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"You're shitting me." Max says. "There's no way."
"There is a way, actually," Eddie says, wearing a no-bullshit expression. "We've been testing it all through yesterday and today."
"But that's..."
"Insane? Hard to believe? Borderline silly? Yes, it is all of those things."
"Spells." She says, shaking her head. She turns to Lucas. "Spells."
Lucas, not disbelieving but incredibly enthusiastic, nudges his shoulder into Max's playfully. "Spells!"
"Eddie. Pleasepleaseplease show us a spell." Dustin says, practically buzzing with his particular brand of puppyish excitement.
Eddie turns to Steve, eyebrow arched as he wiggles his fingers at his shirt. "No. Absolutely not." Steve says. "The work uniforms, sure, but I love this shirt, do not vanish it."
"You vanished his shirt?" Nancy asks.
"Accidentally." Eddie clarifies. "The first time, at least."
"Have you tried to do anything other than make things disappear?" Jonathan asks.
"I lit a joint for Argyle with Lightning Hands." Eddie says, thinking back. "Most of what I've tried hasn't worked, though." He had tried a lot, going through every early-level spell he could think of while Steve and Robin watched, providing commentary. The lightning one had worked for Argyle, but other than that Eddie hadn't been able to make anything consistent happen, which had been frustrating but expected. Every attempt at a purely fire-based spell had fallen completely flat, and Eddie had even tried casting protective spells before holding his lighter under his fingers with little luck, half of them now wrapped in band-aids.
"It was sick." Argyle says, perched on the chair with a bowl of chips balanced on his lap.
"It's like a spark." El says, the only one who doesn't seem surprised by the revelation of Eddie's newfound skills. "You can only light some things with it, at first."
"So I need to practice?"
El nods.
"Do Lightning Hands!" Dustin whispers, awed.
"You got it." Eddie strums a chord, announces the spell, and lifts his left hand, which they all watch light up with sizzling electricity held in his cupped palm.
"This is huge." Nancy says, writing so fast that the tip of her pen is on the verge of tearing through the paper of her notebook. "I wonder if it only works with spells that are tied to the Upside Down somehow, like the lightning. Max, you have to try something."
"I guess it's a good thing Eddie's been teaching me guitar." Max says, dropping down to unzip her case. "—But it would be cool if I could cast through skateboarding, or something." She pulls her yellow guitar out, sliding the strap over her hair and settling it on her shoulders. "Should I...try to vanish something?"
"Here." Lucas says, grabbing an empty can of Spaghetti-O's and holding it in front of Max. "I'm holding a can. Try to vanish it."
She nods, almost businesslike as she lifts her pick to the strings. "I cast Vanish on the can." She plays a note, short and loud, and they all watch the can pop out of existence. She laughs. "Oh my God, that was so easy! I cast Lightning Hands!" Her hand immediately lights up with a burst of electricity that almost singes Lucas's eyebrows off, bright enough to look more like the beginnings of a campfire than the small torchlight that Eddie had conjured.
"Amazing." Nancy's hand is covered in ink, but she doesn't seem to notice.
"Now that's a spark." El says.
