Work Text:
“Okay. Okay. It’s okay. It-it’s fine, it’s..just – inhale – deep breath. There, see? You can bounce back! Who cares about dumb ol’ Stacy you know..popularity’s so overrated anyway! And all those other girls, pssh, who needs em? I’m sure if one of them hadn’t already had a date, you would’ve been picked! Yeah..it’s fine! It’s fine. It’s better then fine..”
As far as pep talks go, Dustin isn’t so sure this one is working. He’s just lucky that no one else was in the boys bathroom with him. Frankly, someone else spying in on him trying to talk himself up and splashing cold water over his eyes to get rid of the red haze, would really be the cherry atop the cake of this whole thing..
He could still hear the dull thrum of the slow-dance music leaking in through the door. It was about to end soon. He sighed, staring down his reflection in the smudged mirror. He came running in here as a refuge after...what happened. He was trying to salvage his ego from where it’d shattered (and not cry in front of everyone either).
It was embarrassing – all his friends had a girl to dance with. Mike with El, Lucas having won over Max, even shy wallflower Will; all of them had scored tonight. And what did he have to show for tonight? Nothing, except a cowards retrieval and a stupid hairdo.
It was one thing, if you’re a nerd who’s got a bunch of equally nerdy friends who all have poor luck with girls. You can feel a bit better about that. But it’s not like that anymore, it seems. Everyone in The Party was getting picked off, leaving him by his own – the toothless freak.
Getting laughed in the face and rejected was one thing – and then losing out on getting the girl too. It wasn’t anything against Lucas; he was one of the best friends you could ask for, and Dustin knew he’d treat Max right. But...was he really that detested?
Doomed to be a lonely freak forever.
Dustin furiously scrubbed his sleeve over his stinging eyes. C’mon now – buck up. That’s what his mom always said when he was small, a gentle encouragement whenever he fell and scrapped his knee or had a nightmare. The night wasn’t over yet, and he guessed he could still have fun with his friends.
I’m definitely not helping my image by hiding away in here.
It was settled then. Dustin stood back up and cleared his throat. Straightened out his suit coat. Made sure his hair was still in place. Did his best to smile and double-check for any wetness under his eyes.
It’s fine.
When he’d finally opened the swinging door, the slow-dance had ended and the couples had dispersed from the floor. Instead, a more upbeat bop played and friend groups of Hawkins Middle School milled about. He spotted his at their table, chatting over snacks. It was just Lucas and Max, with El too.
“Hey.” He cleared his throat as be broached, trying to make sure to hide any cracks in his voice “What happened to Mike and Will?”
“Mike went to go help Will with something.” Lucas answered as Dustin sat himself down between him and El “Where’d you go?”
“Bathroom.”
“What, to go pull the twigs out of your hair?” Lucas cracked a grin. Earlier might’ve been funny, but now Dustin wasn’t really in the mood to hear it.
“Screw you.” He grumbled. He decided to turn away, his eyes finding place on his other neighbour, on El beside him.
She looked very different then she normally did. Her hair was styled back, and she wore a nice dress of a pretty blue. She’d dusted make-up around her eyes with a matching blue – where did she learn to do that? Certainly not when Mike did her make-up – and sitting there as she waited for Mike’s return, quietly observing the busying crowd, she looked almost angelic. Her head eventually turned and she caught his gaze, almost surprising him a bit, like he’d been caught leering or something. But El simply smiled back at him in that gentle way she had. He did the same back.
“You look nice El.” He complimented. Her smile grew.
“Thank you, Dustin. You look nice too..” She spoke gently, her smile soon departing as her brow drew together “But..why do you look sad?...”
Dustin froze up. That’s something he forgot – there was no hiding anything from El. She caught every detail meticulously. As he floundered on an answer, Lucas and Max caught into the conversation, prompting Lucas to ask.
“I thought I saw you try to go ask out Stacy or some insane idea?”
Dustin sighed. So much for wanting to keep this a secret. He chewed on his tongue, all his friends eyes on him which definitely wasn’t helping anything. What was the least...pathetic way, to explain this?
“I think I know what happened..” Max muttered then, eyes narrowing across the dance floor. They all followed her gaze – finding Stacy nestled in with her friends off of the court. They were snickering amungst themselves, with Stacy herself pointing out some other nerdy kid with limbs far too twig-like to be trying the dance he was not-so-elegantly performing. Dustin watched at his table, his friend’s glances become glares once they realized, and even El, who was abit behind on picking up on ques, was furrowing her brow at these heavily make-up’d girls for the cruelty she could easily read in their laughter.
Dustin quickly looked away. Lucas turned to his friend, sympathy written all over.
“Hey, man, don’t worry about it – you’re way too cool for that airhead stuck-up anyway.”
“Pretty sure you have three times the amount of braincells for the half-of-one she has.” Max tacked on. Dustin just shrugged. Maybe they’re right, but, it still would’ve been nice to dance with a pretty popular girl..
“Yeah, whatever..”
El, however, was still glaring out at the dancefloor. This wasn’t sitting well with her. She swung her head back at Dustin.
“She didn’t want to dance with you? Why?”
