Archive of Our Own

After months of recuperating, Billy was sick of being stuck. Stuck in a scarred body. Scarred with the knowledge of what he had done. What was out there. Stuck in a home with a man he despised. Stuck in a town giving him pitying looks. He hated it all. And the more he fought against all of these constraints, the more it felt they tightened, harder and harder, until he couldn’t breathe.

His plan was made out of desperation. He packed his clothes, some possessions, some gear, in a duffel bag one evening. Neil and Susan had gone out for dinner with some friends down the block and wouldn’t be back until later. He assumed Max was out with her friends. He was going tonight, or never. Leaving Hawkins. Finally.

He shut off his stereo and ejected the tape for the road. His bedroom of almost three years fell quiet. He felt a sense of unease as he examined the place one last time, but he pushed it aside almost immediately. He slung his duffel across his back and opened his bedroom door.

He dropped a hastily scribbled note to Neil and Susan on the table in the kitchen. It didn’t contain much other than goodbye. If he wrote anymore, he would probably end up swearing his father out. On paper. That would be lame. He pushed it to the middle and went to exit the kitchen when suddenly Max was there.

“What are you doing?” she asked, her eyes darting between him, his bag, and the note. She pointed. “What is that?”

“Out of the way,” he said, trying to control his temper.

“Are you going somewhere?” she asked. Her face pulled into a frown full of betrayal, which he didn’t get.

He pushed her aside brusquely. “Yeah,” he said simply. He dropped his house key on a hall table and stalked out the front door. When Max kept following him, he said, “Get back inside.”

“I don’t understand, why are you leaving? Where are you going?”

He laughed as he threw his bag in the backseat of his temp car, an unassuming sedan he would love to drive off a cliff. “Why am I leaving? Gee, can’t you think of anything?”

He moved to the driver’s side and went to open it, but she pushed herself in front of it.

“Move the fuck out of the way,” he ground out.

“Is it because of the nightmares? Because of… what happened?”

He glared down at her. But sadly, she’d grown too used to him doing that and didn’t flinch. Damn. “What do you think?”

“If you stay, I’m sure those doctors could help—”

“The government doctors? You’re fucking kidding, right?” He forced her aside again and opened the door. She caught the side before he could slam it home. He was really tempted to slam it anyway, her fingers be damned.

“What about Steve? I mean, you could talk to him, he could help you through stuff—”

“I’d rather talk to the government doctors than that dweeb.”

She brightened. “Well, good, then, we can call them up, I’m sure they can fit you in—”

“Look, Maxine,” he started, breathing heavily through his nostrils. He could kill for a cigarette right now. “I know you think you’re helping, but you’re not. You really aren’t. I can’t stay here a day longer. If I stay, then I—” He tightened his jaw and shook his head. He rattled the door under her fingers. “I have to get out of here.”

He didn’t understand why she seemed so upset about that. There were actual tears in her eyes, but she wiped them away before they fell. He shook his head again.

“I have to get out of this shitshow of a town before I start screaming. You got it, Max?”

She swallowed thickly. She nodded and looked down at the ground. She let go of the door and he was about to slam it shut when she said, “It’s just… I almost… I almost lost you.”

Fuck. The first thing he was doing when he exited this town was getting cigs from a gas station, doctors be damned.

He was going to do something he would regret, he knew it. “Look, I’ll call you when I get to where I’m going. How’s that?”

“Really?” she said. She didn’t believe him, he could tell.

“Yeah.” He turned the ignition over and grabbed the tape he wanted to stuff in the cassette player. When he looked back at her, she had her arms crossed over her chest. She looked so small and angry, like that first time he met her when their parents decided to marry. He cleared his throat and said, “Stay safe, Max.”

“You too,” she muttered. He wasn’t sure if she meant it, but he closed his door and threw the car into drive. He didn’t dare looking back at her as he sped away from that house.

As he drove, he could feel something slipping away. Like the tightness in his chest that usually smothered him. He could feel layer by layer peeling away, like a brand-new skin being exposed. The music he loved was blasting in his car and he was singing along. He felt like this was a new beginning that he never anticipated.

After all, guys like him don’t get new beginnings, right?

The drive across country was brutal. Long days in cars, even though he loved driving, started to take a toll. He stopped for a night occasionally in a low-rent motel. Other nights, he slept in his car in truck stop lots. But he was dreaming of seeing the sea again. The waves, the birds, the endless line of ocean in the distance. He could almost taste the salt and it drove him onwards.

But there were still times when he could feel it at the back of his head. Like a clawing necessity. That darkness that haunted his time in Hawkins wasn’t going away that easily. That thing had forced itself into a part of his mind and it wasn’t going to leave. It tormented him with an endless cacophony of rotten bodies, burnt hair, screaming.

Sometimes he could feel it taunting him as he was driving. He’d be on some nameless highway with the sun high in the sky, and suddenly the horizon in front of him would be painted black and red, swirling masses of hot black tar, screeches of light, coming right for him. He would have to pull off the road and beat the steering wheel until the sight would disappear. Then he’d force himself back on the road and keep driving into the deep blue horizon.

Other times, he’d be suffocating in his sleep from the nightmares. Bloodied hands, claws, stumps would be pawing at him, screaming his name over and over and over, merciless. He felt like he could never wake up from these terrors, but when he did, he’d fall off the bed, tangled in blankets, in haste to vomit in the toilet. Sometimes he’d see bloodied tar in his vomit, but it would just be a trick of the light. Those times, he’d have a hard time getting back to sleep. He’d just pack his stuff and leave the motel and go back on the road.

When he finally got through into California, he drove blindly. All he wanted was to see the ocean. And when he finally got glimpses of it, he drove as far as he could get before tumbling out of the car out onto the beach. He greedily took in breaths of fresh salty air, the tang sharp at the back of his mouth, but welcome. As he went further down the beach toward the water, he pulled of his boots and socks. The sand rubbed between his toes, clinging more and more as he got closer and closer.

He collapsed as he got to the water’s edge. The waves receding and increased around him. White bubbles formed against his jeans as he knelt on the sand. Seagulls cried in the sky. The sun warmed his face, a counter to the cold ice of the water. But he didn’t care. He was free.

The payphone line clicked over the moment the call connected. “Hargrove residence,” Susan said.

“Hi, Susan,” he said. He was fiddling with a lighter.

“Billy…” Susan breathed quietly. He wasn’t sure, but she sounded relieved. “Where are you? How are you?”

She was talking quietly, so he assumed Neil was in the house. “I’m in Cali. Just made it.”

Surprised, she asked, “You went to California?”

“Yeah.” He flicked the lighter open, then closed. Open, then closed. “I’m good. Gonna set up here.”

“I’m happy for you,” she said. She sounded like she meant it.

“Thanks,” he murmured. “I don’t have a phone number yet, but I’ll… I’ll get it to you and Max when I can.”

A pause. Then, “Not Neil.”

“No. God, no.”

“Okay,” she said, falteringly.

“Thanks. Hey, can I talk to Max?”

“Sure, just give me a moment,” she said. He could hear her calling for Max in the background. Then Neil’s voice, faint and tinny. Susan said something, and Billy hoped she wasn’t telling his dad anything. Then she came back on and said, “It’s good talking to you, okay? I hope we hear from you soon.”

“Yeah, you too,” he mumbled.

Then Max came on, her voice strong and sure and curious. “Hello?”

“Hey, Max, it’s me,” he said. He rubbed his moustache.

“Billy?” Max’s voice changed from sure to hesitant and quiet. “Where are you?”

“Geez, I feel like I am under interrogation tonight,” he muttered.

“Sorry,” she said quickly.

“No, it’s—Look, I’m in California. Don’t tell Neil, yeah? But I’ll give you my phone number when I get one—”

On the other end, he could hear Neil was saying something to Max. To Neil, she said, “No, it’s just someone looking for Billy.”

He could hear the expletives Neil was using and was sure they were about him.

When Neil was gone, Max said to Billy, “He’s gone. Sorry about that.”

“No, thank you. I don’t want him knowing where I am.”

Max chuckled. “I wouldn’t either, but unfortunately…”

“I get it. That’s why I left.”

“And other things,” Max added.

He didn’t add to that. “I just got to the ocean, so I don’t know what I am gonna do yet or where I’m gonna go. But… anyway. I’ll call you again when I get set up.”

“Sure.” A pause. “I guess, I hope you find something.”

“Yeah, we’ll see.” Another beat. “Look, don’t feel—don’t feel… This isn’t about you, okay? I just needed to get out of there.”

“I understand.” There was a crash somewhere in the background and Max said, “Look, I better go.”

“Yeah, I get it. Don’t let him get to you, okay?”

“Yeah, yeah,” she said. Then suddenly brighter and false, “Well, thanks for calling. We’ll be sure to let Billy know that you’re looking for him.”

He chuckled. “Bye, Max.”

“Bye,” she said, sickly sweet, and then the phone line clicked.

The cap of his lighter was starting to come off.

It took a few weeks, longer than he expected, but he found a place a town over in Lenora with a bunch of dudes in a shared house. He got his own bedroom on the second floor. He had to share the bathroom, but that seemed minor compared to not living with father. Two of the guys were lifeguards and one was a firefighter. He ended up getting a job lifeguarding. It wasn’t something he loved, but it paid the bills. He gave Max and Susan his number and told them to use it whenever they wanted. He didn’t figure they would call much, but at least it was something.

As it got colder, less jobs were available for lifeguarding, so he started working part-time at a garage. Again, not something he really wanted to do. His roommates, Tony, Ed, and Curry, had lots of parties with the college kids and there was plenty for Billy to do. He was getting back into his old groove, and he loved it. He regularly visited the beach and started surfing again. He had a new woman to see almost every night. It was getting to be perfect.

And then one day at the garage, a beat-up old green car came in. It had Indiana plates. “Fuck,” he muttered. There was no way it was someone from Hawkins, but he wasn’t pleased to see it. He passed the bay it was in to get back to work on an Impala when his coworker came over.

“Hey, Billy, can you do this one?” Dennis asked, his smarmy voice grinding against Billy’s nerves.

“Do it yourself, fucktard,” he spat. He slid under the Impala.

“Look man, I gotta go, I can’t do it,” Dennis continued. “Don’t be such a dick about it.” Billy didn’t say anything, although he was very tempted. “You’re the newest, you get the car. I’ll finish the Impala, you get this one.”

“Fine,” he spat, as he slid back out from under the car. He threw the wrench at Dennis’ feet. He wished he’d aimed it higher. “Go fuck your mother, see what I care.”

“I’m not—that’s not—hey, man,” Dennis stumbled.

Billy stalked out to the office to get the car’s details. He started towards the receptionist, a pretty blonde who liked buffing her nails and watching the little TV in the corner instead of doing work. “Hey, Janey, what’s up with that car that just came in?”

He glanced around the room at the few customers who were waiting for their cars to be fixed. He didn’t hear anything that Janey said as his eyes landed on a woman sitting against the back wall, a cigarette in her hand, tapping her foot agitatedly. As she looked up at him, her foot stopped tapping and he could see the recognition in her eyes.

Fuck.

He slowly walked over as she stood up. Janey said in the background, “Hey, I’m talking to you.” He waved her off.

“Mrs. Byers, I think,” he said, when they got close.

“Billy, Billy Hargrove?” she said, dumbfounded. He could tell she was assessing him just as he was assessing her.

“The green car… that yours?” he asked.

“Yeah, uh, I, uh…” she mumbled. “How are you holding up?”

He shut that down. “Anything wrong with it? The car?”

She blinked, disappointed. “Oh, uh, well—” and she described the problems she’d been having with it.

He nodded and filled in the intake form as she talked. When she finished, he asked, “Janey get your details?”

“Yeah,” Joyce said.

“Good, well, I’ll take a look at it, find out what’s wrong, give you a call and let you know what it is. Are you gonna be staying or—”

“No, I was gonna try to grab some things while I waited.”

“Okay, well, if you want to stop by in half an hour, I can give you an update,” he suggested.

She was frowning at him, but she said, “Sure, that sounds great.”

“Good, I’ll see you in half,” he said, taking the keys and turning to go back into the garage.

“Billy, wait—”

He turned, resigned.

The trip back from school was unremarkable. El was talking about something that happened in class while Jonathon nodded and hummed in appropriate places. Argyle was driving crazy like usual, and Will and El kept getting thrown into each other and holding each other steady through each hairpin turn.

Will was happy to let El take the lead. He didn’t have anything particular to say about their school day, so there was no point in offering it up. But for El, the school system was still new to her. He knew she was struggling to keep up and he and Jonathon helped her as much as they could. But there was something new to work on almost every day. He hated the government men that decided it was best for El to learn her powers rather than anything else.

He was getting used to having a sister, and he kinda liked it. While it was weird spending so much time with a girl who wasn’t his mom, he liked that he didn’t have to explain his history to her and that she was curious about the things he liked to do. She didn’t push him when he didn’t want to talk. There were many times that they’d sit in his bedroom, his music on low, comfortably in silence. She wasn’t Mike, and he was still adjusting to not seeing his friends every day, or even being able to talk to them every day, but they seemed to fit.

Today, he and El already had a game plan for their evening. They had a Civics test coming up and they were going to work on the concepts together, and then he was going to help her with her English essay. When they got home, they sat at the dining room table while Jonathon and Argyle went to his brother’s room to smoke up. Mom wasn’t at her usual worktable, on the phone, which was unusual, but he couldn’t imagine anything was wrong. After all, this was Lenora, not Hawkins.

“Angela was picking on me again today,” El said quietly, as they laid out their homework.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

El considered, then nodded. “Yeah, I’m okay. I just want her to like me.”

“I know, but don’t let her get to you,” Will said. “It’s always worse when they get to you.”

El nodded, pulling out some notes. “I’ll try,” she promised.

They were working on chapter three of their textbook when Jonathon limbered into the kitchen. He had a sleepy quality to him, and the aroma of weed followed. Will rolled his eyes.

“Hey, did Mom leave a note where she is?” Jonathon asked.

Will shook his head, looking at the fridge and the counters. “I didn’t see anything.”

Jonathon began rooting around in the fridge. “Kay, I’ll make us something for dinner. Or a snack, I’ll make us a snack.”

El wrinkled her nose. “You know you smell like that reefer thing?”

Jonathon straightened up so fast, he hit his head on the door handle of the freezer. “What? No, I don’t.”

“Yeah, you do,” El said. Will grinned and nodded at Jonathon.

“Shut up,” Jonathon grumbled. “Just—”

“Don’t tell Mom,” El finished. She didn’t like it, but ever since she found out what ‘reefer’ was and that Jonathon was doing it, she promised to not tell their mother, but that didn’t mean she liked it. She was shaking her head as Jonathon closed the fridge and found a bag of chips to munch on. He leaned against the kitchen counter for a moment before he suddenly tensed.

“Uh-oh,” he mumbled, and he ditched the bag and went back into his bedroom.

The reason for this soon became clear when the front door suddenly burst open, and Mom came in. She rushed into the kitchen with a paper bag of groceries. Her eyes lit up as she saw Will and El at the dining table, but she was already turning away to put the stuff into the fridge.

“Hey, guys! Sorry I didn’t leave a note, I thought my time at the mechanics was gonna be short.”

