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There are a few simple facts of life.
The sky is blue.
The sun is hot.
Susan Hargrove is a coward.
Neil Hargrove is a bastard.
Maxine Mayfield is a little bitch.
And William “Billy” Hargrove fucking hates Hawkins, Indiana.
Hawkins is nothing like San Diego. Hell, Indiana is nothing like California. Like home.
There’s another fact, another truth, and one that Billy doesn’t like thinking much about, at that. And that is that Billy doesn’t hate Max. He knows she hates him, has hated him since he made sure she would, because he’s better off for it. If she hates him, if she thinks he’s just an asshole for no real reason, if she doesn’t know what his dad does to him, then she won’t try to step in. She won’t get in the middle of it, and Billy won’t have to throw himself in front of her to protect her from Neil’s fists.
Because Max would. Max would try to do something because she’s young and stupid and naive and doesn’t think about consequences. She protects her own.
She proved that much when she swung a spiked nail bat in between his legs and drugged him and left him to make his own way home when he woke up without her.
Max cares about her people. And Billy isn’t one of them.
He wishes he could hate her. Sometimes, he thinks he does, when he thinks about the fact that he’s stuck, in fucking Hawkins, Indiana, a town so far inland the ocean may as well not exist. Billy may as well have been dropped in the middle of fucking Pangaea. And it’s her fault. Because she tried to run away, because her dad wouldn’t stop calling, because… because-
Because people fucking wanted little Maxine Mayfield.
No one wants Billy. His mum left him alone, his dad hates his guts, and fuck, Billy doesn’t blame them. He doesn’t like himself, either, most days.
He knows at least part of the reason they ended up in Hawkins, specifically, was because of him. Because it’s a small, shitty town. And maybe his dad just wants to punish him, just wants to make the last year and a half until eighteen a complete living hell, or maybe he thinks it’ll be easier to control Billy here. There’s nowhere to run away, no friends, no beach, no nightclubs he can sneak into, no nothing. There’s not even a mall.
But if Neil thought moving here would calm Billy down, would make him easier to deal with, would curb his anger, well, he was only partly right.
Because Billy thinks he’s more angry now than he’s ever been. There’s been a wild beast living in his torso since he was a kid, and there are no outlets for it here. Billy can’t control it. Billy can’t control himself. It’s just a matter of time before something ends up smashed to pieces.
“What’s wrong with you?” his dad asks, nodding at Billy from across the dinner table.
Billy avoids his gaze, and doesn’t answer. Only shrugs in reply.
“Answer me when I ask you a question,” Neil says, and they’ve got the attention of both Max and Susan now. Max is frowning, eyes shifting back and forth between them, and Susan’s got fine tremors going through her hand, the grip on her fork unsteady.
“Nothing’s wrong,” Billy mumbles, even though that isn’t true. He’s barely said a word to anyone at home all week, hasn’t said anything to Max at all. At school he sits sullenly in class, and he plays like a fucking locomotive during practice, pushing and shoving at everyone except Harrington. Because Harrington is Max’ friend, which is fucked up in and off itself, and Harrington is involved in whatever it is that got Billy’s stepsister out in a nuthouse in the woods in the middle of the night with sedatives and bats full of nails. He’s threatened Tommy twice, but the little shit still follows him around like a lost puppy. Billy’s cried himself to sleep for ten days straight.
Neil scoffs. “You’ve barely touched your dinner. And there’s been surprisingly little back talk this week.” Hasn’t been any reason for Neil to go off on him, he means.
Billy can’t help it, it just slips out. “Shouldn’t that make you happy?”
Susan looses her grip on the fork, and it clatters to the table, clinking against the porcelain of her plate, then down to the floor. Both she and Max jump, and Susan goes scrambling to pick it up. Neil is momentarily distracted, chewing slowly and looking pensive as he watches her stand up and go wash the fork.
“Well, Billy,” he says once she’s sat back down, turning once again to look at him. “What’s wrong?”
Billy can feel Max’ gaze heavy on him. He wonders if she’s scared he’s going to tell his dad what he saw that night, if she’s worried he’s going to pop a hole in the lie she’d fed them. He could. Perhaps he even should, because that shit was weird. But Billy knows it would just come back to bite him in the ass. Neil would spin the whole thing into Billy having failed to protect her and keep her out of trouble.
