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“Need a Ride?” Billy tried his best to act casual making the offer. And you didn’t seem to pick up on his slight nervousness while you collected your clothes from his bedroom floor and pulled your shirt back over your head.
“Nah, thanks though.” You shot him a smile before shouldering your bag and tiptoeing over to the already opened window. It had become a routine by now, you sneaking out late from Billy’s bedroom window so his dad and stepmother wouldn’t see you.
He would rather swallow his tongue than admit it but he didn’t like the thought of you going back to your house alone, Hawkins was a quiet town but he’d seen enough weird shit happening to not trust the small town facade this place was putting up.
“Be careful.” The words slipped out before he could stop himself and he bit down on his lips when you stopped, one leg already over the windowsill.
“You worried, Hargrove?” You had a teasing grin on your pretty lips. Of course he was worried, he’d developed quite the attachment to you after all, which was not only unusual for him but also very unfortunate because you seemed to have no interest in this being more than a casual sex thing.
“Don’t be fucking ridiculous.” He scoffed and grabbed his pack of cigarettes. You climbed fully out the window in the time it took him to light one.
“See you at school, sexy.” You called back and took off down the street back towards your own home to get some sleep in before you had to get up the next morning.
Your little routine with Billy was the best part of most your days, even though you never would have thought resident asshole Billy Hargrove would become a highlight in your life, let alone a somewhat fix part of it.
But there he was waiting next to his Camaro after your final lesson of the day with the shit eating grin on his face that you had grown to love so much. He made no move to come to you but he mouthed ‘see you later?’ and you nodded. You knew he still had to pick up his sister so you made your way home and snuck out of your bedroom window once it was dark.
You left your bike in the shrubbery underneath his window and picked up a small stone to throw against the glass. He opened it and offered a hand to help you inside. You grinned when you noticed his lack of a shirt and the slight sheen of sweat on his skin, he’d probably just been working out.
“Nobody else home?” You spoke low, in case anybody was home. Billy had always made it clear that it was better if no one knew you were coming over, you agreed, since you spent most of your time naked in bed that was probably for the better.
Luckily his parents usually both came home late and Max couldn’t care less what he was doing in his room.
“Just us.” He pulled you in by your waist and pressed his lips to yours, kissing you as deeply as always but his hands didn’t stray from your waist.
“Hey I thought maybe you’d want-“ he looked almost shy when he began to speak but he was interrupted by the distinct sound of a car outside. You looked up at him in shock, neither of you moving, just listening. The sound of the front door opening confirmed your suspicions:
“Fuck, that’s my dad!” Billy cursed, voice kept to a whisper. His hands tightens around your waist before he let go and pushed you in the direction of the window again. “You gotta go, now!”
“We can just say we were studying or something-“ you tried to calm the situation down, after all he just had to put on a shirt to make this seem relatively normal but Billy was getting more frantic by the second.
“No! Listen, you need to leave right now!” He insisted and continued to lead you back the way you came.
“Billy?” A vaguely familiar voice called from the other side of the door. You hadn’t really had much interaction with Billy’s dad but he sounded agitated already so you finally decided to get moving.
Your feet hit the ground outside the same moment the door to Billy’s room opened and for just one second you met eyes with Neil Hargrove. You knew there was no easy way to explain this, so you threw Billy a last look filled with worry and a silent apology, then grabbed your bike and sped down the street.
You awaited the next morning anxiously, in fact you were sure you’d never been this early to school in your life. But Billy’s Camaro didn’t pull up, not even after the first lesson had long started. The pit in your stomach grew bigger and bigger the more time passed.
It wasn’t until you returned to the parking lot after school that you spotted a familiar car amongst the others and you swore your heart skipped a beat. You quickly excused yourself from your group of friends and skipped over to see if Billy was sitting behind the wheel. You needed to at least have a quick chat with him, otherwise you’d have another sleepless night.
