Halley's comet | Steve Harrington

viii. police in the house again

"𝑻𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝒅𝒐𝒆𝒔𝒏'𝒕 𝒋𝒖𝒔𝒕 𝒉𝒂𝒑𝒑𝒆𝒏."

➴➵➶➴➵➶➴➵➶➴➵➶➴➵➶

"Jesus, Halley, you look like you got hit by a bus," Jonathan said, picking a leaf from her hair.

"Got pretty shitty sleep." She stifled a yawn, and plopped down besides her mom at the table. Last night had been exceptionally eventful, and she hadn't been able to fall asleep until well after four—only to wake up two hours later. Her head was pounding, and she couldn't get rid of the strange feeling in her stomach whenever she thought of El. Should she tell her mom about it? Jonathan?

No.

They had enough to worry about right now. Hell, she had enough to worry about right now. Besides, she didn't even know who the kid was yet. She just needed to keep calm; she could go back over to the Wheeler's before school, and ask Mike what happened when he enlisted his mother's help. And then—

"Alright, Mom. Breakfast is ready," Jonathan said, breaking Halley from her thoughts. He bought over three plates; two in his left hand. Handing one to Halley, he tried to put another one down in front of their mom but she quickly rejected it.

"No, no, Jonathan, careful of the poster," she said, scrambling to find a suitably safe place for the paper. She was high strung, and both teens could see it. The last time Joyce had acted like that was when Lonnie finally left.

Jonathan pursed his lips, stopping himself from saying anything that might put her off even more. "Yeah, okay, sorry." He handed her the plate, making sure the fork didn't fall.

Food was the last thing on her mind at the moment, but Halley didn't want to give Jonathan anything else to worry about, so she forced more than a few bites of eggs back. They were practically tasteless, save for the bitter residue it left in her mouth.

A fork was set down harder than it needed to be, making Jonathan and Halley look up. Joyce's hands were shaking. "I can't eat," she said simply, pushing the plate forward.

"Mom..." Halley trailed off, biting her tongue. She made a fist under the table, slowly curling and uncurling her fingers. She didn't want to get into a fight with her mom this early in the morning. Both of them were already too anxious, and she didn't need to add to that.

Joyce ran her sleeve against her nose, letting loose a shaky breath. "Listen, listen. The Xerox place opens in like, 30 minutes." Jonathan nodded, "And I don't want you to go alone."

"Mom, I got it." Jonathan's leg was shaking beneath the table. The water in each of their cups jumped with every movement.

Choosing to ignore what he had said, Joyce continued, "Halley's going to go with you." The two teenagers shared a look. Well, there went her chances of checking up on Mike. They only nodded. "Good, good," she muttered. "We need to make, what, two hundred, three hundred copies?" she stood up suddenly, pushing the table forward with the force. Patting her pockets, her lips mouthed inaudible curses. "How much is a copy?" she was digging through the kitchen drawers now, pulling out anything that wasn't her wallet, and throwing it to the floor.