𝔖𝔱𝔯𝔞𝔫𝔤𝔢 𝔐𝔞𝔤𝔦𝔠~ 𝚂𝚝𝚎𝚟𝚎 𝙷𝚊𝚛𝚛𝚒𝚗𝚐𝚝𝚘𝚗

𝐄𝐩𝐢𝐬𝐨𝐝𝐞 𝐅𝐢𝐯𝐞: 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐅𝐥𝐞𝐚 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐀𝐜𝐫𝐨𝐛𝐚𝐭

DISCLAIMER: I do not own Stranger Things or the characters! They belong to the Duffer Brothers! I do own my OC Charlotte/Ten! This is just a fun habit!!
A/N: Haiii guys 😊 I'm so sorry this one took a while, I've been dealing with thyroid health issues and seasonal depression, I've just been trying to survive 😅 But I started taking medication for my thyroid and I'm feeling so much better! And episode five is finally here so without further ado, grab a drink, grab a snacky and enjoy! Please vote and leave a comment I love reading your thoughts! Thank uuu 🥹💗🫶🏻
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Previously...
Hopper exhaled as he tried to steady himself and got out his pocketknife. He held the knife to the stomach and hesitated before cutting the body. He stopped when he noticed that no blood or inside body parts came spilling out and reached in to see stuffing. It was a fake body. Joyce and Char were right. Will is still out there alive.
He left the morgue and drove to the outskirts of Hawkins Lab. He got out and grabbed some cutters. He walked up to the fence and cut the fence...
Hopper hid in the shadows as two scientists walked out the door. He waited till they were gone and held the door open before it could close. He walked inside and started down the hallway before peeking around to see if anyone was there. He walked down the hallway and kept an eye on his surroundings. He hid when some scientists walked by. When they were gone, he continued down the hall. He got to the quarantined hallway and took a breath before continuing through.
He went down the hallway until he turned to a door. He tried to open the doors, but they were locked.
"No, dammit." He banged on the door and sighed as he turned to a security key slot next to the door.
"Hands up. Hands up!" The head security guy said to Hopper as he cocked his gun at his head a guard coming next to him aimed his gun at him as well.
Hopper turned around and held his hands up. "Woah, woah, woah, woah, woah, woah."
"Forget all the cameras, bub?" The head security asked sarcastically.
"Look, Dr. Brenner asked for me specifically. Okay?" Hopper fibbed as he held his hands up. "How else do you think I got in here?"
"What's your name again?" He asked him as he got out his walkie-talkie.
"It's Jim Hopper." He smiled as he motioned to himself. "Chief Jim Hopper."
"Yeah, I've got Jim Hopper—" The guy started to say as Hopper punched and knocked him out.
Hopper then took his gun out and aimed it at the guard and took the gun out of his hand and put it in his pocket. Chattering could be heard from the radio as Hopper took the guards security key.
"Hey...you mind if I borrow this?" He asked as he yanked it from the shirt and slid the key card to unlock the door. He aimed his gun at the guard until the door closed and shot the key slot.
"Will?" He shouted as he held his flashlight out and looked in each room. "Will?"
He came into a room and saw a security camera in the corner, a lion stuffed animal on the bed and a drawing taped to the wall. It was a drawing of a cat on the table, two children stick figures with 10 and 11 over their heads an adult male stick figure that had 'Papa' over its head. Immediately, he remembered what Char had told him about the lab, her sister and Papa.
He turned and continued down the hallway. He made his way into this room where the alarm was blaring loudly.
"Will?" He shouted as he walked forward. He continued down the hallways until he reached the elevator. He pushed the button and waited for it to open as the guards came down the hall. The elevator opened and he stepped in and pushed the button, and it closed just as the guards came to the elevator.
When the elevator opened, it was dark and there were tiny spores floating around. He frowned before walking forward slowly.
"Will?"
The electricity was crackling as he got further down the hall, and he started coughing. "Will?"
