August 17, 1985
Dove was curled up on the couch, a blanket draped over her legs and a book resting in her lap. The warm afternoon light streamed through the windows, casting a golden glow across the room. The house was unusually quiet, with Dustin out with his friends and her mom working late. It was a rare moment of peace, though it never seemed to last long these days.
A knock at the door pulled her from the pages of her book. She sighed, already knowing what to expect. The sound wasn't surprising; it had become almost routine, the steady stream of visitors who seemed to think of her as some sort of local legend. Everyone in town had heard the story—or at least the official version of it— of the girl who escaped death at Starcourt Mall.
She placed the book on the coffee table and stood, her body still stiff from the lingering soreness. The walk to the door was slower than she would have liked, but by now, she was used to the pace. As she reached the door, she took a deep breath and steeled herself for another round of polite smiles and awkward small talk.
But when Dove opened the door, it wasn't one of the usual neighbors or townsfolk. It was Steve.
He stood on the porch, his hands shoved deep into the pockets of his jacket, his hair slightly disheveled, as if he'd run his fingers through it one too many times. Steve had been around a lot over the past month, stopping by almost every day to hang out with her and Dustin while she healed. It had been a welcome distraction—the three of them had fallen into an easy rhythm, watching movies, making bad jokes, and pretending things were normal.
"Hey," she greeted, her voice light but cautious as she stepped aside for him to come in. "Here for movie night?"
Steve shook his head, a faint smile tugging at his lips as he stepped inside. "Actually, it's something different.." he said, his tone carrying a seriousness that immediately caught her attention. He paused just inside the doorway, glancing at her before asking, "How are you doing?"
"I'm good," Dove said, closing the door and gesturing for him to sit down. "Almost back to normal, I think."
Steve nodded, sitting on the edge of the couch like he wasn't sure if he wanted to stay. There was an awkward pause before he cleared his throat, his fingers fidgeting with a loose thread on his jeans. "Can we talk?" he asked, his voice quieter than usual, almost hesitant.
Dove swallowed hard, her stomach twisting. She didn't need to ask what he meant—she could see it in the way he wouldn't quite meet her eyes, in the tension in his shoulders. She exhaled softly and moved to sit down next to him, leaving just enough space between them for him to feel comfortable. "Steve—" she started, her voice gentle, but he cut her off, his tone firm yet tinged with vulnerability.
"No," he said, shaking his head. "I get to go first this time."
Dove blinked, surprised by the sudden determination in his voice. She pressed her lips together, nodding slightly, waiting for him to continue.
Steve took a deep breath, his hands still fidgeting nervously in his lap. When he finally spoke, his words came out in a rush, as if he'd been holding them in for too long. "I've been thinking. About us, about the mall, about how close we came to losing everything."
He finally turned to look at her, his eyes searching hers. "And I can't stop thinking about how I almost didn't get to say this."
Dove's chest tightened, her breath catching slightly as she waited for him to say what he clearly had been carrying for weeks.
Steve took another deep breath, his hands finally stilling as he rested them on his knees. "I know things haven't always been easy between us," he started, his voice low but steady. "And I know I've messed up—probably more than I even realize. I've said and done things I wish I could take back."
Dove opened her mouth to respond, but the look in his eyes stopped her. He wasn't finished.
"But this past month," he continued, his gaze softening as he looked at her, "just being around you, spending time with you and Dustin—it made me realize something. Every time I think about where I want to be or who I want to be with, I always come back to you."
Dove's heart sank with every word, and the more he spoke, the more she could feel the weight of his words settling over her. She could feel the tension building, the air between them growing thicker. And then he said it.
"I love you," Steve confessed, his voice quiet but resolute, his eyes locked on hers. "I think I've loved you for a while now. I just didn't figure it out until.. well, until I almost lost you."
The words hung in the air like a thunderclap, echoing through Dove's mind. She stared at him, completely dumbfounded, her thoughts racing but failing to land on anything concrete. She had expected this—she wasn't naive—but even so, hearing it out loud was something else entirely.
