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THE FIRST THING VALENTINA FELT when she came to her senses was pain. Flaming, throbbing, ghastly pain all over. In her leg, in her head, even in her ribs—though she didn't remember getting hit there. Maybe she was having sympathy pains after she kicked Billy in his ribs a few times. Or it was karma, which was probably the more likely explanation, because Valentina didn't feel sympathetic or regretful one bit for beating up Billy—even if he won in the end.
She felt a weight on the left side of her body, and she could feel her right side being the weight on top of someone else. Her eyebrows scrunched together, which caused a wave of nausea to attack her noggin, and she tried to open her eyes to see what she was laying on.
But when she opened her eyes, she was met with the sight of a dark wall.
"Hello?" she tried to say, but her voice came out all scratchy. Her throat hurt, and it was only in that moment that Valentina realized she hadn't had a drink of water since that morning.
Dustin, Steve, and her stupidly packed only three plastic water bottles for their journey to the old junkyard, and they ran out within an hour. Valentina would've had an extra sip in her, but Steve ripped the water out of her hands after he finished his and gulped down the last few drops.
'Men need more water,' he said. 'It's biology, or some shit.' He also said that she should know that, because she's 'a genius or something.' Valentina then had to explain that astronomy is quite different from biology, and that he was thinking of physiology anyway, not biology.
She then went quiet because she didn't want to talk about astronomy.
"Do I turn here?" someone said. It was a girly voice, and Valentina suddenly remembered who all was in their group. Max, she concluded, was the person whose voice she heard.
"Just keep going straight," another voice said. It was girly, but still clearly a boy's voice. She realized it was Lucas.
Valentina cleared her throat, then tried to speak again. Her head and body was killing her, but she felt weirdly numb as if she should've been in more pain. She was more confused than anything. Where the hell were they? And why was it so dark and... jostly?
"Hello?" she called out. It came out muffled by the wall her face was pressed against. Valentina lifted her hand, having to wrangle it out from underneath her lax body, and pushed against the wall. She was expecting to move herself backwards off the wall, but to her surprise, the wall fell over.
It wasn't a wall at all. It was Steve Harrington, and he was now on the floor of a car.
"Steve?" Valentina questioned. "Why the fuck are we in a car?"
"Um, guys? She's awake," Dustin said, alarming the girl with his surprisingly close-sounding voice. Valentina sat up a little so she could turn her head, finding the curly headed boy sitting right next to her head while she laid down.