“Well?”
“Why did we have to move here?” The words seem to burst out of him, leaving in a rush. “Couldn’t we- Couldn’t we at least have gone somewhere with a beach? You- You made me sell my surfboard.”
“No need for it here, son. Or are you planning on taking a nosedive off the quarry?”
I fucking might . “I’m not going to stay here forever. I’ll go back.”
Neil only smiles, as though he finds that funny, as though the thought of Billy finding his way back to California is so unthinkable he finds it laughable. Why? It’s not that long ‘til eighteen, and then it’s just a few months till graduation. He’ll only stay here long enough to get enough money together to leave.
“Put your plate in the fridge, and go to your room. I don’t want to see your face the rest of the evening.”
Billy’s teeth clench. He hadn’t been hungry anyway, hasn’t been hungry since they first crossed state lines, but he also hasn’t eaten anything all day because part of his punishment for letting Max sneak out was no lunch money, and Billy hasn’t been willing to use his meagre savings when he can just wait until dinner for food.
But he does as he’s told, and gets up, and puts his plate away, and leaves, stepping into his own room and lying down on his bed.
He wants to scream. He wants to rage, hit something, destroy something, but he values his stuff too highly, and he doesn’t want the noise to draw his dad to him. His eyes burn, and he digs his nails into his palms, moves his arms so he’s hugging himself and presses his nails into his skin. Closes his eyes and tries to hold himself together, waits for the feeling to pass.
It feels like hours go by before he feels put together enough to move. One of his fingers comes away damp, and he opens his eyes to stare at his arm, at the little half moons indented into his skin. One of them is so deep he’s drawn blood.
He wipes his thumb over it, smears the blood around. Presses just below the tiny little wound, watches almost fascinated as more blood emerges. It’s just a few little drops, way less than when Neil really gets into it. They look almost black in the darkness of his room.
It doesn’t hurt. It always hurts when his dad makes him bleed. But this, this just feels… he’s not sure, but he realises his chest has stopped heaving.
There comes a sharp knocking at his door, and Billy jumps, head shooting up to stare at it in apprehension. He feels like he’s been pulled out of a daze.
“Billy?” comes his dad’s voice, muted through the wood. “Lights out in ten, son.” Like he’s a fucking prison warden.
Billy sighs, drags a hand, the one without blood on it, through his hair. He pulls himself off the bed and out into the hallway, slipping into the bathroom and locking the door.
It stings when he sticks his arm underneath the tap, water rushing up his arm and spilling over the porcelain edge down to the floor. He washes the blood away, and scrunches a bit of toilet paper together to press against the wound for a few seconds. Once he’s sure it’s stopped bleeding he throws it into the bowl, takes a piss, and brushes his teeth before heading back to his room.
He gets down to his boxers and climbs into bed, staring up at the ceiling and willing sleep to pull him under. In San Diego, they lived close enough to the beach that if he concentrated, and the house was really quiet, he could sometimes hear the lapping of the waves. It used to lull him to sleep.
The door to his bedroom opens, but the hallway outside is dark, so Billy can’t make out who it is at first. Then the shadow moves, and Billy knows it’s his dad.
Neil steps into his room, goes by Billy’s bed and drops something in his lap on his way to the window. Billy hears it rattle as Neil pulls at the handle, seemingly making sure it’s closed. He reaches out to see what’s been dropped in his lap, and finds a couple dollar bills.
“What-?”
“Lunch money,” Neil answers. Billy looks over at him, sees the pale moonlight illuminating his dad’s profile. Neil pulls the blinds closed and steps away. “And don’t get any funny ideas. You know I can always make sure this window won’t open.”
“Yes, sir,” Billy mutters, moving the money to his nightstand and lying back down. He shivers, and pulls his duvet up to his chin. “‘Night.”
Neil doesn’t answer. He just closes the door behind himself and leaves, heavy footfalls down the hallway to the master bedroom. Billy decides to pretend he just didn’t hear.
