November 7, 1983

NOVEMBER WAS IN FULL BLOOM in the small town of Hawkins, Indiana. The colorful October leaves had ceased falling to the earth, their hues of red and orange transitioning into a dull brown, and while unpleasant to look at, served as blankets for children as they frolicked around the town's playgrounds. Empty pumpkin cans left the shelves of Melvald's in exchange for Christmas lights and gift wrapping. The third chemistry test of the year was taunting the sophomores of Hawkins High, forcing them to abandon parties to study periodic tables and energy formulas. Eurydice Reid was neck-deep in planning her annual Thanksgiving dinner, ignoring her husband's pleas to let herself breathe.

        Though nobody knew it yet, the quiet, humble town of Hawkins, Indiana was soon going to ascend to a pedestal it had never been perceived to reach: the national spotlight.

        Perched on a desk chair, bathed in the sunlight streaming through the window of Robin Buckley's bedroom, Amara hastily scribbled down notes about the Plum Pudding model onto her notebook, her earth-colored eyes flicking between it and her textbook. Next to her, Robin was copying her best friend's work, not attempting to hide her inability to understand the subject. It was their routine: every day after school Amara would go home with Robin to complete their homework together and help each other out with the subjects they struggled with. Their sessions were currently being dominated by the upcoming chemistry test. Little did they both know, in a few short hours their routine was about to change drastically.

        "How the hell do you understand this?" Robin asked for what seemed like the millionth time in the year that they had been friends when it came to the subjects Amara thrived in. The defective girl shrugged her shoulders, flipping back to the beginning of her notebook to review her notes on the movement of electrons.

        "It's how my brain's wired, Rob," Amara answered, not looking up from her textbook.

        "But you're so much better than me!"

        "You're better than me in English. Case closed."

        "It's been almost two hours!" Robin gave up the game and tossed her textbook onto the carpeted floor; it landed adjacent to a plethora of sheets with poorly drawn triangles from geometry. The movement caused Amara to finally lift her head from her notes and face her friend. "Can we please do something else?" Robin pleaded.

        Amara glanced at her textbook one last time before snapping it shut, forming a plan in her brain. "If you agree to pass the test with at least an eighty, we can talk about your hopeless crush on Tammy Thompson," she proposed.

        Robin's eyes lit up. "Deal." She pried the textbook from Amara's hands and dumped it onto the floor next to hers. Amara fake pouted, but nevertheless stood up from her chair and plopped onto the bed with Robin.

        Amara Reid and Robin Buckley were no strangers to the world. While brought into it with the promise of hope and prosperity, it was just an American dream that very few managed to achieve. Homelessness was becoming an issue as leaders discussed everything under the sun except providing people with the resources they needed, veterans were being abandoned on the streets of the country they once fought for, the demand for racial justice was being ignored as people instead chose to concern themselves with Soviet Russia... and the LGBTQ+ community and individuals with neurological disorders were still denied basic human rights.

        It was simple for a high school student like Robin to worry herself over a crush, but that it was a crush on a girl meant that she could not rant to anyone about her unreciprocated affections... other than Amara, the girl who needed to keep her autism a secret if she hoped to graduate high school. And while Amara was far too invested in hiding her defect behind closed doors to even concern herself with romance, she understood her friend's struggle. Amara and Robin were two sides of the same coin left to decay in the depths of the ocean, abandoned by society.

        "Do you think she'll ever notice me?" Robin muttered, fiddling with the rings on her fingers.

        Amara reached forward and grasped Robin's hand, turning it over so her palm was facing the ceiling. "Do you want the truth, or do you want me to sugarcoat it?"

        Robin laughed, squeezing Amara's hand in response. While many found Amara's blunt honesty to be aggravating, Robin loved it as much as the other quirks that came with her best friend. Amara sighed in relief; she could never tell when she was about to offend someone, and Robin was the last person in the world she would ever want to hurt.

        "Amara?"

        "Hmm?"

        "You're adorable."

        It was Amara's turn to laugh, the lovely sound filling the small bedroom. From the outside, they appeared to be normal teenagers, laughing over something as simple as love. But it wasn't simple. It was the farthest thing from simple.

        The moment faded along with Robin's smile. "I don't think I'll ever find love," she sighed.

        "Well, the feeling's mutual."

        Robin opened her mouth to respond, but a loud clap of thunder silenced her. They both hadn't realized that the sun had disappeared.

        "I should go," Amara declared, sliding off the bed and collecting her books. One by one, she placed them into her backpack before zipping it up. "See you tomorrow, Robin."

