CHAPTER 3
THE POLLYWOG

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   It wasn't Laurel's idea to talk with Nancy the next school day in the parking lot about having to take her drunken body home from an awful Halloween party, but there she was, sitting on the front of Jonathan's car at lunch time with Nancy.

"So...he asked you to take me home?" Nancy asked. Laurel didn't want to admit it, but she liked how Nancy looked today. Maybe it was her short curls, or her woven turtleneck sweater, but she couldn't help but feels her heart beat fast whenever Nancy glanced her way. And right now she was staring right at her, expecting a response.

Well, he didn't really ask, but Laurel didn't want to seem like she suggested it. "Yeah, he was upset, I guess..." Laurel mumbled, shrugging her shoulders and biting into her sandwich. "He was really upset." Laurel was so shocked about it because Steve Harrington wasn't one to show his other side of emotions, but she wasn't going to insult him like that in front of his sort of girlfriend.

Nancy glanced to her shoes, and Laurel could tell she was feeling guilty for what she said to Steve, which Nancy explained just a few minutes ago. "But he was still worried about you," Laurel attempted to assure, but Nancy wasn't feeling it. "Hey, cut yourself some slack, okay? People say stupid things when they're drunk, especially things they don't mean."

She wasn't sure exactly why she was helping her relationship with Steve. Maybe if she somehow turned Nancy against Steve she would lean more towards Laurel again, but she wasn't that cruel, and she wasn't that type of person. She was definitely the person to avoid confronting her personal problems at all cost unless someone else besides her brought them up, and quite honestly that was one of the reasons why she hadn't brought up their kiss from last year whatsoever, even if her getting back together with Steve broke her heart more than she could've possibly imagined.

But this was a new year, and a new Laurel. Anything could happen, really.

"Yeah, but that's the thing. What if I did mean it? All this time I've been trying so hard to pretend like everything's fine, but it's not." As Nancy continued confessing her thoughts, Laurel's heart ached at her last words. Pretending like everything was fine when it very well wasn't was the whole structure of Nancy and Laurel's relationship since that December night when she got her heart broken and avoided confronting Nancy about it. "I feel like there's this...I don't know, like this..."

"Like there's this weight you're carrying around with you, all the time," Laurel finished, not being able to avoid Nancy's gaze any longer, as if she wanted Nancy to be able to read in between the lines or through her eyes what she really meant. "I feel it too."

Just hear me. Listen to me. Don't you understand what weight I've been carrying Nancy? She screamed at her through her thoughts, as if Nancy could mind read, but of course that was only fiction.

"Yeah but it's different for you, Will came home," Nancy replied, making Laurel's shoulders slump slightly.

"I wasn't talking about Will," she managed out, feeling her voice falter at the end as her gaze fell to the ground in defeat; her anxiety had won again. She could feel Nancy's confused yet hurt gaze upon her, but she couldn't let herself look.

"But with Will, he's not the same," Laurel tried to change the subject, "I try to be there for him, and help him when he needs it, but...I don't know..." Laurel took a deep breath, looking out into the busy parking lot. "Maybe things just can't go back to the way they were."

Maybe her and Nancy would be stuck in this limbo of their relationship forever, where Laurel would constantly feel like she was drowning, begging for air, begging to tell her everything, but she didn't want to be selfish when Nancy had no intention for a romantic relationship.

"Doesn't that make you mad?" Nancy exclaimed.

Yeah, you just explained my whole life story, she wanted to say, but she kept her mouth shut.

When Laurel didn't answer, Nancy continued. "Mad that those...those people who did this, who ruined so many lives, they just get away with it."

Laurel finally met her gaze for a moment with a shrug. "The people responsible for this are dead."

"Do you really believe that?" Nancy said, leaning forward slightly and making Laurel almost choke on her own saliva at the close proximity. Laurel quickly glanced away, finishing her sandwich.

As she cleaned up her space, Nancy suddenly spoke up, "Your mom's boyfriend...he works at RadioShack, right?"

"Yeah...why?" Laurel responded, glancing at her quizzically.

Nancy glanced away, the gears turning in her head by the looks of it. "What are you thinking?" Laurel repeated.

Nancy then returned the gaze. "Do you wanna skip fourth period?"

Whatever she had planned was a distraction of the distance between them, so Laurel nodded in agreement.

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After an awkward encounter with Nancy's mother and sneaking up to Nancy's room, they had a plan to see if these people really were dead. Nancy called Barb's parents, her mother picking up, and she told Barb's mother that she had something to tell her about her daughter. If these people really were still around, they'd be on the phone lines right now listening in, and Nancy and Laurel bet they didn't want information about their experiments with the upside down spreading around town, so if they truly were dead they'd try to sabotage this meet up the following day.

Jonathan had dropped them off and waited in the car for Laurel, since they were now heading home. School was over, and all Laurel wanted to do was head home and read.

"So...was Nancy doing better today?" Jonathan asked, sitting beside Laurel and driving them home. Luckily Laurel was supposed to receive her license any day now, so she wouldn't have to ask Jonathan to drive her everywhere.

Laurel shrugged, cringing at the itchiness on her side. She began scratching of course, which Jonathan would always tell her to stop doing or else it would make it worse. "Yeah, just feeling guilty. She thinks she may have meant what she said to him."

Jonathan nodded, glancing over worriedly. "Your scar hurting you again?"

Laurel scoffed. "It's not a scar, it's still a wound. And...yeah, a bit." She didn't want to admit to feeling more than under the weather, or else he'd just be more worried than she was.

He shook his head, directing his attention to the road in front of him. "You got any more of your book finished?"

Laurel nodded, breathing slowly to combat her sudden dizziness. "Yeah...wrote a bit this weekend but-"

She couldn't help the sudden loud grunt of pain that came from her lips, as her year old wound suddenly burned ferociously, pain trailing over her skin. She could barely feel the itchiness now with all the pain.

"Laurel?! What the hell are you okay?" Jonathan yelled, pulling over to the side and lifting up her shirt.

Under the bandage that was usually changed each month was a dark red stain, nearly black, meaning it had opened. But when he took off the bandage, the slash looked inflamed, inside of the slash being a dark black wound. It was't oozing anything out of it, only a bit of blood, but it definitely looked painful. Laurel's screams of pain continued as Jonathan noticed her paling skin burning up.

Laurel wasn't sure what was happening, as the pain was conflicting with any other perception of the world around her, but she could feel a darkness seeping all around her. But she wasn't herself, she was somebody else, someone smaller, someone she knew.

She could feel Will choking as if it was herself, her screams coming out barely audible now as she begged for air, clawing at her throat. Jonathan was almost in tears, slamming on the gas pedal to head to the hospital.

And as fast as it all happened, everything stopped within a blink of an eye.

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oH woOw things are getting a bit hEctic

hmm wonder what's happening to laurel 🤔🤔🤔 read more to find out ;)