—
It starts snowing in the middle of fucking November. Billy hasn’t bought a coat, and he refuses to, because buying a coat would mean admitting that he’s here to stay, would just be another aspect of him that’s changing, that makes it seem like he fits in here.
Back in San Diego, one of Neil’s favourite punishments used to be to throw Billy out of the house until the next morning. When he was too tired to deal with Billy in any other way, or too little time had passed since Billy really got his ass handed to him last, so Neil decided that the best thing to do was just to make sure he wouldn’t have to look at him.
Billy doesn’t think he’d survive it, here. If Neil decided to throw him out. He definitely wouldn’t without his car, but even with it he’s not sure he’d make it. He’s had to get up extra early, just to scrape the frost off his windows or shovel around his wheels in the morning.
Still, there’s one thing he does need, no matter how much he hates it. So he gathers his courage together, and although he knows he can’t wait too long, he still tries to ask his dad when he’s in a good mood.
The opportunity presents itself one afternoon when Neil’s in relatively high spirits, his team having just won a game. Billy leans against the doorway to the living room and waits for his dad’s attention to turn on him.
Neil raises his eyebrows.
“I need money,” Billy says, proud of how steady his voice is.
Neil’s eyebrows only climb higher. His moustache seems to flutter. “For?”
“Winter tires.”
Neil huffs. “Well, you do drive like a maniac.”
Billy swallows.
“And with Maxine in the passenger seat.”
Billy thinks of the state he’d found the Camaro in, that Monday after he was forced to walk home. He’d barely kept himself from screaming at Max once he saw her little craft project, pushed to the side of the pedals so whoever it was that drove his Camaro back to Cherry could actually drive. Because their legs were actually long enough to reach them.
He wonders what Neil would say, if he knew his precious little Maxine drugged his son and drove the Camaro who knows where. He wonders why he’s still protecting her.
“You’ll drive down to the mechanic tomorrow after school?” Neil asks.
“Yeah. Yes. Yes, sir.”
Neil nods. “My wallet’s in my coat. Go get it.”
—
Billy’s just finished shaving, is rinsing his razor off underneath the tap when the light from the sun, shining in through the frosted glass of the bathroom window, catches on it and momentarily blinds him.
He moves it, sees how it glints in the mirror. Billy lifts it, and looks away from the mirror to stare directly at the razor. Then past it, at his arm. His skin’s going pale, just a muted gold now, and Billy hates it, hates that this shitty place is changing his very appearance. Soon he’s going to look like he fits in here. It won’t be obvious how out of place he really is.
He thinks about lowering the razor. Pictures it pressed into his hated skin, pictures red bubbling up, little drops that would glide down the curve of his arm.
Right there where his nails had dug into his skin. He’s got a tiny, silver little half moon left. One of the more innocent scars Billy’s got.
It hadn’t hurt. Hadn’t hurt until he’d stuck his arm underneath the spray. Hell, if anything, he remembers the way he’d calmed down, the sense of peace he’d gotten, just staring at it.
He could. He could lower the razor.
He could.
He won’t.
—
Billy passes by his dad on his way towards the front door, and he’s not expecting it when Neil reaches out and drags his hand through Billy’s hair. It makes him jump, flinch back.
“Wha-?”
“It’s getting pretty long, Billy. You ought to get it cut, lest anyone starts to think you’re a fag. You already look enough like Anne, no need to really look like a girl.”
“What?”
Neil’s hand fists in his hair, and Billy winches. He swallows as he’s forced to meet Neil’s steely gaze. “You’re not in California anymore, son. Can’t go around like you did there.”
“Billy!” Max shouts from the next room over. “I’m going to be late!”
Neil’s hand moves from Billy’s hair to the centre of his back, and he’s pushed forward. “Go. Drive your sister.”
Billy stumbles forward, and hurries out of the room. Neil’s right, his hair is getting longer, but he’s not really interested in cutting it at all, not now. Not when the curls covering his ears keep them from freezing, what with Billy’s refusal to buy a hat.
He doesn’t know if Neil would go through with what was basically a threat. Cut your hair, or else.
Or else what? Or else the homophobic remarks will just increase? Or else he’s going to force Billy into a chair and cut it for him?
