"Is this why uncle Steve is called uncle Steve?!" Joan hissed out loud in horror, the thought of having to kiss - or worse - her uncle being almost too much to bare. A groan escaped her lips as she plopped into her rickety wooden desk chair and tossed the picture back onto her desk. "Why him of all the Steve's?!"

"Are you still upset about your break up with Steve?" Dustin seemed to appear out of nowhere in her room, inevitability scaring the shit out of the older teen and sending her into panic. Her rather pitiful reaction was ignored by her brother. "Because me too. I wanted Steve to be my brother after you graduated by marriage so that he could never escape me, but you had to ruin it."

"Me?!"

Dustin rolled his eyes and it occurred to her sliver of amusement that everyone was right about her dad having toned down over the years with his mischief and teasing ways. "Yes, you." His hand waved up and down towards Joan in emphasis, as if her whole body was the problem. "Whatever you did for Steve to break up with you at the beginning of summer you should take it back. Immediately. I want my nieces and nephews to have glorious hair."

"Why are you in my room, twerp?" Joan decided to ignore the Steve problem for now. It was such a relief to find that no she was not dating her future-uncle, but still made her feel icky that she once did date her future-uncle. "Don't you have friends or something?"

Dustin had decided this was an invite to further invade her space - Joan was missing the beauty of being an only child at this point - and plopped down onto her admittedly pretty floral bed. Unconsciously, her hand dove into her pocket to pull out her phone, but to her horror she realized that this was 1980-whatever, no cell phones much less mart phones until much much later.

"That's why I've come to invade your room." Dustin said seriously towards his sister. Joan crossed her arms and raised an eyebrows if saying go on. "I have a proposition worth your time and energy."

"Proposition?" God her dad was the same person even as a tiny little shit.

"Yes." Dustin snapped and pointed at his sister with both hands as if he were a salesman. Honestly, he could have been one.. or be one? "You drive me to Mike's house tonight and you can join us in our campaign, just like you used to. Will said you can be the cleric and since we're only a few sessions in, you can quickly reach our skill levels in no time-."

"Dustin, you don't have to bribe me to take you to your friends." Joan interrupted with a roll of her eyes. She eyed the kid with a smirk and crossed her arms over her chest at the look of incredulous on his face as he walked over and matched her arms over his own chest.

"...Who are you and what have you done to my sister?" Dustin said seriously with narrowed eyes. Joan's heart skipped a beat, definitely skipped a beat, at the accusation and swallowed thickly. "Why are you being so nice?"

Was she not usually nice? Was that why they never talked about the Henderson sister in the future?

"Is it because of Steve?" Joan rolled her eyes and stood up form her chair, ignoring the child and left the bedroom, hoping her response was enough for Dustin. Dustin quickly followed beside the girl, not bothered by the attitude once again. "Do you feel upset about my older man friend breaking up with you, so you're hoping that by being on my good side I'll put a good word in for you so that you and Steve-o can become a thing once again? Because that would totally work and I have-!"

"Jesus, Dustin, do you ever shut up for more than 5 minutes?!" Joan moaned out, already finding the younger version of her father insufferable. Now back in the kitchen she turned towards Dustin and grabbed him by the shoulders firmly, Dustin wisely shut up now that hands made contact with his body. "Look, I-I'm over Steve, it's not a big deal, so stop bringing it up-."

"But, you guys were-!"

"-shut up or I won't drive you anywhere for the rest of the month." Joan hissed out and Dustin nodded his head quickly with wide eyes. She sighed, closing her eyes and counting to three. "I'm taking you to Mike's on one condition only."

When she was sure she had Dustin's attention, Joan backed away slowly and Dustin stayed nearly frozen in his spot waiting for whatever his sister wanted from him so he could get to his friend's house.

"Leave me in peace for the weekend."

"Deal." Dustin agreed quickly before scrambling to his room to get his things, calling out his wake, "I'll be ready in T minus five minutes!"

Joan rolled her eyes and looked at the mirror on the hallway wall with a frown.

It was definitely her body staring back at her. From the tiny scar on her forehead from when she was 12 and thought she could jump from the roof of her house to the nearby tree, to the weird freckle below her chin, and down to the pimple she felt this morning on her temple... quickly, Joan made her way to her bedroom and hurriedly went through her closet for anything but what she had on currently.

"Dad! Watch how far I can jump!"

"How far you can what- oh shit!"

"I-is it okay if my leg bends this way?!"

Oh sweet Jesus. She looked in horror at the cheer outfits and bright colors littering here closet, trying find anything with a neutral tone or not made of jean to throw on, but none glance at her a photo next to her close of her wearing neon made Joan want to throw up.

She settled with high waisted jeans and an atrociously yellow crop top before stepping out to find her, uh, mother. "Uh, mom?" The woman wasn't hard to find with her cats onto of her in front of the boxed television set and Joan tried to take in the scene around her. The home wasn't too different from her time, but there were significantly more photos of the mystery sister that was Joan Agatha Henderson. "I'm taking Dustin to uh, where am I taking you?!" Joan hollered out to Dustin, already forgetting where they were going.

"Jesus, woman. I'm right here." Dustin complained, rubbing his right ear where Joan and turned to yell. Joan rolled her eyes, gesturing to their mom. "We're going to Mike's mom."

