Chapter Text
It was raining. Again. It seemed to always be raining at the moment, and you held your umbrella above your head in dismay. A car drove past, speeding through a puddle and splashing you. A squeal left your lips, and you cursed loudly at whoever the driver was - not that you particularly cared, anyway. It’d been raining all day, you were pretty sure. Cheerleading practice had been cancelled for the third time in a row due to a danger of floods and the fear of students not being able to get home, but once again, you didn’t particularly care for it. It just meant you got more time to relax.
Was there a test coming up? Maybe.
This was your second year in a row failing high-school, but nobody seemed to really notice or remember. The strain of trying to impress your parents was long gone; they hadn’t cared about your education since you were… five? Six, maybe? And that was, quite honestly, a blessing. None of your friends pressured you to study, either. They either got drunk, fucked, smoked or partied, and their studies were the least of their worries. Therefore, you found it difficult to find any motivation to study. Why did you need to, anyway? Regardless of the outcome, you were bound to start working at your Uncle’s company when you turned 21. Plus, high-school was… kinda fun.
You had a relatively large group of friends, with your best friend being someone you knew since you were in elementary. You partied every weekend. You were one of the cheerleading champions of the school, and unbelievably musically talented. Not once, but twice had you been in the top 5 in the school talent shows, and everyone in classes seemed to really look up to you. It seemed like everything was utterly perfect, and despite everyone expecting you to have a boyfriend, you were absolutely content being single.
A small sigh left your lips as a chill ran down your spine. It was meant to be Spring, the season of new awakenings and sun, but not too warm to the point people boiled and burned. Even worse, you were wearing a skirt with thigh-highs, and your legs were shivering. Hair flat against your head and eyeliner running down your cheeks, you scowled as you finally began to cross the road. Boots sloshing in the ever-growing puddles, you began to walk quicker down the street, holding back your hair with one hand and holding the umbrella in front of you like a shield with the other. The wind was absolutely atrocious, and was painfully whipping your cheeks and nose, and it was getting to the point where your cheaply-made umbrella was going inside-out. Fuck.
Even your headphones weren’t blocking out the sound of the storm, and you whined quietly, unsure of whether you should hide in a cafe and wait out the rain, or just get home as fast as possible. Cursing under your breath for not owning a car yet, you began to leg it down the street.
“Holy shit, is that you, Y/n?”
You spun around on your heels, hearing the ever-so-faint shout of your name. Sure enough, hanging out of the window was none-other than your best friend, Penelope Brown. She was laughing at the horrendous state you were in, gesturing for you to get into the back seat of her boyfriend’s car. You thanked your lucky stars that you’d been saved, before running to the door, almost ripping it open.
“Fuck, calm down, Y/l/n. You’ll rip the thing off its hinges if you’re not careful,” her boyfriend, Adam, complained, pinching the bridge of his nose. You stuck your tongue out at him, wringing out your skirt before sitting down on the already-damaged leather seats. You weren’t really fond of Adam, but the fact that he had a car was pretty useful. And who cared what you thought? It was Penelope’s boyfriend, and she was so stubborn that she wouldn’t listen to anything you said if she didn’t want to.
The car stunk of weed. As per usual. You groaned, knowing damn well that the only time this car stunk of weed was when the two of them had sex in the back seat, and you prayed you hadn’t sat in a jizz stain. That was unlikely though.
“Ain’t you lucky we caught you, eh?” Penelope chuckled, tucking her hair behind her ear as she leaned over the seat, sending you a wink as she then adjusted her off-shoulder striped top. “You look… well, not to be horrible but you have seen better days.”
“Thanks,” you sighed, rolling your eyes as you stared out of the window. Adam was playing some random song his band had made, much to your dismay. He seemed to always be bragging about the fact that he was a guitarist in a ‘huge band that was gonna be massive some day’, and he seemed to revel in showing you every single demo and track they made. It wasn’t even your style, and he knew this, so why he bragged to you every single time was beyond you. “Fucking weather, has it been like this all day?”
“Something like that, yeah,” Penelope replied, letting out a loud grumble as she stretched. “Me ‘n Adam have been in the car most of the day, haven’t we, sweets?”