He finally made into the room and noticed something funny on a wall. He coughed as he walked closer. There was this huge fleshy hole in the wall, and it seemed like it was growing. He could hear faint growling and slimy vines grew from it all over the room. He exclaimed softly as he looked on at it. He had never in his entire life seen anything close to this.
"What the hell?" He wondered.
It seemed like there was rhythmic pulsing coming from it the closer he got. When he was in front of it, he reached a hand out to touch it and it was slimy. Suddenly he heard something behind him, and he whirled around to see white figures in hazmat suits.
He held his gun out at them. "Hey! Hey!"
He backed up only to pass out at someone came up behind him and tased him, his vision going black.
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El was laying on the couch, resting as the boys were trying to understand what Will meant.
"What was Will saying?" Mike wondered as he paced around the basement. "Like home...like home...but dark?"
"And empty." Lucas added as he sat in a chair.
"Empty and cold." Dustin sighed as he sat on the basement stairs. "Wait, did he say cold?"
"I don't know. The stupid radio kept going in and out." Lucas groaned.
"It's like riddles in the dark." Dustin sighed.
"Like home. Like his house?" Mike asked them.
"Or maybe like Hawkins." Lucas suggested.
"Upside down." El told them softly.
"What'd she say?" Lucas asked them.
"Upside down." Mike murmured.
"What?" Lucas asked.
"Upside down." Mike said before going to the table and flipping the game board facing up.
"When El showed us where Will was, she flipped the board over, remember?" Mike told them as Lucas and Dustin stood next to him.
He flipped the board upside down. "Upside down. Dark. Empty."
"Do you understand what he's talking about?" Lucas asked Dustin.
"No." He answered.
"Guys, come on, think about it." Mike told them. "When El took us to find Will, she took us to his house, right?"
"Yeah. And he wasn't there." Lucas said.
"But what if he was there?" Mike insisted. "What if we just couldn't see him? What if he was on the other side?"
"What if this is Hawkins and..." Mike began as he flipped the board to show them. "...this is where Will is? The Upside Down."
"Like the Vale of Shadows." Dustin realized
Mike and Lucas looked at each other confusedly. Dustin got the D&D rulebook and turned to the page.
"'The Vale of Shadows is a dimension that is a dark reflection or echo of our world. It is a place of decay and death. A plane out of phase. A place of monsters. It is right next to you, and you don't even see it." Dustin read aloud to them.
"An alternate dimension." Mike murmured.
"But...how...how do we get there?" Lucas asked.
"You cast Shadow Walk." Dustin answered.
"In real life, dummy." Lucas retorted as he rolled his eyes.
"We can't shadow walk, but...maybe she and Char can." Dustin said as they looked at El.
"Do you know how we get there? To the Upside Down?" Mike asked El but she only shook her head.
"Oh, my God!" Lucas groaned.
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Char and Jonathan had just walked through the door to see Lonnie sitting next to Joyce on the couch. Jonathan slammed the door behind him as Joyce and Lennie sat upright.
"Hey, kids." Lonnie said politely.
"What's going on?" Jonathan asked with a raised eyebrow as Char crossed her arms and narrowed her eyes at Mr. Byers. She could sense that he had no good intentions with coming back for 'Will's funeral'. She never liked him. If he hadn't come down to help look for Will, why would he suddenly come back for the funeral?
"Your dad's, uh, gonna stay here tonight." Joyce stammered as she motioned to the couch. "On the couch."
"Yeah, I'm here as long as you need me, okay?" Lonnie added as he nods. "How are you holding up?"
Jonathan noticed the huge hole in the wall and nudged Char. She looked at it and walked closer to it, Jonathan following her. She touched the tarp and saw a vision of Joyce talking to Will through the wall.
She looked at Joyce and asked, "What happened here?"
"Don't worry about that." Lonnie interfered
"Excuse me, Mr. Byers, but I wasn't asking you." Char told him sharply with a glare. He glared back.
"Mom..." Jonathan began. "...that thing you saw before, did it come back?"
"It did, didn't it?" Char stated when she noticed the look on Joyce's face.