Her chest tightened, her pulse quickening as she searched his face, trying to decipher her own feelings. But all she could feel was a crushing uncertainty, an overwhelming sense of not knowing what to say or how to say it.
Steve shifted slightly, his hand brushing against hers as if to anchor himself. "You don't have to say anything," he added quickly, his voice trembling just enough to betray his nerves. "I just.. I needed you to know."
Dove nodded, a small, almost imperceptible motion, but she couldn't bring herself to say anything. Her mouth had gone dry, like she'd been wandering the desert for days, desperate for water but unable to find any. Her heart pounded in her chest, each beat echoing in her ears as she struggled to form words that wouldn't come.
She wanted to say it back. She wanted more than anything to love Steve Harrington. But she couldn't. Not because he didn't deserve it—he did, more than he probably realized—but because the weight of those feelings, the implications, the fear that came with them, felt like too much to bear.
Her gaze dropped to their hands, his fingers still barely brushing hers, and she felt a lump rise in her throat. "Steve.." she started, her voice barely above a whisper, but even that single word cracked, betraying the war raging inside her.
Steve pulled back, his hand falling away as he stood up. She could see it in the way his shoulders tensed, the way his expression shifted—he was building his walls back up, bracing himself for the impact. "It's okay," he said, his voice calm, but there was a hollowness to it that twisted something deep inside her.
Dove stood too, ignoring the dull throb in her side as she reached out and placed a hand gently on his arm. "Steve, wait," she said, her voice still trembling. He turned to face her, his expression guarded, though his eyes betrayed the vulnerability he was trying so hard to hide.
All she could choke out was, "Thanks for telling me." The words felt small, inadequate, but they were all she could manage as the storm of emotions inside her threatened to pull her under.
Steve nodded, his jaw tightening briefly before he forced a small, strained smile. "Yeah," he said softly. "I should go."
Dove wanted to say something—anything—to stop him, to make him stay, but the words caught in her throat. She dropped her hand from his arm, watching as he turned and headed for the door. When the door clicked shut behind him, the silence that followed was deafening. Dove sank back onto the couch, her chest tight and her mind racing.
August 26, 1985
The mall stretched out endlessly before her, a warped and twisted version of Starcourt. The walls bent unnaturally, curving and stretching as if they were alive, pulsing with a dull, sickly light. The neon signs flickered erratically, casting long, distorted shadows that twisted and moved of their own accord. The air was thick, heavy, like breathing through a wet blanket.
Dove tried to move, but her feet were stuck, glued to the cracked, shimmering floor. She looked down—her legs were covered in a black, tar-like substance, thick and cold, creeping up her body like it was swallowing her whole. Panic flared in her chest, but the harder she struggled, the more the black sludge pulled her down.
A distant echo, faint and haunting, reached her ears, steady, like the ticking of a clock.
The walls suddenly shifted, warping further, the cracks in the floor spreading outward like veins, bleeding a dark, oily liquid. The mall around her began to disintegrate, pieces of glass and metal crumbling and floating upwards, defying gravity as they dissolved into ash.
Ahead, she saw Billy.
He was standing alone in the center of the courtyard, his back turned to her, motionless, as if he were waiting. His figure was blurred, like she was looking at him through a fogged-up window. The black tendrils of the Mind Flayer snaked around his body, pulsating as they tightened their grip, but he didn't react. He just stood there.
She saw Max approaching Billy, her steps hesitant but determined. Dove tried to scream her name, her throat burning from the effort, but no sound escaped. She waved her arms, desperately trying to get Max's attention, but the redhead didn't even glance her way.
Max took another step closer to Billy, her hand reaching out toward him. Dove's panic surged, her hands trembling as she fought against the invisible force holding her in place.
The floor beneath her cracked, splitting wide open with a thunderous rumble, and she was falling—plummeting into nothingness. The walls and ceiling of the mall fractured and twisted, bending in ways they shouldn't, as if the whole place were melting. The black tendrils shot out of the cracks, slithering and coiling around her, dragging her deeper into the abyss.
And still, the ticking of the clock. Slow. Relentless. Tick. Tick. Tick.