“That’s okay,” Will and El said.

Will asked, “Did you get that problem fixed?”

“Yeah, and it wasn’t too expensive. I was afraid it was gonna be over a hundred dollars, but the mechanic—he, uh, he got it working good for me.”

“It’s ‘well’, Mom, not ‘good’,” El said.

“Yes, he got it working ‘well’, thank you,” Mom said, smiling. She was starting to prepare dinner with what remained in the paper bag. But then she sighed and stopped, turned fully to them. “Look, I did something, in the heat of the moment, and I’m not sure if I should have now that I’m here with you guys and thinking about it.”

“Did you ask the mechanic out?” Will asked, though he really didn’t want the answer to be yes.

“What? No!” Mom seemed to be freaked out at that. “He’s too young for me, he’s just older than Jonathon I think.”

Will laughed. “Yeah, that would be kinda weird.” He shared smirks with El.

“But I did invite him over,” Mom continued. But then she didn’t say anything more.

Will and El exchanged glances. “Is that a bad thing?” El asked.

“Well…” she said, stretching out the word. She huffed and said, “It’s Billy Hargrove. I invited Billy Hargrove over for dinner.”

“Wait, what?” Jonathon said, coming back into the kitchen at the tail end.

El and Will looked at each other. The last time they had seen Billy Hargrove, he had been strapped to machines in an ambulance, fighting for his life. He had fought off the Mind Flayer and ended up nearly dying. Max had said that the doctors hadn’t been sure if he would live. But by the time things had turned around for Billy, Dr. Owens had moved the Byers and El out of state. They hadn’t gotten to see him at all as he recuperated.

Truthfully, Will wasn’t even sure if they would have seen him. Billy had been an asshole to almost everyone in his friend group before the Mind Flayer took him over. And then he became the Mind Flayer’s puppet. Sentenced many people from Hawkins to death to serve the monster. He was a monster himself.

Swallowing, Will asked El, “How do you feel about this?”

El’s eyes were wide. “I don’t know.”

“He almost killed you.”

“But he didn’t. He stopped. He fought the Mind Flayer.” Argyle came into the kitchen, drawn by Jonathon and Mom’s argument, so El lowered her voice. “And we didn’t get to see him after everything. We didn’t get to talk to him about it.”

“He’s dangerous, Mom,” Jonathon said, his voice getting louder.

“What’s going on?” Argyle asked.

“Hey, Argyle, nice to see you again—” Mom was saying.

“Are you ready to see him?” Will asked El. They were leaning closer together to talk quieter. He searched her face as she thought. She seemed resolute.

“Yeah, I think we should see him,” she said finally. “Maybe we can help him.”

“—kay, I’ll head out then,” Argyle was saying. Jonathon gave him the bag of chips he’d been eating from. “See you later, Mrs. Byers! Bye guys! Bye Jonny!”

“Drive carefully!” Mom yelled after him. When she heard the squeal of tires in the driveway, she sighed in resignation.

Now that Argyle was gone, El stood up and faced the pair in the kitchen. “I think we should see Billy.”

Mom smiled at her. Jonathon sighed. Mom looked at Will in askance. He shrugged. “It’s fine.”

Mom nodded, smiling at them both. “I will be here, so I’m sure he will be respectful.”

“Nah, respectful is not Hargrove,” Jonathon said. “I don’t think he even knows what it means.”

Mom looked at him before going back to the counter. “He was respectful to me at the garage. He was my mechanic today,” she explained to Jonathon.

Jonathon frowned. “So does that mean he’s living in Lenora?”

“Yeah, I think so,” Mom said. “Funny, isn’t it? He ended up in the same place as we did.”

“Max said they came from California, so maybe he wanted to come back,” Will offered.

“We can ask him,” Mom said, brightly.

The next hour went by fast. Will barely had time to process how he felt about Billy Hargrove coming for dinner, let alone study for the Civics test. Before 5, he and El pulled their papers from the dining table and set out plates and cutlery. When Mom was placing the food on the table, they heard a car door slam outside. Jonathon had disappeared for bit, presumably to air himself of smelling like weed, but he returned just as the doorbell rang.

“I’ll get it,” Mom said. She hurried forward as Will and El put the last of the stuff on the table, but Will couldn’t help but look up as Mom opened the door. Mom smiled. “Billy, welcome, glad you could make it.”

She waved Billy in. As he walked into the house, Will could feel some sort of pull to him, as if Billy sucked up all the energy in the room. But Will wasn’t getting any goosebumps on the back of his neck. He couldn’t feel the Mind Flayer rising. So, he brushed it away.

Billy was wearing a button-down shirt under a leather jacket with blue jeans and black boots. His hair was a bit shorter, but he still had all the piercings as before and the gold medallion around his neck. He still cared about his appearance, it seemed, but there was something different about him. Like the bags under his eyes, the pull on his mouth.

“Mrs. Byers,” Billy was saying, no hint of flirtation or antagonism in his voice, “thank you for inviting me for dinner.”

“No problem, Billy,” Mom said, smiling. “Welcome to our home. I think you might know my kids.”

As she introduced them, Billy’s eyes followed along. Will could see when he dismissed Jonathon, but he noticed that Billy paused at El before finally moving his eyes onto him. Their eyes connected, and Will couldn’t tell what Billy was thinking, but he felt like Billy was assessing him. Like he was staring deep into his soul. Will slanted his eyes down just as Mom gestured Billy to the table.

“Nice to see you all,” Billy said. He pulled off his jacket and framed it on his chair before pulling it out and sitting in it. “I don’t think we’ve actually met properly.”

“No?” Mom asked, as she sat at the head of the table. “Not even at school? Surely, you must have met Jonathon.”

Billy glanced at Jonathon before shaking his head. Jonathon said, “We didn’t really run in the same circles.” He sat down stiffly beside Billy.

Will was next to Mom, so that meant he was across from Billy. Mom began passing around the food.

“I hope you like it, Billy,” she said. “I’m not the greatest cook, but I try to do home-cooked meals more often than I used to.”

“Oh, I’m sure it will be great,” Billy said. “It will probably be better than what I am eating most often now.”

“Well, I hope you enjoy it,” Mom said. “So, when did you get into Lenora?”

“About a month ago.”

“Are you going to be staying for long?” she asked.

“Yeah, I hope so.”

After a pause, she asked, “Where are you staying?”

“Over on El Dorado,” Billy said. “I found a house with three other guys. Got my own room. It’s good.”

“That’s good,” Mom said. She looked around at the others. Will kept glancing at Billy but was trying not to engage him. Jonathon must’ve been thinking the same thing because he was resolutely staring past El, tense. So, Mom said, “What made you leave Hawkins?”

Billy took a sip of water before he said, “I could ask you the same thing.”

Jonathon glared at him, but Billy didn’t acknowledge it. Will realized Billy was looking at him and he shifted in his seat. It wasn’t an antagonizing stare, but there was something in it that made him feel uncomfortable.

Mom said, “After everything that has happened, we thought a change was needed. A fresh start.” She paused, considering. “I don’t know how much you’ve been told about what was going on…”

Billy’s eyes moved to El. “I got some of it from the… Then those doctors told me a little bit. I had to sign a paper saying I wouldn’t say anything about it. Did you guys?”

“Yeah, early on,” Mom said.

“Early on?” Billy asked.

“Before you came to Hawkins, Will went missing for awhile,” she said, haltingly. “That’s how we found out about… everything.”

Billy’s eyes shifted to Will. Will tried to hold them longer, but then he dropped them again. Billy’s eyes were like pools of unfathomable ice, a deep dark pool that could swallow him whole.

“I never got a chance,” El began, and Billy’s eyes went back to her, “to say thank you. For what you did. For helping us. Thank you.”

When Will looked up, Billy seemed uncomfortable. “You did some of it yourself,” he said.

“But you stopped it,” El persisted. “Thank you.”

“Yes, thank you,” Mom added, smiling gently.

Billy shifted in his seat and looked at his plate. He just nodded.

After dinner was finished, the siblings cleared away the table and washed the dishes. Mom was in the living room with Billy and Will could hear them talking but couldn’t hear exactly what they were saying. For once, he was really curious to hear. When the dishes were done, Jonathon gave Billy a cursory goodbye and disappeared into his bedroom. Will considered going to his bedroom too, but El had already taken a seat opposite Billy, with her feet tucked under her, so Will went into the living room too. He felt awkward sitting down next to Billy, but it was the only open seat available.

“So, you’re the special girl,” Billy was saying to El.

El glanced at Mom before she nodded. “Yeah.”

“Have you always had your powers?” Billy asked.

“Yeah, pretty much. I don’t really have them right now, though.”

“Why? Why not?” he asked.

“Something happened, during that fight. I don’t know.” El shrugged, but Will knew how much it hurt her to not have them anymore.

Billy was frowning. “Ah,” was all that he said. The phone rang, and he didn’t say anything else. Mom got up and answered it, which left an uncomfortable silence in the room.

“It’s dead, you know,” El said to Billy. “It can’t hurt you anymore.”

Billy just nodded and gave her a fake-looking smile.

“El, it’s Mike,” Mom said.

As El got up to go to the phone, her face bright and expectant, Billy grabbed her arm and stopped her. “Hey, don’t tell Mike that I’m here, yeah? I don’t want anyone knowing where I am.”

El looked down at him, confused. “What about Max?”

“Oh, she knows,” Billy said. “But I don’t want anyone else to know.”

El frowned at that. But she nodded. “Promise,” she said. He nodded and released her arm. She went to grab the phone from Mom and Mom disappeared in the house.

Billy stretched and ended up with one arm on the back of the sofa they were sharing. He looked over at Will. “You don’t talk much, do you?” he asked.

Will shrugged. “Not in general.”

Billy considered him. He took a deep breath, then let it out. “It had you before, didn’t it?”

It wasn’t so much a question as it was a statement. So, Will nodded. “For a bit, yeah. It wasn’t…”

“Yeah,” Billy said. He clapped Will on the arm. “Shared shit.” After a moment, he asked, looking down at his lap, “Do you still get nightmares?”

Will tensed but nodded. “Yeah. Not as frequently now, but yeah.”

Billy seemed to be thinking about that. “I fucking hate them. Do they happen when you’re… awake… too?”

Will nodded. “Yeah. Again, not as frequently, but still…”

“Fuck,” Billy sighed. It was a sentiment that Will agreed with. Suddenly, Billy scrubbed his eyes and looked at his watch. “I think I should go.”

“Really?” Mom said from nearby. “So soon?”

As he got up, Billy said, “Yeah, I have work in the morning at the shop.” He grabbed his jacket from the back of the chair in the dining room, and pulled it on, his shirt twisting as his body moved. For some reason, Will was mesmerized. Jacket in place, he shook Mom’s hand. “Thank you for inviting me over, Mrs. Byers.”

“Anytime,” Mom said. She handed him a piece of paper. “I know the garage has my phone number, but here, just in case you need to call. I do have a phone marketing job, so you may need to try a couple times, and then the kids call their friends in Hawkins, but you’re welcome to contact us.”

“Thanks,” Billy said. He was holding the paper like he was unsure what to do with it. He frowned and tugged on his medallion. Then he looked up at Mom and said, “Do you have a pen? And paper?”

Mom smiled, pleased. She gave him something to write with and he hastily scrawled out his own phone number and gave it her.

“Just in case,” he said.

“Thank you,” she said, smiling.

“Well, I guess I’ll see you guys around,” he announced. He turned to Will and clapped him on the shoulder. Will could feel the heat from the press of his palm through his shirt. He nodded at Billy and hoped it didn’t look dopey. Then Billy waved at El who was on the phone and then at Mom, before leaving the house. A minute later, they heard the car drive off and Will felt like he could finally breathe again.

“He wasn’t too bad,” Mom said after a moment looking out the window after Billy. “He didn’t try to flirt with me. I heard he did that will all the moms back in Hawkins. But… he seems different.”

“Yeah, he does,” Will agreed. “He was respectful.”

“Right?” Mom said, laughing. “I’m gonna rub Jonathon’s face in it.”

Will chuckled and got up to go to his room. His head was spinning from the evening, and he needed some time alone. He put on some Joy Division and laid on his bed, thinking about the man that just left.

With that phone number exchange, Billy found himself being invited more and more often to the Byers house for dinner. Or lunch on the weekends. Jonathon maintained a healthy distance from him, as was appropriate, but Billy felt comfortable amongst the younger kids and their mother. Joyce was actually quite funny. When she started to remind him of his mother, he shut that thought down fast.

El was as he expected. An awkward girl with powers too big for her. But she was nice to him whenever he came, when she had no reason to be. And Will… was interesting.

Billy found his mind would wander to Will frequently. He couldn’t understand it. The kid was an awkward, doe-eyed boy with a bowl cut and smarmy clothes, but he intrigued Billy. Will had been taken over by the monster before Billy had, and that was a year ago. The kid was so young, and he’d already survived so much. He didn’t look like a survivor, but he was.

And what did that say about Billy? Billy was older, more experienced, stronger. And yet he’d been taken over by the same monster as that doe-eyed kid, and he came out worse than Will did. A ravaged body, a haunted mind. Sometimes unable to sleep because of the things he’d see behind his eyes.

He tried to shove it down. His roommates would have keggers and big parties, and he’d be all in, drinking, partying, fucking. His favourite things to do. But lately, the people he’d been with had left a sour taste in his mouth. Some of the partiers were annoying as fuck. And one party got so out of hand that a dickhead tried to disrespect him, as if Billy was nothing compared to him.

So, he did what he did best, punch the guy in the fucking nose. Despite the blood streaming down his face, the dickhead was actually pretty good at holding his own, but Billy had him on the ground, pummeling him, when his roommates finally pulled him off. He hadn’t noticed the sirens wailing while the crowd cheered and hollered around him, but when he did, he knew he was fucking out of it.

He let Ed and Curry manhandle him away from the dickhead and allowed himself to be cuffed and carted off in front of everyone. With the cops there, the party was truly over. He got thrown in the back of a police car and was driven to the nearest cop shop. Fingerprinted, questioned. Some minor first aid. Given water. And then the cuffs came off and he got pushed into a small cell in the back of the building. He’d been arrested before for stuff like this, but he’d been a minor then.

He hit the side wall with a fist. “Fuck,” he muttered. He felt like he was stuck again, stuck in a continuous loop of anger and self-hatred. He was never going to get out of it. “Fuck.”

While not exactly comfortable, the cell proved to be soothing enough that he slept through the night without any nightmares. Although his chest and stomach protested from the rough treatment. He hoped hadn’t torn one of his wounds open. In the morning, he got released pending charges. When he left the station, he had to walk back to his house. He took the long route so that he could walk along a road beside the ocean. The crashing of waves and sting of the air soothed his nerves.

When he got to the house, Tony and Curry had already left for work. But Ed came down from upstairs as Billy moved into the kitchen for water.

“What the hell, man?” Ed said, angrily. “You got the cops called to our party.”

“Yeah, sorry, man,” Billy said. He drank down the glass.

“I have to go in front of my bosses today to explain why, as a firefighter, I let such a fight get out of control. The guy had to get nose surgery.”

Billy laughed. “Really? Holy shit.”