"Jonathan, Char, that's enough." Lonnie told them.
"Can we talk?" Jonathan asked him. "Alone?"
When Lonnie and Jonathan went to his room, Char sat down next to Joyce.
"Did you see Will?" Char asked her.
"Yeah, I pulled the wallpaper off, and he was there. On the other side but it was like this clear pink fleshy wall.... thing." Joyce explained to her as she sighed. "I feel like I'm losing my mind."
"Mom, you're not crazy. I believe you, Will's stuck somewhere and he can't find his way back. He's alive." Char reassured her and Joyce smiled and squeezed her hand in thanks.
Then Jonathan and Lonnie came back in, and Char stood up to meet Jonathan halfway
"I'm gonna head on home, it's pretty late." She told him.
"Okay, I'll see you tomorrow?" He asked her.
"Of course." She reassured him before heading home.
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It's the next morning and Char is standing in front of the mirror in her closet. She sighs before snapping her fingers and red mist covers her body. When they faded, she was dressed in a black lace dress with black Victorian style ankle boots. She sighed once more before grabbing her bag as Mr. Wheeler honked the car. Then she walked out and made sure the house was locked before leaving to get in the car.
She sat next to Nancy who was in the middle in the backseat. She smiled at her and greeted her silently.
"Are you ready?" She asked Char who sighed and shook her head.
They arrived at the church and attended the funeral. Everyone was gathered around Will's grave plot as the preacher spoke. The funeral seemed to go by in a blur. Char tried to pay attention to the preacher but kept thinking back to the monster in Barb's photo. Then she looked at 'Will's' casket. The whole funeral just felt off to her. She couldn't believe that the bad people planted a fake body.
Meanwhile at the Hopper residence, the bad people had just dropped Hopper off after Char left. He was passed out on the couch when his eyes shot open. He gasped as he sat upright and looked around him. It suddenly came to him what happened the night before. He discovered that the body was a fake and broke into the lab to see the weird portal gate.
He breathed heavily as he looked at the coffee table and saw his gun. He grabbed it and went outside and looked around. There was no sign of the bad people. He went back inside and went to the bathroom and looked in the mirror. He looked at his neck and saw marks where they tased him, then he looked at the bathroom lights.
It occurred to him that they could've bugged his place. Thinking about Char, he needed to find the bug and destroy it before they discover that Char is living with him. He promised her that they would never find her. So, he went about tearing the place apart to find the bug. He took the lights apart, took the lightbulbs out. Took photos apart, cleaned the cabinets out, took the radio apart, basically made a mess of the place until he looked at the ceiling light in the living room. Taking it apart, he found the bug. He held it in front of him as he tried to be as quiet as he could be. Then he took the hammer and destroyed the bug.
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Back at the funeral, Char sat with Nancy and Jonathan. He's sat in the middle of them as he shows them a map of Hawkins.
"This is where we know for sure it's been, right?" He asked them as he pointed out the locations and Nancy and Char nodded.
"That's Steve's house." Char pointed out and Jonathan nodded.
"And that's the woods where they found Will's bike and that's my house." Jonathan pointed the other locations out.
"It's all so close." Nancy mused as she looked at the locations.
"They're coming from the lab." Char noticed as she studied the locations. "Because here's the lab and all of the locations are within close distance from it.
"Yeah, exactly." Jonathan agreed as he noticed. "I mean, it's all within a mile or something. Whatever this thing is, it's...it's not traveling far."
"You want to go out there." Nancy assumed as she saw the look on his face, Char looked up at him.
"We might not find anything." He said.
"But Char and I did." Nancy told him and he nodded as she looked at the map again. "And if we do see it...then what?"
"We kill it." Char said determined as she looked at the two. "I'm not letting it hurt anymore of my family."
Jonathan and Nancy nodded in agreement before they got up and Jonathan led them to his Dad's car. He opened the passenger side door and sat down to look through the glove compartment. Nancy and Char kept an eye out warily, Lonnie wouldn't be too pleased if he caught them. He got his pocketknife out and used it to break into the glove box.
