"We are not calling Steve," She told him sternly.
"Isn't he supposed to be your boyfriend?"
She shrugged and looked down, "Who knows? But I'm not- I can't- just, trust me, okay? It's not a good idea."
They were sitting across from one another, sharing two beds in the crappy motel room they had rented, Nancy glaring at Jonathan as she spoke. He had only just picked up the phone which sat between them, looking back at her with a dumb look on his face.
It seemed only fitting that this day, arguably the moment he needed it the most in his life, had been the day his car had chosen to finally bail on him, the engine letting out a host weak splutters and coughs (like the automobile equivalent of a dying lung cancer patient) whenever he had turned the key, refusing to start, for real this time. He couldn't deny that he had been waiting on this day for a while now - the car had already been on its last legs when he had gotten it, handed down from his mother - it was true, he had known he was on borrowed time, but god he had taken it for granted. He'd even gotten a little sad when he'd cracked open the hood and seen the state it was in.
The nature of their drive made it all the more disastrous though: phone a mechanic and the call would be intercepted, phone Hop and he would want to know why. The truth was, nobody knew where they were, and no one could know. Any outgoing call had to be un-suspicious, if only just to be safe, to cover their tracks. Nancy knew that what Steve had said to her before, about them having the power to ruin their lives, hadn't been an exaggeration, it was literally written in the ink, the looming power of the NDA. And there was no way in hell Jonathan was getting his family involved again, not after everything they had already been through.
No, the only options they had were the others. Only the people who already knew.
"Is it really that far? Like, could we just walk it?" He asked her after some thought.
"Are you insane?" Nancy cut back, "No, Jesus no! That would take hours."
"Well do you have any better ideas?"
That morning I woke up to the phone ringing. The ugliest noise, like a hammer to the temple, rolling over into the soft pillow and letting it ring out. I couldn't remember when I had fallen asleep, having been up into the early hours of the morning, looking like a demonic shadow of the girl I once was, the sanity falling away like sand as more time passed. I hadn't been great at falling asleep ever since the incident, which had led to my last house being almost burnt to cinders. I was always waking myself up, seeing shapes in the shadows, keeping the lights on for most of the night. But the light of the sun was already coming in through the blinds now, I knew there was no way I was getting back to sleep.
After a few seconds of silence the ringing started up again, my momentary bliss cut off, making me want to scream. I even started praying, although I would never consider myself religious, but the ringing didn't stop, whoever it was calling again and again.
My eyes were barely open as I dragged myself up, peeling the covers away and pushing tangled hair out of my face as I shuffled through the hall, moving to the phone like a corpse in a zombie movie.
"Who is this?" I asked groggily, the morning making my voice like gravel.
"Y/n?" The tiny part of me that had been hoping it was Steve let it's heart fall to the floor. "Uh, it's Jonathan, Jonathan Byers- Look -"
"What the hell do you want, Byers?" I snapped at him before he could say another word, screwing my eyes together in total annoyance.
He paused and I could hear a muffled voice in the back. Nancy was telling him in a hushed voice to be careful, warning him that 'they're listening' and to keep his lips tight. Fucking psychos, I thought to myself.
"Look I've kinda got to ask you a favour?" He paused again, stumbling through his words, "We -we think - I mean, we-"
"Who's 'we'?" I asked, snorting.
"Uh… Nancy and me." I scoffed darkly. Of course it was, I fucking knew it, "look, just listen, I got to ask you a favour, okay? its important."
"And who says I owe you one?" I said, rubbing the sleep out of my eyes.
"No! Nobody - well..?" He hesitated, "No, not really."
"Jesus Christ," I sighed.
"it's just, we're out of town right now - but, we're sort of in a bend, cause my car's broken down, like, it won't start at all," he rambled out.
I laughed, "You're kidding? You're on a romantic getaway, seriously?" He tried to argue but I interrupted him, "Why the hell are you calling me? Call your mom - call a mechanic for God's sake, I was asleep."
"It's not that simple, Y/n, alright," He bit back.
"What the hell is this really about then?" I finally asked, "Really?" I could hear him breathing but was met with silence. In my mind I knew there was only one reason they would have called me. "All that shit ended last year?" I went on, "The thing, it's dead. The girl killed it, right? We know Barb isn't coming back?"
