Chapter Text
The final bell rang, sharp and shrill against November’s cool afternoon breeze.
Kids flooded out of the middle school in loud, messy waves. Buses idle along the sidewalks, other highschool students with driver licenses stand by their cars as they talk to their friends about this and that.
But not Billy.
Billy’s waiting by the Camaro, one boot propped against the bumper, hands in the pockets of his denim jacket, eyes tracking faces out of habit more than patience.
A group of girls giggle to themselves when they walk past him, Billy pays no attention to them. He’s too busy glancing down at his watch, knowing that Max should’ve been out by now.
He’s told her more times than he can count about her being late but she has an excuse everytime.
”My teacher asked me to stay behind. I had to get supplies for a class project. Or that her locker wouldn’t open so she had to track down the janitor to help.”
And no matter how many times Billy had threaten that she would be skating home next time, she still continued to be one of the last kids out.
He checks the entrance again, then the side doors.
No loud redhead.
No skateboard cutting through the crowd.
He had a sneaking suspicion that her ‘new friends’ or as he liked to call them, the Brat Pact, were the reason why she was so late everyday this week.
Well, today he wasn’t going to listen to some new excuse she managed to come up with. No. His eyes narrow in on the main entrance, and he pushes off the car and heads toward the building.
He wanders the halls, they’re mostly empty, even the classrooms. Hardly any teachers since most of them are out helping direct after school traffic. Just as he passes by Max’s last class for the day does he hear it, shouting and boyish laughter. He stops, listening and soon enough follows the sound of voices.
And finds them near the lockers by the side hall—five boys crowding too close. Max stands with her friends, skateboard hugged to her chest, chin lifted like she’s daring someone to try her.
“Leave us alone,” Max snaps.
One of the boys laughs. “Or what?”
“Don’t suppose your friend with ‘magical powers’ is back in town, is she?” another taunts. The group cracked up—still unaware Billy was closing the distance.
Lucas noticed first. Then Dustin. Will. Mike. The way they all went stiff, eyes going wide as they noticed him closing in.
Billy doesn’t raise his voice.
He simply grabs the loudest one, the leader, by the collar and slamming his back into the lockers. Metal rattling down the hall.
The hallway goes dead quiet.
Billy leans in, close enough that the kid can smell the cigarette smoke and car grease on his jacket. “You so much as look at her again,” Billy says calmly, pointing to Max, “and we’re gonna have a problem.”
He flicks his gaze to the other boys. “All of you.”
No one argues.
Billy lets go and the kid scrambles to get away from underneath Billy’s towering form.
They all bolt down the hall without another word said.
Billy watches them disappear before turning back around.
He doesn’t say anything—just looks at Max’s friends one by one. Lucas. Dustin. Will. Mike. All standing. All breathing.
He steps forward. The boys instinctively back up—all except Max.
Billy reaches for her hand. “What did I tell you about bein’ late?” he says, already steering her toward the exit.
“I wasn’t—Billy! Wait,” Max protests, trying to keep up.
He doesn’t slow down until they reach the parking lot.
Then he lifts her—quick, easy—and sets her on the hood of the Camaro.
“Hey!” she yelps.
“Sit still,” The tone told her he wasn’t messing around.
She stares at him like he’s grown another head as he checks her over, methodical—arms, knees, wrists, face.
His thumb pauses at a faint red mark on her shoulder just barely hiding underneath the sleeve of her shirt.
“What happened?” He asks.
“I’m okay,” Max mutters, embarrassed.
Billy meets her eyes, “What happened?” He repeats.
She sighs, fiddling with the duct tape on the deck of her skateboard, where he had broken it when she had lied to him about Lucas. She doesn’t ride it as often as she used to, scared it’ll break on her mid skate.
“I whacked one of them with my board to get them to back off of the boys and they shoved me back into the wall—said he wasn’t gonna take it easy on me ‘cause I’m a girl.”
Billy's body went rigid, “Who did it?”
She stares down at her skateboard in her lap, remaining tight lipped.
He grinds his teeth at her unwillingness to give him a name, it’s fine though, he has a good memory.
“Yeah, well—.” He exhales. “A little shitbird like you should know better than to start fights you know you can’t win.”
