slut [ eddie munson ]

024

Talia felt herself grow restless as Dustin led them through the woods. The young teen having no actual idea where they were going, using his compass to guide him along the path the map told them to take. It was wrong.

"Dude, I'm telling you, you're taking us the wrong way," Steve complained, his mood mirroring Talia's.

"It's north," Dustin defended himself, "I'm positive, I checked the map.

"You do realize that Skull Rock is like a super popular make-out spot?"

"Yeah, so?"

"Yeah, well, it wasn't popular until I made it popular, all right? I practically invented it. We're heading in the wrong direction."

"Shut up, it was you that blabbed about Skull Rock? I almost got caught hooking up with someone because of that!" Talia gasped, unhappy to find out this piece of information. She had been the one to introduce Steve to the spot during the summer before her sophomore year after a girl she had been talking to brought her there.

"Why'd you tell me if I couldn't go there?" Steve replied, trudging past the two teens and off the path they had been traveling on. Catching on to where he was going, Talia followed after him.

"Steve," Dustin called, noticing his departure, "Talia? Where are you going?"

"Stop whining. Let's go!" Steve beckoned him forward.

"Steve!"

"Cmon, trust me!"

"Yeah, Dusty, trust us!" Talia called back to the boy, mocking Steve. She didn't have much faith in his sense of direction either, but she knew that he was headed in the right direction, unlike Dustin.

"Oh, boom!" Steve cried, shoving branches away from him as he lead them through shrubbery, "bada bing, bada boom. There she is, Henderson. Skull rock. In your face, man. In your stupid, cocky little face."

"Stop bullying the children, Steve," Talia muttered, nose scrunched as she navigated through the branches and leaves.

"Doesn't make sense," Dustin said from behind her.

"Yeah, yeah. Even with it staring you right in the face, you can't admit it. You just can't admit that you're wrong, you little butthead."

Talia jumped, startled as something landed behind them with a thud, leaves crunching under its weight.

"I concur," Eddie's voice called out, Talia whipping her head around to look at him, "You, Dustin Henderson, are a total butthead."

"Jesus, we thought you were a goner," Dustin breathed out, immediately going to hug the Munson boy.

"Yeah, me too man. Me too," Eddie said, patting his back once before Dustin backed away. Steve nodded his head at him in greeting as Talia moved past Dustin, the short girl practically throwing herself into the older boy's chest. Eddie's arms wrapped around her on instinct, his hand moving to cup the back of her head as she nestled her face into his neck. Neither noticed the way Steve's face slightly fell.

"Don't scare me like that ever again," she muttered, her hold on him tightening as she remembered the fear she felt when she saw all of the police outside Reefer Rick's. Talia thought she would never see him again.

The rest of the group had caught up with them by now, all muttering greetings to Eddie before moving closer to the rocks so that he could fill them in on the events of the night before. Talia remained close to Eddie, leant against the side of the boulder that acted as a base to Skull rock, just a few feet from where Eddie sat on a smaller boulder. After presenting the Munson boy with the snacks they brought, the others had fanned out around him. They listened carefully as he explained Mason finding him and being chased into the water by the boys, then Patrick being possessed and murdered the same way Chrissy had been.