Happenstance ⌱ Jim Hopper

[ 10 ] JANIE JONES

[ 10 ] 

THIS OVERCAST GLOOM was a perfect setting for such a shitty day, Jodie thought as she shook her third-to-last Camel from its paper safe, more than ready for her ten-minute smoke break from the hell of Hawkins Theater. Her heart was heavy. 

      Poor kid, dead in a watery grave. 

      Jodie lifted her cigarette to her lips and fished her lighter from the deep, endless pockets of her father's faded sweater.

      And to think, Jodie was probably one of the very last people to lay eyes on Will Byers while he was still alive. 

      She let go of the lever of the metal lighter, extinguishing the flame before it could light her Camel, and turned it over in her pale, quivering hand. Her stomach churned with the clouds overhead. 

      Softly, Jodie rubbed the pad of her thumb over the engraving etched into the smooth side of the lighter. She read the words out loud, "Always in our hearts, Jamey A. Whittier." 

      Sighing, Jodie flicked the lighter and ignited her cigarette, inhaling deeply.

      The nicotine did very little to heal the hurt, however. 

      Jodie leant against the dumpster behind The Hawk and exhaled a cloud, her words carrying heavy along with it. "Well, Will Byers . . . so you too will be."

      She clutched the silver lighter tightly, playing with it in the palm of her hand. She thought about the day she took the lighter to the jeweller's store, red-eyed and pumped full of Jack Daniels. The pain was still as sharp as it had ever been.

      That was the day Jodie Whittier given up hope that her brother would ever be found. That was the day Jodie Whittier knew Jameson Whittier was dead. He wasn't coming back. Not ever.

      The lighter felt icy in the palm of her hand, but Jodie continued to toy with it, flicking the flame on and off with a click, click, click.

      Jodie noticed the bottom corner of the thing was dinged and, frowning, she held it closer to her face, rotating the lighter under the sun as it lazily crept out from the gloom. 

      This lighter had been in Will's possession when he had disappeared. It had been found in the Byers' shed, dinged up and damaged. Jodie's heart sagged, feeling the weight of the missing child almost as heavy as when her own little brother had disappeared. 

       And to think, Jodie's lighter was probably one of the very last things Will Byers touched while he was still alive.

      Jodie stopped mid-inhale and yanked her cigarette from her lips, sputtering and coughing as she gasped for air, being struck with a terrible thought that she couldn't quite shake.

      If Will was holed up in his shed, with her lighter, Jodie questioned, then how the hell did he happen to fall into the Quarry?