Chapter 52: Interfere

"Thanks, Aunt Sharon," Mia says, getting out of the car in front of Starcourt Mall. "I'll catch the bus back home."

For a moment, the teenager questions why she's doing this again. The gray clouds roll ominously above her, like a pathetic fallacy for how she feels on the inside. After tutoring, she'd asked her aunt if she could drive her to the mall for the rest of the afternoon considering it was going to rain and it was a reason to get out of the house besides school and work. After much contemplation, Mia knew it was time to get out and become more social. Make friends and be a normal kid for a change. Joel Rogers still hadn't shown his face for a while and talking with her mom the other night, he hadn't tried to contact anyone who might know of his daughter's whereabouts. It was a relief. Between mother and daughter, they prayed that he'd finally given up after 5 years… unlikely but they could always hope.

"Are you sure?" Sharon says, still a little concerned about everything. Despite the apparent peace her niece has found in Hawkins, she still worries about what could happen. Zack nor anyone else knew that she was keeping a handgun in the glove compartment of the car just in case Joel ever confronted them. She knew better than anyone how dangerous her sister's ex-husband was and would do anything to protect her family.

Mia swallows and grabs her shoulder bag. "Yeah, I'll be fine. I'll see you later."

"If you can't make it for dinner, please call," Sharon continues. "And if anything happens…"

"I will. I promise," she reassures her aunt. She then turns to her cousin sitting in the back seat. "See you later Squirt."

"I want to go to the mall!" the kid demands.

Mia takes that as her cue to head inside with the beginnings of a tantrum possibly on the horizon. In the distance, thunder rumbles indicating the coming storm.

The massive wave of sound hits her as she enters, no surprise as many people would be at the mall when the weather was bad. She's tempted to just find a place to sit and watch people like she did with Bill and Georgie, but decides to walk around, maybe go to the book or music store… normal teenager things.

The word still felt unusual in her mouth "normal" … as she ventured deep into the building.

…

After about an hour of browsing through the stores and buying absolutely nothing, Mia finally gives into her temptation and walks across the mall towards the food court. Deep down, she knew she wanted to come to the mall to see him again. She also knew where he worked now.

There was something about Steve that drew her to him. Or maybe it was because she kept running into him… Maybe someone was telling her something. At this point, she didn't know if the feeling was mutual, but he had flirted with her before. He made her smile and even laugh. It felt good to be with him. Could that mean…?

Then came the doubting thoughts. She didn't really know the guy at all. For all she knew, he could be a huge jerk that just leads girls on to sleep with them. She's questioning why she's even trying to see if Steve was there. Yes, she clearly liked him, but it will all come crashing down, like it always does… A pessimistic way to look at the world, but it has always been her reality.

Her mind flashes back to about a year ago when she was in school in Wisconsin. She felt pretty lonely, especially since she was the "new kid in town" … again. The town was small, meaning that all the students knew each other to some degree and had grown up together. Being the "new girl" meant that she was to be mistrusted and not talked to. Also, Mia didn't doubt that rumours swirled about why she had transferred there and lived with her grandparents. Most of the students met her with some skepticism, and judgement and anyone who talked to her would just basically say hello or hey and that was about it.

For a time, she didn't mind being left alone. It allowed her to adjust to her new school and home life and get her grades on track, but eventually, she started to hate it. Sitting alone at lunch, no one to study with, no plans after school, no parties … it was an emptiest feeling and one more thing to blame on her horrible father.

But after a couple of months, eventually, one boy took a chance. Maybe he was a new kid as well and ended up fit in more when she came along. His name was Andrew Parker. He was a blonde boy. Not on any sports teams, no arts, or sciences, not into things like chess club or A/V. He didn't stand out. He was just there. He just went to school and came home like she did. She eventually found out that he lived on a farm as well. He loved to read and that's where they had met.

She's been doing research for a history project in the school library and couldn't find one specific book she needed. She'd asked the librarian and all he could tell her was that another kid had already checked it out. Discouraged, Mia sat down with what she had and began reading. Andrew was in the corner reading and taking notes. It was then that she noticed he had the book she needed for her project. Instead of reading her own books, she began staring at him. At first, it was just to have an excuse to be frustrated that he had the book she wanted, but eventually, it turned into staring at him because of a developing crush.

When he got up from his chair and left the table, Mia took the opportunity to go over and try to get information from whatever page he was on, desperate to get it for her paper, but he caught her.

"I think this is taking reading over one's shoulder a little too far," he'd said, causing her to jump and nearly scream.