"You know we can't talk about that," he said seriously, his voice taking on a deep and sorrowful tone.
"Well what the hell else is this gonna be about?" I said, "Neither of you have even spoken to me for months and I'm just supposed to drop everything to help you now?"
"That's not what I'm saying, look please -"
"What is it that you're saying then?" I said, "In fact, tell Nancy to call Steve!"
I was about to hang up until he called out.
"We have a lead!"
His words had me stopping dead in my tracks, breath catching in my throat. I could hear Nancy, a faint voice in the distance, going off at him, Jonathan taking the phone away from his face and telling her to be quiet. "Are you still there?" He eventually asked.
"Yeah," My brain wasn't ready for this kind of development, especially not so early in the morning, everything that had already happened that week feeling like far too much in far too short of a time - a reminder of a trauma I'd rather forget entirely - but this changed everything. "What do you mean 'a lead'?"
"It doesn't matter," he dismissed. I swallowed, banging the back of my head against the wall behind me "- we just need you to -"
"You're not even gonna tell me and you still expect me to help?" I asked, groaning at him. We had practically been through hell together and this was all I got. It was so typical of them. Dealing with the pair of them had always vexed me, leaving me on the sidelines, the third wheel.
"She wants to know." I heard him telling Nancy, the words muffled as he took the phone away from his head again, a back and forth between them drowned out by the rustling of his shirt on the receiver. "Um - it's sort of a lot to explain, it's better if we tell you later." He had raised his voice, speaking clearly now, "- it's nothing major, just uh, stuff with the Holland's y'know, everything's fine!" The severity with which he said it made it clear to me that it was not, "can you just give is a ride?" He asked.
The decision was practically made for me. "Where are you?"
"Y'know uh, Motor's Motel, in Effingham, just off the interstate?"
I scratched at my scalp anxiously, "Okay Jesus, alright, I'll come get you at about three."
"Uh, at three?"
"Did I stutter?"
"No, no, it's just - we don't have a lot of time?"
I hissed, "I'll get there when I get there. Do you want my help or not?"
"We can't just sit around all day?" He replied, exasperated.
"Not my problem," I yawned back, finally slamming down the phone and hanging up.
It had been a long night after Steve had left, torturing myself, most of it spent trying desperately to just push him out of my goddamn mind, even just for a second. The fact that Nancy had really been with Jonathan only made me feel worse. Doing their usual and running off together to solve some mystery, dragging me along once they got into a tight spot. What was worse was that this one was long dead and buried; granted in an empty grave, but still buried. I knew. We had gone to the funeral together. Nancy still obsessing over it almost a year later. But hey, who could blame her? We were all angry.
I had never really spoken to Barbra, only ever really noticing her as Nancy's friend, the taller of the two. In a lot of ways that made me feel worse about it, that I had never even really seen her as a person, only as an add-on, and then found out she was dead and had to ask 'who the hell is Barbra' like a complete bitch. I wished I could apologise, so many times, I knew Steve did too. I wished I could fix it. I couldn't even imagine how Nancy felt.
Still though, this wild goose chase wasn't something I had planned for in my Saturday itinerary, which up until Jonathan's phone call had basically just consisted of finding a party, getting drunk and trying to forget, hoping to drag myself out of the heartache before it came crashing down and broke me all over again. Find a distraction from it all. But the tone of his voice told me this was different, not some imaginary, phantom hunch, but something solid, something that may actually make some difference.
I had to take a shower, try to wash all of the grime out of my skin from not sleeping well enough, wash out the confusion, thinking about Steve and the day before.
Everything had gotten so intense, like a live wire between us, but we had always been a little unpredictable I suppose. Things were more extreme, as if the whole world went into technicolour when we were around each other and I couldn't think straight, all my nerves going on end. Steve had said the same thing before, on my birthday, when we had been sitting by the pool. He had said he felt like he was high, felt as if he had 'taken molly or some shit' even though we both knew he was just drunk. He told me: "things always seem more important when you're here, like we're in a movie or something… is that weird?".
