Girl Crush

Chapter 41

 Dani slowly made her way toward Eddie's trailer. She'd decided to just walk from her house, needing the fresh air to clear her mind and maybe organize some of her muddled thoughts. It had been three days since he'd been home from the hospital. Three agonizingly long days without him. She'd called the day he came home and Uncle Wayne had told her he was not up to talking.

"I'm sorry sweetheart," he'd said on the phone. "Eds just isn't up for a conversation right now. Maybe give it a few days and let him heal a bit."

She didn't know if he wasn't up for a conversation or if he wasn't up for a conversation with her. The not knowing was slowly eating her alive from the inside out. Did he hate her? He would be completely justified if he did. She'd thought she was protecting him by keeping Jason's threats from him but she'd only put him right in the path of danger. Every single bruise, every single broken rib, every single ache he had was all of her fault.

Hopper had called her house the next day to tell her that he'd arrested all five boys. He'd picked up Jason, Patrick, and Andy first. Apparently Patrick had been so wracked with guilt over what they'd done that he'd confessed everything and told them the names of the other two that Dani didn't know. He'd claimed that he had no idea that Jason was going to take it that far. She actually believed him but it didn't make his part in it any better.

They had been arraigned and Hopper said they all plead guilty except for Jason. When Hopper let his parents know about the jocks' confessions and the statements from Dani and the others and the prosecutor laid out for him what deal he would get if he plead guilty versus taking his chances in court, his parents pushed him to take the deal. Now they were all sitting in jail awaiting sentencing and Dani was relieved she wouldn't have to testify in any way. She couldn't bear the thought of having to look at that monster's face again.

She had barely been able to get the words out to tell her mother what Jason had done to her. Dani couldn't imagine sitting in front of a whole room of strangers telling them that. It was humiliating, mortifying. Her mom wanted her to go talk to someone but she kept insisting she was fine. Nothing had really happened to her, right? Eddie was the one who'd suffered. She'd just been touched and hit a couple times. The two situations weren't even comparable.

Dani hadn't been getting very much sleep. Every time she managed to fall asleep, her dreams were plagued with Jason's face leering over her, threatening to do the most horrid thing she could imagine. If it wasn't that, images of them kicking Eddie over and over, of his beautiful face bruised and bloody, of him calling her name, tormented her until she woke up sobbing, shaking, her stomach in knots.

She just knew if she could see him, if she could know he was okay, that they were okay, then everything would be better. She missed him. She hated that he was hurting and she wasn't there to help. Dani knew Uncle Wayne would take the best care of him, but she wanted to be the one. She wanted to hold him and kiss his ouchies. She wanted to get him ice and painkillers when he needed them and scratch his head gently the way he liked. She wanted to take care of him like he'd taken care of her after her concussion.

School just wasn't the same without him either. She'd gone yesterday and today but in English she kept looking at his seat and wanting to cry. She'd sat with Hellfire today because it was Tuesday but she'd been quiet. Dustin had simply reached over and held her hand and she appreciated it but nothing was helping the gnawing uncertainty inside her. Steve had driven her to and from school and that had felt weird. Everything was just wrong without Eddie there.

It didn't help that she had become the main attraction at Hawkins High as well, everyone staring at her and whispering behind her back. Some of them hated her because she had taken out their golden boys, the shot Hawkins had of winning the championship. Some of them pitied her and honestly, that wasn't any better. In fact, in some ways, it was so much worse. Seeing them look at her as if she was broken only made her want to scream with rage. She wasn't broken. She wouldn't allow that piece of garbage to break her.