Matilda 'Dixie' Green, who gets dragged into the unfathomable events at Starcourt Mall by her hopeless crush on Billy Hargrove and new-found middle-schooler friends. She struggles to cope with the trauma, which gradually costs her, her popular cheer...
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𐬾The Mixtape Project𐮚
Matilda's POV༒༒10th October, 1985
I laid on my bed, spread out on my back like a star just staring up at the ceiling, my limbs were aching from lugging Kenny's new stock of tapes into the record store.
The television downstairs was muffled, mom was probably watching it half-asleep while drinking her sorrows away - she probably had no idea I'd even been out, or if I'd even made it back home since I climbed my way back into my bedroom through my window... she didn't care, as long as I'd be there to clear her mess of empty alcohol bottles in the morning.
The lightbulb in my room flickered, it disturbed me, knocked me out of my staring contest with this one particular crack in the ceiling - I rolled onto my stomach and my eyes scanned the room wearily, my ears became especially sensitive to the sounds coming from outside too... a branch brushing against the glass of my window, the wind whistling through the small gaps in the frame.
I thought of putting a tape in Mason's old stereo (which I'd discreetly moved into my room), but decided against it because if mom was by any chance sober and heard it, she'd storm upstairs and hit my door until I'd give in... she'd take it away.
With a tired groan, I reach under my bed for my secret stash of Mason's old music magazines... they were pretty outdated now but I found them interesting, they filled a void, distracted me from sounds that seemed to trigger headache inducing nightmare visions... like the ones I'd been getting in the woods.
I flicked to my favorite page, one about Black Sabbath, it used to remind me of Mason. On the night that he left Hawkins with his band he asked me to-
'Learn everything there is to know about Black Sabbath - for me?' The window frame was between Mason's legs, he was about to hop out.
I watched him sadly with a bowed head, holding the tips of my long golden hair between my fingers and pulling it over my eyes to hide the glossiness of them, my spare arm had his leather jacket slung over it.
He noticed me trying to hide and pouted his bottom lip, bringing a hand to my chin and gently flicking it with his index finger, prompting me to look up. He forced a cheeky smile, "Take those magazines - because when I come back for you I'm gonna test your knowledge."
A small smile started to creep onto my lips of the thought of Mason coming back to take me with him on his journey to stardom. I slowly moved my hair out of my face and nod, "Okay."