Billy doesn’t know if Neil would be satisfied if he cut it into his usual mullet length. Would he want more? Billy doesn’t think he could cut it shorter. He’s always had long hair, and yes, part of it has been because he’s wanted to look like his mum, has always wanted to be like his mum - God, how she would hate him if she could see him now, but it’s got to be at least partly her fault, for leaving him, hasn’t it? - but part of it is because he just likes it. It’s familiar, and it fits him, and he looks good, and he doesn’t think he’d bare having to change that, too.
—
Mrs. Wheeler reaches out and strokes her hand up his side. She’s bolder now, more daring then she was the first few times he talked to her. Billy suppresses a shudder and smiles, bites the inside of his cheek until he tastes blood and swallows the nausea down.
Because he needs this, he needs her to like him, he needs her to want him. He doesn’t have any friends here, not real ones that he’d trust with anything important, and he doesn’t trust her either, of course not.
But if she looks at him and thinks about what it would feel like if he’d fuck her, then that means that if Billy ever needs a place to stay, she’ll let him in. And she won’t call the cops, won’t call CPS, won’t try to talk to his teachers, because then she’d have to explain why he came to her when her oldest daughter and son hate him, why she’s blushing when speaking of him, why she sounds breathless even now.
He’d dropped Max off, and she’d immediately run down the basement stairs to her little group of shitstains. Mrs. Wheeler had invited him in, and they stand in her kitchen now, and Billy wishes he could leave.
She’s not the first older woman - the first mum - he’s flirted with. Still, in California, Billy generally went for the college girls, the boys in their 20’s, the ones he could have fun with and who might look at him with some sympathy, but there’d been understanding there too, because they knew what he was going through. What he needed. Because they’d been there once.
In Hawkins, those people don’t exist. In Hawkins, the 20-somethings either leave, take off running to the big cities, or if they stay, then they’re too big losers to be of any use to Billy anyway.
So.
Mrs. Wheeler.
Billy’s learned how to pick up cues, he’s good at it, and he knows neither one of them really thinks there are any real feelings here. They’re both using each other. Billy can’t quite figure out which one of them is the worst person though.
What would people say if they knew? Would they call him a homewrecker? Going after a married woman with children? A manipulator, preying on her feelings, her needs? Would they congratulate him for scoring it with an older woman? If he was a girl, he’s sure they’d call him a slut.
And what about her? Would her friends admire her? Be jealous, because she got it with someone so young? Would they be disgusted? Call her a rapist? Fuck, maybe, if she were a man. If he was a girl. But she’s not, and he isn’t, and they haven’t fucked, not yet, and besides, Billy started this. Billy’s the one who looked at her, and saw a mark, and started flirting. He’s the one who got himself stuck in this situation, leaning against a kitchen counter and flirting with a woman twice his age, her wedding band gleaming on her finger.
Fuck, he misses his mum.
He doesn’t like to admit it, but he’s always hoped she’ll come back for him. But even if she did, if she came looking, she wouldn’t be able to find him. Billy doubts Neil told her they’d moved.
Billy doubts he’s ever going to see her again.
—
Billy’s just stepped through the front door when his dad’s voice comes drifting from the living room.
“Billy? That you, son?”
Who else? He must’ve heard the Camaro. She’s not exactly a quiet car.
“Yeah, dad?”
“Go help Susan with dinner.”
“Right,” Billy sighs, quiet enough Neil won’t hear. He bends down and pulls his booths off, and that’s another thing. Can’t walk around with your shoes on inside, now that they’ve got snow on them, or it’ll melt and drip down. Billy hadn’t thought about that when he stepped back inside the first day it snowed. But his dad had seen the puddles he left behind, and Billy had earned himself a slap, and a shove down to the floor to clean it up.
He steps into the kitchen. There’s a pot already on the stove, and Susan rummaging around in the fridge.
“What’re we making?” He can hear how tired he sounds, but Susan doesn’t react to it. She just shoots him a quick smile over her shoulder.
“Soup for tomorrow,” she says. “And mashed potatoes and beef for tonight. You can go ahead and slice the carrots.”
