Stranger Things What Ifs

Chapter Thirty Four

What if.....Everyone thought Lucas died for a year, but he ends up coming back? (Angst)

***********************************************

Warm day

Nice breeze

But the day....horrible.

Steve stops his car in front of the graveyard, Max just looking aimlessly ahead of her with a blank expression on her face, her cheeks still flushed from her constant tears, her eyes red from the constant rubbing, her hair all over the place with her low ponytail, her playing with the dark brown envelope in her hands a little.

Steve turns off the car, him going to slowly look over at Max, him pursing his lips a little while his thumb taps against the wheel a little. "Just take all of the time you need Mayfield."

Max nods her head a little, going to look down at the envelope that holds Lucas name on it. Even with seeing his name tears begin to prickle in her eyes. She is so tired of crying but at the same time she cannot bring it in herself to stop every single time something is done to remind herself of him, or when she is just alone thinking about him, or a place they would go to making her think about him, all of the memories...

All of the regrets.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" Steve questions. "You could...wait...."

Max shakes her head while she slowly goes to close her eyes. She doesn't want to honestly, she doesn't want to accept the fact that he is gone, she can't even say his name in her own head without going crazy. But she knows the longer she keeps doing this to herself the more worse she is going to get. Although it is hard...

It is something she has to do.

"It's been a year." Max whispers, her slowly shaking her head. "I have to accept that....he's gone." She softly cries. "He won't be coming back."

Steve looks down a little, him swallowing a lump in his throat from the words. "Yeah..." he trails off. That is all that he can say in the moment, because there are no comforting words that can be give right now.

None.

"It won't be long." Max says, her going to take off her seatbelt and open the door.

"Take all the time you need Max. There is no rush." He explains.

Max nods simply, her going to close the door. She takes a little breath while she goes to make her way down the graveyard. It isn't easy being here, memories of her levitating up in the air while reading Billy's letter still resonates with her.

But she knows she has to do this.

Max goes to sit down in front of the tombstone, her going to carefully set the flowers done in front of it, going to throw away the previous flowers that begin to writhe away. She goes back to sit down, more tears prickling in her eyes when she looks at the tombstone.

Lucas Sinclair. 1971-1988. A son, a friend, a brother....

Boyfriend.

Max told herself that she wouldn't cry but all of that washes down the drain. She would have never thought she would be in this position.

But then again, things took a nasty turn....

"Vecna always targets teenagers with past that are hurting and haunting them...." Mike trails off. "And now...Lucas is one of those people."

"Max please hang on!"

"Hang on!"

"Erica help!"