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Jonathan had to direct Argyle around two different detours on the way into Hawkins; the increased traffic was a small annoyance next to the question of what made each neighborhood off limits. The highway around town and the main streets were gridlocked with fleeing cars, while the suburban roads were as blocked with toppled trees and power lines simply missing pavement.
The yellow house at the corner of Maple was bisected into a sink hole, and the one next to it dark and abandoned. The one next to that had a half-packed truck in front of it and an old couple crying as they filled it with boxes.
Jonathan hadn't picked up his camera since their first day in Lenora - since he'd taken a few directed shots of Will and El decorating their rooms that hadn't filled the roll - but the framing caught his eye. The clean window boxes of the house next to the destruction of the tree crushing the roof; the carefully planted garden crushed under a recently forged path; the elderly couple who had thought their future was certain, now heading into the unknown.
A picture of loss, and Jonathan craned his neck to see it from every angle until Mike signaled their arrival by way of opening the back door before Argyle had stopped.
The Wheeler house looked almost untouched, framed in cracked pavement and downed trees and surrounded with cars. The garage door was up, but Mr. Wheeler's sedan was blocked in by the station wagon in the driveway, and parked like shit in front of the crooked curb sat a filthy BMW with the trunk open.
It was so reminiscent of when Jonathan left, his own car packed - a picture of loss - but the metaphor had been turned literal. Obvious, a red pen might smear across the portfolio Jonathan had stopped working on.
Mrs. Wheeler ran out of the house to pull Mike into a tight hold, and Nancy walked a step behind.
Jonathan jumped out of the van himself, eager for the deja vu. Last October he'd left town fearful that he'd never fit again with what he was leaving behind; he only had more doubt now, but it was overpowered by far more mortal fears.
Nancy still fit in his arms, solid in the middle of the chaos.
He could still wrap both arms around her waist, his hands clutching his own forearms to hold her tighter, even as their ribs pushed into each other with each breath.
There were a million questions he didn't want to know the answer to: how had 001 done so much damage to Hawkins? What had Nancy had to fight? What happened to all of Will's friends, to all of their friends? Where was everyone and and how hurt were they?
If he asked any of them though, the answers would be real.
"Have you been driving all week?" Nancy asked, brave enough to leave the bubble of safety he wished actually existed in their silence. "We tried to call..."
"The lab came for El," he said, and Nancy jerked back and whipped her head around to look at everyone else leaving the van, relaxing minutely when she saw El and Will a few steps behind where Mike was still being fussed over by Mrs. Wheeler.
She took a half step toward them, but Jonathan's attention went to her other side, to the street and the car that looked like it could leave at any time.
Steve looked down before Jonathan could catch his eye, folding himself over to push at the boxes in his trunk as though making room. He peeked up at Jonathan from under his fringe, and flushed when he realized Jonathan hadn't looked away.
The day Jonathan and his family left Hawkins, Steve had been scheduled for his first shift at the Family Video, and for weeks before their conversations had been stilted, and time together fleeting or overcrowded with their younger siblings. Unsure where they stood after Steve had graduated and Jonathan and Nancy started working together - wondering if he'd be leaving town, or what would happen when they did. They never got a goodbye, just another slow motion break up that Jonathan had decided he didn't want to follow through with any more.
Steve's eyes widened as Jonathan strode over, and he straightened to his full height. It made Jonathan have to look up at him, made the bruising around his neck stand out. "Hey man," Steve said. "Welcome back. It's- uh, good to see you. Are you alr-"
Jonathan threw his arms around the taller boy's back.
"I've really missed you, man," he said as loudly as he could into Steve's chest. Steve's arms came up slowly and rested gently around Jonathan's shoulders, and then he exhaled and the weight seemed to make them both sink into the newly softened earth.
"Yeah, me too." Steve's voice was deeper than Jonathan remembered, a little scratchy, and he could feel the padding of bandages under his shirt. "Nance said she couldn't get through on phone. Everything okay?"
"It was whole thing with Dr. Owens but it's fine. We can catch up with that later I just- but well, I mean you might have helped with Will and Mike, they kept ganging up on me."
"Fat chance; Mike doesn't listen to anyone." Steve smiled with the corner of his mouth, his eyes flitting behind Jonathan and back toward his chin. Jonathan wanted to follow when he broke their hug, but the way Steve sat on the edge of his car meant he wasn't leaving yet.
Jonathan sat next to him, the warmth of their touching thighs helping him melt into the seat.
"I'm sorry I wasn't here," he said quietly. "I've missed a lot more than just this week's calls. I wish we had all been here, or you all in van. Just, not split up. With you and Nance here alone, I just-"
"What about me and Steve?" She marched with her arms wrapped around her elbows, and her big eyes bored into where Steve and Jonathan were touching as though trying to pin them together.
"We were lost without you, Byers," Steve knocked their shoulders together. "Nancy doesn't take me seriously at all. She and Dustin ganged up on me, too. I told her, didn't I Nance, I said I wished Jonathan were here about a dozen times."
"I take you seriously." Nancy stepped closer, standing right in front of their touching knees. "We did- you were amazing Steve. I couldn't have got through anything without you."
That could have hurt, but Steve sounded so soft when he answered, "You'll never have to, Nance."
Jonathan looked down at his feet, and Steve's next to them, and Nancy's in front. He felt warm. They had been okay without him, but they were also still next to him now for some reason.
"And this week has sucked," Nancy said quickly. "But I mean, if El was danger- Jonathan that's important."
"Shit," Steve muttered. "Your family has the worst luck, I'm so sorry for...whatever happened. I'm glad you all made it back here."
"Me too," Jonathan emphasized. "We're home now."
"Sure, it just looks like shit."
Jonathan quirked his lips and peeked at Nancy quickly where she was still holding herself together, and barely back from crawling over to join them on the beamer. Steve's feet were tapping in the air, and Jonathan knocked them back, absolutely sure of what was going through his mind for the first time in months.
"Nah, you look great," he said. "It's kind of weird that bruises never make you look like shit, actually. Just like a badass."
Nancy fell forward and caught herself on the toes as she giggled. Steve leaned far back enough to give Jonathan a searching look. "Damn, Byers, that was kind of smooth."
"I had a really long drive to think about you two. You're home, you know. Hawkins is..." in pieces in the rear view mirror, even when he was in it. He hadn't been a part of Hawkins when he lived in Hawkins. He was a Byers: his mother's son and his siblings' brother - in Hawkins or Lenora or middle-of-no-where Nevada. He hadn't chosen any of it, it was simply part of him.
But Nancy had been a part of Jonathan since she'd burned the Mind Flayer out of Will, if not when she'd sliced her hand open to summon the Demogorgon into his living room. Jonathan hadn't let it happen at first, like he hadn't let Steve become a part of Jonathan when he picked up Nancy's nailbat and saved their lives.
His family was a part of him in a way Hawkins wasn't, in a way Nancy and Steve weren't.
But he wanted them to be.