She’s already got them out on a cutting board on the counter, so Billy grabs a kitchen knife and gets to slicing.
The radio’s on; music low so it won’t disturb his dad, Billy knows. He lets it distract him from his thoughts, lets himself just stand there and get lost in the repetitive motions.
Behind him, Susan closes the fridge door. He hears her mutter to herself as she opens and closes a cabinet.
“Where did I put…?” she says, and steps out of the kitchen, leaving him alone.
He finishes the last carrot, and doesn’t really know what to do now.
His gaze turns to the knife in his hand, and he’s reminded of that feeling he got whilst shaving.
He’s not really thinking when he lowers the knife until the tip rests against his vein, at his pulse point.
He wonders what his dad would think. If Susan came in, just a few minutes from now, and found him on the floor with blood pooling from his wrist. If her scream would draw his dad to her, if he’d try to get Billy’s mum to his funeral. If they’d bury him here, in shitty little Hawkins, or if they’d make sure he got back home. Back to California. If Max would cry.
Billy’s not one to kid himself, though. He knows he’d probably survive, just one cut with both Susan and Neil home wouldn’t be enough. They’d press one of Susan’s crisp, clean white kitchen towels against the cut and he’d pass out, and then he’d wake up in the hospital and Neil would scream at him for being so damn stupid.
Still, he wonders what Heaven would be like. In a perfect world, it would be a beach, a beach with a boardwalk and all of Billy’s favourite places, and a road that could go on forever for him to drive down, windows down so his hair could whip in the wind. And his mum would be there. Not his real one, because she’s still alive, Neil would’ve told him if she wasn’t, but the one from his memories. The one who used to protect him, who’d sing him lullabies and dance with him in the kitchen in the mornings, who would kiss the scrapes and bruises he got from playing outside better. She’d be there.
Unless… Unless Neil’s right, and the people in church are right, and Billy’s destined for Hell. Like all the other poor fuckers like him.
Fuck.
Fuck, he-
He doesn’t want to go to Hell. God, he doesn’t want to go to Hell.
His hand’s been trembling the whole time, but he hadn’t noticed, not until the shaking gets so bad the knife slips through his fingers. He pulls his arm away, terrified it’ll hit him, and jumps back, feeling a bit like he’s been slapped. There are tears in his eyes, and he feels both hot and cold, shaking all over.
The noise of it has Susan rushing back, and she stops in the doorway. Billy can feel her staring at him, but he doesn’t look at her, eyes fixed on the knife on the floor. He hears her step closer.
“Billy? You alright?” she asks, and reaches out to lay her hand on his arm.
Billy draws back, flinching. His breathing’s ragged. “Don’t fucking touch me.”
He turns his back to her, dragging a hand over his face, smoothing his hair down. He breathes out in a shudder.
“I can finish dinner alone. You go wait in your car. It’s almost time to pick up Max,” Susan says from behind him, her voice gentle.
Billy hates that he feels grateful.
—
The thing is, it’s not there all the time. That feeling of suffocating, of pain, deep in his chest. Not the first few days, when he was still familiarising himself with the place, when he was still seeing things for the first time. Then, after that, it became constant. Those first few weeks, it was just this constant fucking ache. Like whatever’s left of Billy’s heart was being trampled on. Everything is different here, the people, the shops, the school, the roads, the smells, the weather, the fucking trees and flowers.
But the human body and mind are nothing if not persistent, and he becomes used to it. He becomes used to everything being different, he becomes numb. But every ones in a while, something will happen that will jar him back to reality.
It’s so stupid, is the thing.
What makes him feel like crawling out of his own skin ends up being pizza, and the question: “Are you coming to church for Christmas?”
He’s at Tommy’s place. Billy’s a grade below him, but he’s still so good at maths that Tommy’s paying him to help him. Billy refuses to do everything for him, partly because he actually feels bad for Tommy not knowing anything, and partly because he needs the excuse to leave his house. As a bonus, Tommy always pays for food.
“Why not?” Tommy asks.
Billy opens his pizza carton, and stares at the pizza in distaste. It looks different than the pizza Billy’s used to. He reaches into the box, takes a slice and stuffs it into his mouth.
