11. Night Terror

☾.˚˖⁺✦ Night Terror ✦˙⊹˚☽

TW // Horror, Sexual Content, Trauma/Bullying

Song Guide: Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now by Starship

The sounds of laughter and music was what awoke Victoria. Opening her eyes, she found herself standing above water. Looking downwards she saw her friend, Chrissy.

The blonde girl was struggling to get out the water. In a panic, she had reached her hand down to her. It had felt almost as if Chrissy was now miles away from her reach.

She yelled, "Chrissy, grab onto my hand!"

Echoes of bones cracking sounded from a distance. Goosebumps arose on her arms and neck. A shaky breath escaped her lips, fearing to turn around.

Victoria slowly turned her head only to be met by the taunting laughters of a group of boys she had known too well of whom they were. There was no signs of any living person, just the dark forest that followed. Turning her head back around, scared to lose Chrissy, yet again.

She was gone.

Her heart banged against her chest, having a feeling she knew what was coming next, but not knowing what it was. Nothing came, except the hands of someone pushing her.

Turning around as she reached her hand out to grab hold of something to keep her from falling, but only finding Steve being the one to who pushed her.

Betrayal.

Victoria's screams echoed into the abyss as she fell into the icy cold water. Feeling as if her limbs no longer functioned, she struggled in keeping her head above water.

She cried out, "Steve! Help me! I can't swim."

He did nothing, but watched as she drowned. Her cries were now the only thing echoing around her.

The voices of the group of boys filled her ears as her lungs began to burn.

"Steve, why did you push her?"

"Dude, not cool!"

"Bro, does she even know how to swim?"

She felt hands began to pull her under as her eyes fell upon Chrissy's deceased body. More hands emerged. Grasping her hair, neck, legs, arms, waist as they pulled her down deeper into the dark water.

The final thing she heard was the ticking of the grandfather clock.

☾.˚˖⁺✦˙⊹˚☽

Steve's Pov

Her screams were the reason of his cruel awakening. Steve was frightened by the murderous wails escaping Victoria's mouth. He felt her tremble within his arms as she frantically waved her arms around her, still screaming.

"Hey, hey, hey! I'm right here. I'm right here."

He closed his arms around her trying to keep her still and from causing either of them harm. "Victoria, I'm right here. No one's going to hurt you, I swear on my fucking life."

She whimpered into herself as he pressed his head against hers trying to hold back his own tears. The way she was hurting was causing him to feel her pain as well.

"It's okay. It's okay.", he continuously repeated into her hair as he held her.

She mumbled underneath her shaken breath, "Let go of me."

"What?"

"Let go of me!", she began to scream.

"No, Victoria. Just... What's wrong?"

She forcefully pushed out of his arms in tears as she got out the car completely in her under garments.

Steve was unsure to follow her or to give her a few moments to herself, but he impulsively acted and followed her out.

"Victoria?"

Her arms were wrapped around herself in a form to warm herself up. They had both been only wearing nothing but their underwear.

"Why did you push me in the lake that night?"

Steve was caught aback by her words. The harshness and fear all twisted into one.

He shook his head at her, not sure by what she had meant. "I-I don't know what you're talking about?"

She turned to look at him now with harsh eyes. "The day I fucking drowned in Lover's Lake my freshmen year, you don't remember?"

He furrowed his brows as the memories began to rush back into his mind. Except he hadn't been the one who pushed her in, they had been the old friends he had at Hawkins. The ones even Nancy highly disliked, but that was the old him as well.

The past, he hated to spend time thinking about. He wasn't proud of the person he was, and the way he had hurt others unintentionally. Steve was better, and he had matured from then.

But what he had been confused of now was how she had correlated him to being the one to push her when it was far from that.

He tried to reach her, but she pulled away hurting him even more. "I swear on my goddamn life, I wasn't the one who pushed you in. No one knew you couldn't swim..."

She turned away from him not being able to meet his eyes. He sighed as he took a few steps closer to her. "Victoria, look at me.. Please."

He gently tugged on her arm as she caved into his touch. She turned, but looked anywhere to keep her from looking into his eyes.

Placing his hand softly against her cheek, caressing her skin as he pulled her in closer to him where she was forced to look at him now. He felt gutted by the fact that she had been traumatized believing he was the cause of.

