STRANGER THINGS

Now you're in the stars

It's cold. It is November after all, so El isn't surprised. She might go back inside soon, but for now she'll keep sitting on the front steps, watching as lights go out in the neighbours' houses one by one.

The school day was tough. She hadn't expected school to be easy since she had never been to school before, but she'd had no choice. Joyce couldn't afford to homeschool her, so they'd had Dr. Owens do them a favour and run some tests, which determined that she was at a stable enough point in her education to start high school with Will. He and the rest of their friends had started at Hawkins High in August, but El decided to wait until after they moved away. That way she would only have to be new once.

Being new isn't any fun. Jonathan is a senior, and she doesn't know anyone in their grade besides Will, who never talks to her much. It isn't that they don't get along, they just aren't very close and prefer to keep to themselves most of the time. Luckily for him, Will has made some friends in an art club he joined. El, on the other hand, doesn't have the slightest clue how to do the same. The friends she has were made by circumstance, and it was all Mike's orchestration, anyway. If it had been up to Lucas, El would've been left in the woods the night they met her.

Mike. He's the reason she had a tough day. Not that it's his fault, but he was at the center of it. There is a group of other students at the school that El doesn't like. They're not outright mean to her, like pushing her or hurting her, but whenever they talk to her they say things in a way that she just knows is supposed to be rude. It started right within the first week of going to class when one of them tried to talk to her and El was too shy to hold a conversation properly. Now, they talk to her like she's a baby, like she doesn't understand them. She's pretty sure she's overheard them saying she's a weirdo, or some word she's never heard before that starts with an R. She's not sure what it means, but it doesn't sound nice.

Today, El had been at her locker getting her lunch so she could go and sit quietly with Will, as she usually does, and had paused to look at the inside of it. She has one of her pictures with Max up that they took at the mall in the summer, and she has one of Mike that he gave her a while ago when she asked. She used to keep it in her room at the cabin, but now she likes to look at it at school to make her feel less lonely. It reminds her that he misses her just as much as she misses him. She's not entirely sure where they stand now, after the summer. She had broken up with him and then overheard him confess that he loves her, but then everything turned upside down and they just never ended up talking about it. She didn't let herself leave without telling him she returns his feelings, but they haven't actually talked about whether they're back together or not. She would rather see him face to face than talk about it over the radio or the phone, but Thanksgiving is still a few weeks away.

She had probably been staring at the picture or something, because El hadn't noticed the usual group of teenagers surrounding her locker until it was too late. One of them had snatched it right off the door, magnet and all, and started asking her questions.

Who's this? She'd asked. Your cousin?

El had hesitated. My boyfriend, she'd said. It's easier for other people to understand his place in her life that way, even if it isn't the complete truth. That's another thing she's learning: lies aren't always bad. Sometimes they just make things easier when you're in a tough situation.

None of them had believed her and had laughed at her for even saying such a thing, and then made fun of Mike for wearing a Ghostbusters costume and for the face he was pulling. El stayed silent through it all, fuming until they threw the picture back at her without regard and left her alone. If she still had her powers, she would have made them regret ever speaking to her. But she doesn't, so she was left to stew in her emotions instead.