She hit the ground with a thud, the impact jarring her entire body, but there was no pain. She was back in the mall—no, not the mall, but something like it. Everything was wrong. The walls were too high, the ceiling too far away. Colors bled together, dripping down the walls like paint. The distorted faces of people she knew—Max, Dustin, Steve, Danny—flickered in and out, appearing and vanishing like ghosts.
Billy was there, too. His face was pale, twisted in agony. The tendrils wrapped tighter, pulling him up, high above her, as he struggled, his body jerking and convulsing.
She tried to run to him, but her legs wouldn't move. She was stuck again, glued to the ground as black vines slithered up her ankles. The more she pulled, the tighter they gripped, cutting into her skin, squeezing the air from her lungs.
And then the voices started. Soft at first, but growing louder, a chorus of whispers swirling around her, seeping into her mind—mocking, cruel, inhuman.
"You let him die."
Dove's breath caught in her throat. The whisper echoed louder, surrounding her.
"You could have saved him."
Her heart pounded harder, the words cutting deep, suffocating her under their weight. The air thickened with the sound of the clock—Tick. Tick. Tick.
Above her, Billy's face contorted in pain as the Mind Flayer's tendrils pierced deeper into him, his screams echoing through the fractured space. She watched, frozen, as the blackness consumed him, dragging him further away from her.
Max appeared then, out of the corner of Dove's eye, standing just beyond the destruction, her face twisted in sorrow. "You let him die," Max whispered, her voice so quiet, yet filled with devastation.
"No.." Dove tried to say, her voice barely audible. But Max's eyes bore into her, accusing, as the walls of the mall rippled and folded around them like waves crashing in slow motion.
The ticking grew louder. The clock loomed ahead, distorted and enormous, its hands spinning backward and forward at erratic speeds.
And still, Dove couldn't move.
Billy screamed again, his voice raw and broken, as the tendrils wrapped tighter, squeezing the life out of him. The Mind Flayer's shadow towered over them, filling the sky with its monstrous form, blocking out what little light remained.
"It's your fault," the voices whispered, in unison this time.
The ground cracked open beneath her, jagged and sharp, pulling her down as the world shattered into fragments of black and red. She was falling again, spiraling into the abyss, and Billy's scream echoed through the void, haunting her as she plummeted.
Just before she hit the ground, she saw the Mind Flayer's massive maw open wide, black tendrils slithering out, ready to devour her whole. But she didn't struggle, didn't scream or fight. She just closed her eyes, waiting for the end.
Dove's voice trailed off, her eyes unfocused as she sat in the sterile office. The walls were a dull beige, the faint hum of fluorescent lights buzzing overhead. She could still feel the weight of the nightmare pressing against her chest, as real as the day she had stood in the wreckage of Starcourt. But here, in this bland, government-issued therapy room, it felt distant, like it belonged to another life.
Dr. Evelyn Carter sat across from her, a clipboard balanced on her lap, her eyes carefully studying Dove's expression. She didn't seem shocked or surprised—just calm, as though she'd heard worse. But that didn't ease Dove's nerves.
"And then what?" Dr. Carter asked, her voice smooth and steady, nudging Dove back to the present.
"Then nothing," Dove said flatly, staring at the floor. "I woke up." Her fingers clenched tightly in her lap, nails digging into her palm as she swallowed hard, trying to shake off the lingering feeling of being suffocated by the tendrils.
The psychiatrist tilted her head slightly, writing something down on her clipboard. "You feel like you didn't do enough to help.. at the mall?"
Dove's stomach churned at the mention of the mall. She had told this woman everything—about the battle, about Billy, about how Max had screamed for him. But the words felt hollow here, like they'd lost their meaning in this clinical environment. Everything had.
"I could've stopped it," Dove muttered. Her voice wavered, but she forced herself to stay composed. "If I'd been faster.. if I hadn't let the monster knock me out, maybe I could've saved him. Billy didn't have to die."
The psychiatrist leaned back in her chair, her eyes sharp but sympathetic. "You were facing an otherworldly force, Dove. You were fighting against something no one is equipped to handle. What you did that night—you saved people."