She had turned beet red and struggled to explain what happened. He just laughed and offered to share the book so they could both get what they needed for their projects. She found out Andrew was the same year as her, but they had different schedules which is why they never crossed paths. They spent the rest of the afternoon getting their papers done.

After the first meeting, Mia and Andrew met whenever they could in the library during study hall. It was the only time when their schedules worked, and they would talk and flirt with one another. While she was vague about her life, Andrew shared his openly with her. He had two younger brothers and lived with his parents on the farm outside of town. He was hoping to save enough money to go to college eventually and to try something other than farming. He shared with her his doubts of ever getting out of the town or the family business, but he remained optimistic.

Within a few months of the two of them meeting and after one date to the local roller rink, her dad found her in town and the cops had to be there to escort her to and from school. She did try to talk to Andrew a few times, but he never looked at her the same way. It became semi-mutual that they stayed away from each other, even though it stung so badly. She knew Andrew would never want to be with her due to her background, so she became the lonely kid with the psycho dad…

While she was still that now, no one knew that except her immediate family, the staff at the school and the cops, allowing her to potentially make friends with her peers. She knew that her grandparents had made that tough decision to send her away from the farm and let her be a teenager. The sting of what happened still haunted her a lot and the fact that Andrew never even looked at her again just made it worse.

So why are you trying again? She asks herself as she stares at Scoop's Ahoy in the food court. This can only end in tears…

She then remembers what her mother had told her after they'd "gone on the run" from her father, once he was behind bars. When someone at her new school had asked her to hang out and Mia was too afraid to, her mother told her to go and not to worry.

"Amelia. I promise that I will do everything in my power to protect you from Joel Rogers. He's stolen so many years from you, but if you keep hiding from your life, not only will you lose those best years but you're giving Joel the power he wants to have over you. He wants to continue controlling our lives, even when he's not here, but I won't let that happen. We can't keep hiding from him and we can't live in fear. We're never going to live in fear anymore…"

With that speech in her head, Mia walks towards the ice cream parlour.

Fortunately, it's not busy, only two people in front of her, which buys her a little time to think about what she's going to say. Eventually, the two customers leave and there's a girl behind the counter. She looks utterly bored and resentful. Reading the name tag of "Robin", Mia places the girl's face in her English class, who sits in the back row and sometimes falls asleep during boring days.

She reluctantly goes up to the counter but before she can even open her mouth...

"Let me guess, you're looking for Dingus?" Robin says.

"Why do you call him that?"

"I'll let you in on a secret..." she says in a hushed voice and leans in to enhance her sarcasm further. "It's because he is one."

Mia smirks a little bit, amused by the sarcasm.

"But... he has to have something to him if you came back here," she shrugs.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Most girls don't come back after his dorky attempts at flirting... or the sailor outfits are also a bit of a turn-off... the hat especially. But clearly, there's something wrong with you that made you come back."

Mia frowns and shoots a bit of a glare. There is something wrong with her, it's called trauma. She bites her lip in frustration and does her best to battle her tears.

Robin realizes that she's overstepped when the girl's eyes become watery. She didn't mean to hurt her feelings. She didn't need to be so sensitive… but it struck a nerve that did not need to be.

"Relax, I'm just messing with you. It was just a joke."

"No one's laughing," Mia says sharply. "It's not exactly something you should say to someone you don't even know. Just assuming that..."

"You're right, you're right. I'm sorry..." she cuts her off, not wanting a lecture. Mia still raises an eyebrow at her apology. "No, really I am. I just have issues with people sometimes. I come across as a bit hostile and my mouth doesn't know when to stop and sometimes, I say shit when I shouldn't."

"Clearly," is the retort.

"I deserve that," Robin acknowledges her wrongdoing.

"Why are you so hard on him? Are you guys like exes or something?"

"What? God NO, we're friends. Platonic with a capital 'P'"

"If you're friends, why can't you cut him a break?" Mia asks.

"It's just who I am," Robin shrugs. "I'm the kind of friend who gives you a hard time."

"Remind me to never get on your bad side," Mia murmurs.

"But we're not friends," Robin blurts out.

"Not if you keep that up," is the response.

The employee behind the counter sighs, wanting this to end for both of their sakes. "Fair enough. So do you want to talk to him or not?"

"Is he working?"

Instead of answering...

"Hey Dingus, your girlfriend is here," Robin calls out.

A figure appears behind frosted glass over Robin's shoulder. It slides open to reveal Steve Harrington on his break.

"I don't..." he then realizes who his friend was talking about. "Oh hey."

"Hey," Mia smiles.

"Just a sec..."

The glass slams shut and both girls can see movement behind the glass, likely prepping himself for meeting her.

