𝐅𝐋𝐎𝐖𝐄𝐑𝐒 • Steve Harrington

Chapter 8

ONE WEEK LATER
( Saturday, January 19th 1985 )

SINCE shaking hands with Steve and saying good riddance to any undertones of malice or distance, Julie had gotten to a place of smiling at him in the school hallway. Which wasn't much by any means, but it beat pretending not to see him or looking away when she worried she would get caught staring. She wasn't going to be making him a friendship bracelet any time soon, but it was nice being able to say that they were more than civil-natured.

Especially considering they were able to talk properly like two people who had been friends for a lifetime. It was refreshing.

So, when her mother asked her to cover her at work that Saturday so she could spend the day out with Scott, Julie wasn't distraught in the slightest. She didn't roll her eyes. She didn't moan. All she said was a simple, "Okay."

And there she was, making conversation in her mother's apron with the one and only Steve Harrington who wore an apron that used to belong to Julie. They were out back, Steve stripping the thorns off of roses, which was a task he was finally confident in, and Julie cut the leaves off the ones thorn-free.

He wore a maroon polo shirt with blue stripes and some wasted jeans. Julie noticed that was a usual choice for him—his sweaters were interchangeable with striped shirts. She had on a Blondie shirt that she wore over a dark chiffon skirt that went down to her mid-calves, just enough that her frilly white socks were tall and visible underneath her loafers.

"How serious is it getting?" Steve's eyebrows cinched.

"The kind of serious it gets when you start having sleepovers."

"Well, it's not like she wasn't sleeping with him before, you know that."

"Oh please don't say that," Julie cringes.

"What? She's a woman with needs and if she needs a little Scott in her life, she's going to get a little Scott in her life—"

"Egh, stop that. There is a very fine line and I'm drawing it as of immediately."

"I'm just saying it like it is," Steve shrugs. He glanced over at the girl a couple inches shorter than him in height. "I mean, how long has it been for her?"

"It became a year November twelfth." Snip.

"And it's January now..." Steve stopped working for a moment to think.

Julie caught a glimpse of the way he got a little dent between his eyebrows when he thought too hard. "You can count on your fingers, I won't judge."

He ignored her, figuring it out. "A year and three months is a long time."

She smiled to herself. Snip.

"You know, I used to be so jealous of kids with divorced parents because they always got two Christmases."

Julie stopped cutting.

"There's never been a time my parents have been apart and they're not necessarily happy but—"

"Wait, I'm sorry," she angled her body towards him, "you think my parents are divorced?"

Steve blinked at her. "They're not?"

"Steve, my dad passed away."

His eyes softened in a way she had only seen once before. It was compassionate, filled with mountains of untouchable sympathy and apology. They even sparkled like a cartoon character's would. "Oh. Oh, I'm so sorry."