Dove shook her head, bitterness curling in her throat. "I didn't save Billy."
A silence settled between them. The doctor clicked her pen, jotting down a few more notes. Dove could feel the tension knotting in her chest, the same tension that had been gnawing at her ever since she'd woken up from that nightmare the first time. The government had brought in this woman—officially a therapist, but Dove knew better. She was here to report back, to make sure they knew what had really happened at Starcourt. Not just the version they fed the public, but the truth.
Dove clenched her jaw, remembering how they had spun it. Thirty people dead in the fire. Billy was one of them. No mention of the Mind Flayer, no mention of the Upside Down. Just a tragic accident. And Dove was the sole survivor.
"And how have you been keeping up with your relationships?" the psychiatrist asked, casually but with that calculated tone Dove had come to recognize in every government agent since Starcourt.
"Dustin and I are close, obviously. Um, Danny just left for Stanford. Eddie and Steve still visit a lot," Dove answered. "And Max, she.." her voice faltered. She could barely say Max's name without thinking of Billy. The haunted look in Max's eyes every time they crossed paths was enough to shatter Dove all over again. "She's dealing with a lot."
Dr. Carter nodded but didn't press further, scribbling again. "And the nightmares? Have they been happening more frequently since you returned home?"
Dove shifted uncomfortably in her chair, her gaze dropping to her hands clasped tightly in her lap. "I've been having nightmares since last fall," she admitted, her voice quieter than she intended. "But since the mall, it's.. it's been almost every night."
The psychiatrist paused, setting down her pen and looking at Dove with a measured calm. "Dove, what happened that night was traumatic. It's normal for your mind to process it through dreams, especially something so intense."
Dove huffed, not sure if she believed that anymore. "These don't feel like normal dreams," she muttered, more to herself than to the psychiatrist. "It feels like something's.. watching me. Like it's still out there."
The woman's eyes flickered, just for a second, before her professional mask snapped back into place. "It's important to remember that trauma can make us feel like threats are still present, even when they're gone. What you experienced was real, but the danger has passed."
Dove wanted to believe her, but something in her gut twisted. She thought of the way the shadows moved when she wasn't looking, how she swore she could still hear the ticking of that damned clock in the quiet of the night.
A feeling of unease settled over her, and she couldn't shake the sense that everything was wrong, no matter how many times she was told otherwise.
She glanced at the door, her mind drifting as Dr. Carter leaned forward slightly, her tone shifting to something softer, more personal. "Dove," she said gently, "sometimes it helps to focus on something new. A routine or hobby, maybe even a club. Something different, to take your mind off everything."
Dove frowned, still lost in her thoughts.
"Just think about it," Dr. Carter continued. "You've been through a lot, and while it's important to talk about it, it's equally important to move forward. Even in small steps."
Dove nodded slowly, unsure if anything would actually help. "I'll think about it," she muttered.
Dr. Carter smiled, standing as she gestured toward the door. "That's all I ask. Take care of yourself, Dove."
Dove found herself back in her car. She mulled over Dr. Carter's suggestion, unsure if it would make a difference. What could possibly distract her from the guilt that gnawed at her every day?
A short drive later, Dove pulled into the school parking lot, her heart skipping a beat as she stared at the building. Senior year. Somehow, after everything, she was back here, walking into her first day like it was just another normal fall semester.
But nothing felt normal anymore.
As Dove stepped out of her car and started toward the entrance, the familiar sounds of lockers slamming and students chatting filled the air. She walked through the crowded halls, feeling the strange dissonance between the normalcy around her and the chaos still playing out in her mind.
Suddenly, a voice cut through her thoughts. "Hey, Dove!"
She turned to see Chrissy Cunningham standing at a booth near the entrance, smiling brightly as she handed out flyers to passing students. Dove had never talked to Chrissy outside of classes, but her friendliness was undeniable.
"Cheerleading tryouts tonight," Chrissy said, holding out a flyer with a wide, hopeful grin. "You should totally come!"
Dove raised an eyebrow, looking down at the flyer with an incredulous smirk. "Cheerleading?" she asked, trying to hide the laughter bubbling up. "I don't really think that's my thing."