But things had only really been off ever since homecoming. It was as if whatever that feeling had been back then it was retracted now, turning back on itself in the opposite direction and complicating things even more, Demogorgan and upside-down aside.
By the time I was back downstairs it had been almost an hour and there were three missed calls on the machine, rolling my eyes and getting ready to leave instead of answering. I was planning on borrowing my mom's car but was struggling to find the keys, the sustained chaos and mess of the house getting in the way of everything, forcing me to shuffle through every pile of garbage and box of trinkets in sight just in the hopes of finding one thing.
I was reaching down the back of the sofa cushions when something plastic hit my hand, a pair of sunglasses, the ones Steve had. He must have left them behind.
It actually hit me a little, holding them in my hand, getting caught in that web of lovesickness like I always did, throwing me off, especially when it caught me off guard. I put the glasses in my pocket anyway, telling myself it was so I wouldn't lose them again. But by the time I was in the car, pulling up to the sidewalk, the glasses had already made their way onto my face.
"Jonny boy," I called half-heartedly as I hit the door shut, turning to Nancy and doing a curtsey, "Miss Wheeler," I greeted, dipping my head.
"Knock it off, Y/n, this is serious," she cut back, walking past me towards the car with her determined strut, my eyes failing to contain my disdain. "Start driving," was the next thing she said, looking pointedly at me and clutching her satchel bag tightly to her chest.
"You mind telling me what the hell is going on now?" I asked, looking between the two as they sat there tensely, wringing their hands and sharing a look, before both turning back to me.
They wouldn't let me listen to the full tape recording, only a small snippet, but they were right: it was enough.
"We could really take them down with this," I was saying, maniacal as I drove, "I mean, that's solid evidence, right? We could take them to court." I was driving fast - over the speed limit, much to Nancy's distress - all other woes suddenly seeming so insignificant, eyes wide and nailed to the road while my heart drummed hard in my chest, adrenaline on-high. "But, I dunno, part of me is thinking it can't be that simple? I mean, you heard what they said, and the papers we signed?" I was rambling.
"We have to try," Nance said back harshly. She had been saying those same words over and over for the best part of the drive, holding onto the dashboard with one hand as we barreled along, "Just slow down! We can't get pulled over, not right now!"
"We're nearly there," Jonathan was in the back with the map, unfolded to two meters wide and held up like a sheet in front of him. We were very near, just over the hill actually, and then we would be there, just on the outskirts of the city, right by the train line between some factories.
The place wasn't exactly what any of us were expecting, the whole building surrounded by chicken-wire fence, 6ft high, topped with barbed wire, and surrounded by piles of what looked like garbage. The beat up Ford pulling into the driveway with the three of us sat inside, the only other vehicle a junker looking caravan. Each of the windows were boarded up with ply-wood or newspaper, the words 'Keep Door Closed' sprayed angrly across the door in red. It couldn't be more different to the suburbs of Hawkins. To all passers by this place was a dump.
"Are you sure?" I asked, turning round in my seat to face jonathan in the back, peering over the mass of paper that lay in his lap.
"Positive - it has to be." He didn't sound as sure as he should have, "'three-eight double three,' right?"
"Yeah, that's the number it says by the door," I patronised, nodding my head slowly.
Nancy was ignoring us, already opening her door and stepping outside with eyes scanning the place, walking towards it.
As we walked up behind her, kicking the bits of trash out of our way, she leaned down to inspect the buzzer which sat on the wall. The air was still as she pressed it, a harsh noise, the three of us standing back, flinching.
"Look at the camera," The disembodied voice seemed to answer straight away.
"The camera." It said again.
I crossed my arms impatiently as Jonathan leaned in, fumbling around with the speaker.
"Not the loud speaker! Above you - to the right!"
We each looked up, finding the tiny lens and squinting at it, still unsure what this place even was. Before too long however, the door was pulled open in front of us, a balding man in his forties taking its place. There was a distinct odour to him that hit me quickly, standing there bizarrely in an old red and gold wrestling robe and a wife-beater vest, thick black-rimmed glasses and a pair of old carpet slippers, looking between the three of us intensely with his tiny black eyes.
"You three are a long way from home," he mused, the slightest smirk dancing on his face.