Ed snorted. “Yeah, right? But Jesus. He could press charges. If he does, you’re taking them all.”

Billy’s fists clenched, but he didn’t say anything.

“Anyway, I have to go to work. Since you’re off today, you get to clean the shitshow outside.” He pointed to the back of the house where the party had been held. “We left it all for you,” Ed said, matter-of-factly.

Billy nodded. “That’s fair.”

Ed clapped him on the back as he moved to the fridge. Soon, Ed was leaving the house, dressed in his firefighter uniform, and Billy was in the back of the house with a trash bag, grimacing at the shit that people leave behind after a party. He did find some money though. He was keeping it. There was vomit in one of the bushes. He wasn’t touching that.

Joyce had already invited him over for dinner for that night. He considered cancelling. The news had probably spread around town that he’d been arrested after beating someone up. He wasn’t looking forward to her reaction. Or to the kids’ reactions. But he kept putting off calling her. He could have just not shown up, but he forced himself to shower and shave and got into his car.

He wasn’t sure what he expected when he got to their house, but he didn’t expect to see Joyce waiting for him. She was twisting a cigarette between her fingers with agitation with a dark look on her face. He sighed. He could just drive off, but he put his car into park and forced himself out.

She jumped up from the steps as he came towards her, frowning. “I heard what happened,” she said, staring him in the eye, even though he was taller than she was. “Can I trust you around my kids?”

Surprised, he said, “Yes, Joyce, you can.”

“Because I don’t want my kids to be around someone who thinks that beating other people up is okay,” she continued, not believing him.

He nodded and clenched his jaw. Then he said, “I lost my temper. It was wrong.”

She nodded, looking away and pulling a drag from her cig. God, he wished he could smoke one now. “Did that guy press charges?”

“No, not yet,” Billy said.

She looked at him then. “Okay. Well, come on in. I made meatloaf tonight.” He began to follow her in, relieved she wasn’t angrier about what happened, but then she suddenly turned around and he had to stop himself from bowling her over. “Do you ever talk about what happened to you?”

Billy froze. “I thought we weren’t allowed to talk about it.”

“Well, not about the supernatural stuff, but… you can talk about the rest of it. Of what happened to you.”

Billy shook his head. He really didn’t want to talk to anyone about his life. “I don’t think I can tell anyone about the rest of it. I mean, it was made to look like a fire, right? To the mall. How does that—”

Joyce nodded. Then she brightened. “You can talk to me about it.”

He liked that even less. “Maybe,” he hedged.

Suddenly she smiled at him. “You’re like Will, then. He doesn’t like talking about it either, what he went through. Although I’ve told him again and again, he can talk to me.”

She led him inside while Billy digested that. He received an accusatory glare from Jonathon when he came out for dinner. But the kids only seemed curious, especially Will. When Will noticed Billy looking at him, he cut his eyes away. That made Billy grin. Will was forever pretending that he didn’t look at Billy. Kid had some issues.

Other than explaining to the kids that what he did was wrong, mostly because Joyce asked him to, they didn’t talk about his fight at all. Jonathon left soon after dinner with his stoner friend and Billy settled in for a comfortable evening with Joyce and the kids.

Afterwards, he went home and prepared for the night. His friends made fun of him for going to bed so early, after they reamed him about the fight, of course, but these days, any sleep he could get was a blessing compared to not sleeping at all. He’d learned it the hard way after a couple nights forcing himself to stay awake. He had nearly collapsed after seeing a colleague melt into the monster that wasn’t there. His boss made it clear that he was a liability if something like that happened while he was working in the shop. So, he adapted. And his friends knew about the nightmares now. He’d had enough of them on the premises.

What he didn’t count on was to be woken up after midnight with a knock on his door. He grumbled and looked at the time.

“Hey, Billy, you awake at all?” Ed said through the door.

“What the fuck do you want?” Billy said, stumbling out of bed and putting on a shirt. He opened the door and froze. Ed was standing there with Will Byers next to him.

“Here you go, kid,” Ed said, clapping Will on the shoulder before he walked away.

Will was still in pyjamas and was nervously tugging at the sleeve of his sweater. His hair was ruffled. He wet his lips nervously and said, “You said that we could take a drive if I ever have a nightmare again and…” He looked closer at Billy. “Sorry, did I wake you? I’m sorry, you know what, never mind. I’ll let you get back to sleep.”

Will was partway down the stairs when Billy caught up with him. “It’s okay,” Billy said. He grabbed his jacket from the hall closet as they finished the stairs and then another one for Will, which he shoved at him. Grabbing his keys, he ushered the boy out of the house.

They didn’t talk as they walked into the car and got in. They didn’t talk when Billy pulled out onto the road, or when he began driving up the coastal highway. Billy’s music was on, but he turned it down, just in case. With the ocean to the left of him and the highway rolling out in front of him, Billy was in his element.

He could feel Will glancing at him every so often. When Will finally spoke, he asked, “Do you ever feel like… your life is not your own?”

Billy looked over at him, then back to the road. “I guess.”

“Before or after being possessed by the Mind Flayer?” Will asked. He was looking steadily at Billy, so this must have been important to him.

“Both,” Billy said honestly.

Will sighed out, like he had been holding his breath.

“It was bad tonight,” Billy stated.

“Yeah,” Will said. “Most of the time, I flash back to when I was in the Upside-Down. But tonight, I…” He turned to look out the window. “When the Mind Flayer possessed me, it already had an army. It didn’t really use me the way it did you. But… there was a point where it took me over. I could see and hear what it was making me say and do, but I couldn’t stop it. At all. And I tried. I really tried. But it wouldn’t let me out. And then it forced me to watch—”

Will swallowed. He took a breath, and then another, before he said, “My mom’s boyfriend got killed because of me.”

“Yeah?”

“I didn’t see it happen, not exactly, but I was the reason it happened.” His voice was cracking, breaking. He cleared his throat after a moment. “He died because of me. And I liked him. I thought he could… I thought he could be my father.”

Jesus.

“My mom says she doesn’t blame me, but it hurt her to see him ripped apart in front of her. Hop had to pull her away.” He cleared his throat again. “How can she not blame me?”

Billy stared ahead at the road. Suddenly, it wasn’t soothing to drive. Clenching his hands on the wheel, he looked around for signs, and when he found the right one, he pulled off the highway towards a beach. Will sat up a little as they pulled into a little parking lot in front of the sandy beach. When Billy shut off the engine, he said, “Come on. Bring your jacket.”

They got out and Will pulled the jacket on over his sweater. Then Billy led him down to the sand. He stopped close to the water and pulled a big inhale. Will stopped next to him and stared out over the water.

“Have you ever been surfing?” Billy asked.

“No,” Will murmured.

“I could teach you,” Billy said.

That pleased Will. He smiled bashfully and said, “Maybe when it’s warmer.”

“Oh come on, a little cold water is not gonna hurt you,” Billy laughed.

“When it’s warmer,” Will said again, laughing too.

“Fine,” Billy said. At least Will had dropped the ‘maybe’.

Billy gestured and they started to walk along the water, the waves meandering between their feet.

After a moment, Billy said, “I didn’t really know the people that I killed.” Will looked over at him. “I knew Heather, from work obviously. But all the others… they were just people who crossed my path… at the wrong time. I don’t even know some of their names.”

“There was a news article listing their names,” Will said.

“Yeah, but… I wouldn’t know who was who. I wouldn’t be able to put the names to the faces. They are just a sea of nameless people. People who haunt me. Night and day. And I don’t know their names.”

“I don’t really know many of the names of the people who got… because of me. I know some of them because I had to visit the lab for testing every once in awhile.” He swallowed.

Billy cleared his throat. “They tell you it’s not your fault, but sometimes it doesn’t feel like that, does it?” Will nodded. “We have the nightmares, we’re still being tortured by this. It might as well be our fault.” Billy kicked at a rock in his path. It went tumbling down into the water with a splash. “Anyway…”

When they reached the end of the beach where a shield of rock met them, they stopped. Billy put a hand out and caressed the rock, feeling the cuts and crags against his palm. He turned around and dropped his hand. Will was looking at him. In the dim light of the moon, Billy couldn’t tell what Will was thinking. He frowned as Will kept staring at him.

“What?”

Suddenly Will pushed forward against Billy. He expected Will to start punching him and he made to block, but then Will’s lips were against his, rough and without finesse. Startled, he let the boy kiss him and even started to take control, so it wasn’t all teeth and tongue. But when Will’s hand came up to touch his hair, Billy pushed him away, their mouths disconnecting with a wet pop too obscene for the situation.

They stared at each other, breathing heavily. Billy felt like he had just run for miles while chain smoking. The thrill snaking down his spine shouldn’t be there. He shouldn’t like this. This was a kid. And the kid was a boy!

Billy walked away. He breathed in through his nostrils, and out through his mouth. The salt air came in through the nose, purifying as it filled his lungs, but when he breathed out, he could taste the mint and sweetness of Will in his mouth. He licked his lips and swallowed.

When he realized Will wasn’t following him, he half turned and yelled, “Come on.” He felt Will run towards him and he let Will fall into stride with him so that they were side by side, walking back up the beach to the car. But they didn’t talk after that.

Billy’s mind was in turmoil as he drove them back. He’d never had another male kiss him, even though he knew there were some who had been interested. His father always scorned the fags like they were the devil’s creation. Billy followed suit because that was expected. He spurned any men who tried to query him, and he bullied those who looked like they could be fags. He’d tried not to care.

And now this boy next to him had actually kissed him. The scent of mint was suddenly all he could smell in the car. And while this boy was fidgeting, making Billy want to crash the car to stop those hands, he couldn’t help but glance at the long fingers.

As they got closer to town, Billy asked, “How did you get to my house?”

“Uh, I, uh, I biked.” Will wouldn’t look at him.

“I’ll drive you to your house and drop your bike off in the morning,” Billy told him.

“Okay.” His voice was quiet.

When Billy pulled up in front of Will’s house, he grabbed Will’s arm. “Kid, don’t tell anyone about this.”

Will wouldn’t look at him, but he nodded. He got out of the car, took off the borrowed jacket and dropped it back in the car, then closed the door. Billy waited while Will made it to the front door and then inside before he slid away from the curb.

He didn’t see much of the road as he drove back home.

For the rest of the week, Billy made excuses to Joyce about why he couldn’t come over for dinner. He had to work. His roommates had something going on. He was too tired. The first two times, Joyce took it all in stride and let him know that he was always welcome. The next two times, he could tell she suspected something, but she wouldn’t come right out and ask him about it. He didn’t bother giving her any details.

She stopped calling after that. Billy couldn’t decide if he was relieved or not.

One night, he called Max’s house on impulse. He was in the living room with the house phone and was sitting in front of the window. When the line connected, a gruff male voice answered. Neil. Billy immediately hung up and threw the phone across the room. It broke apart into jarring pieces with a shrill ring. He stared at the pieces for a moment, clutching his medallion. Then he got up and pushed the pieces of the phone back together and taped it all up. Still a dial tone. That was good enough.

His days followed a regular pattern, sleep, work, fuck, sleep. The women he sought in bars and at parties were easy-going, ready for anything. They didn’t care that he kept a tank top on while he screwed them into the mattress. They were easy to blow off steam with.

But he felt listless not seeing the Byers. The food at bars was terrible, only there to soak up the alcohol. He wasn’t interested in the company, not even his roommates’. Every party they threw now, he stayed in the background on the porch swing, watching the revellers drink themselves stupid under the cacophony of yelling and shit music.

It was a Saturday night party, and he hated it. He watched two dumb blondes trip over themselves from drinking so much. One girl’s top had ridden down and one of her breasts was peeking out, full and enticing. She didn’t seem to notice while she was helping her friend up. Ordinarily, he would have been over there in a heartbeat, proffering his hands to both of them and leering at that tit, dark and round against the milky skin. But he looked away. And eventually he went back inside.

He picked up the destroyed phone and called Max again. It rang several times before the line clicked over and Max’s voice came on the phone.

“What are you doing home on a Saturday night, you little shit?” he asked by way of greeting.

She squeaked. “Billy?” She seemed to laugh. “I could ask you the same thing.”

“Technically, there is a party going on outside my house,” he told her. “So at least I am partying.”

“Bullshit,” she said. Her voice held curiosity and surprise and laughter. None of the hesitancy from when he first started calling. He could imagine her grinning over the phone. It was nice. “You’re not partying if you’re on the phone with me.”

He could hear male voices in the background. “Is Neil there?”

“No, it’s uh…” she stammered, “It’s Mike and Lucas. They’re trying to convince me to play Dungeons and Dragons with them.”

He sniggered. “Did you call them dorks?”

“Of course,” she laughed.

“Good, good,” he breathed. He took a sip of his shitty beer. “I should think you have better things to do.”

She laughed, but he wasn’t sure if it was sincere. “Totally right.” One of the kids said something in the background and her response was faraway, as if she had covered the mouthpiece. “Are you really at a party right now, and you’re talking to me?”

Instead of answering that, he said, “Listen, if you have a minute, I have a really weird question.”

“Oh,” she said. “Yeah, shoot.”

He opened his mouth, then closed it. He checked that the back door was still closed. Then he said, “You know how Neil is about fags and gays?” He stopped.

“Yeah?” she prompted.

“What’s your take on it?” He took another sip of beer and kept an eye on the door.

“Oh.” He could hear her breathing and hoped she would answer him. “Well, I mean, I personally don’t care is someone is gay. I mean…” He heard a door shut, and suddenly it was quieter on her side. Then the creak of her bed. “I know there are boys who like boys, and there are girls who like girls. And why shouldn’t they? Right? I mean, you can’t help who you love. It sounds really cheesy but I think it’s true.” There was a knock on her door and she yelled, “Hold on!” Then to him, “Sorry. Um, remember when you tried to stop me from seeing Lucas?”

“Yeah,” he said. He remembered. He thought the little shit wasn’t good enough for Max, even if he hadn’t been a fan of her being in his life. He knew he had reacted the way Neil would have, and that made him angry now.

“Well, I uh, didn’t stop being friends with Lucas, even though you told me to. I liked how he tried to make sure I was included in stuff, even though he had no reason to. You really made him scared for his life at one point, so why should he be nice to the new girl whose older brother is an asshole?”

He snorted. “Yeah, I get it. I was an asshole.”

She laughed too and that settled something in the pit of his stomach. Then, quieter, she said, “If I hadn’t taken that chance, I wouldn’t have known what it was like to… fall in love with him.”

Even Billy could hear the “You love me!?” through Max’s bedroom door.

He heard Max snarl before she yelled to Lucas, “Get the fuck away from the door! This is a private conversation. God!”

Billy sat down on a barstool at the counter and rubbed his face. “Max, I’m gonna—”

“Wait, wait,” she interjected. “Stop. Aside from what just happened, which I am sorry you had to witness, albeit over the phone, I do want to answer the question. I don’t think it really matters to other people who you love, as long as it matters to you. If it doesn’t matter to you, then it’s probably not worth doing, but if it does matter, and other people say it’s not right, it shouldn’t be up to them.”

He took a deep breath and exhaled. This girl was way too wise for her age. “Thanks,” he said simply.

“No problem. I hope I helped. And Neil’s a fucking idiot. And a hypocrite. Don’t listen to him.”