Sure enough, when he comes out, his hat is gone and he's doing his best to hide the dorky uniform, not successfully, but he tries. He comes around the counter and stops.

"Hi... uh hi..." Steve says. "What's up?"

Mia swallows and tries to find the words, but immediately her eyes go to the ground. She's fighting the fact that her face is turning red and she bites her lip in frustration. Why the hell does she suddenly have nothing to say?

The two stand there, unsure of how to proceed past casual greetings.

"God it's like watching paint dry," Robin retorts. "And you can actually feel the awkward. Will either of you say something?"

"Don't mind her," Steve says. "This is Robin by the way."

"Yeah, we've met you moron. Not only can she read my nametag but we're actually in the same English class."

Steve groans and does his best to swallow his pride. "Okay… good to know."

Mia swallows and finally decides to speak.

"To be honest, I don't know why I even came here... I guess I wanted to ask if you... wanted to… I don't know…hang out?"

Inside Steve is celebrating. "Like now?"

"Sure, or later since you're still working."

"Later is probably best, my break is about to end, but yeah, I'll see you after," he says

"Okay," Mia smiles, briefly getting lost in his eyes. "I'll be reading outside of the food court."

"Cool. I'll see you then."

"Cool," she says before walking out of Scoops and disappearing into the crowds of the mall.

Steve stands there, shocked, overwhelmed and impressed.

He turns to Robin, arms outstretched in the dorkiest victory pose and internally braces himself for the barbs coming his way. He simply presents himself as victorious and very happy.

"I've got a date..."

"Wouldn't call it a date," Robin retorts. "Unless you're deaf in which case let me help you out… she just wants you to hang out."

"I know that, but it honestly sounds like it could lead up to date."

"Tell me this…" Robin continues. "Shouldn't you be the one asking her out?"

"That's my plan. I'm going to meet her on my break, turn on the charm and when the time is right..."

Robin's snorts. "What charm?"

Steve rolls his eyes and finishes his sentence. "Then I'll ask her out."

"I'm not doubting it, the question will be if she says yes."

"She will say yes," Steve fires back, beyond annoyed. He's also trying to hype himself up that Mia will do just that.

"While I admire your confidence, Dingus, don't force her against her will to say yes."

"I won't"

"Good, now the next question will be if she seems sane enough to like you."

Steve knew this was coming and prepared for another argument.

"Why is it for every girl who actually shows interest in me or hell… even likes me, you think there's something wrong with them?"

"Because you're you." is the reply. "I don't know if you know this but you're not exactly Mr. Smooth or hell even a Romeo type,"

"Why would I want to be? Wasn't he like 14 and he killed a bunch of people and then eventually himself?"

Robin is taken aback by the fact that he knew the Shakespearean character. "My point is… your dating history is not exactly stellar and for the number of times I've seen you try to flirt with girls, it's clear you're charm is very limited."

"I had a steady girlfriend for almost a year," he points out.

"And yet Nancy is ten times smarter than you and I will never understand why she ever went out with you."

Steve groans and grinds his teeth. Robin did have a point. Nancy was a lot smarter than him. She's applying to colleges while he's stuck working here and he's already graduated. He knows he was originally a shitty boyfriend to her, but he did his best to change. While she did cheat with Johnathan, their breakup wasn't as painful as it could have been. It still sucked and stung like crazy… and one could argue she technically dumped him when she was drunk at the Halloween party, but the fact they could still be civil now said a lot about their relationship and how much he'd matured.

"Can't you just be happy for me?" he asks in defeat.

"Ask me in an hour when you're on break," Robin says. She then looks at her watch. "Speaking of which… You're on Dingus."

She disappears into the back room, leaving him to run the counter… just in time for another rush in customers.

...

After cleaning himself up a bit from the ice cream, ditching the sailor hat and putting on his sweater to cover his hideous uniform, Steve does one last check before going to find Mia.

It takes a few minutes, but he finds her sitting next to one of the weird random trees set up by the escalator just outside the food court. The rain pounded against the glass skylight above them, and the occasional flash of lightning caused the mall to become brighter than usual. She's reading a book that has multiple sticky notes poking out from the pages.

He inhales and checks his hair in a nearby window display before walking towards her. He really didn't want to screw this up. She was the first girl who'd shown genuine interest in him instead of all the others who pretended to be flattered by his flirting and then laughed at him behind his back. She seemed like a nice girl, and he wanted to get to know her better.

"Is that worth reading?" he asks, coming up to her.

Mia looks up from her book smiles and blushes slightly. "I'd say so."

She tucks the book into her shoulder bag and moves over to let him sit. He takes her up on her offer and does so.

