Chapter Thirty-Seven: Not Giving Up Yet

We al immediately got to work cleaning out the shed, and Nancy, Steve and I were now in the process of stabling up cardboard and tarp to cover up the walls. I was across the room, putting up tarps when Nancy decided to break the silence.

"Hey...What you did, um, helping the kids...that was...really cool."

"Yeah. Those little jerks are real trouble, you know?" He said, stepping up onto the step ladder.

"Believe me, I know." She said. "So um...I know this is the last thing that's important right now, but I just gotta ask..." She turned around, looking at both of us. "Are you guys a thing now?" My eyes widened, and I turned around to look at her.

"Nancy..." I started.

"No, its ok! Its perfectly ok, I'm not mad, I'm just...curious? I guess?" I looked up at Steve, unsure of what to do.

"Um...yeah. Yeah we're...a thing." She nodded. "Are you...are you and Jonathan a thing?"

"Yeah...kind of." She said. 

"Is this gonna be awkward?" I asked. "Because if we survive this, I was kind of hoping we'd all still be able to hang out."

"I don't think it will be awkward, I think...I think we're both pretty happy with the current situation, right?" Steve asked her. She nodded.

"Happy with the situation, yes...not Happy with the way that it happened. I am so sorry about everything that happened on Halloween, and the day after. It wasn't cool." He shook his head.

"Its cool. We're all cool." Steve said, glancing between us. She nodded, looking between Steve and I as well.

