The Space Between

Aaliyah Carter has always known how to survive Hawkins.
As the oldest of the Sinclair family, she learned early how to be responsible - balancing school, church, and the weight of helping raise her younger siblings while her mother worked herself thin. Smart, guarded, and quietly ambitious, Aaliyah exists between worlds in a town built on lines she was never meant to cross.
She doesn't expect to collide with Steve Harrington again.
Once, they were inseparable - childhood bike rides, shared pizza, late-night movies, and a closeness that faded the moment popularity, pressure, and unspoken truths got in the way. Now, he's Hawkins High's golden boy, and she's learned how to keep her head down and her heart protected.
But when fate forces them back into each other's lives, old memories resurface, old wounds reopen, and the space between who they were and who they've become begins to close.
Because some bonds don't disappear -
they just wait.