Chapter Twenty-One: I Know Places

The next morning, Max met Annie at her place, then they went over to Dustin's. He was coming back from his camp today and the Party wanted to surprise him with El and everyone involved. Annie definitely wanted to be a part of it, considering she liked Dustin second out of the group of boys (Will would probably always be first).

Annie was somewhat shocked at first with Hopper letting El out for this. She's not a prisoner by any means, but he's overly protective. It's nice she's out today, even if it's just at Dustin's house.

Speaking of... "Do we know when he's gonna get here?" Annie asked over Dustin's calls on the radio. She felt bad ignoring the poor guy, but then the 'surprise' wouldn't be much of one.

Mike shrugged. "Any minute now. We've gotta be ready to see his mom's car pull up and then immediately hide."

A few moment later, Will, who was on lookout, turned to the group. "They're here!" They all hid and soon after, an angry Dustin stormed through the door straight to his room. So far, they were in the clear.

"All right El, let's do this," Mike whispered. She nodded and closed her eyes. As blood started to carefully trickle from her nose, the Party could hear the toys and robots starting to mosey down the hallway and make noise.

Annie did her best to hold in her chuckles as she saw Dustin talking to himself, following the line of figures moving down the hall. She turned and smiled at Max, then leaned forward just a tad to look at the rest of the group. He was almost in position.

"Now." Mike's whispered word ended the noises and the group grabbed the poster to get in their own position.

They all quietly walked behind him, Lucas holding the poster in the front, and Max counted them all down to blow their party noise makers.

The second they did, Dustin turned around, screaming, and sprayed hairspray in the unsuspecting boy's eyes.

El jumped to Mike, Will froze, leaving Max and Annie to look at each for a second before stopping Dustin's assault.

"Dustin stop! Stop it's just us!" Annie yelled after pulling the thing out of her mouth. "Dustin!"

She finally pushed his hand down and out of Lucas' eyes. Dustin took a few deep breaths and looked at a smiling Annie. "Surprised?"

Max laughed but then quickly ushered Lucas to the kitchen to wash the spray from his eyes. The rest followed Dustin to his room so he could show off all the new things he built while he was at Camp Know-where. Or whatever.

"Oh, here's another cool one," he turned around and grabbed something huge. He turned back and was spinning it. "I call it, the Forever Clock. Powered by wind, very useful in the apocalypse."

He handed it to Will, who looked over it semi-interested, then Dustin turned back to his bag for more. "Then, I give you..." He turned back around with some weird hammer contraption. "The Slammer."

Dustin turned it on and it start moving. When he held it towards El and Mike, El moved away from it while still holding Mike's arm. "Pretty neat, huh?" Dustin asked through a laugh. He then moved to put 'The Slammer' down and grabbed something else. "But this... this is my masterpiece."

As Dustin grabbed his duffle bag and dropped it to the ground, the others all kneeled down to look inside. "I would like you to meet... Cerebro." He had unzipped the bag and all Annie could see was a bunch of stuff.

"What exactly are we looking at here?" Mike asked. Annie started poking something that was in the bag, causing Dustin to gently grab her hand and move it away.

"An unassembled, one-of-a-kind battery-powered radio tower." Annie's eyebrows lifted at the answer.

"So, it's a... ham radio?" Will asked next. Annie wasn't the only one who was unimpressed. But she also wasn't a huge technology guru, so maybe she just didn't get just how cool this was to Dustin.

"The Cadillac of ham radios," Dustin clarified. Annie nodded, starting to get it now. "This baby carries crystal clear connections over vast distances. I'm talking North Pole to South. I can talk to my girlfriend whenever and wherever I choose."

The others immediately looked at each other, sharing the same thoughts, then back to Dustin. "Girlfriend?" He nodded with a smile, causing Annie to smile back at him.

"That's so cute! You've gotta tell us all about her," Annie immediately said.

Dustin beamed, but then got up with the bag in hand. "I will if you guys come help me set Cerebro up?" They all got up without another question and followed behind as Dustin told them about her.

"So her name's Suzie?"

"Suzie with a 'z'. She's from Utah."

"Girls go to science camp?"

"Suzie does. She's a genius."

"Is she cute?"

"Think Phoebe Cates, only hotter."

"Hotter? No way. Love you Dustin, but that's impossible!"

"It is now, Annie. It is now."

As the group bypassed the kitchen, Max looked at them confused."What's going on?" she asked as they walked out the door.

"We're going to talk to Dustin's girlfriend!" Will answered. A second later, Max and Lucas was following close behind.

"Oh wait! Where are we going? Do we need water?" Annie asked suddenly, hyper aware of how hot the sun was. So, before they left, three things of water were grabbed and it was decided they'd share in some way.

And after what felt like literally forever, the group was walking up the side of some dumb hill. Annie was really happy for Dustin, couldn't be more excited one of her friends has found a girlfriend that seems to be perfect for them.

"Dustin, how much further do we have to go?" Annie called out. She thought she was going to go down and die any minute. Her light green shirt was covered in sweat and it was embarrassing.