"Great. Good." We all turned around and continued to put up the tarps, unsure of where to go from here. Even if we'd kind of talked it out it still felt...super awkward.

~~~

Soon we were all gathered in the shed, covering ever spare inch in sheets, cardboard, tarps, paper from the trash, tin foil, anything that we could find to hide our location. Even Joyce's kitchen chairs were covered in cardboard and duct tape to shield it from Will's view.

Once it was ready, Jonathan carried Will outside and we tied him to the chair. We set up super bright lamps to further shield his view, and Joyce had the sedative she'd stolen from the lab at the ready.

Then the rest of us went inside, leaving only Dad, Jonathan, Joyce, and Mike to talk to him. I walked into the living room, where  Steve was swinging the bat around. I crossed over to stand in front of him, far enough away that he wouldn't hit me. He stopped swinging.

"You really think this is gonna work?" He asked. I nodded.

"I hope so." I walked over to the couch, sitting down. Steve sat down beside me. "It has to, otherwise, I don't know what we're gonna do, but..."

"But?" I sighed.

"I can't shake the feeling that it should be me in there." I said.

"Riley..."

"I still stand by the fact that all of this is my fault." I said. "If I had just told my Dad what happened when I came out of the Upside Down, we could've taken precautions, and Will would have never have gotten taken. And in the field, when that thing got him, he's just a kid. How could I have been stupid enough to not make sure he was behind me?"

"You have to stop this." He said. "You can't keep blaming yourself for everything. If you do that, you're just gonna be miserable and guilty for the rest of your life."

"Its true, isn't?" I asked. He shook his head.

"Riley...look the fact of the matter is, you can't spend the rest of your life thinking about what could have happened or what should have happened. What happened...happened, and there's nothing we can do about that now except try to move on and be happy." I leaned back against the back of the couch, biting my lip. He leaned back against the couch too so that both of our heads were laying on top of it. I turned my head to meet his eyes. "You deserve to be happy. You got out of that place alive, you have enough trauma without adding guilt on top of everything else."

"To be honest, I'm not even sure if I know how to do that." I whispered.

"Do what?" I sighed.

"Be happy. I mean, I'm pretty good at being happy for a moment, but sooner or later, usually when its nighttime and I'm laying in bed, my thoughts catch up with me. How do I move on?"

"It won't happen overnight but...you can start by filling your life with things that will prompt new thoughts like...I don't know, getting your first boyfriend or something."

"Are you saying you're my boyfriend, HAIRington?"

"I'm just saying its looking like there's a good chance things might head in that direction, I mean, unless you know something I don't."

"What makes you think I'm interested?" I asked, teasingly. It almost felt wrong to be joking with him in this situation, but quite frankly, it was the only thing keeping me from spiraling into a pit of guilt.  His amused smile faded into a serious expression, causing my own smile to fade. "What is it?" He sat up on the edge of the couch, leaning his elbows on his knees and running a hand through his hair. I sat up too, looking at him in concern.

"Nothing, I was just...I was thinking about the serious answer to that question." He said, turning to face me. "and honestly? It...Its the way that you look at me. Whether we're joking around and being dumb, or talking about Monsters, you just give me this look," He gestured at his own face for emphasis. "I don't think anybody has ever looked at me the way that you do." I smiled.

"My Dad always told me I wasn't very good at hiding my emotions." I said. "He said when I was a kid and I was trying to lie to him, the truth was always written all over my face. I'm a very expressive person."

"SO what is that look then? What is it saying?" He asked. I away from him, pondering on this.

"I think its saying...why couldn't we have put our preconceived notions of each other aside and start hanging out a long time ago?" I guessed. He smiled.

"Ain't that the truth." I chuckled, looking down at my hands in my lap and lightly bumping my shoulder against his. He chuckled too, reaching up and tucking a few stray hairs behind my ear causing my breath to catch in my throat and my smile to fade. Steve picked up on this, and let his fingers trail down the side of my neck, coming to land on my shoulder as he leaned in and gently pressed his lips against my cheek. My eyes fluttered closed at the sudden contact  and I turned towards him, resting my forehead against his as I had when we were standing outside of the lab. He put a hand on my knee, running it up my leg until it came to rest on my hip.

"You are aware that I haven't done...anything, right?" I whispered.

"Yeah, Barbie, I'm fully aware of that." He whispered back, amusement clouding his voice as our proximity allowed his warm breath to fan across my lips, stepping them on fire and sending a shiver down my spine.

"So you know I don't know how to do any of this stuff, so if its bad-"

"Hey Barbie?"

"Yeah?"

"I think I liked you better when you didn't talk." I pulled back slightly, opening my eyes to shoot him a look.

"You're really gonna bring that up right now-"

"No, seriously, shut up." He said, putting his free hand on my face and pulling my towards him, pressing his lips against mine. My eyes fluttered closed again of their own accord, and I just sat there for a moment, unsure of what to do. But as Steve's mouth began to move against mine, I found myself seemingly overflowing with that electricity that he was talking about earlier and suddenly I knew exactly what to do. I began hesitantly kissing him back, my lips moving in sync with his.  

I folded one leg in front of me, and Steve took this opportunity to tangle one hand into my ponytail and wrap the other around my waist, pulling me closer to him as I brought mine to rest on the sides of his neck, pulling him impossibly closer to me. It was at this moment, however, that not only were we not alone, we had more important things to worry about, so I pulled away from him and scooted across the couch, my breathing coming out ragged and shallow. I glanced over, my eyes falling to Steve's lips, which were swollen from the kiss.

"Priorities, Steve." I breathed, running my fingers through my now slightly-tangled ponytail. "But um...was that...I don't know, right? Did I do it right?" He just stared at me, and I felt myself smile as I realized it was because the kiss hand rendered him speechless.

"Woah." He finally said, causing me to chuckle and press my fingers gently against my now tingling lips.

Our moment was interrupted by the lights starting to blink, and suddenly we all ran into the kitchen to the windows facing into the backyard. We could hear Will screaming inside.

"LET ME GO! LET ME GO! LET ME GO!" Slowly his screams died down and the lights stabilized. 

"That wasn't Will." I said, recognizing the anger that emanated from him as the same anger I felt when I saw the monster.

It wasn't long after that that the others came rushing out of the shed and pack into the house, as Dad grabbed an envelope and a pen and sat down at the kitchen table.

"What happened?" Dustin asked.

"I think he's talking, just not with words." He said, as we all crowded around him. He began writing a series of dots and lines.

"What is that?" Steve asked.

"Morse code." The boys and I all said in unison as Dad began to translate the letters.

"H-E-R-E."

"Here." Mike repeated.

"Will's still in there." Dad stated, putting the pen down. "He's talking to us."

"Ok, so what triggered it? What made him able to talk?" I asked.

"We started talking about our memories with him." Mike said.

"Ok, so...you guys go back in there, reminisce with him some more and...take a walkie with you. You can use that to signal us the patter and then we can decipher the message from here." I suggested. Dad nodded in agreement and we all jumped into action.

We're not giving up yet.