Author: Lauren.

Rating: Rated M.

Character/Pairing: Nancy Wheeler, Billy Hargrove.

Summary: Nancy is still dealing. And she's on her own until she isn't. Nancy/Billy. Post S3 finale, I guess AU cause Billy is live and kicking?

Disclaimer: Stranger Things does not belong to me. Unfortunately.

Author's Note: So. Yes a period of time has elapsed since I've done this. But I got inspired and this happened. Let me know...

She wakes up drenched in sweat again.

It's the middle of the night and she's sitting bolt upright in bed, again.

It shouldn't still feel like this, should it? Cold air hits her lips and she bits down, draws her knees to her chest, listens to the drumming of her heart.

It had been six months since the Byers had left town, six months since what happened happened and Nancy still felt like she was right there. Finger curled around the trigger so hard it hurt, mascara running down her cheeks, her legs aching and hands shaking.

So she finds herself in the car again, sat outside Starcourt Mall a-fucking-gain. In an empty parking lot because no one can really decide what to do with this place. It's been covered in police tape since that night and the local authorities can't seem to choose to knock it down or repurpose it.

Life has mostly gone back to normal. Nancy returned to the Post because she didn't really know what else to do. Went back to making coffee and returning calls and pretending not to hear the comments about her ass.

Feet hit gravel. She's outside the car, walking toward the Mall. She's never done this before, hasn't been there since that night. But tonight feels different. And it's only now that she notices someone else hunched over by the building.

"Billy?" her eyebrows shoot into her hairline. Is he really here? Why would he-? She can't finish that thought because immediately she's seeing his eyes again. Seeing those headlights, making her vision swim, taste coppery blood in her mouth from where she's been clenching her teeth.

He looks... younger than before. Tired, dark circles around his eyes and gaunt, as if he's still missing something inside. Not that she really knew him before, other than we got ourselves a new Keg King, Harrington.

God that seemed like an entire lifetime ago now. Without really knowing why, she finds herself perched on the sidewalk besides him. Sharing his cigarette in silence. There are so many things she wants but the questions die in her throat. That is, until-

"So how's Mike?"

They start hanging out. Not a lot. Not at first. Just sometimes he'd be driving by and offer her a lift home. Or if they were both buying coffee at the same time.

Oh and the kissing. The kissing only happened once. Just once when his hand grazed hers and then he was cupping her face and she could feel his breath on her lips.

She told herself she was just missing Jonathan. That they'd both been through something traumatic and this was just a response to that.

She barely knew the boy whose body she clung to on the backseat of his Camaro. Whose hands roamed her body, fingers threaded in her hair, moaning into her neck.

And she tells herself she doesn't want to ask about how he's even alive. What it felt like to not be in control of your own body, for your brain to be screaming please and your hands to say no.

She didn't want to have to see the terror in his eyes as he told her about agony and fear and regret. Or worse, what if it wasn't that at all. What if her hope that this experience had reformed him from the aggressive thug he'd been before into something else had been foolish? What if he- God don't even say it. What if he liked it.

How he nearly ran her down in that parking lot. How she stared at him down the barrel of a gun, hands trembling, ready to pull the trigger.

No, she needs to believe that she isn't alone in this. Because then they all didn't leave and her little brother won't talk to her.

Even if they don't talk about it.