He gently laid his forehead up against hers as they both stood in silence for a few seconds. They both closed their eyes, breathing in heavily.

"I saved you that night.", he whispered to her.

They both opened their eyes looking into one another. Her expression softening. "What?"

He sighed now pulling away from her, "They we're my stupid old friends, trying to put the blame on me as a joke.. but I swear to you I didn't do it. I did dive in to pull you out."

"You did?"

He nodded his head. Reaching for her hand now pulling her back to him. He placed his thumb over her lips as he teased attempting to lighten the mood, "Hasn't been my first time touching those lips."

Steve watched as her cheeks grew bright red with her eyes widening bigger. Instead of finding it cute, as he had hoped, she bursted out laughing.

He pursed his lips together unsure to why the brunette girl was now laughing, but soon enough he found himself laughing along with her. There was no way he could hold back a smile when seeing hers. If anything, he was glad he brought her to smile instead of crying more tears.

She laughed, "God, you are quite a romantic, Steve Harrington."

His stomach filled with butterflies by the way his name slipped out of her lips.

Steve Harrington.

He pulled her in to kiss her deeply. Every inch of his body was now hers as he hoped the same from her. He wanted her in ways words could no longer describe. Steve would do everything in his power to save her from Vecna's curse the same way he had done that night on the lake.

He pulled back to look at her, taking in every detail of her face underneath the dim moonlight. The small freckles on her face scattered all around. The way her eyes were still glossy from crying earlier. Her nose a slight shade of pink.

Steve planted a kiss on her forehead then onto her nose then to her lips. And more onto her lips. And even more onto her lips.

Until kisses became the tugging of her hair and her nails began to roughly scratch against his bare back for more. Roughly pushing her up against the car whilst they both gasped for air not wanting a spare second apart from each other.

He unhooked her bra letting it fall to the grass, now kissing onto her collarbone then across her chest. Locking his eyes with hers as his tongue softly caressed over her nipples followed by the entirety of his mouth consuming one of her breasts, not daring to look away from her lips that were now parted as her breath began to shakily escape her. "Fuck."

☾.˚˖⁺✦˙⊹˚☽

Victoria's Pov

The sun rose over Hawkins awakening Victoria, the no longer virgin girl she had once been prior to Steve Harrington. The brunette girl groaned as she felt the warmness of his arms still wrapped around her. She shut her eyes briefly as every little detail of last night came replaying back into her mind.

Steve's dark lustful eyes as his hair was now messy and sweaty, drooping over his face. He had nodded for her to get on top as he gently held onto her hand leading her over him.

The brunette boy's hands pressing her down onto his dick as another shaky moan escaped her lips. His hands moving her hips in the perfect motion that pleasured the both of them as he whispered to her, "Just like that."

She followed through with her hips the way he had told her to. His fingers pushing through her hair as his mouth repeatedly teased her lips.

She pushed herself to stop thinking about the details of last night as her body had began to get hot and bothered once again. Taking a few deep breaths trying to act contained, her eyes glanced over to the time that had been displayed on her watch that had been resting on the floor.

She squinted her eyes to get a better read as the time had been 15 minutes till 6 in the morning.

She muttered underneath her breath, "Shit."

Pushing out of Steve's arm she reached over to the front of the car grabbing ahold of Steve's hoodie. It was one thing sneaking out at night when everyone was asleep, but having to come back when all of their friends were now awake was going to be a chaotic morning full of questions, mainly from Dustin.

Her brother had already suspected something between the two of them with all the questions he had been asking her recently. If he were to know they slept together, she was unsure to the way her brother would react.

Aggressively shaking Steve till he woke up, he looked up at her with sleepy eyes as a soft smile rose to his lips. She couldn't help, but find herself smiling back at him.

She ruffled his hair. "Get up, sleepy head. We have to go back before anyone notices we're missing."

"Anyone?", he seemed to have been still half asleep.

"Steve, we snuck out last night or did you forget."

His eyes grew big as he sat up looking around his car. "Oh, shit."

He ran out the car in his briefs, trying to quickly throw his clothes back on. They got back to the front seats as he began to drive back to the Wheeler's household.

They both stayed quiet on the car ride, neither having a clue what exactly to say to each other.

Victoria twiddled her thumbs in her lap nervously, keeping her eyes on the scenery from outside her window.

