❝You will always fall in love, and it will always be like having your throat cut, just that fast.❞
[stranger things season one]
[jonathan byers/brooke henderson]
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[ 02. CHAPTER TWO : STRANGE OCCURRENCES : ❝strange voices are saying things i can't understand.❞ ]
★★★★★
Eyes bleary and head swimming, Brooke felt like her body was shutting down. She had been sat upright in the same chair since Joyce had received the strange phone call that caused her to break down. She had refused to let herself slip into sleep because she wanted to be awake when Hopper came to check up on them.
The presence of Jonathan's hand gently running through her hair didn't help keep her composure as her eyes kept falling closed but she always jolted herself awake when she felt herself slipping into unconsciousness. It wasn't one of her smartest ideas to keep herself awake when school would start within the next three hours but her worries helped to keep her alert.
Joyce decided to break the heavy silence that hung over the three. "The Xerox place opens in, like, thirty minutes. And I don't want you to go alone, since Brooke needs to go to school, so I'm gonna have Karen take you 'cause I should be here." Her continuous rambling didn't stop even as Jonathan responded to her statements. "We need to make, what, two hundred, three hundred copies? How much is a copy?"
"Joyce..." Brooke tried to interrupt the nervous woman as she continued to speak quickly, her worried eyes focusing on the older woman.
"Ten cents?" Joyce kept going, grabbing the pile of dollar bills that rested on the table. "If we ... ten cents--"
Jonathan stopped his mother's rambling effectively, his hand grabbing her wrist that held the money. "You can't get like this, okay?"
"I'm sorry." Joyce apologized, looking worried but Jonathan reassured her that it was alright.
A loud knock captured the attention of all three people in the Byers home and Joyce dropped her cigarette in the ash tray, jumping up to answer the door. As she pulled it open, Hopper's face became visible to them. He looked exhausted, not even wearing his hat that was gripped in his hands.
"We've been waiting six hours!" Joyce complained, shutting the door behind Hopper as he stepped inside the small residence.
"I know." Hopper said quietly, his voice taking on the level of exhaustion his face already had. Brooke felt sympathy for the man as he had gone on longer than she had last night. "I came as soon as I could."
"Six hours!" Joyce repeated, irked with the man she had trusted to find her younger son.
"A little bit of trust here, alright?" Hopper sighed, seeming very agitated as he shifted his hat from one hand to the other. "We've been searching all night. Went all the way to Cartersville."
Brooke rose from her seat, the bones in her back protesting as she moved to stand beside Jonathan. Her energy was drained and all she wanted to do was take a long nap to refresh herself but she still had a long day ahead of her.