It tastes different, too. The spices aren’t the same, there’s too little cheese, too much tomato. He bites the inside of his cheek to will the moisture away from his eyes. “Not your fucking business,” he tells Tommy through a mouthful.
“It’s just,” Tommy starts, leaning back in his chair and reaching for his own pizza slice. He gestures with it at Billy’s pendant. “Carol told me that was a Saint. So like, you’ve got to be religious, right?”
“Tommy,” Billy sighs. “Do you want me to fucking leave?” He’s not about to get into it with Tommy, not about this. It’s too important, and too complicated.
Tommy lifts his hands up in surrender. He’s probably shitting himself from fear that Billy will stop helping him, will leave his rich little ass to fail. “I was just asking, man.”
“Yeah, well, don’t.” Billy flips the page of his notebook, his fingers leaving grease stains on the thin paper.
“It’s just…”
Billy closes his eyes and groans. “What?”
“It’s just weird, man,” Tommy says, shrugging. “Most people here go to church around Christmas.”
Billy doesn’t fit in here. He isn’t like these people, and he’s glad he isn’t, but fuck, it makes it hard to make real friends, form real connections.
“Yeah, well, I’m not most people.”
—
“What are you even going to be doing?” Billy asks. It’s a Saturday, just past noon and he’s driving Max to Harrington’s, which has apparently become one of her friends’ little designated hangout spots. He’d heard her asking Susan for her swimsuit last night.
It’s been snowing all night. What the fuck is she going to be doing with a swimsuit?
“It’s not your business,” Max answers. Which, true, but still…
“What the fuck are you going to be needing your swimsuit for? Look out the window, shitbird.”
Max doesn’t say anything, and Billy feels a little uncomfortable.
“Is Harrington going to be there?”
“It’s his house. Of course he is.”
Billy nods, his jaw working. “You’d tell me, right? If… If something happened. If he was hurting you?”
“What?”
“If… If someone made you do something you didn’t want to, or someone did something, something like, you know…?”
Max seems to realise what he’s getting at, because she lets out a disgusted sound. “Oh my god, what the fuck is wrong with you?” she screeches. “Jesus, Billy. He’s babysitting. Will’s mum is worried about him after last year, so she wants someone to supervise. And we’re at Steve’s place, because the guys know I’m missing San Diego, and Steve’s got a heated pool.”
“So what, they’re throwing you a little party to make you feel at home?”
“Yeah,” Max says. “Exactly.” He shoots her a glance and sees her slump in her seat, crossing her arms over her chest.
It takes him a moment to realise that churning feeling deep in his gut is jealousy.
They don’t speak the rest of the way to Loch Nora, and as soon as Max is out of the car, he presses the pedal down and speeds away.
Susan and Neil are out shopping, so Billy’s alone when he gets home.
He grabs a tape at random and turns his music on loud, fists clenching at his sides. He runs his hands through his hair, pulls at the curls at the nape of his neck.
He wishes Hawkins had a gym. So he could go there, find a punching bag, and just hit it until he stops feeling like he’s going to jump out of his skin. Either that or breakdown crying.
Billy hates crying. He’s heard about pretty criers. Billy isn’t one. It’s fucking shit, too, because Billy is a crier. He does his best to keep from crying, screws his whole face up and shuts his eyes tight, but it’s always a couple hot tears that manage to escape. They make his cheeks blotchy and they stick his eyelashes together and it burns and he hates it. He’ll either start sobbing or he’ll get volatile and break something.
They haven’t even been here that long, and Max has already got herself friends. Real friends. Friends who’ll throw her a pool party and who hang out with her and make her feel at home and what does Billy have?
Fuck all, that’s what.
The pressure behind his eyes gets too strong to keep at bay, and he pulls his curtains shut. Doesn’t want to risk anyone seeing him like this as he throws himself down on his bed.
It’s not often Billy lets himself feel like this. Lets himself feel the strength of all his emotions. He likes keeping them shut away, likes feeling only one thing at a time, because no one ever did teach him how to handle all of them together, did they?