“Yeah, I should know that by now,” he murmured. He didn’t feel like he did. He cleared his throat and asked, “When I first told you that I set up in Lenora, did you know that the Byers family lived here too?”

“Oh.” She sounded surprised, but Max was good at lying. He wouldn’t be surprised if she had known and just didn’t tell him. “No, I didn’t know. Is that where they are?”

“Yeah,” he said. “I’ve been hanging out with them every once in awhile.”

She sputtered. “Seriously? Does that mean you’re friends with Jonathon now?”

“No, he actively hates my guts,” he told her. He chuckled. That fact still tickled him. “But I like their mom. And the kids.”

“For the umpteenth time, we’re not kids!” she yelled at him. “We’re 16!”

He snickered. “Yeah, yeah.” She sighed. The back door opened and one of those dumb blondes from earlier stumbled in with another guy, giggling and talking at an excessively high pitch. “Look, I better go. Thanks, Maxie.” He got up from the stool and started moving the phone back into the living room.

“Alright. I’ll talk to you later?”

“Yeah, talk soon. Stay safe.”

As he climbed the stairs to his room with the sounds of tipsy laughter fading as he went, he turned over what she had said. He felt the truth in it, but it still grated on him. He couldn’t coalesce the two ideas together. It wouldn’t fit his mind.

But when he laid in bed, he started seeing Will’s face behind his eyes. He could feel Will’s mouth on his as if Will was right there in the room. It took him awhile to get to sleep, but when he did, he didn’t have a nightmare. He only dreamed of Will.

It had been two weeks since that disastrous night. Will had pushed his luck and blew it. When he’d woken up from that nightmare, the first person he could think of was Billy. And even though it was the middle of the night, he had biked over to Billy’s house, just to have someone understand.

And when Billy understood, Will had lost it. He’d felt connected to Billy, like all of his being was on fire and being pulled towards him. And the kiss, rushed and frenzied, then sweet and slow.

But Billy wasn’t like him. He didn’t understand after all. And he didn’t give a shit about Will, because he never came for dinner the next day. And the next. And the next.

Every night, he’d ask Mom if Billy was coming over. When she shook her head, he felt like he’d been punched in the stomach. And when he asked each day, and she began to shake her head with more sadness, more pity, he felt like his stomach had been flayed open. Ripped raw. He stopped asking. He didn’t want more pity. He’d had enough of pity for one lifetime.

He spent every night in his room with the music up high. His art supplies were scattered all over the floor, his bed, his desk. Every canvas was dark and moody, splotched with anger and hatred. He even locked El out of his room because he hated how she was tip-toeing around him. His room was his cave and he would not violate it with other people’s pity.

A Saturday came and went, and then it was the weekend again. Another Saturday. He ate breakfast at the dining table with the others like usual, but he didn’t engage with them. Mom was going to clean the house that day, Jonathon already had plans with Argyle and their friends and was quickly putting his bowl in the kitchen so he could leave. El announced that she was going to call Mike.

“Did you want me to ask him to speak to you?” El asked Will, her eyes like pools.

Will shrugged. “No, it’s okay.”

“Are you sure?” Mom said, frowning. He could tell she and El were exchanging glances. “Hey, wasn’t there a new piece of art that you wanted to talk to him about?”

Will shook his head. “No.”

There was a pause. Then Mom said, “Okay,” and got up from the table with her bowl. El followed soon after and he could hear them murmuring in the kitchen. When he got up with his empty bowl and entered, they looked at him with large eyes but let him drop his dish off and leave.

When he got into his room, he pulled out the current tape in his tape deck and rifled through the stuff he had. He found the tape he wanted and dropped it in. Metallica started blaring on the speakers. Perfect. His most recent creation was close to dry, so he pulled it off the easel and dropped it on his windowsill. He grabbed a new canvas and posted it. But then he stared at it.

A fragment of an image was coming to mind. The way Billy’s shirt clung to his chest. The hands on the steering wheel, adorned with some rings. Gripping the steering wheel sure and true. The angle of his jaw, lightly stubbled. The full lips that could twist into a smirk. The tight blonde curls in that stupid mullet. Then the push of his hand against Will’s chest, angry.

Will was crying. He could feel the water falling down his cheeks, hitting his clothes. His stupid clothes. His shitty life. How useless he felt. How wrong he was. How twisted and ruined.

He grabbed his brush and slammed paint onto the white canvas, marring it with black and grey and charcoal and brown. Big globs of paint, hazard strokes, sobbing under the sound of metal. Then he threw his brush down, pushed the easel over and did what Will the Wise would never do.

He jumped out the window.

He stopped crying a couple blocks away. He blindly moved along the sidewalks, not really caring which direction he went. He wasn’t even wearing any shoes. He didn’t see the looks some concerned mothers were giving him. He just kept walking.

It took him a bit, but he realized someone was calling his name. Figuring it was Jonathon, he ignored it and turned right. He was walking up a steep hill and it was beating him. He stopped when he got to the top to catch his breath and suddenly there was Billy. As if Will had conjured him from his imagination. But Billy hadn’t come over for almost two weeks. Billy didn’t like him. It couldn’t be him.

But then Will realized that Billy’s car was by the curb on the hill going down in front of him, and Billy was closing his car door, coming towards him, calling his name. His brows were furrowed and there were white points in his cheeks, like he was angry.

“Come on,” Billy was saying, closing the distance between them. “I’m not kidding. Come on, get in the car.”

Will turned around quickly and used his sleeves to scrub his eyes, hoping to erase any wetness left. When he turned back, Billy was within touching distance. Which was when Billy grabbed his arm and started pulling him.

“Come on, shithead,” Billy said, “get in the car.”

“I’m not going anywhere with you,” Will ground out, trying to twist his arm out of Billy’s grasp. Billy’s fingers were hard and heavy against his skin. They would leave bruises.

“Yes, you are,” Billy countered. “Get in the goddamn car.” He pulled more firmly and Will stumbled. “Your mother is scared shitless—”

“What do you care?” Will pushed against Billy’s chest. The man was immovable stone.

“I don—just get in the car, or I swear to God—” When Will resisted again, Billy pulled him closer to him. “You’re not even wearing fucking shoes! What the fuck are you thinking?”

“I’m apparently not really good at thinking,” Will tossed back. Their faces were so close together, and it took all of Will to not push forward and kiss him again. Because he kept making bad decisions when Billy was this close. But he could smell something on Billy’s breath, like… mint?

“Really?” Billy asked, scornfully. “Then why’d they call you Will the Wise? I thought wise people were not supposed to terrify their mothers. And footwear is not optional when you’re outside. Do you see a beach anywhere, idiot?”

“Fuck you,” Will breathed.

The lines on Billy’s face got whiter. He suddenly released Will. Will stumbled backwards but caught himself in time. Billy turned away and faced his car before leaning on it with his hands. Will could see his shoulders rising and falling in quick succession and wondered if this would be a good opportunity to walk away.

But Billy turned back around. The white lines had disappeared. His fists were not clenched and when he walked toward Will, he seemed calmer.

“Do you want to go for a drive?” he asked in measured tones.

Will swallowed. He nodded. He waited until Billy had started back to his car before following and getting in. Billy’s music was turned down low, but he turned it up as Billy got them back onto the road. Scorpion was playing. Billy was definitely a hurricane. It fit.

While Billy drove, Will snuck glances at him. Billy was wearing his trademark leather jacket over a band tshirt with some ripped jeans. The rips were focused on the thighs, and he could see Billy’s muscle shift imperceptibly as he accelerated and decelerated. On the outside, Billy seemed calm now. But in such a small car, Will could feel the current of energy bubbling under the surface. He kicked himself mentally for agreeing to get into the car.

But as they followed the road to the sea, Will could feel the tension in Billy decrease incrementally. Until it wasn’t there at all. They stopped at a different parking lot next to a different shoreline, but as before, Billy got out and waited for Will to follow him. Then, side by side, they walked to the water.

“You might as well take your socks off,” Billy murmured. Will nodded and dropped them in the sand behind them. Billy himself took off his boots and socks and walked into the water, not caring that the water was soaking his jeans. He walked further and further out, until he was about mid-thigh in the water.

From behind, Will watched him silhouetted against the sun. The last time they came to a beach, it was dark and Will hadn’t seen much of anything except for dark curves and long lines in moonlight. Now, he could watch Billy in his full glory. Clothed, but still. The strong back, the narrow hips, the built legs.

When Billy turned to look at him, the sun was in his eyes and the wind lifted his hair. His smile was simple, calm. But when Billy really looked at him, a sardonic twist lifted a lip, and he started marching back towards Will.

“You don’t get off that easy,” he was saying as he grabbed Will’s hand and pulled him forward.

“What? No, come on, no, it’s too cold!” Will protested as Billy pulled him into the water. Will could feel the freezing bite soaking his pants, but soon it became nothing to the harmonious chuckle that escaped from Billy.

“Yep, you’re getting in the water, William,” Billy snickered and pulled him further.

“No, I’m not, William,” Will threw back. Will put up a half-hearted fight. He was watching the smile on Billy’s lips as they went further. Billy stopped them when the water was getting higher on their legs, but then he let go of Will’s hand. At first Will felt bereft, detached. But then sprinkles, getting larger and larger, of water were flying his way.

Will half turned, half splashed back. He hit the water as hard towards Billy as he could as Billy splashed back. He could feel laughter tumbling out of him along with half-hearted pleas to stop. And Billy was laughing too. Full and bright and eager.

Eventually, they waded back to shore. Will could feel the nip to the air as his soggy clothes left the water. Billy grabbed their socks and his boots and they kept moving further up the sand. Will hesitated. Did that mean they were going back home now? But Billy settled himself on a lunch table away from the few beach goers there were at this time of the year. He dropped their stuff in the sand at his feet and started to squeeze water from his jeans. Will copied his actions. The sun was shining down on them, and he felt blissfully at peace.

When he was as dry as he was going to get, Will looked around. There was an outcropping of rock to the north, and a few trees cloistered around the parking lot. There were mothers with toddlers in strollers, pushing them up the communal pathway. Some teens were hanging out in a pavilion. No one was paying them any mind.

“Um, about last time…” he started before he could chicken out. He could feel Billy tense, but he turned partly to look at Will. His face was pleasant, but his eyes were blank. Will almost couldn’t continue. “When I… I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to make you hate me. I just thought—” He shook his head at himself. “Never mind.”

It took awhile for Billy to speak. When he did, he sounded cautious. “I’m sorry too. I shouldn’t have stopped coming to see you guys.” Quietly, he said, “The truth is, I like seeing you. And your family.”

“Even Jonathon?” Will asked, grinning.

“Well,” he began, drawing the word out comically, “maybe not Jonathon.” He smirked at Will.

Will laughed.

“I even missed your mother’s cooking,” Billy said as he started getting up. Will spluttered in disbelief. “No, really. I was surprised too. Her meatloaf doesn’t even taste like anything.”

Will chuckled.

“And… I don’t hate you,” Billy said, as he handed him his socks to put back on.

Will looked at him as Billy put his socks and boots back on. “You don’t?” he asked nervously.

 He watched as Billy’s fingers deftly tied the laces back up, then averted his eyes as Billy straightened. “No,” Billy said quietly. “Come on. Let’s get you home.”

Together, they walked back to the car and got in. Billy turned the heat on since they were both freezing, and he navigated out of the lot and back on the road.

The ride back was quiet except for Billy’s humming with the music and tapping his fingers against the wheel. Will kept looking at him, trying to frame everything that just happened. He had a great time, but Billy hadn’t said anything about the kiss. He’d even held his hand as he had pulled him out into the water. What did that mean?

It was past lunchtime when they finally got back to the house. As he got out of the warm car, he could see a curtain flicker in the living room before the front door flew open and Mom was rushing down the driveway to him.

“Will! Will! Come here.” Mom pulled him into a hug, and then pushed him away as she felt the water in his pants. “What the—? Did you guys go to the beach or something? What were you thinking leaving like that? You scared me to death. Again. I’m going to go grey by the time you’re 18!” She pulled him back in for another hug.

“Mom, stop,” he murmured, trying to push her away.

Finally, she relented. When he could breathe again, he could see that Billy was already heading into the house, so he and Mom went as well.

“Don’t do that again. Please.” She had an arm across his shoulders and was looking full in his face as they went. He felt uncomfortable with how she searched his face and he looked away.

El was standing inside, radiating anxiety as he and Mom came in. As soon as Mom let go, El latched on. She wasn’t crying, but she was very close. When she pulled away, she said, “I forgive you.”

Will frowned. “I didn’t ask you to forgive me, El.”

“I still do,” El said, shrugging, like that was the end of it. She smiled.

They turned as Mom came back into the room. Billy was nowhere to be seen. Will felt the breath catch in his throat, but Mom said, “Why don’t you go change, honey? I gave Billy a pair of your brother’s sweats to change too.”

He nodded and went to his room, feeling flickers of hope light up his chest. He expected his last painting to be smeared all over the floor, but the easel had been put back up and the painting was propped on it. His paint brush had been put back on his desk and an attempt had been made to clean the paint from the carpet. The music had been shut off and the window had been closed. He closed the door and changed.

Back out in the living room, Billy was sitting on the couch with a plate of food in his hand. His mom and sister were in separate seats. They looked up when he came in and Mom got him a plate of food. He took the space next to Billy, like the first visit. Billy grinned at him as he wiggled his fork before loading some food on it. Will just snorted.

Billy didn’t leave until after dinner. Will basked in the time the four of them spent together. Even though El and Mom were there, he felt comfortable in his own skin. They played games and watched TV as usual. Mom gave Billy his jeans back, a bit drier. The happiest Will felt was when Mom told Billy he could come back any time.

The night was quiet after Billy left. Mom tried to ask him about why he’d run away, but he shrugged it off. He didn’t want to talk about it. She pursed her lips before giving him a bottle of turpentine and some cleaning supplies and telling him to clean that stain out of his carpet. And when he went into his room, he left the door open. El came in, knelt on the floor beside him, and helped him.

Thanksgiving was coming up. His roommates had plans to spend with their families. They each extended half-hearted invitations to Billy to join them, but Billy couldn’t imagine spending a whole day with people he didn’t know. Besides, Joyce had told him that he was absolutely coming over for the day, no ifs ands or buts. A part of him didn’t really want to, but he didn’t want to spend the day alone either.

A few days before, he was summoned to the police station. The asshole from the party had decided not to press charges. Billy was surprised, but he was gonna take it. Despite that, the cops were giving him a written warning. He felt like the bad kid at school again. It took all his power not to just crumple that piece of paper up and throw it straight in the bin.

The day before Thanksgiving, he called Max. He wanted to hear her voice after the shitshow he’d had that week. She picked up on the third ring, her voice neutral. “Hargrove residence.”

“Hey, Maxie,” Billy said.

None of the usual spunk was in her voice. “Hi.” He could hear her moving the phone into her bedroom before she closed the door. “How’s it going?”

He stared out the window. “Nothing much. You?”

A beat. “Neil’s being a fucktard these days. Same old shit.”

He sighed. “He hurting you?”

“No,” she said quietly. “But…” He could hear her breathing deeply. She was afraid. He wanted to smash the window.

“It won’t always be like this, Maxie,” he said, trying to soothe her.