“Billy?” You called and knocked on the glass of his car window. He had his music on and stared out the windshield a cigarette hanging from his lips. His eyes flew to you and he quickly turned down the radio a bit before he let down the window.
“Hey Y/L/N.” He still kept his gaze mostly out the front and his grin seemed a too little nervous for your liking.
“Listen, I’m sorry about yesterday. I should’ve just left, I didn’t want to get you in trouble or anything.” You had chewed on these words for the entirety of last night and the better part of today and they still didn’t sound like the apology you wanted them to be.
“It’s okay, don’t worry about it.” He waved the matter aside just like that and took another drag from the cigarette, still not fully looking at you. “I’m sorry I had to throw you out the window…” he added on and when he heard you chuckle his smile drifted more towards the genuine.
“Yeah that wasn’t how I thought the evening would go.” You agreed. “Maybe we can just meet at my place next time, I mean, if you want to…?” You felt your cheeks warm. Up until now you had tried your best to keep Billy at arms length from your everyday life, just waiting that he’d drop you and move on to another girl.
But you’d realized that it had been months now and you two were still doing whatever this was so you might as well let him get a foot in the door. See where it goes.
“So eager to bring me home, huh Y/L/N?” He was back to his teasing and turned to give you a playful wink. He realized immediately that he had made a grave mistake when your eyes focused on the right side of his face and your eyes widened.
“Holy shit Billy!” You gasped and his features hardened, any trace of intricate emotion gone in an instant. He quickly turned his face back to hide the sight of his black eye from you but you reached a hand through the window to guide him back to looking at you. “What happened?”
“It’s nothing.” He couldn’t meet your eyes.
“Yeah sure.” A scoff followed your words as you brushed your thumb over the bruise with the utmost care. Your mind racing as to who could have done this. You knew he got into fights at school often enough, but with yesterday evening in mind you feared it was worse than that. You narrowed your eyes: “Was it your dad?”
“It’s none of your business, just worry about your own shit.” He bit back and moved away from your hand to stare out the window again. “I have to pick up that little red headed goblin so let’s talk some other time.” He rolled the window back up before you had a chance to counter and you stood for another second in disbelief before you started walking home.
You weren’t hurt by Billy’s apparent dismissal of your worry, if you knew one thing by now it was that Billy was basically incapable of communicating his feelings, or even admitting that he felt anything at all.
You were however, fucking livid that his dad had the audacity to treat him like this, like it was in any way okay. The more you thought about it the deeper bigger your anger grew.
You only realized that you had been walking to Billy’s house when the Camaro sped past you just to come to a stop with screeching tires.
“What the fuck are you doing here??” Billy exited the car and stared at you incredulously across the roof. You could see Max inside holding her forehead and looking ready to blow up at her stepbrother until she saw you on the side of the road.
“I think I’m gonna beat up your Dad!” You yelled back and continued walking, this time with a strange determination in your steps.
Billy felt his blood turn to ice in his veins. His father wasn’t keen on holding back, especially not when someone gave him a reason and he didn’t even want to think what he’d do to someone your size.
“Come back here!” He screamed, not caring that people on the side walk stopped to stare, he just left his car like it was in the middle of the road and started running after you. You had come dangerously close to the driveway when he caught up and grabbed your shoulder to turn you around.
“I’m serious, Billy.” He could see that, in fact he had never seen you exhibiting what could only be described as unfiltered wrath.
“I am too. You need to stay out of this.” For once in his life he was the one to try to talk some sense into someone, the irony.
Out the corner of your eye you could see Max speeding past on her skateboard, sprinting up to the front door and disappearing inside.
“I can’t. This can’t be the first time so it probably won’t be the last and-“ you took an exasperated breath, obviously at a loss for words. You knew your were letting your temper get the better of you but you couldn’t help it. “I like you, a lot actually… so I won’t just pretend this isn’t going on.” You stared him in the eyes with steely determination.
Billy didn’t know what to say to that. He had just realized that you were the first person in a very long time to really care about him and he had no idea how to handle that.