"What are you doing?" Nancy asked him nervously as he looked through it.
"Just give me a second." He told her as he opened the glove box and looked for the gun and bullets. She looked around them nervously before she noticed him grab the gun and checked it for bullets.
"Are you serious?" She asked him exasperatedly and looked around them warily.
"What? You want to find this thing and take another photo? Yell at it?" He asked her as he looked for the bullets and grabbed the gun and bullets and closed the glove box and got out. He put the gun and bullets in his jacket pocket.
"This is a terrible idea." Nancy protested as she crossed her arms.
"Nance, we need something to kill it with." Char reasoned to her as she raised an eyebrow.
"Char's right, it's the best we've got." Jonathan agreed with the girl he considered a sister as he put the bullets in the jacket. Nancy looked away as he spoke up again. "What? You can tell someone, but they're not gonna believe you. You know that."
"Your mom would." She told him.
"She's been through enough." He said.
"She's under enough stress as it is, what with her scumbag ex-husband and the entire town thinking she's crazy." Char scoffed as she rolled her eyes.
"Char." He warned.
"Sorry, you know I hate him. He abandoned her and you and Will." She sighed.
"Still, she deserves to know." Nancy reasoned
"Yeah, and Char and I will tell her...when this thing is dead." He said. Nancy just sighed and looked away.
Meanwhile, Mike, Lucas and Dustin walked up to Mr. Clarke who was in front of a table of food.
"Mr. Clarke?" Mike asked him as they walked up to him.
"Oh, hey there." He greeted them when he turned to them. "How are you boys holding up?"
Dustin was munching on a cookie as Lucas spoke up. "We're...in...mourning."
"Man, these aren't real Nilla Wafers." Dustin said as he looked at the cookies and Mike and Lucas looked at him oddly.
"We were wondering if you had time to talk?" Mike asked Mr. Clarke as he faced him.
"We have some questions." Lucas added.
"A lot of questions." Mike finished.
They all sat down at a table and Mike spoke up. "So, you know how in Cosmos, Carl Sagan talks about other dimensions? Like, beyond our world?"
"Yeah, sure. Theoretically." Mr. Clarke answered.
"Right, theoretically." Mike agreed.
"So, theoretically, how do we travel there?" Lucas asked.
"You guys have been thinking about Hugh Everett's Many-Worlds Interpretation, haven't you?" Mr. Clarke asked them.
Dustin looked at Mike, who shrugged as Mr. Clarke continued to explain.
"Well, basically, there are parallel universes. Just like our world, but just infinite variations of it. Which means there's a world out there where none of this tragic stuff ever happened." Mr. Clarke explained to them.
"Yeah, that's not what we're talking about." Lucas differed as he shook his head.
"Oh." Mr. Clarke noted.
"We were thinking of more of an evil dimension, like the Vale of Shadows." Dustin began to ask Mr. Clarke. "You know the Vale of Shadows?"
"An echo of the Material Plane, where necrotic and shadow magic—" Mr. Clarke began to answer when Mike interrupted him.
"Yeah, exactly." Mike nodded. "If that did exist, a place like the Vale of Shadows, how would we travel there?"
"Theoretically." Lucas added.
"Well..." Mr. Clarke began as he thought about it, grabbed the paper plate, and got a pen out and began to draw a line on it. "Picture...an acrobat..."
He drew a line and drew a stick figure to represent the acrobat. "...standing on a tightrope. Now, the tightrope is our dimension. And our dimension has rules."
He drew an arrow on either side. "You can move forwards, or backwards."
He then drew a tiny dot to represent a flea. "...right next to our acrobat, there is a flea. Now, the flea can also travel back and forth, just like the acrobat. Right?"
"Right." Mike agreed as he listened to him.
"Here's where things get really interesting." Mr. Clarke told them.
He drew arrows on either side of the flea and then drew a line diagonally on the rope. "The flea can also travel this way along the side of the rope. He can even go..."
He then drew a line leading underneath the rope. "...underneath the rope."
