Stranger Things What Ifs

Chapter Thirty Six

What if.....Everyone thought Lucas died for a year, but he ends up coming back? (Angst and Fluff) (Continues off of Chapter Thirty Five)

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"Okay everyone have blankets or sleeping bags?" Charles questions while looking at everyone in the living room.

"Yes we do." Eleven replies. "Thank you again, for letting us stay here."

"Of course." Charles responds.

"How's your stomach?" Nancy questions at Max, her going to sit down with Susan and Max, Max's head being leaned on Susan's chest.

"Still cramping." Max replies, her hugging her stomach tighter. "I just took another dose of medicine though so...I should be fine."

"It'll get better." Susan says while moving some of her damp hair away from her face, Max just getting out of the shower and her wearing Lucas dark blue hoodie and blue joggers and her ankle socks, her hair being in a messy bun.

"He'll be out soon Max." Nancy tells her. "He's just showering."

"Okay." Max replies, her going to put her hands in the hoodie sleeves. "I'm just a mess."

"We're all a mess sweetie. And that's okay." Susan says. "Some of us are more of a mess then others."

"And that is completely okay too." Nancy says, rubbing Max's knee. "But he's back, he's back." She smiles.

Max smiles softly while she nods her head. "I'm so glad he is." She cries softly. "I didn't know how the hell I was going to live without him."

"Well now you don't have to worry about thinking like that, because he is here baby, he is here." Susan assures softly.

Max nods her head, her leaning on Susan while she closes her eyes, her just thanking the lord, thanking god that he is back in her life.

Lucas slowly brings his head up while he stands in the shower, him breathing out a little bit in relief as he feels the cool water hit him, feeling his body begin to relax more and cool down. He leans his hands on the wall, just taking a minute to let the water pour down on himself.

The past year has been hard for him, harder than he admitted to everyone else. It is something he doesn't intend on keeping from them, he just knows that they are already overwhelmed so much by seeing him so he just has to tell them things slowly rather than dump it all on them at once and them ending up getting more overwhelmed and stressed.

Especially Max.

It breaks his heart, realizing she has been getting these panic attacks ever since he was gone, all for one whole year. It pained him to see her in a hospital bed for one year and not being able to see her at all for another year, not knowing if she was dead or alive, but him still having that hope that she was.

But for her...it was worse.

She thought he was dead, and that plagues him hard because he can only imagine of the pain she was feeling. Thinking about it he quickly goes to bathe before he makes his way out of the shower, going to dry himself off.

He opens the cabinet, him taking out some bandages and looking at the two closed stitched wounds on his hips, him going to clean each of them while biting down a little on the cloth in his mouth to keep himself quiet, him going to bandage up the wounds, him breathing out a little after he is done.

He goes to put on some sweats and a night T shirt, him going to make his way out of the bathroom after he is done, him going downstairs.

He spots his mom in the kitchen, him smiling softly at her. "Hey mom."