She heard Steve's highly strung taps against the steering wheel. "Soooo."

Slowly turning her head to look at Steve with her cheeks now flushing in color, "So?"

She carefully watched as his jaw tighten and release. "We gonna talk about last night?"

Outside of the good time they both had, which was pretty unforgettable, there was still one thing that was taunting her.

She had heard the clock ticks that all of Vecna's victims heard. Although, she hadn't seen the clock itself. This was nowhere near a good sign. Victoria had to force herself to ignore the rising sounds into her ear not wanting her first time to be tainted by such a horrible thing. In fact, she had almost forgotten it had occurred until this very moment.

On the brighter side, she may now have a favorite song with a very strong memory attached to it. A part of her wanted to replay the song in that instance and endure into it more. She wanted to relive the moment she had with Steve, every second of it.

The brunette boy had reached his hand over to her side grabbing hold of one of hers. Her body stiffened. This was new. She never really had a serious relationship with anyone, only a few flings at Hawkins High. This, however, was something she had not experienced with any other boy.

She never deemed anyone worth her time, but with Steve. Whatever they had was something she couldn't quite stop thinking about, she liked the sensation it was making her feel all over. He made her laugh and made her stomach twist in a way it hadn't before and everything just felt so right with the boy.

She interlaced her fingers with his as he spoke to her again. "You gonna tell me what's going on in that head of yours, Hend- uh- Vic— Wait, what should I call you?"

Victoria had been caught aback from the question. She had been accustomed to all the different names everyone had for her. Eddie typically called her Queen Victoria. Dustin varied from calling her Vic to Twinkle Toes. Her whole cheer squad referred to her as VeeVee.

She wasn't sure what Steve should call her. Her mind revisited the time when she was very young and her father still had lived at home. Dustin had barely been able to pronounce anyone's name, let alone hers.

In his first attempt of saying her name, it had been a jumble of murmurs. Her father had shortened it to Vickie. She hated it, but her brother had still not been able to pronounce it properly. Instead, he had said Vixie.

Once, Dustin learned how to say her name correctly, he had stopped calling her that. Her father had been the one to call her that instead, but after he had divorced her mother things went downhill between him and her mom and Dustin and Victoria.

It had felt like the family had a fallout, except realistically her father was the one who fell out. He had abandoned them. He had abandoned her.

Victoria had a lot of unresolved feelings towards her dad, but besides that, Vixie had been a treasured memory of hers. That's when she felt most connected to her family, to Dustin. She felt bonded to the person who would call her that, and somehow she felt bonded to Steve now.

She tightened her grip onto his hand feeling a new excitement, "Vixie, call me, Vixie."

He cocked a brow up at her wanting to ask where the name had suddenly come from, but he just smiled and spoke out loud. "Vixie, has a cool rocker chic ring to it."

Vixie.

☾.˚˖⁺✦˙⊹˚☽

Victoria and Steve approached the front door to the Wheeler's home, unsure if they should both walk in together or go in separately. "What if they ask questions?"

Steve chuckled, "You really think they're wide awake at this time?"

She wasn't too sure how to respond to that question. Her brother was one to sleep in often, but lately he had been up pretty early. Victoria hadn't known too much of the others sleep schedule, in response she shrugged her shoulders at Steve.

"You go in first.", he pushed the brunette girl towards the door.

She did so as she opened the door and walked right in. Mrs. Wheeler had already been making pancakes as her husband sat by the kitchen counter reading the morning newspaper.

Nancy's mom had noticed her walk in through the door, "Oh! Good Morning, Victoria. I hadn't realized you left..."

She smiled nervously, "Good Morning, Mrs. Wheeler. I was just getting some fresh air."

She nodded her head as she quickly turned back to continue her cooking not giving much of a worry of her whereabouts. One thing was for sure if this had been her mother's home, she would have been bombarded with questions. She was lucky enough her mom hadn't even called the cops on her and Dustin at this time, but Mrs. Wheeler was kind enough to give her a ring about their stay at her home.

Victoria's eyes fell on Max's red hair as she had been seated at the kitchen table with Nancy's little sister. Instead of heading back towards the basement, she walked over to join her.

Max had her headphones over her ears not noticing that Victoria had approached. Her music had been turned up all the way as the same Kate Bush song had been playing on replay since Max had almost gotten taken by Vecna.