The man nodded, turning a sharp left and then flipping off a cyclist who he’d almost hit. “Stupid bastard, he could’ve killed himself. Ugh… anyway what’s up, Sugartits?”
You tried hard not to gag at the nickname he gave his girlfriend, knowing that they were a tad bit younger than you. Despite this, you did not remember ever being called something as horrendous as ‘Sugartits’ by your previous boyfriend.
Zoning out of the conversation (Penelope had begun to tell him off for ignoring her), you began to stare out of the window, pulling into a trailer-park that Penelope lived in. Since her place was on the way to yours, it made a lot more sense for Adam to drop her off first. The rain was only getting heavier, and you sunk down into your seat, trying to ignore the bright flashes of lightning in the sky that frightened you so much. However, you began to notice a figure sitting in the rain, their long curly hair sticking to their shoulders and head. He looked like he was wearing a denim jacket, which was surely to get ruined in this weather. Penelope snorted, shaking her head at the figure.
“Hey, it’s the freak again,” she muttered, nudging Adam to look out of the window at him. “Fucking… whats-his-name.”
Oh yeah. Freak…
Since you’d gotten older, you’d begun to realise the relentless bullying that went on in schools and amongst students. Different people were found to be strange or weird, and it just created a world of hate amongst everyone. ‘Weirdos’ hated the ‘Popular Kids’, and the ‘Popular Kids’ hated the ‘Weirdos’. You were in that comfortable balance where you qualified for both, but hung out more with the latter since… well, Penelope did. You squinted your eyes, trying to figure out who it was, but were ultimately unable to due to how heavy this rain was.
“Gross…” Penelope grumbled, clinging to the door handle as she pouted. “I don’t feel safe going out there now, what if he hurts me, Adam? Baby, whatever would you do without me?”
You rolled your eyes, looking away since you knew they were just gonna kiss again. On many occasions, you’d been unfortunate enough to end up in a situation where you were just sitting awkwardly listening to music while those two made-out less than five feet away from you, sometimes even going a little further. It was a surprise they hadn’t had full-blown sex in front of you.
“Penny, I doubt he cares enough to even move from that spot,” you chuckled awkwardly, trying to get her to leave so you could go home and they could spare you the embarrassment of watching two teens eat each other's face off. “Plus, I’m pretty sure he’s gay.”
Penelope wrinkled her nose at this, and stuck her tongue out. “Makes him even more freakish. What if he touches Adam? I can’t have my baby go through that trauma!”
After another five-ten minutes of trying to get the damn woman to get out of the car and go home, you eventually decided to just walk her to her house. Adam refused to get out in case someone stole his car (or his stash of weed, since that was definitely a lot more valuable than his shitty-ass car), so you stepped out into the wild, wild storm to help your attention-whore of a friend to get home.
She speed-walked to her front door, constantly looking left in fear of whoever was sitting on the floor. You’d been friends with Penelope since you first moved to the town of Hawkins, both being neighbours before she moved out with her dad, but since she started high-school, she’d developed an awful superiority complex and seemed to think the world revolved around her. Despite all this, she was awfully talented at what she did, which was beauty, cheerleading, and being the leader of one of the school’s pop bands, and she’d even pierced your ears for you when you were younger. It really was a shame she’d become who she’d become, but she was still an amazing friend of yours (mostly).
“God, I hate this place,” she sighed, standing in the doorway. “That weirdo goes to our school, ya know. People around here think he’s gonna kill someone, cuz he listens to weird shit like… Iron Maiden? Is that the band? And Black Sabbath. And he plays Dungeons and Dragons, so if someone dies around here, we know who did it.”
“Penny,” you chuckled, shaking your head and glancing back towards the guy, who was beginning to stand up. “You’re way too suspicious of people. I’m sure… I’m sure he’s great.”
She wrinkled her nose at you, shaking her head. “Born a freak, always a freak. You’re sounding a lot like one right now. But I know you’re not, Y/n. Just… be careful, okay? I love you to bits and I don’t want you falling down the wrong path, yeah?”
Sure. As if she and her boyfriend don’t spend their entire day smoking and fucking.
“Yeah, I know. I’ll be fine.”