Last Night in Hawkins: A Memoir & Guide Written by & For Eloise Turner

The Meeting

I can't remember anything too big happening in '79 - other than the multiple tests, I suppose. But I know that Kali had escaped sometime before the beginning of 1980.

I've tried to use my abilities to figure out the exact date of her escape, but there's been no luck. I suppose I'll have to ask her when I see her.

Still, that didn't stop the program. There were still two subjects left: Eleven and me. We'd only crossed paths a few times, but I remember hearing her screaming for Brenner when she'd failed to comply with one of his sick instructions one afternoon. For context, this was before that day with the cat in the cage. That day was a year after this day, actually.

Anyway, I heard her screaming for Papa repeatedly. I was outside my room walking around to get some exercise when Eleven's voice got closer, then I heard her yell, "NO! STOP!", before the yelling was accompanied by a door slam. I'd decided to follow the commotion. I knew exactly where I was going: the isolation hall. I remember seeing the guards lock the door and walk away from it as the girl kept screaming and begging for Brenner to let her out of the closet. I hid from their view as they passed me, even though I knew they'd be able to see me anyway. But they missed me somehow, so I was able to go to the door.

I don't know why, but I leaned my forehead against the door. I wanted to connect with El, to let her know that she wasn't alone. I must've been in that position for a while until Brenner appeared out of nowhere, it seemed.

"Twelve? What are you doing out of your room?" he asked me in that faux fatherly voice. I looked up at him. He repeated himself. I didn't answer. I had no clue what to say, and what was there to say? "I was coming to find you," he said eventually.

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I couldn't do what he asked either. I was screaming and kicking in protest as the two guards dragged me to my isolation closet, which just so happened to be next to Eleven's closet. I'd never actually been put in the closet before, so you can imagine how frightened I was when one of the men shut the door. I heard the lock click and I was left in the dark all by myself. I backed into a corner and collapsed on the floor. I couldn't cry, even if I was alone. I just felt angry. It was boiling up inside me, and I was afraid of it.

"Twelve," I heard from the other side of the wall, "what happened?"

It was Eleven. I leaned against the wall, staying on the floor. I couldn't see her, but I could tell that she moved so that our backs were against the wall. "I didn't make Papa happy," I said simply.

"We are..." she trailed off. Neither of us knew how to speak very well, so it was hard to find the right words to express our feelings most of the time. "Are we bad?" she finally asked after a while. Her voice sounded very fearful, which made me sad. It still hurts, even though it was a long time ago. "Papa got mad at us," she explained, "so, we must be bad."

I was tempted to agree with her, but then I remembered something that Three once told me when I was very little, and I repeated it to my sister: "No one can make us bad." I smiled and continued, "We can be good, and no one can tell us that they own us."

Eleven must've been smiling when she said, "I want to be good."

I smiled too. "You are," I told her, "Remember: we are good."

Even though the conversation ended there, I like to think that we- even though we didn't specifically say it- decided to escape someday.

So, I can tell you: we did. Together, but we'd never see each other again for a very long time.

And I can say, when I saw Papa carrying a weak Eleven one year after that conversation, I knew she decided that she wanted to be good. Because she spared that innocent cat, and only acted in self defense when she killed those guards. I was proud of her. And Papa, that was the day I realised that you were the bad one. You're always going to be the bad man who stole our lives and ripped away our freedom. So trust me when I say that this will come back to haunt you. And I won't need to wake any spirits to do it.