He stepped aside and gestued us in, we three looking between ourselves before shrugging as we stepped inside, the man who I could only assume was the aforementioned 'Murray' they had talked about in the car, watching us like a hawk as we did.
The inside was no better than the outside, the carpet and wallpaper all stained and peeling, revealing the dark floorboards underneath. The entrance was a narrow hall, it's narrowness only made worse by the filing cabinets on either side - which there seemed to be many - loose leafs and folders of paper still falling on every surface, no visible organization at all, just junk, with a kooky array of psychedelic posters and american flags lining the walls above. This eventually led to an orange, grated gate which he then pulled back in some kind of movement, almost akin to grace or drama, revealing the rest of the space: a modest staircase which led the way up, a desk, and rooms of couches all with the foam spilling out of them. A black, garage door hid the rest of the rooms from view, pulled back to reveal a den of sorts, a room of computers and machines, with a kitchen to the left and no windows or doors, bookcases lining most of the walls, the kicker being an adjoining wall entirely obscured by a pile of old TVs
Despite the mess, however, I couldn't help feeling as if there was something about it that reminded me almost of wonderland, a whole world of possibilities hidden away in a cave. Something magical, a secret place. The mess, the theories, the chaos. It seemed almost unreal.
There were pictures and newspaper clippings pinned all around the far wall I could see, connected together by tiny bits of string: red and white, a whole web of faces and articles that had been cut out, times and locations, spelling out the last two years of our lives. But just like the rest of the house, it was disorganised, not quite right, sometimes way off.
Murray was still talking, but I had dropped off from listening long ago, stepping forwards and following the lines of thread with my eye. "Russians and bears?" I let out quietly, sharing a look with Nancy.
"The timeline is wrong," she said.
"I'm sorry?" he interrupted.
"Your timeline is wrong," she said again, this time turning to face him.
The rest of the day was mostly spent explaining, filling in the blanks between all of the details he already had. All the back-alley whispers and phone calls he had hunted down, not nearly enough to piece together the full extent of what had happened. We were sat around the table with our coats off now, listening to the tape. Murray's beady eyes shining bright, shimmering in the light as he listened closely, his ear no more than an inch from the machine.
He was tutting to himself as it came to an end, clicking his tongue just behind his teeth, and straightening up again to lean back in his chair.
"What do you think?"
We all looked at him, waiting for a reply.
"Is it enough?" Nancy asked him impatiently, "the tape recording, is it enough? Is it incriminating?"
Eventually, without a word or warning, he pulled himself up from the table, walking over to the freezer instead and prying open the plastic door, taking out a frosty glass vodka bottle and setting down behind him with a heavy hand.
"What are you doing?" she asked him.
He plucked a cocktail mixer from the shelf, pouring a generous amount into it.
"Thinking," he replied bluntly.
"With vodka?"
"It's a central nervous system depressant, so yes, with vodka." He walked across the room behind us again now, flicking through his records for a moment before picking one up delicately and removing it from its sleeve. It was Billie Holiday, the opening of 'No More' floating its way like a breeze through the room. Nancy, who had also stood from the table, followed him over, her arms crossed in front of her chest.
"Music? Really?"
"It helps me think," he answered bitterly, practically spitting his words at her.
"Is the tape incriminating or not, it's a simple question?" she pushed again.
He laughed, not genuinely but sarcastically and mockingly, only riling up Nancy more, "there's nothing simple about it, nothing simple about anything you've told me," he answered with a wild look.
"You don't believe us, do you?" Jonathan asked now, standing from his seat.
"I believe you, but that's not the problem: you don't need me to believe you, you need them to believe you."
"Them?"
"Them!" Murray replied, "with a capital 'T'." As much as it pained me to admit, he was right, the story was too far-fetched to believe, maybe not for us - who had seen it with our own two eyes - but certainly for Them: 'the world at large' as he put it.
Nancy wasn't taking this well, obviously not hearing what she had wanted or expected to hear, raising her voice and yelling back at him, something about them 'admitting culpability,' holding the tape aloft in her hand and brandishing it defiantly.
"The minute someone with an ounce of authority calls bullshit everyone will nod their heads and say 'See? Hah! Yes - I knew it!' it was bullshit!'" he was saying, "That is if you even get their attention at all!"
