Billy's gone.
Ruby Buckley's world ended with him.
But Hawkins isn't done with her yet.
When strange deaths begin again, Ruby is pulled into the heart of the storm. Between shadowy nightmares, the town's newest outcast, and someone she was never s...
( songs for the chapter ) pretty girls make graves // the smiths miserable man // david kushner
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The air in the boathouse was still. Damp. Cold. Only the faint creak of the dock and the low buzz of the flashlight filled the silence.
Eddie sat slumped forward, elbows on his knees, eyes unfocused. The adrenaline that had carried him this far was bleeding out of him, leaving only the tremor in his hands and the hollow rasp in his throat.
Ruby crouched beside him again, keeping a careful distance this time, close enough that he could feel she wasn't going anywhere. Her voice was steady, though her pulse wasn't. "Whenever you're ready," she said quietly.
Eddie dragged both hands down his face, smearing tears and dirt together. When he spoke, his voice cracked on the first word.
"Her body just... lifted up. Into the air." He blinked hard, staring at the floor as if the memory were playing there. "And she just hung there. In the air. And her bones-" His breath hitched. "Her bones started to snap."
No one spoke. Even the lake outside seemed to hold its breath.
"Her eyes, man," Eddie whispered, shaking his head. "It was like there was something inside her head... pulling." His fingers twitched upward, mimicking invisible strings. "I didn't know what to do. I didn't-" He swallowed hard. "I ran. I left her there."
The confession cracked open something in the room. Ruby's chest tightened until she thought she might suffocate.
Eddie scoffed, the sound brittle and wet. "You all think I'm crazy, right?"
"No," Dustin said immediately. "We don't think you're crazy."
"Don't bullshit me, man!" Eddie snapped, his voice breaking. "I know how it sounds."
"We're not bullshitting you," Max said softly.
"We believe you," Robin added, firm and sincere.
But Ruby wasn't sure she'd even heard them. Her mind had splintered around one sentence, looping it again and again, something inside her head, pulling.
The words crawled under her skin, dug into her chest, rooted themselves there until she could barely breathe.
Her throat burned. Her hands trembled. She wanted to be strong, to stay, to ask him every question clawing at the back of her tongue. But all she could see was Chrissy's face, laughing beside her locker, light in her eyes, and then the imagined horror of that smile twisting in pain.
"I'm sorry," Ruby whispered, barely audible.
Eddie looked up, startled, but she couldn't meet his eyes. "I just... I can't-"
The tears came before she could stop them.
"I can't be here anymore."
And before anyone could speak, she turned and fled, the boards creaking under her boots, the damp night air rushing to swallow her whole as she disappeared through the doorway.