"Alright, sweeties. Keys on the counter. Drive safe and be home by 11:00, both of you!"

The brother and sister rushed out after their goodbyes and Joan slowed down to watch which car Dustin would go to and followed him to the older one of the two. Unlocking the old metal car, Joan quickly wished a black hole would swallow her whole.

Stick shift.

She could do this, right?

"Break, ignition, clutch.."

"You got your license a month ago and you already forgot how to drive?!" Dustin called out incredulously as the car stalled and he watched his sister whisper the instructions to herself as she tried again.

"Shut up, dork!" Joan snapped with a red face. "I-I know how to drive, okay!?"

"Then why aren't you clutch to floorboard?!" Dustin snapped back, pointing down at her feet in emphasis. There was a tense silence between the two before Dustin let out a huff of air and sat back in his seat. "Press the clutch to the floorboard."

"What?"

"Clutch to floorboard! Jesus, woman! Are you deaf?!"

"Tiny little shit..."

"Turn the key... break... shift the gear, no no, shit, no, like that! Are you trying to kill us?!"

The irony of this was that here she was being taught how to drive by her dad for the second time and he was just as stressful half the size as he was full size. But, just like when she first started driving, Joan was quick to pick it up, both Hendersons throwing their arms up in excitement with a matching whoop!

With a grin, Joan peeled out of the driveway and followed Dustin's instructions to Mike's houses, ignoring his jabs at how could she forget how to drive and his friend's house? She paused at the familiar two story home.

She had been here only a few time for birthday parties and a sleep over or two, but indeed there it was. Ryan and Harry Wheeler's grandparents had lived here all their lives and since her dad and their dad were childhood best friends, it wasn't an abnormal thing for her to be over here on the occasional Fourth of July or birthday party.

"Are you going to come in?" Dustin popped up at her open window, sending her heart to beat sporadic once again. "Seriously dude? You're going to get scared every time you see me from now on? That hurts."

"Oh shut up, you dork." Joan snapped out, turning off the car and getting out. There was such much more she hadn't seen and didn't know... the house was so much nicer than the decades that would come after it. "Who's, uh, DMing for you guys?"

"Will, duh." Dustin replied with a roll of his eyes and knocking the secret knock. "We're going to finish this before I go off to camp next month so that there's no long break in between campaigns. That's not fun for anyone."

"You're telling me." Joan snorted, thinking back to the last time they kept a campaign throughout the Christmas break before the club discovered and her notes were terrible. It was a disaster and they had to scrap the whole play and start over again with the same world build, much to everyone's annoyance.

"What would you know? You haven't played since you decided you were too cool for the nerd shit." His hands did a mocking form of quotations even though he had his arms full.

"Just, uh, sympathy, I guess."

"Yeah, whatever, it's-."

The door opened and Dustin wasted no time shoving himself inside towards the basement with shouts of, "I brought the goods, I repeat, I brought the goods!" leaving Joan to blink with wide eyes as a mess of raven hair quickly followed Dustin down the stairs. The teen closed the front door slowly before making her way down the basement stairs as if she was on auto pilot.

It was surreal.

Chattering around the table were all of her dad's friends minus a few and she stared with wide eyes at her own friend's parents acting like children. It wasn't the attitude that through her off guard, they always acted childish, but the looks of them that made it so unsettling.

"Shut up, Lucas! You got the corner piece last time, it's my turn!"

"They're brownies! They're should be like four corner pieces!"

"Yeah, well, my mom and bitch of a sister already ate three of them. I'm pretty sure she was high."

"Joan got high?!"

"No way, dude."

"Yeah." Dustin nodded rapidly with a look of seriousness on his face and brownie crumbs littering his chin. "Mom's like, super pissed. I think she's addicted to cocaine."

"Nah, she's a cheerleader, man! There's no way, I think it would be weed."

Joan felt her eye twitch from her spot on the stairs, staring down at the group of four and tried to use Kaleigh's powers to flip tables and choke the shit out of her brother. But alas, she was not special.

Brynnyn looked just like her father, Joan mused at the miniature Uncle Lucas arguing about whether or not she did cocaine or weed. The army definitely gave him some muscles over the years and he still had that confrontational, offense attitude that was passed onto his daughter.

"She doesn't even smoke cigarettes, guys." Mr. Wheeler interrupted with a roll of his eyes and a scoff. "There's no way that Aniza the Good would even touch a blunt or powder."

If she ever got out of here, she was giving Mr. Wheeler a huge hug and birthday card.

"She hasn't played in, like, three years. She's probably changed a lot." Will said matter-of-factly, yet quietly. The statement was fair, Joan supposed, but it still bothered her that these group of boys who would soon be family thought that she was a drug addict.

"I'm telling you assholes. I watched her wipe her nose and everything! I'm pretty sure there was a little bit of white dust there too and I don't think it was from powdered donuts, if you know what I mean."

"No, Dust-bin. I don't understand." Joan stepped down the stairs, making herself known and relishing in the unmasked horror on the little twerps' faces. Arms crossed, she towered over the boys with narrowed eyes, landing on the other Henderson. "Please do tell me what your bitch of a sister did?"

"Oh shit."