There was a lingering sense of dread that had somewhere settled in my gut, tuning out their ongoing argument and getting up from the table myself. I walked to the kitchen instead, reading the bottle's label and scoffing, opening the fridge.
"Excuse me! Do you mind?" The man cut over, walking back towards me now, his robe billowing out behind him.
"Do you?" I asked back, not amused by his charade, pouring a drink of my own (Cranberry two-parts, vodka one) drinking it and covering up the icky feeling. A different kind of icky this time.
To my surprise he didn't seem that bothered, his reaction turning much more strange, leaning back slightly with his dark eyes widening, and letting out a gasp.
"That's it."
I looked at him weirdly. "What's it?"
"It's just too strong," he mumbled, too quiet for any of us to hear, striding his way around the table. Finally taking a sip of his own drink he flinched, making a face and a gagging noise and stomping to where the bottle of distilled water still sat in front of me. I moved out of the way as he drew closer, watching him curiously as he bumbled about, adding more water to his drink. "Better," he commented as he drank it, adding a little more, and then: "Perfect." He grinned this time, turning back to me with teeth bared. That was when I understood.
"Of course," I pointed at him, sharing a look.
In a moment Nancy's demeanor changed too, a light twinkling in her eyes that I hadn't seen for a long time, leaning onto the table as Jonathan looked quizzically at us all from behind her, still brooding around like a moody teenager in the back.
"We water it down," she said, the corners of her mouth twitching up.
"Wait, what?" he asked, wandering over to us again.
"We make it easier to swallow, more believable," I explained.
"Exactly," Murray began once more, picking up a further two glasses to pour into them as well, "just like this drink here: perhaps, Barbra was exposed to some dangerous toxins?"
"Like, 'three-mile island' or something," Nancy added.
"Something still bad, but believable," I said, Murray beside me leaning over and handing them the drinks.
"Close enough, that it hits the man where it hurts."
"And those assholes who killed Barb?" Nancy asked, taking hers from him.
"They'll go down," he replied, a wry grin spreading across his face, raising his glass in a toast. "To taking down The Man!" he finished, each of us reaching out our glasses, to clink together.
In a matter of mere minutes our plan was put in action, all set up in Murray's living room (if you could even call it that) working in a chain, an assembly line of sorts: Murray writing and labeling the enovopes - with the typed out message inside - and handing them to Nancy, who handed them to Jonathan, who sealed them and put them in the pile. Meanwhile I was sat at the desk, all of the years of practice mashing together mixtapes late into the night finally becoming useful for something, stooped over the dusty cassette deck, copying the tape over and over, so many times that I had lost count.
"Commie bastards sure know how to make a spirit, am I right?"
The sun was setting outside by the time we were finished, the four of us sat in a circle now, our final visit to the post office complete, another round of drinks in our hands. I chucked, my initial plan to drink that day somehow coming to fruition after all. When Murray leaned in to refill our glasses however, the others piped up.
"Oh, no no no."
"No, we can't -"
"Yeah, no, our parents," Nancy laughed out.
"Yeah, and I probably shouldn't, I've got to drive," I added.
"Drive?" Murray chuckled, "What, tonight?" We looked between one another. "C'mon, your parents would be proud if they knew what you were up to - just tell 'em you're at Tammy's or Dawn's or whoever's - you two can take my guest room and then there's the sofa-bed, there's plenty of space," He gestured around.
"I mean, do -do you want to stay?" Nancy asked, turning to Jonathan and I.
"Well, it is pretty late," he said.
"Fine by me," I agreed.
Jonathan tuned to him, "Uh, could I use the sofa?" he asked.
Murray's brow furrowed in confusion as he began to chuckle lightly to himself. "Okay, whats going on here?" he looked between them, "Lover's quarrel?"
I choked on my drink, laughing and spluttering, mumbling out a quiet 'sorry' as I wiped my chin and coughed again, the alcohol burning my throat. He looked over at me, still equally as confused.
"What? No, no - we're just friends," Jonathan replied uneasily, smiling broadly as if that would hide the awkwardness.
When Murray laughed this time, it echoed around the room.