“Are you okay?” You looked at him, fearing your sudden confession had come too out of the blue. He probably didn’t want to be pitied. You were an idiot.
“You’d honestly pick a fight with my Dad? For me?” He sounded much softer than what you were used to from him. This tone of voice had been reserved for your evenings spend together, in the afterglow of amazing sex and on the brink of falling asleep. It was the only time he had let his guard down even slightly.
“I would and I will.” You replied, followed by a mumbled “Fucking piece of shit.”
He hugged you as tight as he could. It was easier than putting what ever the fuck he was feeling right now into words. You wrapped your arms around his waist and just stood there breathing in his familiar scent and thinking that maybe everything would turn out okay.
Neil Hargrove once again brought a sudden end to a nice moment when he threw open the front door to his house and yelled Billy’s name across the street.
You let go and turned to glare at the man, who’s eyebrows furrowed even more upon seeing and probably recognizing your face.
“Is that the bitch you snuck in?!” He addressed Billy without taking his gaze off you, you didn’t back down either and you felt Billy’s arm tighten around your waist as if he was preparing to hold you in place. A rightful assessment, you were pissed.
“Yes it is!” You yelled back.
“I told you not to bring your whores into my house, if you don’t want to listen you know the consequences.” A diabolical grin appeared on his face and Billy’s jaw tightened. “Get your ass inside, right now!”
He couldn’t move. He knew what would happen once he went back into the damn house and it would be even worse than last time. And he could deal with it, he decided, if he at least could keep you out of the mess that was his family.
“I’m warning you…” Neil interrupted his thoughts, he was obviously getting impatient.
“You’re not going back in.” You said all of a sudden.
“It’s okay, Y/N.” He said through clenched teeth. “Just leave.”
“Fuck no.” You bit back and it was in that moment he realized how hopelessly in love he was with you, because he would rather die than see you hurt. He had no time to dwell on his feelings, let alone say any of that out loud, because his father had decided he’d waited long enough.
You eyes widened slightly when you saw Hargrove Senior storm towards you but you acted before your fear could really set in. You kicked him full swing in the balls, much to your own surprise as well as everybody else’s and broke into a sprint back to Billy’s car.
“Billy!” You called when you realized he wasn’t following behind you and thank god he broke from his stupor and caught up to you.
“Come back here you son of a bitch!” You heard Neil’s pained growl behind you, your attack hadn’t left him incapacitated for very long and you knew you were quite possibly running for your life right now.
Your fingers were trembling when you pulled open the passenger side door and kept your eyes on Neil until Billy was in the car too, you pushed down the button for the central locking just in time to stop the furious man from ripping the door open again.
“You leave now and you won’t have to think about coming back! You hear me?!” Neil banged a fist against the glass and you winced, he looked ready to murder the two of you on the spot and you let out a slight sigh of relief when the engine started and Billy hit the gas so hard you could smell the burned rubber.
It took a drive almost out of town until you had somewhat calmed down. Billy had an unreadable expression on his face and it was starting to scare you.
“For fuck’s sake, you’re totally nuts, you know that?!” He finally spoke sounding just a bit frantic still, you couldn’t blame him.
“I’m sorry I got you kicked out.” You said, assuming that was the point of contention. None of this had gone as planned, then again you hadn’t had much of a plan to begin with.
“… Fuck that. It’s probably for the better.” He kept his eyes on the road. “I wanted to leave Hawkins anyway.”
“You’re gonna ditch?”
“Not like I have much of an option, sugar.” The nickname made you blush but it wasn’t enough to distract you.
“You can stay at my place, no problem. We’re only months away from graduation and after we can ditch together…” you bit you lip before you could spew out more fantasies about a joint future.
He didn’t respond for a terrifying second too long and then you could see him smile, soft and honestly: “God damn, you really are whipped, huh?”
“I- no! Okay maybe.” You stumbled over your words and ultimately just closed your mouth to collect your thoughts before you could fuck this up.
“Calm down, Y/L/N. I like you too.”