There’s a bottle of cheap alcohol he’d snagged from a party a few weeks back stuffed in the back of his closet, and Billy longs for it. But the amount he’d need to drink to feel remotely like himself in his current state is too much. His dad would be able to tell he’s been drinking. Day drinking, like a fucking alcoholic. And he still has to pick up Max in a couple hours.
He turns on his side and reaches out for his alarm clock, making sure it’ll ring before he has to go get Max. He’s got a tendency to fall asleep after one of these episodes. Doesn’t generally remember much when he wakes up, either.
He fumbles when putting the clock back, and his hand hits something. It falls off his nightstand and goes skidding across the floor.
It’s his pocketknife.
His breath catches in his throat, and for a moment, he actually considers it. He’s alone in the house. Neil and Susan won’t be back for hours. Harrington will drive Max home if Billy doesn’t show up.
He could do it. Just grab it and press it to his skin and then… Then everything would be quiet.
He just wants the rushing in his ears to stop. The racing of his fucking thoughts. The heat, the fire, in his veins, the rage and oppressive sadness that never seems to leave his chest. He wouldn’t even have to kill himself, not really. He could just cut shallowly. Just let all the shit bleed out for a moment.
It’s not like Billy doesn’t have experience stopping bleeding. He’s stitched himself together once or twice before. And he could do it somewhere where it wouldn’t be so obvious. He’s vain enough he doesn’t want big scars where lots of people can see.
He thinks it’d be easier if he’d just do it. If he wasn’t so scared, wasn’t such a coward. He remembers when he was a kid, and something had made him scared, had made him run. He can’t remember what it was, but what he does remember is his dad shouting at him that he was running away, ‘like he always does’.
Maybe Billy does. Maybe he’s always been running, running himself ragged, running straight to an early death. Maybe Neil had seen it before Billy had, maybe that was why he’d almost laughed at the notion of Billy ever getting back home.
But Billy doesn’t want to die. He’s a coward, and he’s scared, and he’s tired, but he… he doesn’t want to die.
He’s heard shit, in school, about cutting. Girls with scars down the insides off their wrists. But it was always girls, and they were always made to sound completely off their rocker. Billy’s not a girl, and Billy doesn’t think he’s crazy. He just… he’s got too many feelings, and there are no outlets here, short of making everyone hate him at school, short of hurting Max when he’s spent years trying to protect her despite her knowledge, short of making his dad hit him.
And he… he doesn’t like pain. That’s the thing, isn’t it? He could never do it to himself. Could never outright hurt himself like that. Because he’s scared, and he doesn’t like pain, he doesn’t, he-
He feels vomit rush up his throat, and he clamps his mouth shut as he runs to the bathroom and falls to his knees by the toilet.
His sweating like he’s run a marathon, and his legs are shaky as he stands up, using the sink to heave himself to standing. He flushes the toilet, scoops up a little water in the palm of his hand and rinses his mouth.
He feels dizzy as he stumbles back to his room. Thinks he’s going to pass out when his foot knocks into the pocketknife. He kicks it away, and it lands somewhere beneath his closet. His music’s still blasting, and he hits the eject button on his way to falling back into bed.
The sudden silence only makes his breathing louder in his ears. He pulls his blankets and duvet up to cover his head, and curls around his pillow so he’s hugging it. Can’t stop crying at the thought of what he’d almost done. Just because he’s sad and angry and lonely and so, so homesick.
He burrows deeper into the blankets, draws them tight around him until he can close his eyes and almost pretend they’re someone’s arms. Pretend he’s being hugged, by his mum, by anyone who loves him. Pretend he isn’t so alone.
—
Max is smiling, laughing, when Billy goes to pick her up, and Billy feels another surge of anger start up within him. He’d fallen asleep, his alarm clock waking him up, and he still feels exhausted. Shaky and jittery and out of sorts.
Max waves to her friends as she climbs into the Camaro.
Billy hits the gas as soon as her door is closed. Max jumps, shoots him a glare as she hurries to pull her seatbelt on while Billy speeds down the roads, only slowing down a little to keep from skidding at the ice as he turns a corner. Thinks it’s lucky Neil gave him money for new tires.
“What’s wrong with you?” Max asks, and for once doesn’t sound accusatory. She just sounds concerned.