"You've told me a lot of shockers tonight, but that -" he pointed it at them, still grinning, amused, "that is the first lie."
"It's not a lie?" Nancy said, still trying to feign some amusement at the prospect. Jonathan, however, had entirely shut down.
"'Bullshit'" I said, voice still strained from choking, trying to stop myself from laughing again. Nancy was staring daggers at me, playing it off as being light and humorous but having that effect that all teenage girls have.
"Okay, I'm sensing there's more to this," Murray continued, putting up his hands and leaning forward, "but honestly, here you are: you're young, attractive, you've got history, chemistry, plus, the real shit," he paused for emphasis, an undeniable glimmer in his eye, "Shared trauma." He winked. The pair of them looked as if they were about to argue back for a moment before he continued, this time homing in on Jonathan before he could even digest what he'd said, "Trust issues, am I right? Something to do with your dad?" He was practically squirming in his seat by then.
"What? No!" He bit back, pausing to reel in his anger before he went on, "I mean, my dad -"
"Is an asshole," Nancy interrupted.
Murray raised his hands, "it is a curse to see so clearly," he confessed. "You," he pointed to Nancy, still away in his world, "You're harder to read," he commented.
"No," I leaned forwards now, "I'd say she's pretty simple, just a classic case of 'good-girl' repression," I quipped, "with a side of denial and a royal serving of guilt." I sent her a look, smiling to myself, by this time more drunk than I had anticipated.
"Oh, interesting take," Murray complimented, narrowing his eyes at her, "but still, you're probably, like everyone: afraid of what would happen if you were to just accept yourself for who you really are." he went on, "But for you that fear culminates differently, I'd say in retreating back to the safety of…" He paused, closing his eyes and snapping his fingers as he thought. "Name?" he finally asked.
"Steve?" Jonathan replied.
"Steeeeve… yes yes yes, we like Steve," he said, returning to his smooth tone.
"Of course!" Nancy agreed.
"but we don't love Steve." He grinned.
He was referring to something he must have overheard us talking about earlier, a comment I had made to Jonathan as I had been copying tapes (along the lines of "good news, wonderboy, by the looks of it real-estate is opening up on your end" or something similar which had asked for further explanation and a recounting of the events of last weekend)
"No? I -I do," she replied lamely.
The icky feeling hit me like a truck right then, an anger and jealousy that came up my throat in a matter of moments, contempt at her for how obvious she could be, how badly she could even lie about it, not even seeming like she cared.
"Oh, fuck you," I sighed out into my glass before I could help it, only under my breath, but loud enough to make out in the silence.
"Oh ho ho!" Murray laughed out, readjusting himself in his lumpy seat to face me, regretting my choice instantly. "I wouldn't be so fast to judge if I were you," He laughed out. I gave him a look, which he took as invitation to continue; "Well you, my friend, you are something else entirely," he added, pointing at me with the same hand that held his glass. He leaned forward, "You're not just scared, you're ashamed of yourself." I said, still smiling, "You don't open up to people very often do you?" I glared at him. "Thought so," he replied instantaneously, sitting back again. "But Steve," he continued after a brief pause. I started to feel a heat come up my ears. "Steve Steve Steve…" he continued, "How long have you two known each other?" He asked, we had known each other a long time, I didn't want to know what he was getting at. "And does he know?" I almost felt myself go numb, staring at that sick grin still plastered across his face.
"You don't know what you're talking about," I finally said, telling myself the guy was clearly nuts.
"Oh, but I think I do," he replied, nodding at me tauntingly, "Shared trauma, my friend! It's a powerful thing." he leaned back and crossed his legs with a smug look on his face, "All I'll say is, there's obviously a lot you're hiding there." He took another drink.
"Well fuck you too," I replied, snapping a little, "You don't know anything about me, you met me less than twelve hours ago," I added.
"Spoken with such conviction!" He jabbed sarcastically, flashing his yellowed teeth in yet another grin.
"I mean he's right though, about you guys," I continued, gesturing over at Nancy and Jonathan, "I mean you're practically all over each other, mentally," I finished, ignoring him and shifting focus instead.