"How busy is it?" she asks, not wanting to go into awkward silence again.

"Scoops? Busy as it can be. I'm usually stuck with the busier crowds because Robin… well you've met her."

"I have and she seems…" Mia hesitates with the words. "To speak her mind."

"That's putting it mildly. Robin lacks a lot in terms of people skills. She hates the job because of obvious reasons, but if she was in charge all the time, we wouldn't have any regular customers."

"And yet she's your friend."

"She is kind of sort of less mean and nice once you get to know her, but she takes some getting used to."

"So, she's told me. She says she's the kind of friend that will give you shit because you're her friend. Which if I'm honest, is not the best way to keep friends."

"She and I have been through a lot," Steve says, feeling like he's defending the reasons why he still hangs out with Robin despite how awful she treats him. "It's why we're friends."

"Those are the ties that bind," Mia shrugs.

The two go into silence again, this time is just as awkward as the last. People walk by, staring at them for brief moments before turning back to their own lives. Mia does her best to stop blushing and avoids eye contact to hide it. She continues to stare at the ground, but Steve cannot stop staring at her.

When she looks at him she can tell he doesn't know what to say next either.

"To be honest, I'm not really sure why I came to find you today," Mia says, deciding honesty was the best policy, especially how awkward it felt at this moment.

"Really? Why? You don't like me?"

"No, I do..." She does her best not to blush again. They could only be friends, nothing more. "I guess it's just been hard to find friends in a new town, and I guess the best place to start is the person you seem to always run into."

"Literally," he says. "You ran into me twice."

"Excuse me?" she smirks. "I'll admit the first time I wasn't watching where I was going but the second time we share that responsibility."

"No, I was coming into work, and you were running for the bus," he reminds her. "You ran into me."

"Okay fine," she admits smiling. "I ran into you."

"You also said it's like the universe is telling us something," he prompts.

"I don't actually believe in that kind of stuff," she says quickly. "It was just some stupid thing that I said in the moment."

"It's cool."

Steve decides to change the subject. He then notices the book in her bag again.

"What are you reading?"

Mia looks down and pulls out the book.

"The Tempest. It's one of Shakespeare's plays."

Doesn't ring a bell with Steve. Then again, he'd usually cut English class anyway and never read any of the actual books assigned. When he did book reports, he just used the plot summary and any random pages he found. It's how he knew about Romeo and Juliet.

"I don't know that one. I never studied it in school," which was the truth even if other kids in his class did.

"It's one of my favourite plays by the Bard," Mia explains. "It was actually Shakespeare's last play that he wrote and likely the last one he starred in as Prospero before he died. I just love the magical element in the story. It has a lot of thematic elements mixed together."

"I didn't know you were such a fan."

"My grandparents are actually the ones who love him, and it's kind of rubbed off on me. My grandmother was an English professor before she met my grandfather and on nights when we had no power on the farm, we'd pick a scene from one of the plays and act it out."

"Cool." Steve says. It was a sweet memory that she was sharing with him, and it sounded nice overall. "But how can you understand all of this… I mean its old English and barely comprehensible."

"I'm guessing like Robin you fell asleep in class?" she muses.

"Sure, yeah or I just wasn't there," he admits, scratching the back of his neck.

Mia looks at him sympathetically.

"I don't blame you for being confused or finding it boring. I barely know what I'm reading half the time too. There are a lot of double meanings, metaphors, puns, and old words in there that most people today don't get. I think Shakespeare can be an acquired taste and if you haven't grown up with it like I have, it's tough to get through…"

She swallows and puts on her best British accent. "There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so."

The second she finishes the quote, Mia is mortified. She doesn't know why she did that. She made herself look like a total dork and turned beet red in response. She looks down in embarrassment and does her best not to cry. She bites her lip to curb the pain she feels.

Steve smiles and thinks it's adorable. She's a really smart girl and was obviously not what she seemed.

"Sorry, I don't know why I did that…that's so embarrassing,"

"I think it's cute," he smiles reassuringly.

This causes Mia to go even redder, this time with attraction.

"I'm actually reading it with the kid I'm tutoring."

"Yeah, how's that going?"

"Pretty well. It's the police chief's daughter Jane."

It takes him a minute; Steve is just so used to calling her 'El' by now.

"Oh, Chief Hopper's daughter," he says.

"You know her?"

Yeah, I know she can move things with her mind and has battled monsters from another dimension, he thinks to himself. And helped us fight Russians under our mall.

"Yeah, I've met her," he says. "Good kid."

"She is, but super shy. I know she's had a rough upbringing, but she's really a smart girl."