"Upside down." The boys said together as they realized.
"Exactly." Mr. Clarke agreed.
"But, we're not the flea, we're the acrobat." Mike noted.
"In this metaphor, yes, we're the acrobat." Mr. Clarke answered him
"So, we can't go Upside Down?" Lucas asked.
"No." Mr. Clarke answered.
"Well, is there any way for the acrobat to get to the Upside Down?" Dustin asked Mr. Clarke.
"Well...you'd have to create a massive amount of energy. More than humans are currently capable of creating, mind you, to open up some kind of tear in time and space, and then...
He folded the paper plate in half and poked a hole through it. "...you create a doorway."
"Like a gate?" Dustin asked.
"Sure. Like a gate." Mr. Clarke answered. "But again, this is all—"
"Theoretical." Lucas finished disappointedly.
"But...but what if this gate already existed?" Mike asked Mr. Clarke.
"Well, if it did, I...I think we'd know. It would disrupt gravity, the magnetic field, our environment. Heck, it might even swallow us up whole." Mr. Clarke answered them.
Mike, Lucas, and Dustin all looked at each other in thought as they processed the information.
"Science is neat. But I'm afraid it's not very forgiving." Mr. Clarke told them.
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Back at the Hopper residence, Powell and Callahan had just drove up to the trailer. They got out and walked up the steps to the front door, Callahan taking a peek inside through the window.
"Whoa." He whispered to himself before knocking on the door. "Hey, Chief!"
"Hello? Whoa!" He said as Hopper yanked the door open and stepped out, closing the door behind him to hide the mess.
"Hey!" He said, holding his gun
"Whoa," Powell said before taking in how Hopper looked. "Jesus, Chief. You all right?"
"What are you doing here?" Hopper asked them as he ignored the question.
"We tried calling, but—" Powell began to explain but Hopper interrupted him.
"Yeah, the phone's dead." He told them.
Callahan just looked at him as he raised an eyebrow before speaking up. "Hey, so Bev Mooney came in this morning all upset. Said that Dale and Henry went hunting yesterday and they didn't come back home."
"She thought they were on another binger, but she's not so sure now" Powell added.
"I think this whole Will Byers thing has everybody on edge." Callahan remarked to Hopper.
"Where was this?" Hopper asked them, hoping his suspicion wasn't true.
"It was at the station." Callahan told him.
"No, no. Where did Henry and Dale go hunting?" Hopper specified as he asked them again.
"Oh. Uh, out near Kerley." Callahan answered him.
"Mirkwood." Hopper mumbled as his suspicion was becoming increasingly true. Char was right, He thought.
"What?" Powell asked.
"Okay. You go back to the station. I'll take care of this, all right?" He told them as he began to go back inside.
"Are you sure?" Callahan asked him, uncertain.
"Yeah, leave it." Hopper answered.
"Oh, hey. Uh, they found Barbara's car." Callahan mentioned to him.
"What?" Hopper asked as he came back out.
"Barbara Holland's car, Charlotte's friend. Seems she ran away after all." Powell specified. "Staties found it late last night at a bus station."
"Funny, right? They keep doing our job for us." Callahan remarked.
His suspicion kept growing even more after he heard that.
"Yeah," He chuckled. "It's funny."
He went back inside and closed the door, Callahan trying to take a peek inside. Callahan just looked at Powell and they went back to the police car.
"Is he off his meds again?" Callahan asked Powell as he sat down in the vehicle.
"He's been spending too much time with Joyce Byers. That's what I think." Powell remarked as he ignited the engine and leaving.
Hopper got changed and left. The more things he hears, the surer he is that the Hawkins Lab is covering something up.
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Meanwhile, Joyce came into the living room to see Lonnie boarding the giant hole up.
"What are you doing?" She sighed exasperatedly.
He looked up at her and raised an eyebrow. "What does it look like I'm doing? You want to freeze to death all winter?"
She scoffed and rolled her eyes when she noticed that he took the lights down. "I told you not to take these down!"