“Yes, it will,” she said. He could hear tears in her voice. “He will always be like this. I wish my mother had never met him. All he does is make her miserable, and then she screams at me for nothing. I hate it.”

He took a deep breath. His fingers were clutching the medallion around his neck.

“You should have taken me with you,” she said haltingly. “Why didn’t you take me with you?”

“Max, it’s not that simple,” he told her. “I can’t just take you from your family. I could get in real shit for that.”

“My family?” she said harshly. “They’re not my family. They stopped being my family the minute they married.”

“I get why you feel like that, but—”

“But what?!” she yelled. “You left them too! You don’t want them in your life either. You didn’t even want me in your life.”

“Max, it’s not like that,” he began.

But she cut him off. “You know what? I don’t care. I gotta go.”

He clutched the phone receiver so hard he swore it cracked. “Wait, Max—”

But then a door slammed open on her end. He could hear Neil’s rough voice and words. Max said, “No. No!” before he heard a slap of flesh. The phone was definitely cracking in his hands and then he could hear Neil’s voice before it sounded like the phone was wrenched from Max.

“Where are you, you little shit?” Neil cursed over the line.

The bottom fell out of Billy’s stomach. Shards of plastic were tight against his cheek and chin. “What did you do to her?” he asked hollowly. But he already knew.

“You useless piece of shit! You think you can skip out on me, runaway like the little pussy you always were, did ya? You think a little note to us was good enough?!”

“No, but I—”

“Where you hiding, you faggot? Tell me. You owe me that much.”

“I-I don’t think I owe you that,” Billy said quietly.

“Tell me, you fucker! Huh? Where are you?”

“I’m not gonna tell you that, sir,” Billy said.

Neil laughed and it grated on Billy’s skin. “Well, maybe I’ll just ask my wife. I bet she knows. It seems these two bitches have been pretending they weren’t talking to you for so long, but I figured it out. Not so smart, were you? To keep calling her. I’ll just lean on my wife and she’ll tell me everything she knows—”

“Don’t you fucking dare—”

“—she’ll sing like a canary. And this little dumb slut of kid, Max, she’s not as smart as she thinks she is. She and that black kid, parading around with their fucking disgrace of a relationship. I’m gonna find you, kid, and I’m gonna beat the shit out of you. You mark my words.”

“Don’t do anything to them!” Billy yelled, but then the line went dead. He pulled the broken receiver from his head and looked at it. “FUCK!” The phone slammed against the wall, the tape pulling the pieces apart and spraying everywhere.

He could feel his blood boiling. The world around him seemed hazy, elusive, nonexistent. All he could imagine was blood, limbs torn, re-forming, black tar. Max’s flaming hair, drowned in black ink, her face pushed down and down until he could no longer see the pale of her skin under the blood.

A hand clapped on his shoulder. There’d been voices, moments ago, hadn’t there? But still, he reacted, flipping the hand back and around the body behind him so that the angle pained his attacker.

“Billy! Billy! Fuck, man, stop!” Tony was shouting, grabbing at Billy’s arms.

He started coming back to himself. He had Ed’s arm twisted behind his back. Ed was kneeling on the floor, gritting his teeth in pain, whining a little bit. A part of him delighted in those small little whimpers. Tony was in front of him, yelling, grasping at Billy’s hands.

“You fucking bastard! What the fuck are you doing?” Tony was yelling. Curry was in the back, holding pieces of the phone. His body was narrowed, avoiding danger.

Tony punched Billy. His head went sideways, and he lost his grip. He lost his balance. Ed’s body followed his as they hit the ground. Billy could see the stark brightness of the living room light, feel the heaviness of Ed on his legs. Then Ed was moving off and Billy began to sit up, tenderly touching his jaw.

He looked at the scene in front of him. Ed whimpering as he pulled his arm the right way around. There was shininess in his eyes. His joints cracked as he moved. Then there was Tony, who was cradling his hand to his chest. His face was mutinous. Curry hadn’t moved from his spot by the wall but seemed dumbfounded.

Billy closed his eyes. When he couldn’t get rid of the images, he stuck his hands against his eyes, rubbing and rubbing as if that could help.

“You’re a fucking disaster, Hargrove,” Tony said.

Billy took a deep breath, in and out, and didn’t answer. He let go of his eyes and opened them again.

“Did you hear me?” Tony growled. He stalked closer. “You’re a fucking disgrace.”

Billy wouldn’t look up at him. He looked over at Ed, who was watching him warily, holding his arm close to his chest. “I’m sorry,” he told him.

Ed frowned, like he didn’t believe him. He struggled to get up with just one hand, but when he was standing, he said to Billy, “I think you should find somewhere else to stay.”

His heart thrummed in his chest. He swallowed. Then he nodded and got up. Tony backed up to let him. Curry slid further down the wall to let Billy pass by to go up the stairs. Billy tried not to think about that as he went up to his room. He grabbed his duffel bag out of the closet and began stuffing his clothes and belongings back in. His mind was racing, and he tried not think about how the others were talking about him down below.

His duffel was full to bursting when he came out. As he came down the stairs, he found the others waiting for him. Curry was neutral, Ed was glaring, and Tony had his arms crossed. Billy paused at the doorway. “Again, I’m sorry,” he offered, but he knew they didn’t give a shit.

When no one said anything, he left.

He drove to the nearest payphone and called Max’s house. The operator was telling him that the line was disconnected. He could feel the panic mounting as he tried again and again. The line was disconnected. Then he called the operator and asked for Hawkins P.D. When the line clicked through, a deputy responded. He explained the situation to the man and asked for someone to go over to Max’s house. The deputy tried to give him some bull about domestic disputes not being priority.

“Bullshit!” Billy yelled. He was actively trying not to destroy this phone, but that meant he was grasping the ledge of the payphone window like a lifeline. “Look, you have to go over there. They could be in trouble!”

“We’ve had no recorded problems from them, sir,” the deputy’s nasally voice rattled. “We have no reason to suspect that there will be any issues there. I would advise that you try calling them first before you send us on a wild goose chase.”

“But I have been calling them! I can’t get through to them. Please, sir, you’ve gotta—”

“Please hold,” the deputy said, before the line clicked to the waiting tone.

“No!” Billy slammed his fists against the phone box. “You fucker.”

Another option occurred to him. He slammed the phone down and high-tailed it to his car. He peeled back out on the road and drove fast to the Byers house, before parking haphazardly in their drive. Then he threw open the car door and ran to the house to knock.

He could hear the television inside with a tinny, spacy quality. Murmurs. Then the door opened, and Billy nearly sagged. Joyce was frowning at him, taking in his appearance.

“Please…” he panted, “you’ve gotta help me. I don’t know what else to do.”

“Come in,” Joyce said, becoming alarmed.

She sat him down as he explained everything, except for being kicked out. He vaguely noticed Jonathon and the kids in the background. He could tell when Will sat beside him. The kid shouldn’t be so close to him. He might lash out. But Will remained there, a steady presence.

Jonathon was saying, “I’ll call Nancy, get her to go over.”

“Will she go though? It’s probably midnight there.”

“Yeah, she’ll go,” Jonathon said, phone already at his ear. But after a minute, Jonathon’s face was pinched.

“What?” Billy asked.

“They’re not answering,” Jonathon said.

“Try them again,” Billy said. But Jonathon was already redialing.

Joyce had placed a cup of tea in front of him. “Drink this,” she said, a note of order in her voice.

He smelled the floral fragrance before the cup even made it close his face. He scrunched his nose. “What is it?”

“Chamomile,” Will told him. “It helps me sometimes.”

Billy arched an eyebrow at Will and took a small gulp. He made a face. “Whatever it is, it’s gross.”

Will snickered. Billy drank a bit more.

“Still nothing,” Jonathon said.

“What about Lucas?” El suggested. “He’s Max’s boyfriend.”

“No,” Billy interjected as Jonathon was about to dial. “He shouldn’t go anywhere near that house right now. He’d get killed.”

Joyce’s eyes widened at that. But she nodded at Jonathon.

“What about Steve?” Jonathon suggested. Billy shrugged. Jonathon took that as an affirmative and opened a little phone book. He dialled when he found Steve’s home phone. When Jonathon said, “Hi, is Steve there?” Billy jumped up and went to the phone. “It’s Jonathon Byers. Yes, thank you.” To Billy, he said, “Steve’s dad. He’s getting Steve.”

He handed the phone over to Billy so Billy had the pleasure of hearing a disgruntled Steve come to the phone. He sounded like an angry hedgehog. “What do you want, Byers?” Steve said.

“It’s Billy, actually,” he said. He enjoyed the splutter from the other end.

“The fuck do you want, Hargrove?” Steve muttered.

“Listen, I need you to do something,” Billy began.

“Uh huh,” Steve said doubtfully.

“I need you to go to Max’s house and check on her,” Billy said.

“And why would I do that?” Steve muttered.

“Just do it, asshat!” Billy ground out.

“Language!” Joyce exclaimed.

Jonathon leaned close to Billy. He could smell the marijuana lingering on the other guy and feel his breath against his own. He had to fight to not push him away.

“Steve, we think Max might be in trouble,” Jonathon said into the phone. “We need you to check up on her.”

“What are you doing with Byers?” Steve asked. “Never mind. Fine. I’ll go check up on her. You want me to call you back at the Byers?”

“Yes, thank you,” Billy breathed. A thought occurred to him. “Hey, Harrington, is it true you have a bat with spikes on it?”

“Yeah…”

“Bring it. Just in case.”

“Okay.” If Steve was surprised, he didn’t let it through. They hung up as Steve went to check on Max and Billy returned the phone to its cradle, gently.

Joyce sat him down at the dining table and went into the kitchen. He started picking at his fingers, thinking about everything that could be happening to Max. When she came back, she shooed Will away from sitting at the table with them and held out a towel with ice cubes wrapped in it. He frowned at it, then at her, until she pointed at his jaw. “Your bruise. It’s for your bruise.”

“Oh,” he said. He had forgotten about getting punched earlier. He held the ice against it and hissed as the ache bloomed to life.

“Want to tell me what happened?” Joyce asked, her voice quiet.

Billy looked into the living room, where the others were waiting in strained silence. Will glanced back at him. “Not really,” he said.

“Okay. How about this? Tell me what happened.” She gave him her best stern look.

He tried not to chuckle. “One of my roommates punched me.”

“Another fight?” Joyce asked. He could hear an undercurrent of disappointment.

“Sort of. My father had hung up on me.” The skin of his jaw stretched and prickled as he talked. “I knew what he was going to do. And I was powerless to stop it. Then Ed must have snuck up on me and grabbed my shoulder. I reacted. I twisted his arm. Then Tony punched me.” He took a breath and looked down at his other hand. “They threw me out after that. I don’t blame them. I’m a walking freakshow.”

Joyce was frowning. “Do you have a place to stay?”

He gave her a reassuring smile. “I have some ideas.”

But really, he didn’t. He wasn’t thinking about it at all. All he could do was think about what might have happened to Max and Susan. What was Neil doing? Had he twisted one of their arms too? Had he punched them?

A coil of shame slid into his stomach. In the space of an hour, he’d reverted back to what Neil was. What Neil wanted him to be. A perfect copy of Neil. Brutal, unrestrained. Unforgiving. Inhuman.

Joyce was pulling him to her, pushing his head down against his shoulder. He didn’t understand at first, but then he realized. He was crying. Tears were freely running from his eyes, wetting her shirt, and she was patting his head and making soothing noises.

“That’s okay,” she was saying. “Let it out. That’s it.”

The feel of her hand smoothing his hair made him cry harder. “I don’t want to be like him,” Billy breathed into her neck. “I don’t want to hurt people like he hurt my mom. He made my mom leave me. He’s turning me into him. Why can’t I stop being like him?”

“You can, you can,” Joyce soothed. “You always have a choice. There’s always a choice. You don’t have to be like him.”

“But I don’t know how else to be,” Billy said.

“You’ll figure it out,” Joyce assured him. “You will. You just have to make choices that make you less like him, and the more you make those choices, the farther away from being him you will be.”

He couldn’t see that in his future, he couldn’t feel like it was true. But he nodded. He struggled to breathe through the snot and tears, and eventually he could pull away from her shoulder. She got up and offered him some tissues. He cleaned himself up. His eyes were burning from the tears.

“What if he’s killed them?” he said quietly.

Joyce swallowed. “We don’t know that he has. Let’s hope he hasn’t.” She grabbed his hand. He held onto it like it was the only tether of reality.

When he felt ready to move from the table, he followed Joyce into the living room. The others were tense. El was curled into herself on the couch, crying against her knees. Will was pressed up against her, rubbing her back. Billy dropped onto the couch beside him. He felt like all of the fight had been punched out of him. Like he had run thousands of miles with nothing positive to show for it.

As they waited, they watched the television. It was on a sitcom, but he wasn’t really paying attention. He barely noticed when Jonathon refilled his glass of water and took away the forgotten towel of melting ice. He didn’t notice when Joyce pulled El out of the room.

He did notice when a slender hand slid into his. Their fingers moved in sync, flexing and curling, fitting like puzzle pieces. The hand was warm and soft against his, and Billy looked at Will. He was watching the screen, a grim line to his mouth. But Billy could see that he was breathing quicker, his eyes wider. After a moment, Will turned and gave him a small smile. He looked over Billy’s face as if making sure it was okay to hold his hand. Billy gave his hand a squeeze. He couldn’t smile back; it was the best he could do.

When Jonathon came back into the room, they quickly let go, as unobtrusively as they could. Then Joyce and El came back, El looking a little better. They settled back in to watch the disinteresting TV show, El’s head against Will’s shoulder. Billy bit his fingernails to the quick.

The shrill ring of the phone pierced the silence, and everyone jumped up to get it. Jonathon was closest and he picked it up. “Hello? Yeah?” Jonathon seemed to release a breath. “Yeah, I’ll tell him.”

He hung up and turned to Billy. His breath caught in his throat.

“Steve found Max with a broken arm,” Jonathon began. “Her mother was out cold, but not dead. They’re both alive. He called an ambulance, and they were transported to the hospital. But… your father was gone.”

He could hear the sound of water drowning him. He forced himself to remember that Max and Susan were still alive. That was the most important thing. They were still alive.

“So, what does that mean?” Will began. “Does that mean that your dad is coming here?”

Billy forced himself to take a breath. Then another. It seemed unreal.

Jonathon said, “Max told Steve that they had to tell Billy’s father where he was living now. He probably is coming here.”

“Then what do we do?” Will said. “We can’t let him get Billy.”

“I second that,” Billy said quietly.

“We can defend Billy if his father does come here,” El said.

“We’ll probably need weapons,” Jonathon chimed in. He nodded to himself and stood up. “I think we might be able to improvise.”

“There’s lots of stuff we can use at the garage,” Billy suggested. He relished the idea of whacking his dad with a solid wrench.

“No, no, no,” Joyce suddenly said. Everyone looked at her, surprised. “This man is human! He’s not the Mind Flayer or a Demogorgon. He’s human.”

“He could be under the power of the Mind Flayer,” Will pointed out.

