it's the end of the world as we know it.

15. things get weird

A few days had passed and life was still casually normal, at least for someone with Frankie's expertise in normal. He went to work, drove Stella around Hawkins like her personal chauffeur, and unfortunately he rarely got to talk to Jonathan in the past two days. Frankie didn't really consider the last time they talked an argument, he was willing to move past the slight scuffle.

At work now, they held a staff meeting pre opening hours. They sat in the lounge chairs in a circle, Freddy standing in the center with a clipboard, tapping his pen against it as he took count of his staff.

Looking across the circle, Frankie watched Billy curiously, as there was something off putting about the other teen, more so than usual. What's weird about it is that Billy seemed perfectly normal yesterday when Frankie saw him. He was flirting with Nancy's mom like usual, and Frankie had been grossed out by the fact that she reciprocated the flirting so he had forced himself to look at something else. This morning, however, he seemed nervous and fidgety, and he seemed to be in a cold sweat. Frankie tried to play it off in his mind as maybe he had a fever and was a weirdo who went to work instead of taking the day off, but knowing Billy Hargrove and Frankie's world, that probably wasn't the case.

"Alright," Freddy began, glancing among his staff. "We've just got a few things to run over before we open up the pool for the day. First off â€" we need to make sure our sales are up, and while they are pretty good currently, keep making sure you tell your friends and family in every conversation you can that we're open. We want a full day to where we have to close it off because of capacity."

"Secondly - we need to watch who we're conversing with during hours. Some people, I'm not naming names both ways - think it's weird to see some of us conversing with older customers." Freddy stated, and Frankie choked on his laughter at the obvious yet not confederation. Freddy stared at Frankie, and Billy scowled at him; Frankie cleared his throat awkwardly.

"Which also, need I remind my staff, we have to be 100% sober on shift. Some of us are not very good at concealing our sobriety, so we need to stay committed to being sober. That means no alcohol or weed at all during the shifts. If I catch you with either on the premises, that means a write up will happen first, and extermination second." Freddy stated, and Frankie stared at him, blinking, before shrinking into his seat at the direct callout. To be fair, he's shown up to work high at least twice this summer, otherwise, he normally smoked outside of work.

Freddy continued to yap on about sales or whatever else management had to reprimand staff about that wasn't directed at Frankie or Billy, and sooner than later, the meeting had ended. Those who had to return to work unfortunately had to stick around, and those who got to go home left. Frankie unfortunately was not one of the latter, and he retreated back into the interior building to grab his equipment from his designated locker.

The rest of the shift, Frankie kept a closer eye on Billy and his strange behavior. He hoped it was just himself painting it out as his paranoia. From the bench where the other lifeguards sat, Frankie watched Billy stumble about the pool. His hair looked wet, from sweat or something unknown, and he even stumbled into a customer, knocking their drink out of his hand. The customer made a sound of complaint as Billy said nothing and continued on, and Frankie noticed a strange red blotch on his arm.

"Billy, are you okay?" Heather called out, her voice laced with concern as her eyebrows furrowed, watching the teen. Billy glanced back at her but said nothing, and continued on, entering the building out of their sight. Heather glanced at Frankie, who was frowning slightly. "Should we go check on him? He didn't look okay."

Frankie looked off in the direction of the showers where Billy had gone. "Dunno, he looked sick, yeah. But if he's got herpes or something he probably deserves it."