Billy wonders if she can see it on his face. Exhaustion. Eyelashes clogged together from the amount of crying he’d done earlier.
He erupts.
“You don’t even like swimming!”
“ What? ” Max says, sounding incredulous.
“Whenever we went to the beach, you wouldn’t swim, you’d just stay up on the boardwalk and skate, you’d just beg me to take you to the skate park, or the Arcade, or to get ice cream, or you’d sit in the fucking sand and read a comic! You wouldn’t swim!” He knows he sounds ridiculous, knows he’s acting fucking unhinged, but it makes him mad, thinking of her having fun in Steve Harrington’s heated fucking pool while Billy had a breakdown at the thought of killing himself. “Why the fuck would you want to have a pool party?!”
He’s surprised when he glances at her to see her sitting straight in her seat, just looking at him. She usually falls back during his outbursts, tries to stray away. He’s even more surprised when she speaks, and what comes out, in a quiet tone, is, “You’re not okay, Billy.”
“Really?” Billy says. His eyes shift between her and the road, and his fists clench on the wheel. He swallows. “What made you come to that bright conclusion?”
“You’re crying,” Max answers, and he doesn’t think he’s ever heard her sound so gentle.
He lifts a trembling hand up to touch his cheek, and she’s right. It comes away wet.
Fuck .
“Don’t drive back to Cherry,” Max says. “Drive into town. Please.”
He doesn’t know why he listen to her. Maybe it’s because she’s seen him cry. Or maybe it’s because the thought of going back to the house, back to his room with its rumpled sheets and the pocketknife beneath his closet, makes him feel like throwing up again.
“Turn left here,” Max says, and they end up in front of a diner. She directs him to park, and then leaves, heading inside. But she doesn’t make any move to indicate she wants Billy to come along, so he stays put. Keeps his head down in case anyone he knows is here. Doesn’t want them to see him crying.
Max emerges a few minutes later, and she’s got milkshakes with her, one in each hand. “Do you know the way to the quarry? Not the top.”
Billy nods, doesn’t trust his voice not to shake. He pulls out of the car park and drives down to the quarry, not the top where his classmates sneak off to fuck in the back of their cars, but down at the bottom of it, close to the water. He’s never actually been down here, but he’s seen the signs for the road.
It’s… peaceful. Feels a bit like home, staring at the gently lapping water. Billy wonders if it’ll freeze by Christmas or New Years.
Max hands him one of the milkshakes.
“It’s not strawberry,” she says. “I know it’s your favourite, and you know it’s mine, too, but I went there with the guys a while back, and it doesn’t taste like it did back home. So… blueberry. And chocolate for me.”
Billy’s surprised at her reasoning. But he’s glad for it, because if he’s not trying Hawkins’ strawberry milkshakes, then he won’t be able to compare them to the ones he’s used to. This way he can just appreciate it for what it is.
“Thanks,” he whispers. He doesn’t miss the surprised look Max shoots him.
“You’re missing California,” she states.
Billy sighs, looking down at his lap. He raises the milkshake, sips at it through the straw. It’s good. “Yeah. Yeah, I- I don’t fit in here, Max. I can’t-“
“I know,” she says, then a little quieter. “I know. I… I miss you. The way you used to be.”
Billy closes his eyes, growls in the back of his throat. “Max…” If this is just a ploy of hers to get to shit on him when he’s already down…
“Shut up,” she says quickly. “Listen, we’re stuck here. We can’t do anything about that, so at least… At least let’s call a truce. I don’t want to be enemies with you, Billy. We could… We could set aside a couple hours every week, and do something fun together.”
“What, just you and me?”
“Yeah. Why not?”
He sighs, exasperated. “What would we even do?”
“I don’t know. We could watch movies, if nothing else.” She grins a little teasingly. “We wouldn’t even have to talk to each other then.”
That makes him laugh. It’s unexpected to them both, and Max smiles at him when she hears it. He can’t remember last time she smiled at him. “Can’t fight if we’re not talking.”
“Exactly,” she says, nodding. “So what do you say?”
He shrugs, still staring out at the water, sipping his milkshake. “Sure, shitbird. Let’s try.”