“I wasn’t afraid of him and I’m okay, so what does it matter,” she says, shrugging it off.
“You’re okay now,” Billy corrects. “Next time, you and your ‘friends’,” he rolls his eyes when he says the word, “need to kick ’em in the balls and you need to skate like hell outta there.”
She blinks at him, “What?”
“I’m serious, you guys are lucky I showed up in time.” He leans back once he’s satisfied with that one spot being the only mark she has.
She rolls her eyes, “You’re insane,” She whispers.
“Yeah, I am,” Billy says unbothered, “Because it’ll be on my ass if you come home all busted up so you’re not getting hurt on my watch.”
Something in her expression shifts as she looks up at him. She opens her mouth like she’s about to say something–
At that moment, a familiar rumble pulls their attention. Steve’s car rolls up to the main entrance of the middle school just as Lucas, Dustin, Will, and Mike are coming out, talking over themselves.
The boys are almost ecstatic as they pile into ‘The Harrington Beamer’.
Billy sees Steve’s eyebrow arch, looking half-amused or half-impressed by what they’re saying, no doubt about what just took place inside. Then he’s glancing over toward Billy and Max across the parking lot.
Billy straightens as Steve’s gaze settles on him he grabs Max off the hood and puts her on her feet with less fanfare. “Come on, we gotta go.” He says as he rounds the hood of the car, opening the driver side door without looking back.
She grabs her board, follows him into the car without another word.
Billy starts the engine.
Max is brushing a strand of hair from her face, staring out the window towards Steve’s car.
Billy grips the wheel, expression unreadable.
“You’re sure you’re okay?” he checks.
When she doesn’t answer right away, he knows she can feel his eyes on her. “I’m not asking again.”
“I’m sure,” she answers.
“Good,” he grumbles out and peels out of the parking lot.
___
Billy doesn’t say anything about it the next day.
He just shows up.
Max is stuffing her math book into her locker when she feels it first, the shift in the air. The hallway is loud – lockers slamming, sneakers squeaking against tile, kids shouting over each other in the usual end-of-day chaos.
She’s half-expecting it now — the comments, the shove, the boyish laughter that comes a little too sharp.
She’s bracing for it.
Instead, there’s silence behind her.
Not empty silence. Occupied.
She turns her head.
Billy is leaning against the lockers a few feet down, arms crossed, boots planted wide like he owns the place. He looks bored. Dangerous in that lazy way of his, eyes sweeping the hallway.
He doesn’t look at her.
He looks at everyone else.
Max blinks, her fingers still on the locker handle slack.
“Holy shit,” Dustin whispers from beside her as he and Lucas join her. “What’s Billy doing here?”
Billy finally glances over at them, sharp and warning. Dustin shuts up instantly. Before Billy goes back to watching the hall.
Mike and Will make it over a moment later, both of them clocking Billy and not quite sure what to do with the sight of him here.
“He’s not leaving.” Lucas says after a beat, watching Billy carefully.
Max swallows. “He never does.”
That’s when the group of boys who’d been harassing them all week come out of a classroom together. They see Billy almost immediately. Conversations die mid-sentence.
Billy, doesn’t move toward them.
He just stares.
It’s different, his anger— not loud, not explosive.
Controlled.
The boy who usually leads them, the one that Max had hit with her skateboard, nudges the others, muttering something under his breath. Their shoulders tense, then all slowly veer off toward the side hallway exit instead of coming their way.
That earns looks of surprise from all of them, Max included.
Billy still doesn’t move, he does however finally look over at her, nodding with his head to come on. His patience wearing thin, she’s guessing.
But he doesn’t rush her, doesn’t bark at her to hurry up. He just stays where he is while Max shuts her locker, slings her backpack over her shoulder, and starts walking his way.
He falls in step beside her without comment.
The boys trail close. Not clumped together, not obvious — just near enough. Safe by proximity.
Max notices the way other kids give them a wide berth, the way whispers start and die when Billy’s eyes flick their direction. She rolls her eyes when a couple girls blush and whisper as they pass.
“Your brother’s still kinda terrifying,” Dustin says, reverent.
“Quit walkin’ so close,” Billy grunts.
Dustin immediately falls two steps back.
Lucas doesn’t.
Neither does Mike or Will.