"I remember you saying that you were tutoring. How's it going?"

"Pretty well. It's nice getting paid and Jane is a fast learner. I think she's going to do just fine going to high school."

"Well, that's good to hear."

"I can't imagine what she's gone through that's caused her to be so far behind and be able to go school… to not make friends…"

Steve swallows. He's worried about what Mia knows about El's past. Did Hopper tell her that his kid was a lab experiment who had powers and was part of various government projects that brought supernatural monsters to Hawkins?

He takes a moment and realizes that the Chief would never do something like that, especially if it jeopardized her safety. He probably made up a story to tell Mia about what happened to Eleven.

"She's definitely had it rough," Steve admits truthfully, which was a massive understatement.

Mia shakes the thoughts from her mind on how she's had it rough as well.

Steve inhales, psyching himself up for wanting to ask Mia out. His heart is pounding in his chest, all the various possible outcomes scroll through his mind.

The worst she could say is no, he keeps telling himself. But she won't because she likes you.

"So, um…" he begins. "I don't know if you're doing anything on…"

Just then a loud clap of thunder cuts him off from his words and a bright flash of lightning near blinds the two of them. Mia stares up at the skylight. The clouds were almost black in colour and the rain pounding against the glass splattered off like tiny explosions, not like little ripples on a pond that occurs with drizzling conditions.

"Good God," Mia says. "I didn't realize that it was that bad outside."

"Yeah, no kidding," Steve says. He's a little upset that he'd been cut off, but he inhales again and prepares to start over.

"Sorry, you were saying," Mia prompts him.

"Yeah, um so if you weren't doing anything on S…"

This next rumble of thunder practically shakes the entire mall. People around them stop what they are doing, and either look up or murmur in surprise at the sheer power of this force of nature.

Steve sighs in frustration and then grinds his teeth, wishing that a damn thunderstorm would stop trying to prevent him from getting a date.

He decides to try again, this time really quickly to avoid bad timing again.

"So Mia… would you want to…"

In a bright flash of light and another explosion of thunder, the power in the entire mall shuts off, plunging all of them into darkness.

Then chaos erupts. People's voices ring out in panic, some scream from the shock, others instinctively head towards the exits or a safe place to stay until the lights come back on.

Both Mia and Steve squint in the dark to watch people rush by them, in a flurry and a panic. One poor kid cries thinking that they are stuck on the escalator now that it's stopped moving. Other parents call out for their kids.

"All of this over the power going out," Mia scoffs. Unfortunately, Steve can't hear her over the noise.

Steve's hands clench into fists. Maybe the universe was trying to tell him something. That he wasn't ever getting a girlfriend again. It seemed to be a pretty clear message from the forces above.

He then groans in equal frustration knowing that he has to go help Robin. There were procedures that they had to follow at Scoops in case there was ever a power failure. He wanted to stay and let her deal with it, but it was a multi-person job and if he left her to do it, he'd never hear the end of it.

But he also doesn't want to ditch Mia in the dark.

Knowing it's not the best idea, he leans as close as he can get to Mia without making her uncomfortable, cups his hands and says.

"I'm sorry. I have to go back to work to help Robin. But if you're free on Friday night, I'd like to take you to the movies."

Mia turns to him, squinting to make out his face in the dark. All she can do is nod before Steve reluctantly turns to head back to his job.

While it was not pitch dark and Steve knew the route back to Scoops, he still bumped into people and walked into other things. It wasn't until another flash of lightning allowed him to properly map his way back to the parlour. It was so weird that the emergency lights hadn't come on yet. As if the whole place was deprived of power.

Mia sits. She could barely hear what he'd said, especially the last part, but she assumed that Robin his coworker needed help. She stays where she is, waiting for the flurry of activity to die down, as well as the rain and then try to catch the bus home. She hated to cut their visit short, but circumstances had caused it.

Steve heads to the food court with a spring in his step, knowing that he'd asked out a girl on a date and she'd said yes. He couldn't wait to rub it in Robin's face.

A/N: Something is interfering with Steve and Mia. Is this a sign they shouldn't be together? Let me know. Sorry if it's been a while. Please follow and review.

norozco772: That battle will come don't you worry.

Larry: Sorry, I don't do requested fan fiction. I also don't know a thing about Maze Runner.

GlaringEyes: Yes it would have been too easy if there had been something there. I agree that this is the first time the Party and Loser's Club are reacting genuinely. Most of their secrets have been laid bare for all of them to react to and their shared trauma and as you said, their enemies brought them together to fight. I don't really know if I will give Bev any powers yet, I will certainly consider it.

Guest: Thank you, I liked the idea too.