Right Side Up - A Stranger Things Season 4 Fanfic (incomplete)

Chapter 4

"M-Murray?" Joyce's hand almost let go of the phone out of shock.
Why was Murray calling her in the middle of the night? They would speak frequently over the phone, only because Murray called her every few days to report another one of Hopper's "sightings"

"Look, if it's another sighting, I'm sorry but I don't have time for-"

"Joyce! Listen to me, carefully." He cut her off. What could he want that was so important that he needed her full attention?

"The thing is I-I.. I found something. It's not good, or bad, but it's something. We need to talk immediately."

"Well, tell me then!" She was getting impatient. All she wanted to do was go back to sleep. She wished she didn't have anything to do with this. Anything to do with him. But deep down, she hoped that he would finally tell her that he found something about him, something crucial, important.

"I-I can't tell you over the phone, you never know who might be listening. I need you to come to Hawkins."

Joyce froze again. She needed to go back to that hell of a town so Murray could tell her whatever it was he had found? No, she couldn't possibly do that. That place was home to so many of her memories, mostly bad ones. It was the place where she had gotten married and divorced to Lonnie, the place where she had lost her son, and later watched him get possessed, the place where Bob got eaten alive, the place where Hopper blew up right in front of her.

She couldn't possibly go back there

"Murray.. I-I can't-"

"I know how hard it is for you, Joyce, but it's not safe to tell you what I found over the phone. Someone could be listening to our conversation, you know that better that anyone! Please, try to be strong and come down to Hawkins."

And with that, the line went dead.

Joyce knew her limit. She knew that as soon as she would lay eyes on that dreaded "Welcome to Hawkins" sign, she would break down. Either in rage, or sadness.

But she also knew that she had to be strong. It's what he would've wanted, he would've wanted her to face her fears, and overcome them.

And that's exactly what she would do.

As she made her way to her bedroom, Murray's words came back to her,
"You never know who might be listening". What could be so important that someone would want to listen to a phonecall about? Who could be listening in the first place anyway?

Maybe Murray's being paranoid again. I mean who could possibly want to spend their time listening to random people's phonecalls?

Her thoughts managed to slowly put her in a deep sleep. It didn't quite make sense to her. Who could be on the other side of the line secretly listening to the conversation? And why were they doing it? No one other than Joyce, Hopper, Murray and the kids knew about the events of the Upside Down, let alone its existence.

Well, Brenner knew as well, but he was long dead. El had gotten rid of him at school right before she disappeared into the Upside Down.

She was sure Murray was being paranoid as per usual.

Their secret was safe.

Or so she thought..

A/N: Hello everyone! I'm very sorry I took so long to update the story, writer's block sucks lol. I just wanted to say thank you so much for reading my story so far, I really appreciate it! Even though each chapter gets 2-4 reads, I always get so happy when the little number on the bottom left of each chapter goes up! I'm going to make the next chapters longer, so the story doesn't get boring, so I hope you're hyped up for that! :) Once again, thank you so much! Happy reading! <3