And if Billy notices, he doesn’t say.
Steve Harrington is waiting, leaning against the rail at the end of the main entrance steps, keys twirling around his finger. He looks up when he sees them, eyebrows shooting up.
“Dude,” Steve says, half a laugh. “You’re going inside now?”
Billy doesn’t slow. “Nah.”
“Just waiting then? For—” Steve glances at Max. Pauses.
Billy stops walking.
Looks at Steve properly for the first time.“For her,” he says flatly. “Thought it was your children making her so late this week.”
Steve blinks.
Billy’s mouth twitches, not quite a smirk. “Turns out it’s not.”
He flicks a glance back toward the building—“And now,” Billy adds, already moving again, “it won’t be.”
Something shifts in Steve’s expression. Not judgment. Just quiet understanding. He nods once, stepping aside to let them pass.
After a short good-bye to the boys, Max walks a little closer to Billy without meaning to.
He notices. And doesn’t comment. Just adjusts his stride.
It happens the next day and the day after. He kept showing up, waiting for her, then together they walk out, boys included even if they’re still a little standoff. And by the time they reach the Camaro, Max realizes something that sits heavy and strange in her chest:
Billy isn’t hovering.
He’s guarding.
Billy doesn’t wait for anyone to thank him.
He never does.
He just gets in the car and drives.
—
Billy doesn’t mean to stick around.
The arcade is buzzing with its usual Friday after school activity, the parking lot is crowded.
He drops Max off at the curb like always, engine still running, arm slung casually out the open window.
The boys, Mike, Will, Lucas and Dustin come around the corner, walking their bikes to the bike rack by the door.
He’s halfway through telling her not to be late when Lucas looks over—and freezes.
It’s brief. Barely noticeable.
But Billy sees it.
Lucas straightens, shoulders squaring like he’s bracing for something. Dustin nearly crashes into him from behind, “What the hell dude?,” but then his eyes flick to the Camaro, then back to Max. Mike nudges Will, low and urgent.
Billy doesn’t move.
He just watches.
Max catches it too. She pauses with the car door open, glances back at Billy, then at the boys. Something in her posture shifts—not defensive, not apologetic. Just… steady.
“It’s fine,” she says, like she’s reassuring them and herself at the same time. “He’s just dropping me off.”
Billy snorts.
Lucas hesitates, then lets out a breath. “Right. Yeah. Cool.”
Mike and Will agree, nodding along.
There’s a beat.
And then Dustin waves. Awkward. Too enthusiastic. “Uh—hi Billy.”
Billy lifts two fingers off the steering wheel in acknowledgment.
That’s it.
Max shuts the door and jogs over to them, and Billy pulls away without another word once they’re all inside.
It happens again next weekend.
At Steve’s house of all places.
Billy parks crooked in the Harrington driveway, music thumping low as Max jumps out, already halfway to the door. Steve’s standing there with the boys flanking his sides, his hands are shoved into his jacket pockets, eyes flicking from Max to Billy.
The boys don’t scatter this time. They don’t stare. They don’t tense.
They just… exist in his presence as they wait for Max to reach the door.
Steve hesitates.
Then—“Hey, man,” he calls out, casual but careful.
Billy leans out the window. “Harrington.”
Steve nods. Acknowledged.
Once inside, Billy watches Max through the windshield as she drops onto the couch like she belongs there and the boys follow after, showing her what games or movies they’ve got planned that night. She catches him staring before Dustin blocks his view, kid’s arms waving excitedly.
Outside, Billy lingers a second longer than usual, Steve notices.
“She’s good,” Steve says quietly, stepping closer to the car. “We’ve got her.”
Billy studies him for a long moment.
Steve doesn’t withdraw as he stares him down, even holding his gaze.
Then he nods once. “Yeah. I know.”
He drives off.
Catching Steve in the rearview mirror standing in the doorway, watching his car turn out of the driveway before closing the front door behind him.
It becomes normal after that.
Billy’s car pulling up. Max hopping out. The boys glance over, acknowledging him with a nod of their heads—then going back to whatever they were doing. No flinching. No fear. Just awareness.
Almost respect, maybe.
And the next time Billy drops her off, Max doesn’t look back to check if he’s watching.
Because she already knows he is.