Nancy scoffed and shook her head, "We are not-"
"You can deny it all you want, Wheeler, doesn't make it any less obvious," I snarked.
"Y/n, stop," Jonathan warned, picking up his glass again.
"Or what, you'll take pictures of me naked through my bedroom window?" He choked on his drink, "don't push it, hotshot, I've seen your dirty laundry," I finished, Jonathan looking down in embarrassment. I forced out a chuckle, "But hey, at least you're not a cheater."
Murray was loving it, sipping on his vodka with his feet up on the table. This was probably like his version of watching a soap opera. Stirring the pot and then watching from afar.
He let out another laugh, "Now that! That is some fierce loyalty!" he said, chuckling. "I gotta ask - and I hope you don't mind - but when was the last time you saw our dearest Steven?" He pushed further, bringing it back round to me, like a spotlight in an interrogation room.
"She saw him a couple days ago," Jonathan replied immediately, practically jumping out of his seat, "she left the party with him, you know, after…" He trailed off, losing his initial boldness as he looked over to Nancy.
"You left with him?" She asked, her face dropping. looking at me questioningly.
"Well it's not as if you were anywhere to be seen," I said back.
"Now, now, ladies. Let's keep it cordial," Murray interrupted, looking between us warily.
"Where did you go?" She asked me.
"We went to his place, but it wasn't like that," I replied, "he was devastated Nance, I just - I wanted to make sure he was alright."
"So are those his glasses?" She nodded to the sunglasses which, at whatever point in the day, had managed to migrate to the top of my head. I cringed, feeling icky again.
"Yes," I replied, wincing at how it looked, "but that's just because he left them at my place, I'm going to give them back -"
"I thought you said you went to his place?" Murray interrupted once again, catching our attention.
"Who's side are you on, asshole?" I hissed, "and what the hell does it even matter to you?"
"Hey now, I am nothing but an impartial bystander," he responded, raising his hands in surrender again and drinking some more, the spillage running down into his beard.
I scoffed. He must have been wasted. I shook my head. "That was halloween, we went to my place yesterday." I sighed, "but it all went to shit so you may as well forget about it - that's my plan. Hopefully," I mumbled the last part.
Sitting opposite me however, Nancy seemed to be laughing to herself, a strange laughter, not real, with a hand placing her glass down on the table to be filled again, a gesture to which Murray obliged gladly.
"What?" I asked her, "What's so funny?"
She shook her head as she took another drink. "Nothing," she replied, "It's just-" she stopped herself, "No, it's nothing."
"Come on, spit it out," Murray butted in, "We're all friends here, are we not?"
"Seriously, it's nothing." She was still smiling knowingly. I gave her a look. "Well I suppose it's just kind of funny is all," she finally answered, "All this time and Carol Perkins was right," she finished casually.
The dread that came up in my throat was indescribable at that point, a deep embarrassment, a hatred; although mostly aimed at myself.
"Come on, leave it, Nance," Jonathan said to her in a hushed tone.
"I'm sorry, am I missing something here?" Murray asked, looking between us curiously, frozen in his seat.
"Don't," I said simply, rising from my seat and walking away through the grated gate, slamming it shut behind me.
Once on the front step I took out a cigarette, my hands a little shaky as they brushed against the car-keys in my pocket, trying to find my lighter in the cold, a frost already beginning to set over the concrete. At least I was finally alone.
The sky was totally black now I realised, a few stars shining out but not nearly as many as you could see from Hawkins, too much light-pollution from being near the city. It felt like it had been weeks, Steve and I only yesterday, listening to The Kinks and talking about Chicago, seeming like a life-time ago.
It was all so fucked up. All of it. The four of us who were tied into all this, to hunt down interdimensional monsters and evil scientists like the plot from a stupid movie, feeling as if we were losing our minds. What was worse was how we seemed to just keep getting sucked back into it all, with the secret lab and the upside-down again, just like last time. None of us had signed up for it, we were just teenagers, we had our own shit. And Steve, probably out there thinking about Nancy right now, back in Hawkins.
Weirdly enough, the only thing about it that actually felt at all normal about any of it was Steve being involved. It was like what Murray had said, about shared trauma, only it was different. It was like I wouldn't be able to survive without him being there. Even if it was all so overwhelming, knowing that he had seen that monster too made it all the more bearable.
