Love Like That

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-One: The Pollywog pt.1

Third Person POV

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It was five a.m. when Hopper walked into the living room with a small bucket of water in his hands. Eleven and Natalie were sound asleep still; Eleven in her bedroom and Natalie on the couch, snuggling the blanket Hopper gave her. Hopper dumped the bucket of water all over Natalie causing her to jolt awake with anger. "What the fuck?"

"Next swear word to come out of your mouth and I'm adding another week to your sentence."

"My sentence?" Natalie questioned confused as she wiped her eyes, trying to get all the water away so she could see her Godparent clearly.

"You're grounded for the next week because of your little parties skills, but I can happily increase that if you would like to cuss more," Hopper smiled at Natalie, who was now groaning in pain from her hangover.

"Shh," Natalie whispered, "you're too loud. What time is it even?"

"Five a.m." Hopper watched as Natalie groaned and fell back against the couch cushions. "You have an hour before you need to start getting ready for school, but before then, I want you to clean this place and I mean a deep clean."

"What?" Natalie protested, shaking her head. "I'm drenched. I can't work like this."

"You can and you will," Hopper announced.

"Wait," Natalie winced at her headache before something hit her, "where the fu-heck am I?"

"You don't remember?" Hopper scoffed, shaking his head in disbelief.

"No... I remember going to the halloween party with Jonathan after we dropped off Will and Dustin for their thing and then... I went to the party and went home."

"You decided to come here... drunk out of your living mind," Hopper added with a loud stern tone as he finished his sentence. "Then you told me how you really feel."

"How I really feel?"

"The truth that you've been bottling up, so I made the executive decision to move you into the cabin with one condition," Hopper explained to Natalie, who was confused on what the condition was going to be. "You cannot, CANNOT, tell anyone about this."

"Why?" Natalie asked with a raised eyebrow.

"Follow me and stay quite," Hopper announced, gesturing for her to follow him. Natalie got up silently and followed after Hopper. The chief of Hawkins slowly opened Eleven's door a few inches to show Natalie who was in there. Natalie's eyes widen in shock as Hopper closed the door softly and pushed Natalie back towards the couch.

"Was that-."

"Eleven, yes," Hopper nodded his head, "AND, before you start yelling at me for keeping it a secret, I had my reasons."

"Oh did you? Do the boys know?"

"No," Hopper shook his head. "No one can know... if someone finds out then the bad men will come for her."

"But we can fight them off," Natalie raised an eyebrow in confusion.

"Some battles we don't always have to fight, kid," Hopper explained to his Goddaughter.

"So you just keep her locked up in here... for how long?"

"Until we can assure her safety," Hopper replied softly. "Now, start cleaning up this place. I had to throw out the rug after you puked all over me."

"I threw up..."

"Yes," Hopper nodded in disgust, remembering the moment very vividly. "Right on my shirt..."