor kid has terrible luck with pools: a girl disappears into the Upside Down through it, and now a Gate to the same place has been opened in it. Shaking off his thoughts, he leaves the relative safety of the house and shuffles over to the pool area, flamethrower clasped between his hands in case anything decides to jump out at him.

He steels himself and climbs down the ladder into the pool. The Gate is relatively small, and it splits open the side of the pool that is farthest from the house at a fairly low point. Jim makes his way over the slimy vines coating the bottom of the empty pool and stands just outside the Gate.

"Is he coming?" says a muffled voice that Jim doesn't have the energy to place.

"He is coming," Jane replies. "It is safe to come through," she adds, and Jim assumes that she is talking to him.

He steps through and swallows a shit ton of water. Clearly, they thought he could do with some drowning after his time in the Upside Down, since they didn't think to drain the fucking pool. Jim drops the flamethrower and kicks off the bottom allowing his momentum to push him toward the surface. He grasps the ledge of the pool and coughs up the water he'd swallowed.

"Jesus," he gasps, holding tight to the ground in front of him, "were you guys trying to drown me?"

Hands reach down and wrap around his biceps; they lift him out of the water slowly, until enough of his body is above the water that he is able to slump forward on the paved ground. His legs are still in the pool, but Jim can't find it in himself to care, not when he's finally touching sun-warm concrete that doesn't have any repulsive fucking vines crawling over it.

"Nah," he hears Steve say, "we're hoping that the water'll drown any Demogorgons that try to get through; none of us have seen 'em interact with water, so we thought that maybe they can't swim or something. We figured it'd be too much to ask for the water to actually hurt them."

Jim chokes on a laugh. "'S good to hear your voice, kid."

"Good to hear yours, Hop," Steve replies amusedly. "Now let's get your ass outta the pool, yeah? Robin, come help me out, dude," he shouts, and then he and Robin help Jim get the rest of the way out of the water.

With the kids' help, Jim collapses on one of the lounge chairs; Steve brings him a glass of water and gestures to the plate of sandwiches that's on the table next to him. "Sandwiches," he says redundantly, "if you're hungry."

Jim finds that he is hungry, and so he scarfs down one of the sandwiches while taking stock of his surroundings.

Jonathan and Nancy are standing together by the diving board; Mike – the little fucker – is beside Jane, who is making her way toward him, and Jim doesn't even have the energy to yell at him about it. Max and Lucas are sitting side-by-side on the chair next to him, and Dustin and Will are peering curiously into the pool, which is giving off an eerie red glow. Joyce is coming out of Steve's house, and when she sees him, her eyes go wide.

"I told you we'd come for you," Jane says, having appeared beside him.

Jim jumps. "Christ. Did you learn how to teleport while I was gone, kid?"

"Teleport?" she repeats carefully.

"Move from one place to another instantaneously," Mike explains. Jim scowls at him.

"Oh. No," Jane replies. "I am happy to see you again. Dad," she adds, like it's an afterthought.

"I'm happy to see you, too," Jim says, and hugs her gently.

"Halfway happy?" she asks tentatively.

"All the way happy," he corrects, smiling at her. She smiles back.

"El," Mike interrupts. Sometimes Jim can't stand him. "You've gotta close the Gate now."

"Okay," Jane says agreeably, and offers Jim another smile before she and Mike make their way back to the edge of the pool. She holds out her hands and stares intently at the tear between the worlds. Jim looks away; he's seen her close the Gate before, and he'd rather not look at Upside Down related paraphernalia any more than he absolutely has to.

Joyce sits at the foot of the chair when she reaches him. "I'm sorry," she says, looking as though she's near tears.

"Don't be," Jim tells her. "We agreed that the keys would get turned no matter what happened. You did exactly what we agreed to do, and yeah, I was in the Upside Down for a little while, but we're all alive." He shrugs. "That's what matters."

"I just –" her voice cracks, and she swipes at her eyes. "We all thought you were dead. I thought you were dead, and I thought I was the reason why."

"Hey," Jim barks, but it's softer than it normally is. "There's no use thinking about that shit, alright? I'm not dead, okay? And the Upside Down sucked really hard, but I don't regret what we did, okay? I don't regret it, and you shouldn't either."

"Okay," Joyce says. "I'll work on it."

"That's all I'm asking." Joyce nods and stands, starting to walk toward Will. Jim catches hold of her wrist. "I'm sorry I missed our date," he tells her. "Can we reschedule?"

Joyce looks at him critically, and he figures he's probably not looking so hot at the moment. "Yeah," she says finally. "Enzo's. Friday at seven."

Jim smiles and lets go of her wrist. She walks away.

"Damn," Steve says over the sound of an argument that's started over by the pool, and Jim turns to see him smiling faintly. "I guess I've gotta spend twelve days in the Upside Down to get a date, huh?"

"Guess so, kid," Jim says fondly. "Guess so."