She patted her shoulder as she turned to look at her. "Uh, hey."

"Hi.", she pulled to seat herself beside her friend. Victoria's eyes fell on a few drawings that had been scattered out on the table.

Max followed her gaze. "I'm drawing what I saw..."

"In the Upside Down?"

She nodded her head in response to her question. The brunette girl gathered the few sheets of paper that Max had drawn up to examine them. Before she had a chance to get a proper look at them, the front door had opened.

Both girls turned to look as Victoria could feel her heart practically racing out of her chest now. Max was going to know which somehow she seemed to be the one to know all her secrets recently.

Steve had entered the home, greeting Nancy's parents and then turning to look over to where she had been sitting with Max. He had a panicked look on his face as he nervously waved at the two of them.

"Hey, Max! and... uh... Vix.. Henderson."

Victoria loudly gulped as her eyes had the look of wanting to kill Steve for ruining their cover. He frantically made his way to the basement escaping any confrontation the two of them knew Max would have towards them about where they had been.

Max turned to look at Victoria now, who was quick to bring her attention back to the drawings, pretending as there had not been any weird tension in the room between her and Steve. Victoria pointed nervously at one of the drawings that seemed to have the grandfather clock in them. "Is that what you saw at the school?"

The red headed girl snatched the drawings away from Victoria. Max had a very inquisitive look on her face, analyzing every bit of way the brunette girl was portraying how nervous she was. She couldn't even bother to bring her eyes to meet her knowing if she did, Max would know everything.

Unfortunately for Victoria, Max already knew.

"Don't even try to deny it."

"Deny what?"

"You and Steve."

Victoria glanced back to where Steve had been and back to the younger girl. "Fine, I'm not denying whatever you think happened. Now let me see those drawings."

Max shook her head, "No, I want you to say it."

"Say what, Max?"

A devious smile formed onto the girl's face knowing how much power she held in this situation. "How far did you go with him?"

The brunette girl's eyes widened to such a question. "I'm not telling you that... Aren't you like too young to even know about any of that is anyways?"

"Any of what?"

"You know... like", she looked at Holly who was too distracted to realize what the two had been talking about, " s. e. x."

Max laughed, "So, you two did sleep together. Thank you for confirming!"

"What! No, I did not confirm anything! It's what you insinuated!"

Max was now laughing as Victoria continued to struggle to explain what had happened between her and Steve, except there was nothing to explain. She did sleep with Steve and Steve slept with her and the sex was the one of the things pounding through her mind every second since last night.

Even though she was slightly ashamed her and Steve hooked up under the circumstances, it was nice to find Max finding humor in it. It had been awhile since she had seen the girl laugh and smile in a genuine way.

"Fine, yes. Steve and I---"

"Morning guys, everything okay?", came Mrs. Wheeler's voice as the two girls turned to find Nancy and Dustin looking at them with fear in their eyes.

Max smiled at them as Victoria felt awkward now looking at Nancy, who was now on her way to sit with them.

Nancy smiled softly towards them, "Hey, you guys okay?"

Victoria froze unsure what she was supposed to tell Steve's ex. She couldn't just blurt out, Oh, I'm doing great in fact I slept with your ex last night.

Max noticed the uneasiness in Victoria's shoulder as she took the lead to respond, "Just couldn't sleep. People kept blasting music in my ears, for some reason... And by people I mean Victoria."

The brunette girl was thankful for the big save her friend gave her as she nodded her head. "Yeah, been here all night blasting the same song..."

Nancy furrowed her brows confused to why Victoria had extra emphasis on the words all night. The girl didn't question her, but instead brought her attention to the sketches on the table. "Is this what you saw last night?", Nancy was quick to change the subject.

"I mean, it's supposed to be. I thought it'd be easier to draw it out than to explain it, but... not so much."

Nancy grab ahold of one of the drawings. "Is that...?"

Victoria had looked down at the one Nancy was pulling towards them. Chills ran down her spine when she had realized that Max had drawn Chrissy and Fred trapped in what looked like a tree.

"It was like they were on display."

"Were they alive?", the brunette girl questioned with a shaky voice.

Max shook her head. She knew what the response would be, but a tiny bit of her had a glimmer of hope that one of her closest friends could miraculously be alive. Was not the case.

The red headed pointed around all the drawings. "And then there was this red fog everywhere. It was like a dream. A nightmare."