Joyce leveled her son with a hard stare. “How likely is that, given we closed the last gate back in Hawkins? The Russians were chased away, and they needed a location close to Hawkins to open a gate. All that is done, and over. We can’t just kill a human man.” She moved her stare to Billy. “No matter how much we’d like to or how much we would be justified.”

Billy nodded. He knew she was right. He would have loved to have killed his father, for what he did, what he’s done, what he was likely to do. But then he would end up in jail. He would end up stuck again, stuck because of something he had done. He had to make choices. The right ones.

“What do you suggest?” he asked.

“If your father is coming here, why don’t you go there?”

“Seriously?” Billy said.

The others were putting in their own objections.

“It’s not a foolproof plan, I realize that. But if he comes here and doesn’t find you, he can’t hurt you.”

“I’ll just be letting him chase me out of town,” Billy objected. “I won’t let him do that to me.”

“It would just be temporary,” Joyce assured him. “But by going to Hawkins, you’d delay his finding you. And then you can convince your stepmother to press charges on him. If she were to press charges, the police will arrest him. And then hopefully he’ll be put away for long enough that he won’t be a problem.”

Billy thought it over. He tried to think of anything else, but he couldn’t. He was too tired and too weary. It was the best plan they had.

And he wanted to see Max again. After a few months apart, he missed her. And now that he knew that she was injured, he wanted to check on her. And on Susan. He also didn’t like having their fates as a big question mark dangling over his head. He wanted to protect them. He hadn’t been able to so far. And he hated that.

The group talked the plan over. Billy would leave in the morning, as he was in no fit state to drive that night. Joyce would go over to his former roommates’ house in the morning and inform them that his father was coming. That way they weren’t blindsided by Neil coming to them. If Neil came around to her place, she would call the cops right away. And hopefully Neil would turn around and go back to Hawkins, right into the waiting arms of the cops.

When they finished finetuning, Joyce sent everyone to bed. She made a bed for Billy on the couch, after he refused her own bed, and put together provisions for him for the morning. All that was left was the night.

At first, the darkness was complete and inescapable. Billy tossed and turned, staring into the pitch black of the living room. Whenever he tried to close his eyes, he kept seeing Max, drowning amongst a sea of bodiless souls, the people he’d killed. But opening his eyes was no better. Every shadow was the monster, reaching out its tentacles to suffocate him.

He threw the covers back and turned on the lamp on the far end of the couch. Getting back in, he settled himself so he could see the light and all that it illuminated. Eventually, the light turned into a blur, and he passed out.

He woke with the first of the dawn. He’d managed to get enough sleep to feel a little rested. As he opened his eyes, he could see the glimmer of sunlight at the top of the ceiling, turning the paint a golden colour. As the light lengthened and stretched, he knew it was time to go.

He cleaned himself up as quietly as he could and threw on a pair of clean clothes. As he passed Will’s bedroom, he felt an indescribable twitch, like he wanted to open the door and see Will sleeping in his bed. He forced himself to walk past the room.

He scribbled out a short note to tell Joyce and the others that he’d made an early start to Hawkins and went to leave it on the dining table. He noticed a folded sheet of paper there labelled ‘Mom’. He put his note down and opened it.

“No,” he said. He nearly ran outside. There was Will, sitting on the bottom step to the driveway, his backpack at his feet. “No.”

“Why not?” Will asked, turning to look at him.

“You’re not going,” Billy said. “Your mother would kill me if you came with me. And you’ve got school, don’t you?”

“It’s Thanksgiving,” Will said, raising an eyebrow at him.

“You’re gonna leave your mother on Thanksgiving?” Billy asked.

That gave Will pause. “She’ll understand,” he said. “Besides, you need some sort of back-up. Just in case. My friends and I always stuck it out for each other, no matter how scary it was. Why can’t I do the same for you?”

“My father will hurt you, kid,” Billy ground out.

“Don’t call me a kid!” Will stood up, his eyes wide with anger. “I’m 16!” He saw the note clutched in Billy’s hand. “Put that back where you found it. Please.” He picked his backpack up and opened the back of Billy’s car to throw it in. Then he got in the passenger seat and stared resolutely forward.

Billy stared at him, then shook his head. He went back in, threw the note on the table, then grabbed the rest of his stuff and went back out.

“I hope you know what you’re doing, kid,” Billy said as he backed out of the driveway.

Will huffed but didn’t say anything.

Billy put some music on, and they started the journey east. At first, it felt slower going back to Hawkins than it had leaving it. He and Will talked while they drove, mostly banal subjects, like music preferences, schoolwork, the future. He asked Will questions mostly to keep his mind off what he might be driving toward.

But he was curious. This boy had forced his way onto the road with him. And he wanted to know who he was. What made Will tick. He was fully aware of the boy sitting next to him, smelling like clean laundry and mint. That mint, again. It was filling Billy’s nostrils, invading his mouth, like a tingle down the spine.

And objectively, Will was handsome. Some might say ‘cute’, what with the big brown eyes and the bowl-cut. But he had a strong jaw, thick brows, defined arms. Billy stopped himself before he looked for more reasons to like him.

After a few hours on the journey, Billy was getting restless. He needed to get out of that car, get some distance from Will. And he had an errand to run that would help him achieve that.

Will squinted at the sign as they pulled into the parking lot. “’Buck Show’?” Will asked, frowning. “Is this some kind of… strip club?”

Billy cackled as he parked. “Nothing that wild, man,” Billy said. “I just want to grab something from here before we continue. You can come in. It’s not X-rated.”

Will got out but followed doubtfully. The tinted windows didn’t hint at the contents of the place, but they passed a few customers of the wild and burly type wearing camo clothes, and Billy had heard that this was a good place to get what he needed.

When they entered, the air was rank with cigarette smoke and gun oil. Billy coughed on the heavy fumes. When he could breathe a little better, he assessed the aisles in front of him before weaving through the tight merchandise to the gun counter.

“A .22, please,” he said to the long-haired man behind the counter. The guy looked at him, then grabbed a gun out of the display case. “And a box of bullets.” The man put them on the counter. As he rang them through the register, Billy looked at Will, whose wide eyes were questioning. He looked away and pulled out his wallet.

When they left the store, Will burst out, “Mom said no weapons!”

Billy chuckled. “I know.”

“You bought a gun!”

“I feel like I was kinda forced to buy a gun,” he said as he got into the driver’s seat of his car.

“What are you talking about?!” Will exclaimed. He had gotten into the passenger seat but was gesticulating wildly. “This wasn’t part of the plan!”

Billy turned and looked at him straight on. “And was your coming along also part of the plan?”

Will froze. “Well—”

“No, it wasn’t. I didn’t hear anything last night from your mom about your coming with me as back-up. The whole plan was for me to get to Hawkins and convince Susan to press charges on Neil. If I’m lucky, I won’t see Neil at all. But what if I’m unlucky? Huh? What if I don’t even make it to Hawkins when Neil finds me? Do you think I’ll survive that?”

He could see realization dawning on Will.

“And then you invited yourself along with me,” Billy said. “I told you you shouldn’t come, but you insisted. So now I have to worry about you getting beaten up by Neil.”

“With two of us, it’ll be harder to hurt us,” Will pointed out, quietly.

Billy looked away. “Maybe… but you don’t know Neil like I do. He’s plenty capable of hurting both of us. And what will your mom think if…”

Billy backed up and eased them out of the parking lot. He got back onto the main road as Will sat quietly, the gun and box of bullets in his lap.

“You could have told me that I couldn’t come,” Will said, eventually. He was fidgeting with the box of bullets.

“Yeah, well…” Billy shook his head. He should have forced Will to stay home, but he didn’t. He glanced at the gun in Will’s lap. “Do you know how to shoot?”

Will sighed. “Yeah. My dad taught me.” And suddenly Will was pulling the magazine out, opening the box of bullets, and putting bullets into the magazine as if he had done it a hundred times. His long, deft fingers made it fast work. He pushed the magazine back in.

“Well…” Billy was surprised, and feeling a little hot. He couldn’t understand why. “That’s good, I guess.” He tried to stop thinking about Will’s fingers. “Have you actually hit your target?”

Will laughed. “Of course I have. I was better at it than Jonathon.”

Billy laughed too. He had Will put the gun and bullets in the glove compartment. He felt a little better knowing that Will knew how to shoot. Maybe they’d be able to survive this after all.

They drove until darkness fell before pulling off the highway into a little roadside motel with the vacancy sign on. Will got out with his backpack and waited as Billy lightened his duffel bag to just the provisions he needed. He slipped the gun and ammo in, just in case, before they made their way to the reception.

The older lady behind the desk barely looked at them when they came up. “Do you have two rooms with doubles?” Billy asked.

“Sorry, darling,” the woman said, not looking away from her tiny black and white television playing a game show. “Just got the one room left. But it’s got two beds. Name?”

“Will Byers,” Billy said. When Will looked at him, he just shrugged. When the lady pushed a sign in book forward, he motioned to Will to sign it and paid the fee.

“Here you go,” she said, depositing a key on the counter.

Billy grabbed it. “Thanks.” Then they made their way back out and followed the directionals to their room. It was the last one on the ground floor and to the back of the building. After dumping his duffel on one of the beds, Billy moved his car to park in front of the door before locking the door after him. He felt insanely paranoid about doing that, but he did it anyways. Will didn’t question it though, which made him relax a little.

They had stopped at a grocery store for their dinner, so they took out the frozen meals and popped them into the dingy microwave, one by one. Billy flicked the TV on and put it on that game show the woman was watching. They sat at the little table eating their meals. Billy felt his eyes wander to Will as they ate. To how the hair fell forward on his head. To the fingers clutching his plastic fork. When Will chanced to glance up at him, Billy looked back to the TV, ashamed to be caught in the act.

After dinner, they both performed their evening rituals and then settled on their respective beds. Billy propped his head up on his pillows to watch the TV. He noticed Will bend forward to grab something in his bag, his shirt pulling taut against the lines of his back. Will straightened with a pad and pencils and settled himself back against the headboard, presumably to draw.

The occasional scratching against paper filled the room. When Billy couldn’t stand their silence, he asked, “Why did you come on this trip with me?”

The scratching stopped. “I…I didn’t want you to get hurt.”

“So you wanted to get hurt with me?” Billy said quietly.

“No, I…” He looked at Will. Will was trying to think of the right words to say.

“Do you feel sorry for me?” Billy asked. It came out bitter.

“No! No, not at all!” Will exclaimed. Billy sighed. “Look, I know what it’s like to have everybody feel sorry for you because of something that happened to you. I wouldn’t do that to you.”

“Yeah?” Billy frowned at the TV.

“I wanted to come with you,” Will said. “Because… you’ve been there for me. I want to be there for you. And… I like you.”

Billy turned onto his side and propped his head up. “You like me?” he repeated.

A blush was flooding Will’s cheeks. It was oddly endearing. And enticing. “Yeah,” Will said, hiding his face.

“Like a… friend?” he asked, curious. He remembered their kiss from the walk along the beach. He could still feel the tingle of his lips after he had pushed Will away.

Red was flooding Will’s face and neck. Billy wanted to remove the boy’s shirt and see how far down it went. “Well, like… I… like more…” Will peeked at him shyly. His tongue darted out to moisten his lips.

Suddenly Billy was on a precipice. The old Billy would have ridiculed this boy, maybe even beat him up. He wouldn’t have thought twice about it despite the unease at the back of his mind.

But Billy was thinking twice. His hazy thoughts were scattering memories around him like seeds. The bite of the salty wind. The roughness of Will’s lips. The taste of mint, expanding in his lungs, clinging in his throat. The feel of those fingers. The starkness of Will’s paintings. Paintings that mirrored his own mind. The loss when Will hadn’t been in his bedroom and had run away. The smile and laughter carried on the breeze as they sprayed each other with water.

The seeds took root. “Prove it,” he said, his throat like tinder. He sat up and faced Will.

Will looked at him, assessing. The shyness was there in his eyes and his hands. But then Will put the pad down on his bed and got up.

Billy could feel his heart pounding as Will walked toward him. His muscles were locked in place, anticipatory. Will licked his lips and roved his eyes over Billy’s face, still wary. But then he bent down, slowly. His breath tickled Billy’s lips. Then their lips touched, feather soft, unsure. Minty. Then a little harder, firmer, as Billy responded in kind.

He moved Will onto the bed with them as they continued to kiss. The kiss was igniting a fire in Billy and he couldn’t stop it. He let his hands explore Will, from the firmness of his shoulder blades, down the lines of his back, to the softness of his buttocks. Will moaned as he grasped them. Will was exploring him too, leaving his skin burning and tingling as he went.

He felt like a tinderbox, being enveloped in flames. But just before he was about to ignite, unbidden thoughts filled his head. Neil leaning over him, pushing him to the ground, calling him a faggot, grinding a boot into his stomach, telling him not to be a pussy. Backhanding him because he looked gay.

Billy could feel bile in the back of his mouth and broke away from Will’s mouth. Will tried to follow him, but he laid a hand against his chest and kept him back. Not looking him in the eye, he said, “I think you should go back to your bed.”

Will hesitated and Billy could feel his body tense underneath his palm. Then he moved off the bed and got into his own. Billy didn’t dare look at him and focused on calming his breathing and swallow down the bile. His father was filling his head again, and he hated it. He hated how much that man could get under his skin, even when he wasn’t even present. All he could think about was how his father would see this as disgusting and wrong, when all his body saw it as beautiful and right.

He’d never liked men before this. He thought about all the guys he’d encountered since he started having sex. He’d known some men were objectively handsome. He’d admired men’s physiques, but more in the distant way one has when comparing oneself to someone else. He’d never thought about sucking those men’s dicks. He’d never thought what it might feel like to cum in a man’s mouth or in his ass. He’d never even had anal sex with a woman, too afraid it would make him gay.

And then one male teenager with big brown eyes and shared trauma came into his life and turned everything he knew upside down.

Billy hit the bed with his fist. He felt the walls and ceiling closing around him, and he wanted it all to stop. Why wouldn’t it stop?

The snap of a light turning off made him turn. Will had turned off the bedside lamp between them. As his eyes adjusted to the darkness, he could see Will’s form under the covers of the other bed. He was turned away from Billy. He looked small, like he had curled in on himself.

The night continued to be oppressive, and Billy struggled to sleep. When he did, it was fitful. Images of Max, ripped apart and covered in blood, soon morphed into images of Will, his body broken and bleeding on the side of a dark road. Will was sobbing as he lay there bleeding, staring up at Billy like he was betrayed, like Billy hadn’t done anything to help him.

Billy wrenched awake. He could still see the outline of Will’s broken body against his eyes as he pulled from his sleep, and he rubbed his eyes to banish the images. His heart was pounding in his chest and his lungs were burning. He looked at the bed next to him, but he could barely make out Will’s form under the blanket.

He turned the light back on. Will was still facing the opposite direction from Billy, but he felt his heart settle, taking in the dark hair against the pillow. He ached to touch him, and his hand even began to reach out, to assure himself that Will was still alive, but he stopped himself. He went to turn the light back off.

“Billy?” Will mumbled, turning over.

Billy hovered over him awkwardly. “Sorry, I…” he began. Will’s hair was mussed from the pillow and his eyes were blinking sleepily. An excuse for being awake was on the tip of his tongue, but this was Will. “Nightmare.”

