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"Broken Wings"

Take these broken wings

And learn to fly again

Learn to live so free

- Mr. Mister

They all came together for the first time since everything had happened a couple of weeks later, for Bob's funeral.

Hopper hung back from the rest. Bob's parents had flown in from Maine, and he didn't want to take the chance that they remembered him from high school and found it inappropriate that he should be there. Not that he'd been a jerk, or, at least, he didn't think he had been … but he hadn't exactly been nice, either. 'Nice' really wasn't a word anyone would have used to describe him in high school.

Except maybe Joyce, he thought, watching her as she stood at the side of Bob's parents—both of whom managed to look just like Bob. Small, round, plain … and carrying hidden depths, he added to himself, remembering how Bob had died. Sometimes great power came in small packages.

He glanced back behind a nearby tree, where Eleven stood waiting for the service to be over. She had never met Bob, but she cared about Joyce, and about Will, and she wanted to be there for them. Hopper had promised a few minutes with her friends afterward, if he could finagle it somehow, and he could see Mike already glancing challengingly at him from the graveside.

As the minister read the service, Hopper watched the people at the graveside. There were a lot of them, he realized with some surprise. Bob would have been happy to know how much he mattered to people. His coworkers from Radio Shack, his parents, friends from high school, Joyce and all the kids … a lot of people were going to miss plain, unassuming Bob.

It went without saying, Hopper thought without bitterness, that his own funeral would not be nearly as well attended. Which was okay. He didn't deserve a lot of mourners.

With another glance at Eleven, and then back at Joyce, he mused that maybe now that they had dealt with the Upside Down, he would have a chance to fix that. Be a real father to Eleven. Maybe, someday, when she'd had time to heal, give Joyce a chance to love again. Give himself the chance while he was at it.

He saw Will slip his hand into his mom's, and Jonathan put his arm around her shoulders. She had done a good job with those boys. Maybe she hadn't always been in a great place, and Lonnie clearly hadn't been much of a father, but they loved each other, they loved her, and they were strong. As strong as their mother, for all that she was so small and slender.

Hopper leaned against the tree, further obscuring Eleven from the mourners at the graveside with his body.

"Is it done?" she asked softly.

"Soon."

Silence followed that answer. She hadn't forgiven him for all the lies he had told her with that word over the past year. Probably she shouldn't.

"Ten minutes," he clarified.

"What are they saying?"

"The minister's praying over the body."

"Praying?"

He really hadn't even touched on religion in the past year, feeling that she had enough complicated things to learn without that, and he didn't want to get into a full explanation here at the funeral. "Talking to God. A … a higher power people believe in."

"Why?"

"It comforts them."

"Oh."

He could tell her more later. He had so much to tell her about the world, and how it worked, so much to teach her … but there was time for that now. Or at least, so he hoped. He'd had a call from Owens, very brief, mostly just confirming that the doc had lived through that nightmare at the lab—although how, Hopper didn't know. He'd been damned lucky. Owens said he was working on something, that he would be in touch. Hopper hoped to hell that something was setting Eleven free, because otherwise—well, he'd take her away, someplace safe, even if it would break her heart, and probably his, to have to leave behind the people they loved.

The funeral was ending now, and he saw Joyce look up, her eyes finding his across the space between them, and she managed a little smile.

He raised his eyebrows in question, and she nodded back. She was okay. Or okay enough, anyway. She leaned down and said something quietly to Will, who motioned to Mike and started toward Hopper.

"They're coming," he said to Eleven. "Remember, no loud voices, no big moves—"

"I'm not stupid," she reminded him.

"No. No, you're not. But sometimes, I'm scared, and it helps to remind you of things." He was trying to talk to her more like that, tell her more about how he felt, but it didn't come easily to him. It never had. Not even with Diane. Or Sara.

"Hi, Chief," Will said as the boys approached him.

"Hey, kid. How you feeling?"

"Fine."

It looked true. Will had good color, his eyes were clear and bright, and he walked with more confidence than Hopper had seen in him all this past year. Maybe it was really over. God, he hoped so.

Pushing off the tree to give the kids some privacy, he moved toward the graveside. Joyce was giving a final hug to Bob's parents. As they turned to leave the cemetery, Joyce came to Hopper. "You could have come closer."

"I thought Eleven might have questions."

"Did she?" Joyce glanced around. "This must seem weird."

"I think it does. She had a few." He cleared his throat. "You okay?"

"Sort of. At least, I will be until there's nothing else to do. Then …" She shrugged. "I'm helping his parents pack up his house the next few days. That's going to be—" Her eyes welled up with tears. "He was such a good man, Hop."

"I know," he said gently. "And brave when it counted."

Joyce nodded. "If I hadn't been standing there, he wouldn't have stopped, Hop. He would have kept going, and then he might have—he might have—"

"Hey. You can't think like that. Okay? You can't blame yourself. He wouldn't want you to do that."

"No. No, you're right, he wouldn't." She rubbed her coat sleeve over her face to wipe away the tears. "Did you hear from the lab?"

"Not yet. Owens said be patient."

"Because you're so good at that."

He smiled, glad she could make jokes. "I could get better."

"Sure you could."

Joyce shivered with the cold and Hopper considered putting an arm around her shoulders, deciding that was maybe not appropriate while standing near the gravesite of her boyfriend. He didn't want people getting the wrong impression. "I can bring Will home if you want to go."

"No. Thanks. Someday I'll be able to let him out of my sight, but not yet. It's a miracle that I got him back again, Hop." She looked up at him. "I could bring her home, if you want to go."

"I'm not ready, either," he confessed.

"Then I guess we're stuck with each other."

"I guess we are."