At first, Shannon Bishop was just the babysitter. It was convenient, living in the same neighborhood as the Hendersons, but it wasn't too much of a stretch to move to the Wheelers' house or even out where the Byers family lived to watch all the boys...
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Dressing for the funeral of Will Byers when she knew the body they were burying was a fake and he was alive, just trapped somewhere, felt like an odd out-of-body experience for Shannon.
Larry was waiting for her by the front door, but she lingered in her room, studying herself in the mirror. Only for special occasions did she ever wear dresses, and today felt like one. Not because Will was dead, of course– he wasn't. As she tugged on the hem of her skirt, smoothing it over her legs one final time, Shannon imagined Will breaking into a toothy grin at the sight of her in a dress before mocking her for wearing one, and she smiled at the thought.
As her father drove them to the cemetery, she had to remind herself that just because she knew there was hope for Will, no one else but the boys did. All she wanted to do was tell Joyce and Jonathan what she and the boys had figured out, but there was no simple way to do it. She hadn't personally gone to see Joyce once since Will had gone missing, so to say anything now to give that poor woman hope on the day she was meant to bury her child would be cruel. Shannon was more inclined to say something to Jonathan, but after the stunt he'd pulled with taking pictures of her and the others at Steve's house, she was more apprehensive about him now.
She'd picked up her own camera just last night for the first time in ages. As Jonathan had remarked about previously, she used to photograph things all the time– people, animals, still objects. Most afternoons she had holed herself up in the high school's dark room each week to develop the shots she'd taken, then sift through the ones worth keeping and the ones she could discard. Since her mom had died, however, Shannon had hardly even glanced at her camera from where it sat in her desk drawer– at least until last night, after she had returned home from the Wheeler's house with enough hope floating inside her to pick up that camera and roll it around in her hands.
Maybe once they brought Will back she would use it again.
The ceremony was simple enough. More people turned out than Shannon had expected, but then again their small town of Hawkins had never quite been wracked by something so terrible as a missing child's death before, so it made sense that people were banding together. It made sense, too, that many folks no longer went outside as much after dark these days unless they had to, even with the unfortunate turnout of Will Byers now known. Joyce Byers was understandably upset, although her good-for-nothing ex Lonnie was a little too stoic for Shannon's liking. Jonathan was quiet, eyes downcast for the entire thing even as people tried to wish him their condolences. Down the line Shannon spied the three boys, all lined up in their nice clothes trying to talk in hushed tones and getting caught whispering to each other consistently by Karen Wheeler, who kept quietly reprimanding them. The Sinclairs leaned against each other, and Claudia Henderson blew noisily into the tissue in her hand many times. Nancy was clearly troubled from where she stood next to Shannon, and there was no obvious sight of Steve Harrington anywhere from this vantage point.
When it was all said and over and people began to disperse, Shannon lingered, debating on if she wanted to say anything to anyone at all. Joyce was led away by Lonnie, which left Jonathan still standing at the edge of the grave. Reminding herself she couldn't give him false hope until she and the boys had a better idea of how to get Will back, Shannon braced herself for what she imagined to be an awkward conversation with the eldest Byers boy and started toward him, but was shocked when Nancy Wheeler swooped in first and led him away. She watched, gobsmacked, as the two rounded the nearest end of the long iron fence that wrapped the entire cemetery's property and ducked down behind it.