Will frowned but nodded. He turned all the way over so that he could see Billy as Billy went to sit back on his bed. “I was having trouble sleeping,” Will admitted.

“Yeah?” Billy nodded. He wasn’t sure what to say. “Do you want to watch TV with me?”

Will nodded. Billy got up and turned the TV back on, flipping the channels until they came across something that both didn’t mind watching. He sat back on his bed, Will in his own, and they passed the time on some sitcom reruns. Eventually, he noticed that Will had fallen asleep, partially propped up on his pillows to see the TV.

Billy got up and went over to Will. His face was frozen in an angelic quality. Billy touched his cheek, feeling the creamy softness of his skin and the angle of his cheekbone against his hand. He felt something expand and unfurl in his chest as he watched Will sleep. He felt overwhelmed. It felt like a million things were happening to him all at once and he couldn’t orient himself properly. Like he was a ship in a storm, riding the raging sea.

He sighed and dropped his hand. He turned off the TV and then turned off the light between them. And got back into his own bed.

The next few days passed in a similar manner. Each morning, they woke up, got themselves ready and left the motel to spend hours on the road, stopping only for bathroom breaks, gas, and food. Will was learning to drive, so Billy let him take the wheel every once in awhile. He guided Will as they drove, correcting him gently when he made a mistake. It reminded him of the first time he had taught Max to drive, but that meant he was picturing Max in a hospital bed, and he forced himself to concentrate on Will.

If Billy had been alone, he would have slept some nights in car parks or truck stops, no matter how cold it was getting at night. But with Will there, he felt they needed to stop overnight at motels. That meant sharing a room every time. At first, he was nervous about having the kid around him, taking up his space, because he still couldn’t figure out how he felt about him. But then it became a dance between the two of them, a ritual, where they would get ready for bed, slide past each other in the bathroom door, sit across from each other at mealtimes, talking, sharing. Billy could feel the heat of Will’s body wherever he was in the room. Sometimes he ached to bring that body to him, kiss those lips, feel the heat encircle them. Despite the danger facing them whenever they stopped, Billy could feel his heart stutter every time Will smiled at or laughed with him. He almost didn’t want it to end.

The last leg of their journey, they stopped in a motel within Indiana itself. He had used this motel many times in the past, during his family’s initial move to Indiana and during the times he’d had sex with girls while his father and stepmother were home. He felt a little weird bringing Will to the reception desk, almost like he didn’t recognize the guy he had been when he’d come there before.

“We just have a queen,” the man at the desk said. He was filling out a crossword in the newspaper and was hardly paying attention to them.

“Oh,” Billy said. He didn’t know how to react. “Uh—”

“That’s fine,” Will said, reaching for the sign in book. Billy looked at him, but Will was resolutely not looking at him, a look of concentration on his face as he wrote his name in. When he was done, he pushed the book back to the clerk and looked down at his feet.

“Yeah, fine,” Billy said, turning back to the man as he pulled his wallet out. The man was looking between the two of them strangely now. “How much do I owe you?” He hoped the man didn’t recognize him from the previous stints he had stayed there.

When they got the key, they left the reception and went to their room. The queen bed seemed to dominate most of the room as they entered and put their stuff down. Billy watched as Will set himself up on the left side of the bed. He forced himself to go back outside and move the car closer to their door. He glanced around the parking lot and went back inside.

Will was coming out of the bathroom, dressed for bed in his usual night shirt and soft pants. “It’s all yours,” he told Billy. He slid under the covers on his side and grabbed the remote to turn the TV on.

It felt like an eternity before he could get himself to move from his spot and grab his toiletries and night clothes. He felt stiff and awkward as he got himself ready in the bathroom. He’d had to sleep in beds with other guys before, but that had been few and far between and had meant nothing to him. But here he was, nervous as a virgin, about settling into bed with Will. He had to force himself to leave the bathroom.

Will gave him a small smile when he came out into the room. Billy went to his side of the bed and ignored his clumsy fingers trying to pull at the cover. When he was settled underneath, he could feel the heat of Will’s body like a scorching burn down his side. It both soothed and riled him. He glanced over at Will and was delighted to see a bright flush to Will’s cheeks. Will was breathing quicker, his cherry lips parted. Will looked at him.

They moved as one as they came together, lips fusing as all of the electricity in the room seemed to snap. Will’s mouth was hot and needy on his. He coaxed Will’s mouth open, licking at the bottom of his lip, and delved deep into the moist heat of Will’s mouth.

Will moaned as they kissed and Billy clutched him closer, trying to get him as close as possible to him. Will’s hands were exploring Billy’s chest and back, but when Will touched a wound on his stomach, he couldn’t help groan in pain and break away.

Will’s eyes were wide as saucers. “Sorry, I’m sorry,” he breathed, holding his hands out where Billy’s body had been.

Billy was grimacing as the flare of pain slowly subsided back into nothing. “No, no, it’s okay,” he said, grabbing one of Will’s hands. When the pain disappeared, he let out his breath. “They still hurt occasionally.”

Will was looking at the spot on Billy’s stomach he’d touched that had caused him pain. “How long will it take for them to heal?”

Billy shrugged. “A few more months, probably, until they are fully healed. I haven’t needed bandages for them for awhile, so I forget that they’re there, sometimes.”

Will’s eyes were full of curiosity and heat. His lips were red and bruised from their kiss. Billy licked his lips and felt some of that electricity come back to him, but Will lay back on his side, facing Billy. He felt disappointed, but he didn’t push it, even though he wanted to devour Will.

“Can I ask you something?” Will asked suddenly.

“Go for it.”

Will opened his mouth but didn’t say anything. He blinked a few times, looking down at the sheets. He looked cute nervous. But then he asked quickly, “Are you gay?”

Billy felt his face fall. He felt his hackles rise, like he was being attacked by some asshole, but it was just Will looking at him in their bed, his face earnest and embarrassed. Billy forced some of his ire to cool and reminded himself that Will had no idea what he had been through with his father or how Billy had been struggling with this very question for the past few months. Ever since he had met Will.

He swallowed and reached out a hand. He traced a finger along Will’s bottom lip. Will’s eyes fluttered and his mouth parted, heated breath dousing Billy’s finger. He removed it and Will’s eyes popped open, watching him.

“I don’t know,” Billy said honestly. Will frowned at that. “I… I’ve never felt like this around other guys. I… My father doesn’t think very highly of gay people.”

Will’s head dipped down as he absorbed that. “Neither does mine,” Will murmured.

“Yeah?” Billy watched as he swallowed. “Are you gay?”

Will looked at him fully, one eyebrow arched. “What do you think?” he said.

“Hey, I don’t want to assume.” Billy put his hands up in mock surrender and Will shook his head at him, annoyed. Curious, he asked, “How long have you known?”

Will thought about it. “Since I was a kid, I guess.” He shrugged nonchalantly. “I never really thought about girls like my friends did, so I knew I was different. But I didn’t really understand it until everything happened. One of my friends, Mike, had stuck by me, had always been by my side, and after I was possessed… it was like I woke up and realized that I liked him… as more than a friend.”

“Does this Mike… like you back like that?” Billy asked. He felt breathless asking.

Will shook his head. “No. He doesn’t have a clue. He’s dating El, you know.”

Billy thought back to all of the kids’ faces he had seen while under the influence of the monster. He searched his memory from before and after and thought of what this Mike looked like. Had he been the curly haired chubby boy or the thin kid with the shaggy hair? He sighed and pushed it out of his mind.

Will was frowning, thinking of his friend.

Billy looked at him for a few beats, then he sat up and began to take off his shirt. Will watched him with interest, sitting up too, and his eyebrows shot up as Billy bared his disfigured skin to him. He could feel his heart hammering in his chest as he pulled the shirt off his arms and threw it behind him. He wanted to turn away from Will’s gaze, but he kept himself still. Let him look.

He had never shown this to anyone since leaving Hawkins. When he had gotten out of the hospital, regular check-ups of the wounds had been necessary, but since coming back to California, he had kept this as far from prying eyes as possible. When he had done some lifeguarding, he had worn a shirt. Slept with girls, wore a shirt. Moved around his roommates’ house in a shirt while they went bare-chested, proudly displaying their muscles, as if boastful they were hot guys who could beat you to a pulp. Billy had been jealous of them, maybe a little angry.

After all, he had been so proud of his appearance before everything happened. His body with ripped, sculpted muscles had been his stock in trade in Hawkins. Working on his body to have the women around him swoon had given him pride.

He had no pride in this, the fragments of chest and belly that were sewn back together in haphazard patterns, the skin red and raised and raw from healing. He had spent so much of his time ignoring the problem of his body, trying to forget that it existed. But he couldn’t escape it.

But he felt brave enough to show Will, if only to get his mind off his friend’s abandonment. He steeled himself and looked at Will’s face. Will was taking him in, his eyes travelling over every raised rivulet and sinew. He began to reach out a hand but stopped when he saw Billy flinch.

“No, go ahead, you can touch,” Billy said, forcing himself to stay still.

Light as a whisper, Will’s finger touched a raised point on his chest. His finger followed the red line down as it zigged and zagged down his stomach where it stopped before his groin. Then he laid his hand, flat, against the large expanse of wound in his stomach. Firm, but not too hard to hurt. Billy felt his own heart rabbiting in his chest.

But Will was sombre. He looked up at Billy, hand still on the wound. Billy had the impression that Will was fighting with something, before he launched himself at Billy and threw his arms around him, hugging him tightly.

Surprised, Billy awkwardly settled his arms around Will’s form. Will was breathing raggedly, but his voice was steady when he said, “I’m glad you’re not dead.”

Billy closed his eyes and held Will tighter. They stayed like that, not moving, for a few minutes, before Billy let his arms drop. Will got the hint and pulled back, surreptitiously wiping his eyes.

“We should get to sleep,” Billy said. He grabbed the remote from beside them and turned the TV off. Will nodded shakily and settled back down in the covers. When Billy turned the light off, he settled himself beside Will. He didn’t bother putting his shirt back on.

“Billy,” Will’s voice said. Long fingers were jostling his shoulder and he opened his eyes to see Will above him. His hair was tousled, but he had his jacket on and his eyes were wide. “Billy,” he was saying. “Wake up!”

Billy sat up so fast they bumped their heads together as Will struggled to get out of the way. “Sorry. What’s wrong?”

“Does your father drive a Buick?” Will asked, rubbing his temple where they collided.

“Yeah…” Billy said, as dread began to pool in his stomach.

“I think… I think he’s staying in this motel,” Will said. “I saw a dark green Buick outside, with Indiana license plates. I think it’s him.”

Billy was throwing the covers back as soon as Will had begun talking. He started throwing his shit together in his bag and pulled out the gun. “Did he see you?”

“No, I don’t think so.”

“Get your stuff,” Billy said gruffly. He put the gun in the back of his waistband after he pulled on his jeans and shirt. He badly needed to urinate, but he didn’t dare waste time when Neil was close by. When Will was finished packing, they moved to the door. Billy pushed Will behind him and opened the door a crack. No one. He opened it further and stuck his head out, surveying the parking lot.

The sun had long since risen and the parking lot was flooded with light. And there was the dark green Buick, parked near the road. From where he was, he couldn’t see if anyone was in the driver’s seat.

Billy was leaning far enough out that Will could fit outside behind him, looking too. “We have two options,” he began saying to Will, “we can stick it out in the room in the hopes that he hasn’t seen us. Or we can jump in the car and get the fuck out of this parking lot and hope he is not sitting in his car to see us.”

Will took a deep breath. “What about the room key?”

The last thing on his mind was the stupid room key. “Just leave it in the door. We’ve already paid for the night.” He turned to look at Will. “When you saw the car, did you see him in it?”

Will frowned in thought, then he shook his head. “I don’t think so.”

Billy turned and looked at the Buick. He stepped out farther but he still couldn’t see the front of the car. “So, which is it?”

“What do you want to do?” Will asked after a moment.

“I want to get the hell out of here,” Billy said. He looked at Will, who was indecisive. After a moment, Will nodded. “Alright, got your stuff?” Will nodded again. He hoisted his bag over his shoulder and put the room key into the lock. Billy hoisted his own bag and tensed to spring. “Let’s go. Quickly.”

They flew to the car and threw their bags into the backseat. Billy stopped long enough to pull the gun out of his waistband before he sat in the seat and put it on the dash within reach. He jammed the key in the ignition and turned it. The car rumbled to life, but it didn’t seem fast enough for the adrenaline pumping through his veins. Neil was way too close for comfort and Billy threw the car into reverse and then forward without using the brakes and sped out of the lot.

“Keep your eyes open for him,” Billy muttered as he concentrated on navigating the narrow lot. How had he not noticed Neil’s car last night? It was so fucking obvious. As he looked at the car, he almost slammed into a car backing up ahead of him and he had just enough time to yank the car to the left to swerve out of the way while the other car stopped and honked at him.

Fuck. He hoped that noise didn’t bring anyone to their windows. He forced himself not to look at the motel as he maneuvered around and past to get to the exit of the lot.

Then he felt Will tense before he said, “Shit. I think that’s him.”

“Where?” Billy asked, as he slowed at the exit of the lot enough to look for oncoming traffic before pumping the gas to get onto the road.

“He came out of a door,” Will began. Then, faster, more agitated, “He saw us. He’s running to his car!”

“Fuck, fuck, fuck.” Billy punched his dash, but that didn’t help. The road was straight in front of him, no twists or turns to lose Neil in. “Fuck!”

Will was twisting in his seat, looking out the back windows. “He’s in his car.” A beat. “He’s on the road behind us, but that other car is in front of him.”

No doubt he’d pass that car to get to them. “Keep tabs on him. And put your seat belt on.”

Will nodded and did his seat belt up. Twisting around to look behind them was harder, but it allowed Billy to press on the gas and get them going as fast as he could. When they came up to a red light, Billy began to honk to go through it and they narrowly avoided a car coming at them. Will whipped back around and clutched the dash as the other car narrowly missed the back end of theirs, but it meant that they had more room to breathe.

He wasn’t going to waste it. Any cars in front of him going slower, he made every opportunity to pass. He kept Will checking the mirrors for Neil and made his passes around slower cars more daring. All the while, the blood was rushing in his veins and roaring in his ears. All of his instincts were telling him to look around, find Neil, see where the man was. But he fought it and concentrated on the road ahead.

He recognized the road they were on when it started to twist and turn. Passing slower cars was more dangerous now because he couldn’t see ahead. But he felt like Neil was breathing on his neck as he slowed the car to match the one in front.

“Anything?” he asked Will.

Will twisted around. “I can’t tell. We don’t have anyone behind us at least.”

“That’s not good enough,” Billy grumbled. He badly wanted to run the car in front of him off the road so he could pass. They were so close to Hawkins, he could tell by the landmarks. But he didn’t want to endanger more random people. He hoped Neil was far enough behind that the twisting road wouldn’t be an issue.

When the car ahead of them turned off the road to a driveway, Billy breathed a sigh of relief. He gunned it and prepared for the last descent into Hawkins.

Then Will said, “Fuck. It’s him. He’s behind us.”

And looking into the rear-view, sure enough, there was the green Buick with Neil at the wheel, speeding their way as they whipped through twists and turns.

