Jopper : You make my heart skip a beat

Chapter 3

His deep, ocean  blue eyes are hidden with something Joyce can't decipher. He smiles gently at her while his hand moves to El's shoulder. Joyce speaks kindly "Hi, come on in!" She stands out of the doorframe to let them in. 

Hopper guides El through the door before she runs up to Joyce, enveloping her in a warm hug. "Hi, sweetheart" Joyce says as she wraps her arms around the small girl. "Hi. Is Will here?" She asked pulling out of the hug, looking around for the boy she has come to known as a brother of sorts. 

At least that's how El believes a brother should be. Kind and understanding. Will understands what I went through the past 2 years and I understand his feelings about the upside down. I hate that place. It's cold and dark  and in the shadows lurks a creepy, eery thing. Well, not a thing exactly. More like a feeling. But not  a good feeling. A bad feeling. A dark feeling. But they understand each other and that created a bond. Like siblings. Since meeting Will for the first time, properly she felt connected to him. But not like Mike. Like a brother.

"Yeah, sweetheart, he's in his rooming drawing." Joyce tells her. A smile lit up El's face as she quickly walked down to Will's bedroom door, before knocking.

 "Come in, El" Will called from his room. She pushed open the the door and stepped inside, careful to close the door. "Hi Will" she said as she looked over his shoulder. "Hi, El." 

He was happily drawing all the Party's DnD characters, Will the Wise front and centre, a fireball on the end of his staff pointing towards a beastly creature. "That's really good, Will!" She said, sitting on the only other chair in his room. He lifted his head with a bright smile on his face. "Thanks! It's all of our characters!" He said while holding up the piece of coloured paper.

"I love it!" She said, a huge smile on her face. Will saw how happy the drawing of the DnD characters made her and thought up an idea. "We should make you a character! And we can teach you and Max how to play DnD, so you can play with all of us!" Her faced lit up once again at the idea of being able to play with them instead of sitting and watching, confused, thinking what is happening. A thought brought more happiness to her. I could play with Mike! "Yes please!" 

Will put his drawing down and picked up a new, blank piece of paper. "What are you doing?" El asked, she was curious. "Do you have any ideas what you're character should look like? Oh and what they're name will be?" He questioned, a crayon already in hand, ready to write or draw what she wanted.

"I don't know. I don't know the rules." She said sheepishly, ducking her head in embarrassment. "That's ok. There are no rules on what you're character should look like. You make up your own  rules." She still seemed unsure so he decided on something else. "I can ask you questions about what you would like and you can answer them and we can make up something to show the rest of the Party." El's smile returned at this suggestion. And I can see Mike. He can help me with my character. 

They've been talking about what El's character should look like for at least twenty minutes. They decided early on that she should have powers like El. But what she should look like was still a challenge. They were both trying to decide on the hair when El saw her chance.

She has been thinking for a few days now about something and has wanted to ask Will what he thinks. Hopper and El haven't been over in five whole days. That's too long for a girl locked up in a cabin for her 'own safety' in Hopper's words. She thinks she will be ok, if she could just go to hang out with the rest of the Party. But this always ends up with no tv and no eggos. And I need these to keep me happy while I'm away from my friends.

She couldn't wait any longer so she just asked. "Will?" "Yeah" he responded, still focusing on his drawing of character ideas, trying to think of the best style of hair suited to her character. "Do you think Hopper loves your mom?" She asked innocently, watching his face as he thought about this.

"I think he does. And I think my mom feels the same way." He turned to face her now. "Really? How do you know?" She said while fidgeting with the red crayon between her fingers. She would make it fly as Dustin says but Hopper is very strict about her using her powers unless absolutely necessary. 

"She's always happy when she sees him and when you's come over. Happier than she normally is and when he leaves she is sad." He doesn't like it when his mom was sad. 

"Hopper does the same. He looks at her like I look at Mike. And I love Mike so Hopper loves Joyce. He smiles a lot more when she is there." El states, proud of the information she has when normally she doesn't know what's going on. The Party seem to reference to a lot of movies she has never seen, but Mike always explains things to her afterwards.

"Do you think they know how they feel about each other?" Will asks. "No I don't think so." El thinks about how they behave around each other. "They avoid their feelings and that makes them sad" she said thinking of how sad she would be if Mike never asked her to the Snowball.

"You know what we should do?" Will said, excitement clear in his voice. El smiles wondering what she could get to take part in "what?" "We could try get them together!"