I cursed to myself as I hissed into the cold air, a cloud of my breath stretching out in front of me as I slid my back down against the icy steel door, no one there to listen to me, to talk me out of my head or comfort me.
"I know this is kinda selfish, but I'm glad you were there, even if it was pretty fucked up at times."
He had never meant Tommy and Carol.
But it hadn't quite clicked until that moment what he had meant. Standing outside, miles away in Illinois, with his words coming back to me from deep inside my head, the moment already long gone.
No matter what could have happened differently, it would have still been us. Even if I hadn't overheard the pair of them in the library and told Jonathan what had happened, it would always have been Steve who would have driven me home that night, covered in blood and frozen in shock, telling me "if anything happens just call me, alright?" Because, in truth, the only person that I could ever see myself going to for any kind of comfort or help was Steve. Not because I 'liked' him or anything, but because I trusted him; more than anyone.
Whether it had been Carol and Tommy being annoying in Chicago that had done this to us, or some backwards, twisted version of fate, who could say? All I knew was that in that moment, the only person I wanted to see was him. Only him.
That was why her words hurt all the more.
I wiped a tear from my eye before I went back inside, noticing they had all retired for the night, the lights out and Jonathan on the pull-out making it clear he had no interest in talking, while Nancy had retreated to the guest bedroom, taking the whole thing for herself. Murray was still in the den however, sat at a makeshift office sort-of-a space in the corner, with a beat up computer that had wires all through one of the closets and about a year's supply or canned foods crammed underneath the desk.
"You mind some company?" I asked him from the door. He turned to me, the newspaper which told the old story of the bear attack in Steve's backyard held in his hands.
"Not at all," he answered, a haze of drunkenness clouding his eyes sleepily now.
"What are you reading?" Of course I knew the answer, the real question I wanted to be asking was 'why?'
"A line, in the article," he replied, not looking up at me as he spoke, scanning the page, "I remember it caught my eye… something in the tape…" he trailed off.
"'Experts assure that 'the beast' will remain contained, by all means necessary," I quoted, the line having etched itself to the inside of my skull.
He looked up at me, "how did you know?"
"I remembered it too," I said, "I asked Steve about it at the time and he said it was nothing, they just added it so the neighbours wouldn't freak out, or to try and be more dramatic about the story I guess… it's just coincidence," I brushed off, a shiver still running down my spine regardless.
"Huh." He folded the paper, "Typical journalists," he snarled, throwing it back down.
Our conversation was interrupted by the sounds of movement from the hall. Nancy and Jonathan.
"How much?" Murray whispered, ears pricked up like an owl's, listening closely. I shot him a confused look, "come on, a friendly bet?"
"Twelve bucks says they chicken out," I finally replied in an equally hushed tone from beside him. And sure enough a few moments later there were footsteps again, the pair going their separate ways. I smiled, holding out my hand.
Reluctantly he fished around in his robe pocket, rolling his eyes and sighing. "I only have a ten."
"I'll still take it."
He placed the money in my palm.
"It's not so bad you know," he started, looking away into the distance again.
"What is?" I asked him.
"The almost constant way teenagers have to cruelly and publicly humiliate each other?"
I sighed, the realisation hitting me, "Oh." I looked down.
"I'm sure you could already tell, but when I was a kid - well let's just say it wasn't exactly smooth-sailing," he went on.
"I'm sure," I replied, looking him up and down with a chuckle.
Both our heads turned as more sounds of movement came from down the hall. We held our breath. Muffled voices and the creak of a floor board, the closing of a door, and then silence, followed by the unmistakable squeak of mattress springs. I suppose I was wrong about Nancy afterall.
When I looked back at him, Murray was grinning proudly to himself.
"You're disgusting," I stated, handing the money back to him begrudgingly, standing to head out the door and back through to the living room, already knowing I wouldn't be sleeping - not able to shake that lingering feeling, a foreboding that still sat deep in my gut.
"You'll be fine, kid," he called after me through the hall. Though the words brought me no comfort.
"Here's to hoping," I replied genuinely, scanning the room for a couch.
