Chapter Text
Hawkins 1987. Monday, September 7th.
The day was chill. First day of school, the first day of his junior year. As he crossed the lobby door, his mind changed into school thinking. Chance knows this time he needs to concentrate more on his studies to collect credits for the university; next year will be worse, so as not to disappoint his parents, he needs to get the grades up. Last year was not his best one; he can admit it. If he wants to get that sports scholarship, he needs to focus on both sides, not only on basketball; that's what his dad would say, he can hear the preaching already.
He was acting on full automatic mode, lost in his thoughts. He walked to his locker next to Andy's, who was already talking to the others. He silently raised one hand at all of them in a form of salutation, he dont need to say a word to them; they already seen each other a few days ago. He opened the locker and ordered his stuff in full silence when someone talked beside him.
"Guess what we discovered just now?" Jessica says, the now subcaptain of the cheerleaders, and one of the only two girls who form part of their "jocks group". All heads turn to face her, expecting.
"Zombie boy is returning to Hawkins today." Amber appeared behind her, cutting Jessica mid-sentence, gaining an "hey, I wanted to say it" from the other girl.
"No way, I almost forgot about that freak. Why would he give up on the tanned skin and come back to this shithole?" James says, creating a full conversation in the group about it. Chance suddenly snapped out and paid attention. He frowned, curious.
"Who is... Zombie Boy?" he broke out in the middle of the group. There was a silence "Oh yes, you get here just when he left," Amber says, "So basically this guy's name is Will Byers, a few years ago he disappeared for a week, they even found his dead body in the quarry, there was a funeral and all that stuff in his honor, and out of nowhere he appeared, alive! like nothing happened. Hence the name."
For Chance, that sounds... odd to believe, but anyway, Hawkins is a really strange place, so he chose to call it true. "Like Jesus?" He joke.
"But if you make him a fuckin weirdo." Jason interrupts. Chance's head tilted as he was questioning why he said that.
"He is or was a friend of the dn&d guys" Andy answered his mute question.
Oh, the guys they have been bullying since last year, he recalled in his mind.
"You know, there was another rumour of him, but it was very little talked about, but still present." Jessica dragged her words, "Nuh uh, that one is disrespectful." Amber interrups.
"But it can be thruth you know? He always rejects the girls." "Yeah, but you also never saw him with boys." The girls begin a whisper dialogue that is difficult for him to understand.
"What rumour?" He dares to ask; he knows a guy can't be this nosy, it looks bad, but he is gonna blame that on his mother.
"Basically that he is a cocksucker" Andy answered him, again.
"That sounds rude Andy" Amber says. The guy just shrugged "Is the thruth"
That pricks into Chance's mind a little bit; he never knew people like that, or heard about them close to him. Only what others say about it. Sin. Disgusting. Unnatural. Contagious like a plague.
His face grimaced, and he took a mental note. He didn't even know Will Byers, but he doesn't want to be too close to him anyway. Be true or not, the guy is a freak too, and that, in his friend group language, is almost the same.
He was laughing at some lame joke when the hallway door opened with a loud metallic creak, cutting through the chatter like a knife.
At first, nobody paid attention. Students were still pouring in, voices overlapping, lockers slamming. But then the noise… shifted. It wasn’t silence exactly—more like a stutter, a pause in the rhythm of Hawkins High.
Chance noticed it before he understood it.
Heads turned. Conversations trailed off mid-sentence. Someone let out a low whistle, quickly shushed by a sharp elbow.
“Holy shit,” James muttered.
Chance followed their line of sight without thinking.
Will Byers stepped inside. And also a girl besides him, but he didn't pay enough attention to her, his (and he dare to say everybody) gaze was on the guy.
For a second, Chance didn’t connect the name to the body. This wasn’t the sickly, half-dead kid they had just been talking about. This boy walked as if he belonged there—shoulders straighter, steps steady. He’d grown. Filled out. His skin was darker, kissed by a summer Hawkins never seemed to give. The bowl cut was gone, replaced by messy waves that brushed his forehead like they didn’t care about rules.
He was… different.
Too different from what he was expecting.
Chance’s throat tightened, his breath catching in a way that made no sense. His eyes dragged over details he didn’t ask to notice—the way that t-shirt clung to his arms, how his jeans sat low on his hips, that guy definetly do exercise because he has a huge...
“Zombie boy?” Amber whispered, disbelief sharp in her voice.
“No fuckin’ way,” Andy said. “That’s him?”
Something twisted. Low. Uncomfortable.
He looked away too fast, heat crawling up his neck. His body reacted before his brain could catch up, a traitorous flutter under his ribs that made his stomach drop.
What the hell was that?
Chance swallowed. His locker suddenly felt too small, the hallway too warm. He forced a laugh that didn’t quite land. “Doesn’t look half-dead to me.”
No one answered him.
Will walked past their group, didn’t look at them. Not once. And that somehow made it worse.
Chance stood there, frozen, pulse loud in his ears.
He watched Will disappear down the hallway anyway.
Chance didn’t follow him—but the image lingered, unwelcome and impossible to shake.
At noon. The bell rang, sharp enough to cut through the strange heaviness that had settled over the hallway. Chance followed the crowd toward the cafeteria, shaking the feeling off his shoulders. The first day was always weird. Too many people, too much noise.
The cafeteria was already loud when he sat down at his usual table by the windows. He dropped his tray in front of him and stared at it for a second, trying to remember when he’d stopped feeling hungry.
Then he saw him again.
Will Byers sat a few tables away with the group of freaks. "So he is still their friend, huh?" he thought. He looked different up close—healthier, steadier. Comfortable in his own skin in a way that made Chance inexplicably uneasy. Will listened as someone talked, chin resting in his hand, eyes bright with interest. Everybody at that table looked happy to be with him for some reason.
Chance frowned, confused by the sudden tension pulling tight across his chest.
Will laughed, quick and genuine, and something in Chance’s body reacted before his mind could catch up. His breath stuttered. Heat crept up his neck. He shifted in his seat, annoyed, unsettled, his fingers tightening around the edge of the table.
What the hell was that?
“Hey,” Andy said, nudging him. “You okay?”
Chance blinked, eyes snapping down to his tray. “Yeah,” he muttered, grabbing a fry and chewing without tasting it.
When he glanced back up, he was gone.
The space he’d occupied was empty, unremarkable. The noise of the cafeteria rushed back in all at once. Slowly, Chance felt his shoulders loosen, the strange pressure in his chest easing without explanation.
He sat there for a moment, unsettled by how easily it faded.
He didn’t understand what had just happened.
And that bothered him more than anything else.