"They were in the way, babe." Lonnie brushed off. "How long are you gonna keep those up? I mean, really?"
She rolled her eyes at him and went to put the lights back up.
"You know, it's a shame what they've done to this family." Lonnie brought up casually as he continued to board up the hole.
She stopped and looked at him confusedly. "What?"
"The Sattler Company." He answered. "I went to the quarry on the way over here. I just wanted to look around, you know?"
"Couldn't believe it. I just couldn't believe it." He shook his head.
Joyce frowned as she watched him board the hole up.
"No warning signs, no fence, no nothing." He continued as he shook his head. She kept watching him as she put the lights up. "'Ought to be held accountable if you ask me."
She watched him suspiciously as he continued to board up the hole.
Back with Mike, Lucas, and Dustin, they were in the Wheeler's basement. Mike sat in front of El as he explained how they could get to the Upside Down with paper and pencil. He stabbed a hole through the paper, El's eyes widening.
"It would take a lot of energy to build a gate like this." He began to tell her. "But that's got to be what happened. Otherwise, how'd Will get there, right?"
"Right." She agreed
"What we want to know is, do you know where the gate is?" Lucas asked her. She shook her head. "Then how do you know about the Upside Down?"
She looked down at her hands before noticing Dustin pacing back and forth with a compass. The two boys noticed and looked at Dustin, who was still pacing back and forth with the compass in his hand.
"Dustin, what are you doing?" Mike asked him, but Dustin didn't hear him. "Dustin?"
Mike sighed with Lucas before they both yelled his name. "DUSTIN!!"
Finally, Dustin snapped his head up at them before saying, "I...I need to see your compasses.
"What?" Mike asked confusedly.
"Your compasses. All of your compasses, right now!" He demanded.
Mike and Lucas just looked at each other before getting all the compasses and setting them on the game table. Dustin picked each compass up before setting them in a line next to each other.
"What's so exciting about this?" Mike asked Dustin.
"Well, they're all facing north, right?" Dustin asked him.
"Yeah, so?" Lucas answered as he shrugged.
"Well, that's not true north." Dustin told him.
"What do you mean?" Mike asked him.
"I mean exactly what I just said. That's not true north." Dustin insisted and Mike and Lucas still didn't understand. "Are you both seriously this dense?"
Lucas shrugged at him, and Dustin began to explain it to them like they were kindergartners. "The sun rises in the east, and it sets in the west. Right?"
Mike and Lucas shrugged once again.
"Which means that's true north." Dustin said as he pointed towards true north.
"So, what you're saying is the compasses are broken." Mike assumed as he looked at the compasses.
Dustin sighed and deadpanned, "Do you even understand how a compass works?"
He showed a compass to Mike, "Do you see a battery pack on this?"
"No." Mike answered.
"No, you don't. Because it doesn't need one." Dustin continued to explain as he set the compass down. "The needle's naturally drawn to the Earth's magnetic North Pole."
"So...what's wrong with them?" Lucas asked him.
"Well, that's what I couldn't figure out, but then I remembered." Dustin began. "You can change the direction of a compass with a magnet. If there's the presence of a more powerful magnetic field, the needle deflects to that power."
"And then I remembered what Mr. Clarke said." He added. "The gate would have so much power—"
"It would disrupt the electromagnetic field." Mike finished as he realized.
"Exactly." Dustin agreed.
"Meaning, if we follow the compasses' north..." Lucas began.
"They should lead us to the gate." Dustin confirmed as he finished Lucas's sentence.
El watched them nervously. She knew where the gate was and how dangerous the area is.
Back at the Byer's residence, Joyce went to Lonnie's bag and looked through it while he was taking a shower. She had a suspicion that he wasn't back for a good reason.
She got his wallet out and looked through it. She saw a blue paper folded up and picked it up. She opened it up and sat down to look at it.
It was an advertisement for a lawyer group that specialized in accidental injury or death. She scoffed, pissed off. She knew he wasn't back for a good reason.
