Love Is a Battlefield | Steve Harrington

Annabelle Macher has spent her whole life being told she wasn't enough.

After the car crash that killed her older brother James, Annabelle became the daughter her mother never wanted - a quiet reminder of what was lost. James was the golden child, the one with the scholarship offers, the smile in every photo. Annabelle? She survived. And in her mother's eyes, that's the worst part.

Now she floats through her senior year at Hawkins High with perfect hair, a biting wit, and a wall so high no one dares to climb it. Except for Steve Harrington, the one person who gets under her skin more than anyone else. Arrogant. Shallow. Everything she swore she'd never fall for.

They hate each other.
At least, they're supposed to.

But when a local boy disappears, strange things start happening all over Hawkins - flickering lights, static in the air, something breathing in the woods at night. Annabelle starts to feel it: something wrong. Something watching. Something that doesn't belong.

And when her younger brother Benjamin - the only person she truly loves - starts hearing whispers from the trees outside their house, Annabelle knows whatever is happening isn't just small-town paranoia. It's real. And it's getting closer.

She might not trust Steve.
But she might need him.
And for the first time since the crash... she might finally be afraid to survive alone.