        "Bye 'Mara," Robin said, shooting her best friend the smile she reserved for her. Amara smiled in return and left the room.

IT WAS BEGINNING TO RAIN lightly as Amara pedaled home on her bike, though she could still see several feet ahead of her. She hadn't expected it to storm and therefore had no article of clothing to shield her body from it, but she didn't mind. Her house was only twenty-two blocks away.

        She rode past the cul-de-sac, past the house that belonged to the Wheelers. She'd heard of Nancy Wheeler before, knew that she was becoming popular as a result of her newfound relationship with the King of Hawkins High, Steve Harrington. It was an odd pairing, but it fit the old saying: opposites attract.

        The rain picked up as she pedaled down the stretch of road that broke through the woods, an area she would sometimes venture to when she needed a break from the world. An area she would be visiting again quite soon, but for a very different reason.

        It was almost half past seven by the time Amara reached her house, a cozy dwelling perched on an ample field of grass at the corner of Cherry and Cornwallis. The blue Audi she recognized as her parents' was parked in its usual spot in the driveway, but Kevin's grey Toyota was missing. Odd.

        Eurydice was setting the table as Amara made her way into the dining room, her hair damp but slightly drier than before. She smiled at her daughter as she placed a large bowl of cooked pasta with tomato sauce on the table. Taking off her gloves, she pulled Amara into a hug.

        "Are you okay?" she asked, aware of how damp Amara's clothes were.

        "I'm fine, mom," Amara laughed. "It's just a bit of rain."

        Eurydice pulled away from the hug, but kept her hands planted on her daughter's shoulders. "How's Robin?"

        "Oh, she's wonderful," Amara responded, smiling like she always did at the mention of her best friend. "We're ready to kick that chemistry test in the ass."

        "Language!" Eurydice chastised, but she was grinning, glad that Amara had at least one friend. She knew the challenges her daughter faced when it came to making friends, due to Amara's difficulty with social skills, as well as the fact that society was unaccepting of people with autism and other similar diagnoses.

        Scott Reid entered the room, a copy of the Hawkins Post in his hands. "Hey honey – wait, where's Kevin?"

        "He's never this late," Amara remarked. Their family always had dinner together at 7:30 every weekday, another part of their routine. Another thing Amara would break very soon.

        "Maybe he went to a friend's house," Eurydice suggested as she turned on the sink, rinsing the pot she'd used to cook the pasta.

        "No, that's not like Kevin, he only does that on weekends," Scott reminded them, sitting down at the table while still reading the paper.

        Pushing aside the question of whatever Kevin was doing at the moment, the other three members of the Reid family began to eat, adhering to their normal schedule, one they had developed so Amara would be able to balance her schoolwork with her family life. The rain continued to pound against the slanted surface of their house before sliding through the drainpipe and dripping onto the ground.

        "Did anything new happen at school today?" Scott queried, folding the newspaper and facing his daughter.

        "Nothing really," Amara replied, twirling spaghetti around her fork. "We have that massive chemistry test tomorrow, there's another basketball game soon that I'm not going to attend, and – oh! Nancy Wheeler's now dating Steve Harrington."

        "Oh really?" Eurydice asked incredulously. She had conversed with Nancy's mother, Karen Wheeler, a number of times in the past year. In the circumstances she had run into Nancy, she struck her as poised and studious. She was referred to as the Golden Girl of Hawkins High by many of her peers, not the type to go running around with King Steve.

        "I mean, I don't really pay attention to stuff like that," Amara clarified. "But given that everyone at school is talking about it... "

        The sound of a car pulling into the driveway broke through the conversation. Eurydice immediately left the table and hurried to the door, holding it open for her son as Kevin stumbled into the hallway, his hair sopping from the turbulent rain outside.

        "Where the hell have you been?" Eurydice demanded. "It's almost eight!" she held her watch up for effect, pointing at the short and long hands that together read 7:53.

        Amara was expecting him to say that he'd been goofing off with his friends, or skipped dinner to go on a date, or was even just late as a result of traffic. What she wasn't expecting him to say was –

        "I got held up at Melvald's."

        Melvald's was becoming a thorn in Kevin's side as he had to juggle it with his college life, often skipping parties to work every afternoon, all to provide for their family. He always left the second his hours were up, so why would he stay longer?

        Kevin seemed to register the shock on his family's faces, and so he told them his reason for staying late:

        "Will Byers is missing."

published to quotev: 7/24/20
published to wattpad: 6/2/24

i hate how rusty my writing is here but then again it's from four years ago