fifteen

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ONCE DAYTIME CAME, the girls were walking in the rain, going to billy's house, so they could find out more.

the weather was not good today, it was sprinkling rain, and thundering a little.

it was gonna start raining harder later.

"it's gonna start pouring soon." y/n says.

"we should be at the mall or, like, watching a movie or something." max adds.

"you don't believe me?" el sadly asks max.

"i believe you saw some super weird stuff, totally." max explains to el. "but, you said mike has sensed you in there before, right? so maybe it was just like that. maybe billy just.. sensed you somehow."

"but the screams." el adds.

"yeah, i know, but here's the thing." y/n explains. "when billy is alone with a girl, they make, like, really crazy noises."

"they scream?" el asks.

"yeah, but, like.. happy screams." y/n says, trying to make it seem as innocent as possible.

"happy screams? what is happy screams?" el asks y/n, in confusion.

"it's like.." y/n tries to explain. "i'm just gonna lend you max's mom's cosmo."

y/n, max, and el then stopped in front of max's house, getting ready to go into billy's room.

"his cars not here." max notices.

"you really want to do this?" y/n asks el.

el nods her head yes.

the girls walk into the house, then into billy's room.

"why do i get the feeling we're gonna find all kinds of wrong in here?" max says.

a heavy metal song played on the stereo in billy's room.

max went into billy's drawer and found magazine of provocative girls.

"ew! gag me with a spoon." max says in disgust as she closed the drawer.

they went into the bathroom, and el flicked on the light switch.

y/n went to the bathtub, and saw it filled with water and ice packs.

"max?" y/n calls.

max carefully picks up the ice pack, to see what y/n was worried about.

"it's just ice." max says as el walks over to them. "probably for his muscles or something. he worked out like a maniac."

el looks behind her, and sees blood on the cabinet.

el picks up a tiny garbage bin, and finds a lifeguard bag, with rhinestones, and a whistle.

-

the girls arrived at the hawkins community pool, wearing raincoats, since it was raining hard outside.

"excuse me." max says as she comes up to the lifeguards working at the front desk.

"no one in the water until 30 minutes after the last strike." the guy cuts max off. "and don't try and argue with me. you wanna get electrocuted, go climb a tree."

"yeah, we don't care. we're not here to swim." y/n clears up.

"or get electrocuted.." max adds as she furrows her brows.

el picks up the lifeguard bag.

"we found this." el says as she holds up the bag.

"does that belong to anybody here?" max asks.

"oh, yeah." the guy replies. "that's heather's. i'll get it back to her."

"we could give it back to her." el tells him.

"you could. except she's not here." the guy responds. "bailed on me today. what is this? you girls want a reward or something?"

"nope." y/n simply replies. "we're just.."

"good samaritans." max finishes her sentence.

the girl that was working smiles at the girls.

y/n looks over to max, who had her hair dripping in her yellow raincoat.

el turns around, and finds heathers picture hanging up.

max and y/n immediately follow behind el, curious on what she was about to do.

"heather, do you think you can find her?" y/n asks el.

el looks behind her to see the people that worked there were distracted. el rips off the picture, and walks into the shower room with max and y/n.

max and y/n turn on all the showers in the room.

el sits down, with her jacket off, and y/n places the goggles onto el, to block out her vision.

she starts to focus, with heather's picture in front of her, then she goes into the void.

she finds a mailbox, and she touches it, then a red door appears.

"what do you see?" max asks el.

"a door. a red door." el replies, as she walked around in the void.

el goes to the door, and opens it to find a bathtub.

she walks closer to the bathtub.

then suddenly, heather comes up from the bathtub and gasps.

"help.. me." heather says, then she gets pulled back into the bathtub.

el starts screaming, as heather was screaming too.

el rips off the goggles and starts hyperventilating.

"what happened?" max asks, concernedly. "el!"

-

y/n, el, and max go to the house heather was at, and stops in front of it.

"is this it?" max asks.

el nods her head, recalling what she saw in the void.

they go to the door, and el unlocks it with her powers, then y/n opens the door.

once they walk into the house, they take off their hoods, with their hair dripping.

"this is her house." max realizes.

"what?" el asks.

"heather's house." y/n adds.

the girls hear laughing from the dining room, and they walk there.

"max." billy says.

"we didn't mean to.. barge in." y/n begins. "we tried to knock, but.. maybe you didn't hear us over the storm."

"i'm sorry, who is this dripping all over my living room right now?" heather's dad asks.

billy starts to chuckle, then puts his fork down.

"i'm sorry. janet, tom, this.. is my sister maxine, and her friend y/n." billy introduces.

billy walks up to the girls.

"is something wrong?" billy asks.

"we just wanted to make sure everything was okay." max says.

"okay?" billy asks. "why wouldn't it be okay?"

"where is she?" el suddenly asks, getting straight to the point.

billy immediately turns to el.

"i'm sorry. where is who?" billy says with confusion.

"well, they're a little burnt, i'm sorry-" heather says as she walks out with a tray of cookies.

"heather!" billy says. "this is my sister, maxine, and her friend, y/n." then he turns to el. "and, i'm sorry, i did not quite catch your name."

"el."

"now, what is it you were saying, el?" billy asks. "you were looking for somebody?"

el starts stuttering, confused on what was happening. "i-i saw-"

"your manager. at the pool." max cuts el off. "he said you guys didn't come in to work today, so we got worried."

"heather wasn't feeling so hot today, so we thought we'd take the day off to nurse her back to health." billy replies. "but you're feeling just fine right now, aren't you, heather?"

"i'm feeling so much better." heather responds.

billy turns back to el with a wide smile plastered across his face.

"do you girls want a cookie?" heather asks with a smile. "they're fresh out of the oven."

-

after el finished brushing her teeth, she went back onto the bed, next to y/n and max.

"which one?" max asks y/n with a smile as she holds two comics.

"i don't know." y/n replies as she puts the covers over her.

max turns over to el, who had a sad look on her face.

"hey, there's nothing to worry about anymore, okay?" max assures el.

"it doesn't make sense." el sighs.

"what doesn't make sense?" max asks.

"heather.." el replies. "the blood. the ice."

"heather had a fever, so she took a cold bath, but she's better now." max tells el. "that has to be it. i don't know where that blood came from, but, we saw her. okay? we all did. she's totally fine."

"what about billy?" el worriedly asks.

"what about him?" max asks in confusion.

"he seemed wrong." el replies.

max chuckles. "wrong is kind of like his default. but it's nice to know he's not a murderer, because that would've totally sucked."

y/n points to a comic max was holding.

"who is that?" y/n asks el, pointing on wonder woman.

"seriously, y/n?" max asks y/n with a smile. "you don't know who wonder woman is?"

"see, this is why you can't just hang out with the guys all the time." max tells y/n, then max picks up the comic.

"this is wonder woman. a.k.a princess diana. she's from paradise island, which is, like, this hidden island where there are only women amazon warriors." max read the comic to y/n.

y/n rested her head on max's shoulder as max read the comic to her.

max felt herself getting fluttery on the inside, and her cheeks getting warm. she didn't know why. y/n has done this a bunch of times to her, but max always felt the same way each time.

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