“Hold on,” Billy said, and whipped them onto a side street so fast the car skittered across the two lanes and nearly into the ditch. The gun slid across the dash and Will grabbed it. Billy regained control and sped up the country road. But Neil made the turn too. And he didn’t go into the ditch either.

Billy played the same gambit on the next crossroad and their car swerved in a wide ark through the turn. The cows in the field opposite stared at them as they sped past. But then Neil’s car made that turn too.

“Fuck! How much does it take to get his car in the ditch!?” Billy yelled.

“There’s another road coming up,” Will said helpfully.

“Okay, here we go,” Billy said and threw the car into the turn more deftly than the first two. But there was a car oncoming and he had to throw the wheel to the right to get the car back into the right lane. He could feel, more than hear, the scrape as the other car scratched against the back of his, but he didn’t stop. He kept going, sparing a glance for the other car only. They had stopped at the crossroad and the man was getting out, gesticulating wildly. That meant that Neil would have to slow down to take the turn. This would give them a bit of distance, and Billy would use it.

Billy slammed on the gas and the car shot forward. The road was going into twists and turns again and Billy focused on the road and not what was happening behind him. He barely heard Will tell him the result of Neil’s turn. All he could see was the road in front of him, the trees on either side, the twists pulling to the left or the right.

“This one! This one!” Will was suddenly yelling.

Billy vaguely saw the crossroad ahead and slowed enough to take it safely. Now, on another road, hopefully Neil would think they had kept going straight and miss that they had turned. Billy backed off the gas a little, but only so much that he could think out the roads ahead of him.

This road was straight and was still going through the farms on the outskirts of Hawkins. There was another road to cross, but it wasn’t for awhile, and that road led them into the residential areas. If they followed those, there would be more collateral damage, but it was also the quickest route to the hospital. It was the best option at this point. All they had to do was hang tight until they got to that road.

Then Will squeaked. “He’s back! He’s right behind us!”

“Fuck,” Billy growled out slowly. He chanced a look in the rear-view, and Neil was gaining on them steadily. In fact, he was coming on them too fast. He barely said, “Hold on!” before Neil slammed his car into theirs.

Billy’s car shot forward and he struggled to keep it on the road. As he was getting traction back to his tires, Neil did it again, slammed their car forward, and all traction was lost.

He felt like he was flying. The grain beside the car was whizzing by too fast. Then the car made contact with the deep valley of the ditch, before bouncing up and slamming into a fence.

Billy’s head hit the steering wheel, almost breaking his nose. He put a hand up to his face and felt the blood. There was a cut. The car was ticking, and he could see the hood had popped up and steam was billowing from it. He looked to Will. He was slumped over, cuts on his forehead, and glittering glass in his hair. Like a halo. He couldn’t see where the gun went. He couldn’t tell if Will was breathing or not.

Then Billy’s door was opening. He was being pulled against the seatbelt, choking his throat. His father leaned in and yanked open the seatbelt, cursing the whole time. Calling Billy names. Then he yanked Billy’s arms and pulled him out of the car and Billy couldn’t even put up a fight as Neil began hitting him.

His body was thrown against the car. Then Neil shook him like a ragdoll. “You think you can disobey me?! Leave like the little cunt you are!? You’ll fucking regret it.”

And he continued, slamming Billy against the car a couple more times. He could feel the sharp edges of the car against his back, burning like fire. Then Neil punched his face. His head snapped to the side with the force. He couldn’t hear what Neil was saying. His ears were buzzing, and his vision was swimming. But looming large was Neil’s angry face. His eyes and mouth twisted into rageful lines. It seemed Neil was asking him a question. But when he didn’t answer, Neil tossed him onto the ground.

Then suddenly, Will was there. Will was pushing Neil away, his hair shining like diamonds, yelling at Neil. Billy tried to push himself up, to get up, but then Will was on the ground beside him, body spread-eagled, and Billy felt his rage build.

“Little faggot,” he heard Neil say. Then Billy barrelled into him. They fell onto the ground and Billy stayed on top, throwing punch after punch at his father. The man who had been his father. The man who abused him, who demeaned him, who controlled him. Who had made Billy so small that he took his father’s beatings because that was how things were supposed to be. But in that moment, he was sick of it, and so angry. His father had tossed Will to the ground and called him a name, like the kid was nothing to the world, nothing to him, and that made Billy so angry.

But as he threw his rage into his punches, his control began to slip, and soon his father had them flipped over and was hitting Billy’s face and chest. His father’s face was purple with rage as he leaned over his son, and when Billy felt hands around his neck, he thought, that’s it. This is how he dies. He had no strength left to fight his father off, but he tried to pull at Neil’s hands anyway. He was struggling to breathe as Neil crushed harder.

And then a crack split the air. Neil looked behind him and the pressure lightened from his throat. Billy took in as much air as he could, gasping, his throat burning. He moved his eyes to see what Neil was looking at.

There was Will, determined, gun in hand. It was pointed squarely at Neil’s chest.

Billy could barely hear Will say, “Get off him,” and Neil’s response, a derisive, “Or what? You gonna shoot me?” Then the miniscule movement of Will’s finger tightening.

And all Billy could think was, No. This boy shouldn’t be a killer. He wasn’t a killer. The monster had taken both of them over, but they weren’t possessed right now. They weren’t killers. The monster was. And so was this monster, sitting on top of him. And yet Will was going to blow a hole through Neil’s chest.

Billy shoved Neil with his legs as the gun went off. He could feel the moment the bullet tore through Neil’s flesh, in, out. Felt the spray of blood as it splattered him. And then Neil was crumbling on top of him, covering Billy’s face. Neil had been trying to suffocate with his hands before, but now he was suffocating with his body. And wet sticky heat was pouring out of him as Billy tried to push him off. But he could feel Neil’s lungs expanding and contracting.

Neil’s body began to shift, and Billy could breathe again. He could see Will above them, pushing Neil’s body to the side. Together, they pushed him off Billy completely. They laid him on his back and Billy could see the rise and fall of the man’s chest. It looked like the bullet had ripped through his stomach. But he was still breathing.

Then Will dropped to his knees beside Billy and embraced him. The hug was tight and fierce. Will was trembling. Billy raised his own arms and tightened them around Will, hugging him back. Hugging him as if his life depended on it. Glad he was still alive because of this boy. Glad it was Will who was there with him.

As they embraced, he could vaguely hear sirens. He pulled back when Will did, and they looked up to see cop cars pouring down the road behind them. As those cars screeched to halt, uniforms began jumping out, guns out, yelling directions at them. Will dropped the gun and slid it to them. Held his hands up. There was a flurry of movement as Will was dragged away from Billy, but at the same time, Billy could feel himself start to droop as all of the energy seeped out of him and then he was out.

Waking up was a slow process. He could feel himself surfacing from murky dreams to a bright environment, where every piece of his body hurt. He was back in the Hawkins hospital, sore from head to toe, like the intervening months in California had only been a dream. Like the battle at Starcourt mall had just happened, and he hadn’t actually lived any time away from Neil.

It felt like a knife had been plunged into his heart. What if he hadn’t gotten to see the ocean again? What if he hadn’t experienced Joyce’s cooking? What if all those times that he had felt at home among the Byers family had been just a dream? A cruel dream where he woke up to the cold reality that Neil was still his father, and he was still under his roof…

There was no one beside his bed. There were no flowers or gifts. Just the ticking of the machines and the scratchiness of the bandages.

He felt the tears behind his eyes and tried to stop them. Why was he feeling sorry for himself? He deserved this. He deserved everything he got from his father. He deserved to have it all be a dream, because people like him don’t get happy endings.

Then the door clicked open. He wiped away his tears and waited for Neil to make comments about his son being a weak pussy. But it wasn’t Neil.

It was Will. He blinked his eyes to make sure it was actually Will, but it was. Will looked worse for the wear, with bandages on his head and healing cuts on his hands. But it was him. Everything that had happened was real, and Will had defended Billy against Neil. He had spent those months with the Byers family, basking in the California air and sun.

“Billy—” Will began.

“Will, are you—are you alright?” Billy said, as Will came closer. He looked Will over from top to bottom. There were no other obvious injuries.

“Yeah, I’m—how are you? You’re the one he—” Will came to the edge of the bed. He swallowed.

Billy reached out and touched his hand, needing to be sure. Will looked down as they curled their hands together. Then Billy chuckled. “For a second there, I thought everything that had happened had just been a dream.”

Will shook his head and smiled sadly. “It happened.”

“What happened after I blacked out?” Billy asked.

“The cops were going to arrest me, but they didn’t. The new chief of police saw that it was Neil who… they’ve been looking for him since he did what he did to Max and her mother. They called ambulances for both of you and they’ll be pressing charges against him.”

“He’s still alive?” Billy asked.

Will nodded. “Yeah. He’s here but under police guard.”

“How are Max and Susan?” Billy asked, rubbing his thumb against the back of Will’s hand.

“They’re doing better,” Will said, looking down at their hands again. “Susan woke up. She’s going to make a full recovery. They reset Max’s arm and she has a cast on it.” He looked up at Billy. “She wants to see you.”

Billy nodded. “I want to see her too.” He tried not to think about the shame of not being able to protect Max and her mom and was going to say something else when Will asked,

“Why didn’t you let me do it?” Billy knew exactly what he was talking about. “I had it lined up. I wasn’t aiming to wound.”

“I didn’t want you to do it.” He looked down at their hands this time.

“But Billy—he was killing you!” Will exclaimed. “He-he had his hands around your throat. You were turning blue. I thought—”

“You’re not a killer, Will,” Billy cut in. He looked steadily into Will’s eyes. “No matter what the monster made you do, not matter what it made me do… You’re not a killer. And you shouldn’t kill someone for me.”

Will blinked rapidly. There was a sheen misting his eyes. He looked away from Billy. Said quietly, “I would have killed him for you. Gladly.”

“Why?” Billy asked. “I’m not… I’m not someone you bring home to your parents. I’m not a nice guy.” Will was looking up in earnest and shaking his head, but Billy went on. “That man made me who I am. I can’t change that. I am trying to change my choices, but… it doesn’t feel like it’s enough. I’m just going to hurt you. And you deserve better than that.” He let go of Will’s hand and tugged the bedsheet up higher, looking at the wall straight ahead of him.

“You’ve already met my mom,” Will pointed out. It was a meek argument. “And… I should be the one to decide what I deserve. I am the one to decide what my choices are.” His voice was becoming more confident as he spoke, and Billy had to look at him. “And if I had to do this all over again, I would still choose to come with you, and I would still choose to aim for his heart. Maybe you’re right, maybe I’m not a killer, but I would have done it, I would have killed him, because he hurt you.” He was calm and determined.

After a moment, Billy nodded. “What about us?” he said. “I’ve never been with a man.”

“Neither have I,” Will threw back.

The implications of that made his blood race, but he shook his head. “My whole life I have been taught to despise gay people, anybody who is different. I will push you away.”

Will thought this over. Then he asked, “But do you feel something for me?”

Billy swallowed. “Yes.”

Will nodded. “Then I want to try.”

“You’re sixteen.”

“So?” Will asked.

“It’s illegal for me to start anything with you. I’m almost 19.”

“I don’t care about that,” Will said.

“Your mom is going to kill me,” Billy added, but he could feel his resistance crumbling.

“I highly doubt she will,” Will said, suddenly smirking. “I have it on good authority that she likes you.”

Billy frowned at that. Why the fuck did Joyce like him? “Even after you got hurt coming with me?”

Will suddenly looked shifty. “Well, I didn’t tell her how badly I got hurt…”

Billy shook his head.

“So?” Will asked, hopeful.

Billy studied him. Big earnest brown eyes stared back at him, waiting. Impulsively, he said, “Okay.”

Will smiled. It was dazzling, full of hope and eagerness. Billy tried not to smile from the exuberance pouring from Will, but he could feel his jaw aching with it. Then Will leaned forward and brushed his lips against Billy’s, and it was all Billy could do not to drag him down on top of his sore body to keep the kiss going on for hours.

“Billy!” was suddenly screeched through the air as the door opened. Billy barely registered the streak of red hair as Will fell away from him and Max was suddenly hugging him. “Billy! I’m so glad you’re awake!”

He felt like an anaconda was trying to hug him. “Max,” he breathed, “this is too tight.”

She relented a little. “I was so worried. When I heard about what happened. I’m so sorry this happened.” He could hear tears in her voice. “If I had held out longer—”

“Hey, don’t think like that,” Billy said, pushing her back so he could look into her eyes. “Don’t you dare blame yourself for what that asshole did to you. Okay?”

She nodded, wiping her eyes. “What do you think is going to happen now?”

He looked past her to meet Will’s eyes. Will smiled.

Christmas in California was not the same as Christmas in Indiana. While the temperatures had dipped, there was no snow on the ground, and the Christmas revelry was focused on fake greenery twisting around fences and porches and blinking Christmas lights and fake snowmen.

Billy was driving back into California in yet another car after spending the past month with Max and Susan in Hawkins. He had helped Susan around the house while all three of them recuperated from their injuries. They had provided evidence against Neil. Neil had woken up from his bullet wound only to be charged with attempted murder and assault. The fallout from the chaos meant that they were now labelled as victims by the people in the town, which made Billy cringe. But it was better than Neil being in that house.

Susan had decided to sell the house and downsize as Billy had already decided he wasn’t staying. She found a two bedroom a few blocks away. Billy boxed up all his stuff and said goodbye to his bedroom one last time. All of Neil’s belongings went into storage. In the new house, Billy was given the pullout couch. It was easier to relax amongst Susan and Max’s things when they were out of the old house.

Will had stayed for a couple days in the beginning. He had spent more time with Billy than he had with catching up with his friends in Hawkins and Billy felt a little smug about that. But then Jonathon had driven over to drive him back home and Billy had to work on getting a new car.

When he got back to California, back to Lenora itself, he once again didn’t have a permanent home for himself. But now it was more than just the call of the salty tang of the ocean pulling him there.

The door to the Byers house opened as soon as he parked. Will bounded out, followed by El and Joyce and even Jonathon. As soon as he stepped out of the car, Will hugged him, his body melding with his in relief. He had talked with Will over the phone, but it wasn’t the same as having Will in his arms, and he loved it.

“Hey, hey,” said a female voice, “let me in there.”

He chuckled as he and Will broke apart so that Joyce could hug him. She rubbed his back before letting go. Then El hugged him. He and Jonathon didn’t hug but awkwardly clapped each other on the shoulder.

“Come on, let’s go inside,” Joyce said.

He grabbed an overnight bag and followed them in with Will by his side. “Wow,” he said as he entered the living room with them. There was a big Christmas tree, fully decorated, with lots of presents underneath, and strings of lights hanging in the dining room. And on the dining table was a full feast set out for them, including a turkey that looked edible and smelled delicious. There was a plate for him too.

He could feel the tears burning the back of his eyes, but he cleared his throat. “Looks good enough to eat, Joyce,” he said, as they took their seats.

“That’s because it is good enough to eat,” Joyce teased. “We got the turkey right this time,” she then admitted.

He laughed with the others and felt the warmth entering his chest. Joyce began telling him about the turkey she had made for Thanksgiving and the others were laughing. He looked up into Will’s knowing eyes and realized, this was home.