Regular People [Elmax]

Chapter 20 - The Holloway House

The car veered around the corner and up the driveway of the Holloway house. As soon as it came to a stop, they all unbuckled their seatbelts and jumped out, hastily walking towards the red-painted front door.

Although Max put on a tough exterior, this stuff scared the crap out of her sometimes. She could never quite wrap her head around the fact it was all real; The Upside Down, Demogorgons, Demodogs, The Mind Flayer, even El's powers, something she saw with her own eyes almost every day. Running into danger to save the world from evil? That was stuff that was previously limited to comic books, now she was dating a literal superhero. She always got nervous doing this sort of thing, but she didn't let it show often. El may have had badass superpowers, but Max was a redheaded Cali girl with a skateboard and you can't get more badass than that.

They all slowly approached the door, like guilty puppies who knew they'd done something wrong. They stood before it for a good minute.

"What do we do?", asked Jonathan, unclear on the etiquette when you're about to march into someone's house and accuse them of being possessed by monsters from another dimension.

Nancy was unsure either. So she decided to treat it like any other situation. She reached out and pressed the doorbell. No one came to the door. She pressed it again, but there wasn't even a creak from inside the house, either they really didn't want visitors or no one was home. Hoping it was the latter, Nancy and Jonathan looked at each other before turning to El. Her eyes quickly flicked between the two of them before she turned her focus to the door, she knew what to do. With a simple flick of her head, the door flew open and Nancy and Johnathan led the group into the house.

"Tom? Heather?", Nancy called out, though rationally she knew not to expect a reply.

"Jesus, it's freezing.", Max noted, rubbing her arms in an attempt to maintain some warmth.

She was right. Not only was it cold, but the house also emitted an eerie and unsettling aura. It was just a house, a family house in the suburbs, yet you couldn't help but fear for your life just being in its presence. Max was beyond unsettled, her eyes darting around as if expecting something sinister to be hiding in every nook and cranny. She looked to El for reassurance but she was frighteningly calm despite the situation in which they found themselves. Her eyes also glanced all around as they passed through the house, though her gaze was filled with a curious yet determined stare as if this was simply a puzzle to solve, a job to complete. It made sense, it was all Eleven had ever known. She was so innocent to so much in the world that it was often easy for Max to forget that there was never a time when these seemingly strange things weren't in her life, it was all she'd ever known, it was normal for her. Max couldn't wait for this all to be over, for a chance to show Eleven a normal life; well, as normal as things could be for them.

"Do you guys smell that?", Nancy questioned as they entered the kitchen.

They all sniffed the air, indeed smelling something that didn't belong. As they turned the corner, they all grimaced.

"Oh God. More chemicals", Nancy held her nose as she approached the countertop.

It was covered in empty bottles, leaking what little remained of bleaches, bug sprays, and various washing powders.

"Do you think they're guzzling this shit?", Johnathan remarked as he inspected an empty bottle.

"Yeah, either that or they just went on a hell of a cleaning spree", Nancy replied, also picking up a bottle.

Max thought for a second, something didn't seem right.

"But last year, Will didn't eat chemicals. Did you?", she asked while turning to Will who had been very quiet up until this point.