Hurt - Eddie Munson

1

The first day back at school was always gut wrenchingly anxious for Lana.

This was the worst year yet though.

She thought she'd ditched this place forever. She thought it was all over, she didn't even need to graduate, she could just live on the road with Billy forever.

But things didn't turn out that way.

See last year she'd impulsively left Hawkins with just a handbag and $30 to her name in the passenger seat of her boyfriend's, now ex's, car, Billy.

Everything was so fun at first. Constant sex and drugs and travelling and drinking and trouble making.

She felt true freedom for the first time in her life in the fleeting beautiful moments those few months offered her.

Billy enjoyed himself too, of course he did, he was the one in control wether Lana knew it or not; he was the man.

But two extremely emotionally unstable, drug dependent, young adults, who are running out of cash and around each other 24/7 can only stay sweet for so long.

She had a gut feeling from the beginning that it would all go wrong, it always does, but she stuck around anyway, she can't help herself. Adrenaline and validation are worth more than safety. She didn't know it would go so wrong though.

Once the drugs began to run out and the slightest withdrawal kicked in, Billy turned from the handsome saviour to the scary villain.

No matter what Lana did now to please him, to make money for them, for him, the act had dropped, the honeymoon phase was over and he was over seeing her as a person. She was his toy now. That's how it goes with men.

So when things got too bad, even for her, back to Hawkins she came, feeling more broken than ever.

Her mother was fuming of course. Embarrassed that her daughter had made her look like "such an irresponsible parent" to the whole town. Not concerned by what made her run away in the first place, or what might've happened to her while she was gone.

Of course everyone eventually found out about Lana's disappearance or more running away with Billy. Before Mrs Blau even made the police report, people had seen them street racing, drinking, shouting, being general nuisances and it was a bit of a topic already.

When she arrived home, Lana didn't have the energy to care about the gossip, to even leave her room - she was crushed. He was just another man. Like all the rest. Even if he did make her feel different, even if he was so beautiful at first, they were all the same.

And he was back in town too. Which made it all worse. He came back only a couple days after her.

The thought of seeing him filled her with more dread than this day did. She hadn't even properly processed everything that had happened to her, she didn't understand it and she didn't want to, she just knew that she was very much scared of Billy now.

For the two whole months she'd been back in Hawkins, she rarely left the trailer, only ever doing so to pick up drugs or buy food, not that she was eating much anyway.

Her friends, Steve, Robin and even her cousin Jonathan tried talking to her a couple times as soon as they heard she was back, but she didn't have the energy to talk.

She didn't have the energy to do this year of school again.

But she needed to, just to keep her mum off her back, just until she could escape for real this time.

The thought that kept her going now was that feeling of freedom again - the freedom she felt when her and Billy first left Hawkins. She was going to be free again and this time forever, she just didn't know how yet, and finishing high school to get a good job seemed like a start.

Atleast that's what her mum said.

So now here she was, looking at herself in the mirror she hated so much, slowly getting ready to leave the safety of her room.

Sobriety wasn't going to help either. She popped a couple of Xanax and immediately felt herself calm down slightly.

Her clothes were baggy and worn, a pair of dark blue jeans and a black jumper. She clipped her Walkman onto the side of her bag and put her headphones on, playing A Forest by The Cure as she left the home and began to walk towards where the bus would be.

It was a chilly, grey morning and the trailer park was pretty quiet, so far no one had said anything to Lana and that was how she liked it.

Until she got to the park bus stop and could see all the kids waiting.

As she silently walked over, she saw them all turn to look at her and then quickly turn back to each other and whisper.

All of them except for Eddie Munson that was. The tall, curly haired, repeat senior that she'd once been childhood friends with.

He just stared and thought "What's happened to Lana?"

He didn't know her that well, not anymore anyway.

They used to be practically joined at the hip when they were kids. Really little kids.

Since then they'd drifted apart; Eddie being loud and somewhat leader of the nerds, Lana being quiet and content with her own small group. They didn't really talk to each other anymore, maybe a quick hello if they happened to pass by, but nothing more.

Lana never thought much on them drifting apart, or on Eddie at all for that matter, and Eddie never thought much about it either - until he heard about her and Billy Hargrove... and all of the rumours surrounding them.

What was she doing with that son of a bitch? He was only ever up to trouble.

He knew that she had changed since they were kids, obviously, and he knew that she must've got herself involved in some bad shit to have ran away with Billy, but he wasn't expecting such a dark eyed, tiny, slumped, girl to come out of that trailer.

It shocked him, badly.

He decided in that moment that he  was going to work out what happened to Lana. What made her suddenly change the way she did all those years ago? Why weren't they friends anymore? What did Billy do to her?

He decided he was going to get his crazy, funny, beautiful childhood friend back. He just didn't know how yet.

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