"You think Vecna's just trying to scare you?", Nancy asked next.

"With Billy? Yeah. But when I made it here... I dunno, something was different. He seemed surprised almost. Like he didn't want me there."

The sounds of her footsteps approaching, Victoria turned back to see brother walking towards her with a plate filled of freshly made pancakes. Her stomach began to growl as she didn't realize the hunger she had until now.

In an annoying form, Dustin had attempted to push his sister off her seat, but she refused to budge. They both ended up sharing the same seat as Victoria rolled her eyes at her brother. She stole a pancake from from his plate in a way to irritate him as he frowned at her.

She smiled as she took a big bite out of it, rubbing it into his face. He scoffed in an offended way until his eyes fell onto her neck. "What the hell is that?"

"Your pancake I just took a bite of?", Victoria was unaware to what he had been referring to.

He shook his head as he got uncomfortably close to his sister as he practically yelled to the whole world, "Who the fuck give you a hick-"

Mortified, she stuffed the pancake into his mouth to keep him shut. Nancy was confused, but Max wanted to see the hickey that not even Victoria knew she had.

Max pulled on her arm now getting a better look trying to stop herself from laughing. Dustin had been to preoccupied on chewing the pancake to ask any further questions.

"Anyways...", Max attempted to help cover Victoria's back.

"Anyways", Dustin crossed his arms, "Where the hell did that come from and who the fuck did it!"

"We're not doing this right now, Dustin."

"Oh, uh. Yes, we are! You tell me what foul beast did that to you right now!"

"No, what the fuck is wrong with you."

"I am your brother, and I demand to know right now!"

Max slammed her hand on the table catching the two by surprised. "Are you two done? There are more important things then a fucking hickey being on her neck!"

"What's a hickey?", Holly had questioned from across the table.

Nancy waved her sister off, "It's nothing, just a joke.."

She was now glaring at the group of three at the table.

"Sorry... Okay, fine. Anyways", Dustin began, "Maybe you infiltrated his mind."

Victoria turned to look at her brother, "And how's that?"

"Well, he invaded her mind, right? Is it that big of a leap to suggest you somehow wound up in his? Like Freddy Krueger's boiler room!"

"Ohhhh!", Victoria said out loud pinpointing the example her brother had made.

The two Henderson siblings had grown up watching horror films, some including A Nightmare on Elm Street.

Nancy's youngest sister turned to look at Dustin yet again. "Freddy Krueger?"

"He's a super burned- up dude.", Dustin began to explain

"With razors for fingers.", Victoria added.

"And he kills you in your dreams!"

"Seriously!", Nancy interjected towards the two of them even more agitated at the two.

Victoria and Dustin fell silent realizing that Holly is too young to even know who Freddy is and not in the age to tell what is real and what is not.

"Sorry, it's a movie.", Dustin apologized.

"Not real at all, Holly.", Victoria continued.

Nancy let out an annoyed sighed, but Dustin furthered his explanation.

"Just... think about it. What if you somehow unlocked a backdoor to Vecna's world? Like, maybe the answer we're looking for is somewhere in this incredibly vague drawing. God, we need Will!"

One thing Victoria had remembered about Will Byers was that he was quite an artist. He was one of the best at Hawkins.

"Yeah, no shit! But I tried them again this morning, and it's the same busy signal."

Nancy took one of the drawings into her hand as she stood out of her seat to get a better look at the bigger picture. "Is this a window?"

"Yeah."

Victoria and Dustin pushed through each other to take a look.

"Stained glass with roses."

"Yeah. See? I'm not so terrible after all."

"Yeah, well, it helps that I've seen it before.", Nancy pointed out.

She proceeded to place each sheet of paper in a specific layout as the other three watched.

Dustin rather looking at what Nancy was doing was trying to get a better look at his sister's neck which earned him a thump to the head from Max. "Ow!"

"Dustin, leave her alone!"

He groaned in response as he finally looked at the sheets of paper in front. Victoria cocked her head to the side in realization that the drawings were forming a house. "Oh, my god! You're a genius, Nancy!"

The curly haired girl smiled at her in response. She grabbed hold of a sharpie as she outlined the the pieces together to make it more prominently a home.

"It's pieces of a house.", Max realized as well.

"Not just any house. It's Victor Creel's house."