"Yeah, aren't we high enough?" Lucas followed up.

However, they kept climbing. "Cerebro works best at a hundred meters," Dustin explained.

"You know, I'm pretty sure people in Utah have telephones," Max said as she lugged a heavy bag.

"Yeah, but Suzie's mormon."

"Oh shit, she doesn't have electricity?" Lucas asked.

Annie lightly hit his arm while Max corrected. "That's the Amish."

"What are mormons?" Will asked, looking at Annie.

"Super religious white people, part of Christianity but also super different."

Dustin came in next. "They have electricity and cars and stuff but since I'm not mormon, her parents would never approve," he explained. "It's all a bit... Shakespearean."

"Shakespearean?"

"Yeah, like Romeo and Juliet..."

"Right."

"Star-crossed lover."

"I got it."

"Hey guys!" Everyone stopped and turned around, noticing Mike was the one who yelled, and how he and El had stopped moving a while ago. "This is fun and all, but, uh..." He then pointed at his wrist as if there were a watch.

(There was no watch).

"I have to go home," El finished for him.

"We're almost there," Dustin protested, gesturing to the top of the hill.

"Sorry man, curfew!" Mike shouted back.

"Good luck!" El said, then they were hurrying back. Annie realized they had taken one of the three water bottles with them.

Still stopped, Dustin looked at his actual watch. "Curfew at four?" he asked.

Annie shook her head, kind of sad to see El hurrying away with Mike. "They're lying," Lucas said. He was as done as Annie was. As the others were.

"It's been like this all summer," Will added on. Annie knew he was definitely saddened when Mike left. They were close.

Max shrugged. "It's romantic," she weakly defended. Annie paused and for just a moment wished she and Max were the ones holding hands, running down the hill to wherever.

"It's gross."

"It wouldn't be so annoying if it didn't happen all the time," Annie added, shrugging. She liked El, she wanted to hang with her. But it felt like she only hung out with Mike.

"It's bullshit. I just got home," Dustin complained. "Well their loss, right? Onwards and upwards, Suzie awaits!" With a sigh, Annie turned and followed Dustin again.

She turned to say something to Will, but noticed he wasn't there. Her eyebrows scrunched together and she turned to look behind her, seeing that Will hadn't started walking again. Instead he had turned to face the other direction.

"Will, you okay?" Annie called out, getting the boy's attention. He turned back towards her and nodded. She stayed put until he started to walk up again. "You all good?" she asked at a normal volume once he had gotten next to her, and they continued up the hill.

He nodded. "Yeah, just... felt weird for a second."

Annie nodded and they followed Dustin to the very top. "Made it!" He dropped his bag and looked at the view for a second.

Will took a drink from one of the two water bottles, handing it to Annie when he was done. She thanked him and took a drink, then heard Lucas chugging the rest of the other one.

"Did you seriously just drink the rest of that water?" Max asked.

Lucas spit out the water he hadn't swallowed yet and tried to hand it off to Max, who shook her head and walked away. "You can have some of this one," Annie said, holding the bottle out to her. Max took it gratefully and took a drink.

Annie felt someone nudge her and looked over to Will, who had his eyebrows raised and a smile on his face. "What's that look doing on your face?" Annie quietly asked him.

He just shrugged. "I don't know, Annie, what is it doing there?" She knew, but rather than saying anything else she turned back and accepted the bottle from Max's outstretched hand with a small smile. When she gave it back to Will, he did an eyebrow wiggle that caused Annie to nearly push him down the hill with a laugh.

"Okay guys, we lose light in a few hours, let's get this bad boy all set up!"

"This better not take that long," Annie complained, but she walked over and started helping anyway.

It almost did. As soon as it was all finished, Dustin pulled out the radio and started calling for Suzie. After the first few times, Annie figured she was just busy, maybe hadn't gotten home yet or was busy with her family.

After what felt like the thousandth time she heard, "Suzie, do you copy, over," she thought her head was going to explode. Will was asleep by her, and she was close to doing the same.

"Hey, Dustin," she said as she sat up, interrupting his radio calls. "I'm so sorry, but Steve's probably going to be home from work soon and if I'm not there he'll freak. Maybe tomorrow we can try again? I'd like to meet her."

She felt bad for leaving when she saw the look on his face, but knew Steve would seriously go ballistic if she weren't home. He's always been protective, but after the incidents of last year and earlier this year, he's been super protective.

He nodded and sighed. "Yeah, okay. Did you tell him I came home today? I wanted to surprise him tomorrow."

Annie smiled. "Nope, he was off to the mall already when I left. He works at Scoops Ahoy at the Starcourt Mall. He'll be excited to see you," she said.

Max waved her a goodbye, Lucas nodded, and Will slept.

She did manage to make it home before Steve, and crashed in her bed seconds after she put on her pajamas.

A/n: I'm so excited for this part of the book, y'all! It might be my favorite (although, at the time of writing this, I haven't written the third part/season 4 yet, so who knows)!