Dustin let his head fall back in defeat. He knew his friends meant well, but how many times was he going to be forced to relive his embarrassment through constant questioning? Frustrated, he blurted out,
“I dunno – maybe because I’m a toothless freak who’s probably going to die alone before any girl would be willingly seen with me?? That’s probably why all them laughed or walked away!”
“Dustin man, don’t say that –”
“Don’t bullshit me Lucas, you already got a date!”
“Exactly, so you will too!”
“Yeah, and, to be fair Dustin, stalker here clearly, barely made it through a sentence to ask me to dance, so..”
“When did this become about me?”
Dustin simply sighed again. He stared back out at the gymnasium, back to pretty, perfect Stacy, and all the other giggling girls hanging off her shoulder. Trying not to think about how happy Max looked dancing with Lucas. Really, who had he been kidding in the first place?
“I’m just a socially low-bar freak, I guess.” He muttered, the pod of popular kids laughing away amungst themselves “Just gunna have to fess up to reality..”
The other girls, Stacy included, continued to giggle away, unaware of the fragile emotions they’d stomped all over, and Dustin felt as though his only lot in life was to just stare from the side-lines, always second best –
There was a sudden, girlish shriek. Dustin’s eyes went wide when out of nowhere, Stacy’s punch cup she’d been so innocently holding jumped up in the air, sending the bright red cough-medicine like liquid splattering all down her dress. All the clingers-on flew back wide-eyed, looking just as flabbergasted as Stacy was as she cried out at the massive red stain that’d no doubt ruined her dress for the evening,
“It..it just flew out of my hand!!!”
Dustin, as well as Lucas and Max, couldn’t believe the sight, at the total improbability...and then Dustin started grinning. Like a slow reveal, he moved his head just to the right – and found El slyly wiping her hand under her nose. Lucas started smiling too, Max, beside him excitedly whispering did she do that?? in his ear as he nodded back. With Stacy running off in tears, El casually hid away any evidence and simply turned back to her friends – catching Dustin’s gaze again, and letting loose a small smile.
Dustin’s grin grew.
He really did have the coolest friend in the world.
Then, El did something not-so-like her shy nature. She abruptly stood up from the table and her pale hand grabbed his wrist, smiling back in assurance at his confusion.
“They’re mouthbreathers.” She declared “I’ll dance with you.”
Dustin didn’t have a much of a choice, suddenly tugged up from his chair. It wasn’t a slow sway this time; instead, everyone was dancing around in glee to a playful Wham! song. El led Dustin to the edge of the pool of kids, skittering to a stop. They stood there for just a second, staring at one another, a little unsure of how to take this forward. Dustin flicked his eyes to the crowd, to their peers just tossing themselves to the beat in abandon, twirling each other around. He started to smile, an idea growing.
This time, he reached in, gently grasping El’s hand. Quick enough to be snappy but not too much to startle the timid girl, he twirled El around in a perfect, playful circle, watching the bottom of her baby blue dress flare out. Just faintly, he could hear her quiet gasp under George Michael’s voice – but, when she made the circle around, he saw her giggling.
He made El laugh. The blooming pride had Dustin grinning back; you hardly ever saw anything more then a sad nervousness on her. She just looked so happy in that moment.
Excited, Dustin shouted ‘watch this!’ – still holding onto her hand, he extended out their arms, only to twirl her around again so she’d spin into him, bumping into his shoulder. She started giggling again, her nose scrunching up. Dustin couldn’t help laughing too, the noise contagious.
That was all it took. The two friends starting spinning and jumping around each other – El reaching up on her toes to spin Dustin around this time, careening around so hard they had to not laugh when they bumped into other people, with Dustin only faintly aware of onlookers leering at them in confusion ( was that girl actually dancing with Dustin Henderson?). It was way more fun then he would’ve ever had dancing with Stacy or any of those other girls. He knew for sure, he wouldn’t be trying to regain control over his breath through his laughter as El leaned her forehead into his shoulder to stifle her own.
“..Seriously, though, El..” Dustin started as they both calmed back down, finding her soft brown eyes “You don’t..have to do this if you really don’t want to..or you, like, want to go wait for Mike or something..”
“..You’re my friend.” El furrowed, questioning why he would even bring it up “I want to dance together.”
Dustin was so surprised at her earnesty, that he honestly didn’t have a reaction. But when El nervously held up her hand and asked if he could spin her around again, Dustin broke out into another grin.
Looks like he wasn’t picked last after all.
They continued to dance around, making each other laugh. Soon, Lucas and Max came up to join in on the party, laughter spread around at the simple, honest fun shared together, even if they looked a bit ridiculous. Lucas and Max rolled their eyes at Dustin’s attempt at the moonwalk, but El just giggled at the silliness – and that was the most important part to Dustin.
The night did eventually have to come to an end. This time, his mom was coming to pick him up, and he waited patiently for the old car to roll up into the parking lot – the music gone, the lights dimmed, and parents milling around as they took their kids home. When Dustin slid into the front seat, his mom immediately had to ask,
Did you have fun tonight honey?
Dustin sat back with a deep breath, and then a smile, thinking about how when Mike offered to walk El back to where Hopper was waiting for her, she gave him a wave goodbye.
Eat your heart out, Stacy. An actual, live supergirl wanted to dance with me.