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"It's My Party"

It's my party and I'll cry if I want to

Cry if I want to, cry if I want to

You would cry too if it happened to you

- Lesley Gore

Hopper had spent the afternoon and evening deep in the woods, following the trail of gross, slimy, dying trees. He was finally coming out, dirty, tired, and discouraged by the dying, rotted vegetation where yesterday there had been healthy crops and the lack of any clear reason why, when he suddenly had the strong sensation that something was watching him. He had trained himself in Vietnam never to ignore that sensation—he had seen too many guys dismiss the feeling as nothing and then fall to a sniper's bullet. Stopping short, he trained the flashlight on the field, unsnapping his holster, his hand hovering near the butt of his gun.

Suddenly there was a sharp report, like a gunshot. Heart in his throat, Hopper turned … to see a little kid in a cowboy costume shooting a cap gun at him.

He took a step back, breathing a sigh of relief, the tension broken.

"You look scared," the kid taunted him.

"Yeah, you got me, kid."

The kid reached up high, pointing the gun straight up in the air and snapping off a few more shots.

"Happy Halloween," Hopper said grudgingly.

Then it hit him. Halloween. Oh, shit. He looked at his watch. He was in so much trouble. She would never speak to him again—and deservedly so. "Oh, shit, shit, shit," he chanted, like a mantra, like it would get him there faster or turn back time or somehow make it so that he didn't fail her again.

He got in the car, peeling out, the dust flying up under the wheels as he turned around. Only a few feet down the road, he remembered that he had promised her candy, and the stores would be closed. Glancing up, in the rearview mirror he saw the little kid standing there, a candy bucket dangling fom his hand, and he threw the truck into reverse, backing up until he was facing the kid once more.

The little cowboy turned to watch him, mildly interested, as if adults acting crazy was the way things usually happened. Hell, maybe it was. Who was Hopper to judge?

Leaning across the front seat, Hopper rolled down his window. "Hey, kid. Gimme some of that candy, would ya?"

Solemnly, the kid shook his head. "No way."

Awkwardly shifting in the seat, Hopper extracted his wallet, holding up a five dollar bill. "All right. How about now?"

There was a long pause, in which Hopper was sure the kid was going to soak him for a twenty, at least, and then finally he nodded, equally solemnly. Taking his earnings and handing over his loot, he observed, "You can buy a lot of candy for five dollars."

"Not when the stores are closed." Not bothering to roll up the window, Hopper sped down the road, hoping she would understand, but not able to come up with a single convincing reason why she should.

As soon as he was in range, he started beeping the code at her, hoping she would forgive him if he just tried hard enough.

At the cabin, he gave the code knock. Then he gave it again.

Silence.

He waited, cursing himself for all kinds of a fool, as near tears as he had been in a long time. Since Eleven had come into his life, really. She was the best thing to happen to him since Sara had died, and now he had acted like she wasn't important, like she didn't matter as much as his stupid job, as much as some guy's dead pumpkins. Just because he was curious. He had wanted to know, to find the answers. And he had screwed everything up. Just like he always did.

Pushing back the tears with some effort, he called out, "Hey, kid, open up, all right, look, I—I know I'm late. I got candy here, all right? I got all the good stuff." He put his hand on the door and listened, but there was nothing. Angry at himself, he pounded his hand against the doorframe. "Please will you open the door! I'm gonna freeze to death out here."

Finally he heard the clicks of the locks opening. He went in, but she had opened the locks with her mind, and was firmly barricaded inside her room with the TV. He could see the blue flicker of some old movie beneath the door.

Hopper crossed the room. "Hey, kid, open up, would ya? I got, uh, stuck somewhere, and I lost track of time." That was the way it had always been—an interesting case, a puzzle to solve, and he forgot everything. How many of Diane's dinners had he been late for? How many nights had she called him crying, needing him to come home and help with the baby, and he had been too caught up to be there? They had fought over it so many times. Trying to learn from that, he offered Eleven the one thing he had never been man enough to offer Diane. "And I'm sorry," he said quietly through the door, meaning it. Leaving it at that, no explanations, no defenses. "El? Could you please open the door? El?"

There was no response, and he gave up, carrying the bucket of candy to the couch.

"All right," he said, loud enough to be heard through the door, sitting down, "I'm just going to be out here by myself, eating all this candy. I'm gonna get fat. It's very unhealthy to leave me out here. I could have a heart attack or something. But … you know, you do what you want." He popped a chocolate bar into his mouth. It tasted like dust, and he flicked the wrapper across the room in disgust. Apparently he wasn't going to be able to fix this, at least not tonight.