Chrissy giggled softly, waving off her comment. "You'd be surprised. It's fun! And besides, it might be a nice change of pace. Something different, you know?"
Dove's instinct was to walk away, to brush it off. She wasn't the cheerleading type. Not at all. She had too much on her mind—Billy, Max, the nightmares.. but then Dr. Carter's words echoed in her head. Something different.
Dove took a step forward, then stopped. She turned back toward Chrissy, eyeing the flyer in her hand for a long moment.
"Thanks," she muttered, reaching out and snatching the flyer.
Chrissy's face lit up in surprise, her smile widening. "That's the spirit! See you tonight!"
Dove gave her a small, reluctant nod, tucking the flyer into her bag as she continued walking down the hall. She didn't know what she was doing, but maybe—just maybe—it was a step forward. Something to pull her out of the shadows of the past.
Dove stood in the middle of the gym, her heart pounding in her chest as she watched the other girls practicing their routines. The energy in the room was contagious—nervous excitement buzzed in the air as music pulsed from the speakers, echoing off the high ceilings. Chrissy was at the front, leading a group of girls through a series of jumps and kicks, her ponytail bouncing as she moved with effortless grace.
Dove shifted awkwardly, glancing down at her sneakers. What was she doing here? She had always thought cheerleading was something for people like Chrissy—bright, peppy, and full of sunshine. Not for her. But something about the idea of doing something so far removed from the horrors of Starcourt had tugged at her, and now here she was, standing in a line of hopefuls trying out for the cheer squad.
"Alright, next up!" Chrissy's cheerful voice snapped Dove out of her thoughts.
Dove looked up, nodding slightly, her palms sweaty. "That's me."
"Don't worry," Chrissy said with an encouraging smile, "just have fun with it."
Fun. That was easier said than done.
As Dove stepped forward to take her place, she could feel the eyes of the other girls on her. She took a deep breath, trying to ignore the tight knot forming in her stomach.
The music started, a fast-paced beat that filled the room. Dove forced herself to move, following the rhythm and trying to keep up with the steps Chrissy had demonstrated. At first, she was stiff, her movements awkward and uncoordinated. She could hear the soft whispers of the other girls, the shuffling of feet as they watched, but she pushed through it, focusing on getting the routine right.
Kick. Jump. Spin.
She wasn't as graceful as the others, and her timing was off, but as the routine continued, something strange happened. Dove's mind, which had been buzzing with nerves and self-doubt, started to clear. The music, the movement—it drowned out the noise in her head, the guilt, the ticking of the clock that haunted her nightmares. For a brief moment, she wasn't thinking about anything but the beat, her body syncing with the rhythm in a way that felt freeing.
She spun too hard at one point, nearly losing her balance, but she caught herself, laughing awkwardly as she tried to recover. Chrissy clapped from the front, smiling warmly.
"Great save!" Chrissy called out. "Keep going!"
Dove could feel her cheeks burning with embarrassment, but Chrissy's encouragement gave her a tiny boost of confidence. She kept going, her movements less stiff now, her body falling into the routine more naturally. By the time the song ended, she was out of breath but strangely exhilarated.
The music stopped, and the gym was quiet for a moment. Dove glanced around, expecting judgmental stares or whispers, but instead, she saw Chrissy beaming at her.
"You did great!" Chrissy said, walking over and giving Dove a high-five. "Seriously, you picked that up so fast."
Dove blinked, surprised by the praise. "Really? I felt like I was all over the place."
"Not at all," Chrissy insisted. "You were awesome. With a little practice, you'll be amazing."
Dove smiled, a small but genuine smile that felt foreign on her face after everything that had happened. For the first time in a long while, she felt a flicker of something—something like hope, or maybe even excitement. It was just cheerleading, something she never thought she'd try, but here, in this moment, it was a step toward feeling.. normal again.
As the tryouts wrapped up, Chrissy gave Dove a thumbs-up and told her she'd let her know soon about the results. Dove nodded, heading toward the door, feeling lighter than she had when she first walked in.
Maybe this could be the distraction she needed.