When he came back into the living room, she shoved the paper into his chest.
"You were here for the money!!" She shouted at him angrily.
"No!" He protested.
"The money!" She pushed him. "Admit it!"
"You weren't here 'cause of Will. You never cared about him. You never did!" She accused.
"Jesus, Joyce, it was his funeral today. Do we have to do this right now?" He asked her.
"I can't believe I fell for this." She said.
"I'm here to help, Joyce." He insisted.
"To help?" She asked him sarcastically.
"We could use that money for good." He tried to convince her.
"Oh, like maybe to pay off your debts?" She stammered as she asked him.
"To pay for Jonathan to go to school!" He said loudly.
"Oh, don't do that." She scoffed.
"Do what?" He asked.
"Lie to me!" She yelled.
"I'm not lying to you!" He yelled back.
"Yeah, well, where does he wanna go?" She quizzed him as she crossed her arms. "Huh?"
"What?" He asked as he made a face.
"Where does Jonathan want to go to college?" She yelled.
"We get that money, anywhere he damn well pleases!" He yelled.
"NYU, Lonnie!" She yelled at him. "He's wanted to go to NYU since he was six years old!"
"So, then he goes to NYU!" Lonnie yelled back.
"Get out." She demanded, angry. "Get out!"
"You need me here, Joyce." He insisted smugly.
"Oh, brother," She scoffed at him and shoved him. "I have not needed you for a long time!"
"Oh no?" He scoffed. "Look what happened."
She scoffed at him as she glowered at him, beyond upset. "Oh, don't you dare. At least I was here!"
"Oh, come on, Joyce." He scoffed as he faced her again. "Just look around at this place. All your Christmas lights. What the hell am I supposed to think?"
"You're such a great mom? You're a mess!" He finished.
(A/N: And now, for my favorite Joyce quote.)
"Maybe I am a mess. Maybe I'm crazy. Maybe I'm out of my damn mind!" She began to tell him. "But, God help me, I will keep these lights up until the day I die, if I think there's a chance that Will's still out there!"
She then picked his bag up and shoved it into his chest. "Now, get out! GET OUT OF MY HOUSE!!!"
He glared at her before storming out and getting in his car and leaving. She took deep breaths as she glared after him.
(A/N: MOM. OF. THE. YEAR!!!👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻)
⭑·ﾟﾟ·*:༅。。⚬.✶༅:*ﾟ:*:☾☆✶☆☽:*:ﾟ*:༅✶.⚬。。༅:*·ﾟﾟ·⭑
Nancy is with Char at the Hopper residence as they look in the tool shed for some kind of object that could be a weapon against the monster.
Char found a metal baseball bat and picked it up and swung it a couple of times, practicing when she whirled around to see Steve(A/N: Stevie boy🥹💗) standing inches from her, his car parked in front of the trailer.
"Whoa, whoa, hey, whoa, whoa." He said as he avoided the baseball bat.
She yelped as she jumped back, her heart racing. She whacked him on the arm.
"What are you thinking?! You scared me!" She scolded him as she grinned at him.
"I'll give you two some privacy." Nancy said as she gave Char a teasing smile. Char stuck her tongue out at her in response as Nancy giggled and walked away.
"What are you doing here?" Char asked him with a raised eyebrow as she exhaled, her heartbeat calming down.
"Me? What are you doing?" He asked her in response as he looked at the baseball bat.
"Nothing." She said innocently as she held the baseball bat sideways behind her back and rocked on her heels.
"I hope that's not meant for me." He told her. "You know, after the whole thing with Jonathan, which I feel really bad about."
"What? Oh, no." She told him. "I'm practicing self-defense. You never know when I might need it, you know?"
"You know, I'm really sorry about the whole thing with Jonathan by the way. I mean, even before you threatened me with the baseball bat." He changed the subject as he put his hands in his pockets as she scoffed at him with a grin at the last part. "I panicked and...I mean I was a total dick."
"Yeah, you were." Char agreed as she smiled. "I accept your apology."
He sighed before looking at her longingly.