It was for the best that she woke up alone. Sadie sat up to find the window cracked from where he snuck out hours ago—not without leaving a red and black flannel behind. He always forgot something, but she could only assume this was purposeful. An article of clothing to remember him by. One that smelled like a mix of cheap cologne and shared cigarettes. She wore it, of course, the oversized material hanging from a petite frame as she loaded shit into the back of her father's station wagon.
It was just the two of them in the car. A proud father and his daughter… who wasn't entirely sure she had made the right decision. All she had ever known was Hawkins, Indiana. Who the hell was she to think she'd survive college in a big city alone? Moving someplace like Seattle had always been their dream. A fresh start with a good music scene. Something far enough from the small minds in their rural town.
Her decision to go alone—to get their life started while he pursued that goddamn diploma—hadn't been easy. Sadie struggled with it every day, feeling more confident about it on some days than others. While she longed to make her father proud at least once in his lifetime, Sadie wasn't ashamed to admit Eddie meant more than any curfew or ridiculous rule her parents had implemented since the start of her more rebellious teenage years. She studied his expressions and body language during each difficult conversation, skeptical if he'd ever really be truthful. He had every right to be disappointed. Angry, even… but Sadie knew Eddie would rather lie than hold her back from anything. He was too pure of heart.
Their last night left her confident that their separation was temporary. Eddie reassured her that she'd do fine on her own and that he would visit. She hadn't considered how he would scrape up enough money for a plane ticket. And there was no way that beat-up van would take him halfway across the country.
Leaving Hawkins. Come again soon.
As it always did, that confidence faded as the Hawkins sign grew smaller and smaller in the rearview mirror. Sadie had spent her entire life in a bubble surrounded by the same kids, shops, and cookie-cutter middle-class homes. While she despised such familiarity at times, she could not confidently say that leaving was her dream either. Or, maybe it was who the young woman left behind that made her choke on such indecisiveness. Silent as she watched familiar scenery pass through the passenger window, resentment began to bubble in her chest. They wouldn't be in this predicament had Eddie not kept his failing grades from her until it was too late. By the end of April, Sadie had already committed to the university. Eddie was just… there, his nose buried in his D&D journal instead of their homework. They could have moved out together had he spent a minuscule fraction of the time studying as he did preparing for Hellfire campaigns or practicing with Corroded Coffin.
It didn't seem fair to keep two people in love so far apart, yet, Sadie felt as if she bore the brunt of it all. Every difficult decision was left to rest on her shoulders. While her decision to leave seemed selfish, Sadie would have stayed in Hawkins had he asked. But he never did.
Glancing at the single thread of red ink around her right pinky finger, that resentment mixed with both sadness and guilt. The line encircling her smallest finger represented fate, connecting those destined to meet regardless of time, place, or circumstance. Sadie had read somewhere that the thread could stretch, but it would never break. They had given each other the tattoo three months into their relationship as if two dumb kids knew anything about fate.
Not even her father was immune to this rollercoaster of emotions. Anger threatened to spill over as they sat in McDonald's on the second day of their drive. Fiery emotions were pulled taut across delicate features as he so brazenly questioned why Eddie Munson had not accompanied them to Washington. William Lepley planted these seeds of doubt, believing it was for her own good when he knew damn well how much his daughter loved the Munson boy. Watching her mope around the house had been utterly dreadful, but she'd eventually pick herself up and move on to better things.
As a tenured teacher at Hawkins High, he had been the one to partner them up in chemistry. His intentions were innocent, hoping his daughter's ability to follow directions would boost the kid's scores in at least one class. But the town freak collapsed into the stool beside his daughter with no books, only a pen in his mouth, and they just stared at each other. William knew right then and there that his plan had backfired. His precious daughter had become inseparable from a nonconforming piece of Forest Hills trash, and Sadie noted the slight twist in her father's features every time he was reminded of it.
Maybe their relationship reminded William too much of his past, but Sadie never cared enough to ask about her mother. When he acted like this, her father was no better than a mother willing to abandon her child.
"Why didn't Eddie come along for the ride? The car ride home would have given us time to talk." As if time to bond with Eddie Munson was something her father wanted.
Resentment. Sadness. Guilt. Anger.
Tucked away in her new apartment, Sadie coped with her lonesome by cycling through those emotions like a hamster stuck on a wheel. Though schoolwork and a new part-time job at the closest record store filled her days, the young woman found the time to wallow in a heartache that soon made her sick with anxiety. Part of her was constantly pulled back to Hawkins, where the slightest doubts led her to believe Eddie had already moved on. The other part of her desperately wished to embrace life on her own—one Eddie could someday be a part of. She hovered in the middle, stuck in a torturous, eternal tug of war.
Hundreds of miles away, it became much easier to shut everyone out than to be vulnerable. Inevitably, Sadie's calls home came less and less. Eddie noticed it, and each time she assured him it was nothing more than a busy schedule. When he pressed, she felt cornered—and it was strange that her first reaction was to break up with him over the phone. Tears blurred her vision as their silence stretched on, and two unsteady fingers clung to the filter of a lit cigarette when he asked for the reason why.
He deserved a reason. He deserved so much more than that. But how does one say goodbye when the heart still wants to hold on?
You just don't.