brutal ━ mike wheeler

six. arrests will be made

SIX━━━━
ARRESTS WILL BE MADE

stranger things;
season 4    ep 3

THE TWO GIRLS WOKE up the next morning with giddy smiles on their faces when they had seen how close they had fallen asleep. They were still in their clothes from last night, one of El's comic books open and lying on top of both of them.

Frankie smiled when she had seen how El's hair went everywhere. It was quite adorable. She reached up and flattened down some loose strands, unhooking her hair from the hair clip that she still had on.

"Good morning." Frankie said with a smile, and El grinned at her, letting the girl fix her hair. "Morning."

El's voice was still sleepy, but there was a softness to it that Frankie couldn't get enough of. For a moment, it was just them and the quiet. The sun streamed through the curtains in warm stripes, casting lazy patterns over their legs.

El rolled onto her back, arms stretched above her head with a yawn. "You snore," she teased gently, poking Frankie in the side.

Frankie gasped in mock offense. "Excuse me? That was you. I woke up to what I thought was a dying walrus."

They both broke into giggles, their laughter echoing lightly through the small room. It felt like a rare moment of peace—a kind of normal neither of them got to have often. Frankie pressed her lips together in a soft smile as she looked around the room, her eyes landing on a cardboard box that look a bit bent out of shape.

It was painted blue and has some characters in it, a custom house made out of popsicle sticks. She lifted her head to get a better look. "Oh! That my diorama. I dropped it, so I need to fix it." El said when she saw what Frankie had been looking at.

"Oh. . . Maybe I can help you when we get dressed?" El nodded with a sweet smile and got up, stretching her limbs. Frankie followed suit, walking over to her bag, grabbing her clothes. A pink top and a white ruffled skirt. "I'll be back, El." She said before she walked away and into the bathroom across the hall. She got dressed and quickly pulled her hair into a braid, fixing her skirt as she walked out. When she walked back into El's room, she was dressed and sitting at her desk.

Frankie sat on the edge of her bed and looked closer at the project. "Is that. . . your dad?" El nodded sadly and turned to look at her. "I had to make a diorama of a hero. I made one of him." Frankie furrowed her eyebrows but smiled with a nod. She looked at the bent top of the box and frowned. That didn't look like she had just dropped it. She decided it was probably best that she didn't question it.

She got a little closer to El and reached for the glue that was on the edge of the desk. "Let's fix it, yeah?" Frankie said with a positive smile. El nodded quickly and grabbed a paintbrush, flipping it around and sticking the end in the tube of glue. Frankie gently held the box in place as El smeared some of the glue on a popsicle stick, putting it back where it was supposed to be.

She grabbed the bottle from Frankie and carefully put some glue on the character that Frankie knew was Hopper, fixing the hat that had gotten a bit jumbled. She frowned when she dropped some glue on the bottom of the box.

Frankie carefully let go of the box and turned to El. "I'll go get some paper towels and a cup of water." Frankie said, getting up. As she walked out the door, though, she heard a voice she hadn't heard before. It was coming from downstairs.

Curiously, she peaked her head around the corner and spotted Jonathan talking to two police officers. "You may or may not be aware of an incident involving Jane at the Rink-O-Mania." Frankie pressed her lips together and sighed. She heard the creak of a floorboard behind her and quickly turned around.