Time After Time (a Stranger Things fanfiction)

Right Now

"Right Now"

Make future plans, don't dream about yesterday

C'mon turn, turn this thing around

Right now

It's your tomorrow

- Van Halen

Will slept on and on, and Joyce was terrified of what it would be like when he woke up. What he'd been through, alone there in that nightmare world, would have to change him somehow, and that was bad enough, but she could handle that. The worst part, the scariest question, was how long his heart had been stopped, how long he'd gone without oxygen. Would he still be her Will? She would love him no matter what, but she would never forgive herself, if he'd lost part of who he was to that thing, for not having been there sooner. If only she'd remembered the axe and chopped through the wall, she kept thinking, watching his pale face. He had known her, there in that darkened library, at least he had known her. That had to be a good sign, right?

She wanted to ask the doctors, but they were not being forthcoming with any information. It was all 'wait and see when he wakes up'. Joyce supposed she got it—she couldn't imagine Hawkins Lab had told the local doctors about the Upside Down, so whatever story they had told probably left the doctors with unanswered questions and suspicions. Still, she would have liked more ... anything. Anything but this interminable waiting.

Leaving Jonathan with Will for the moment, she went into the waiting room. All three of the boys jumped up.

"Will?" Mike asked, in the tone of someone who was grasping at the last possible straw to hold on to.

"Still sleeping." Joyce glanced at Karen and Ted. "Do you suppose I could ask you a favor? The doctors think it would help Will if he had some familiar things with him—crayons, paper, some of his tapes, that kind of thing—but I don't want to leave him. Just in case. I don't want to leave him ever again," she added, feeling the sting of tears behind her eyes.

Karen got to her feet, looking relieved to have a task. "Of course. Whatever we can do."

Ted was slower, but no less willing. "We'll be back as soon as we can. Your house locked?"

Joyce shook her head.

"All right." They left, with a quick hug for Mike and a squeeze of Nancy's shoulder. No one had told the Wheelers about the Upside Down, but whatever Hawkins Lab had told them while looking for the children had let them know about Nancy's friend Barbara.

The girl was holding up well, but Joyce could see anger in her. Anger at herself, at the lab, at ... the universe. She hoped Nancy could turn that anger in the right direction. The third boy, the long-haired teenager Steve, was hovering around, clearly wanting to help, but out of his depth. Joyce sympathized. These were hard times to care for someone.

As soon as the Wheelers were gone, Hopper drew everyone else together in the center of the room, and they told their stories. Nancy's was terse, quick, and to the point; Hopper's much the same, although Joyce believed he had left out a few things.

Mike seemed to think so, too. He added very little to the boys' portion of the story, letting Dustin and Lucas go over how cool Eleven had been and how there had been blood everywhere. They talked a big game now, but Joyce had to believe at the time they must have been terrified.

"What do we do now?" Mike asked at last. "Just ... go back to our lives like nothing ever happened?" His tone said he thought that sounded stupid.

"Yeah, kid," Hopper told him. "Trust me when I tell you I know how that sounds, like nothing can ever be normal again. And no one's saying it won't take a while. But ... you have to go back to school, and clean your room, and do your chores, and run your—what is it? D&D?"