𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐘 𝐒𝐓𝐎𝐎𝐃 𝐎𝐍 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐎𝐔𝐓𝐒𝐊𝐈𝐑𝐓𝐒 𝐎𝐅 𝐇𝐀𝐖𝐊𝐈𝐍𝐒, 𝐀𝐒 𝐈𝐅 𝐖𝐀𝐈𝐓𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐅𝐎𝐑 𝐒𝐎𝐌𝐄 𝐊𝐈𝐍𝐃 𝐎𝐅 𝐒𝐈𝐆𝐍. A sign that reassured them that what they they were going to do was the right thing, something that might tell them how to proceed or when to go, or even something that hinted that they should turn around and go back home-home, where the answers to their questions lay beneath long forgotten memories of ripped photographs and nostalgic clothing from the good old days. But there was nothing of the sort.

Scout found himself staring at the sign beside Letitia and Steve next to her. The walk here had been tinged with tension and uneasiness, Steve's presence causing him and Letitia to exchange glances more than once, but they neglected to say anything-although he could tell she wanted to-in favor of contemplating their thoughts in silence. And if Steve noticed the looks between them, he didn't mention it.

But now he felt as if he had to say something, clearing his throat and rocking on his heels as he raised his head to look at the Leaving Hawkins, Come Again Soon sign perched on the side of the road. It wasn't anything special, really, just a red sign with white lettering that just barely went past his head, forcing him to tilt his vision slightly upward in order to take it in completely. He could see Steve mimicking his actions out of the corner of his eye and awkwardly clearing his throat and Letitia craning her neck back even further, being a couple inches shorter than them, her red lips pursed in an expression he couldn't quite place.

"What're we waiting for?" Steve abruptly said, pressing his lips together and raising his eyebrows, motioning past the sign, "Or do you guys wanna keep standing here?"

Scout and Letitia shared yet another look, and it seemed the boy couldn't help but say something about it now, "Okay, what's-what's with the whole-" he motioned his hand towards their faces, "If you got something you wanna say, just say it, okay, we're, um, we're all friends here, right?"

He couldn't help but roll his eyes a little at that, and it wasn't hard to tell that the brown-skinned girl was doing the same thing, Steve clearing his throat and once again motioning for them to alk past the sign. He wasn't proud of it, but Scout dug his heels into the ground even more when he saw Letitia shake her head and follow Steve, beginning to walk toward Night Vale, the girl noticing that he wasn't beside her immediately.

"Well?"

"It's just-I don't know, I just feel like..." he did know, but he wasn't ready to say it quite yet, raising his head and realizing both of them were looking at him expectantly, "Oh. Okay."

Scout took one last look at the sign before steeling himself and jogging to catch up, kicking up little mounds of dirt from beneath his sneakers as he did so, placing himself beside his friend. If he'd been anxious before, it was nothing compared to how he felt now, his heart beating like thunder in his chest, almost as if it could burst any minute. He wondered how long it would take the paramedics to arrive if something happened; no one would know where to look for them, and there certainly wasn't a landline lying around for people's conscience.

"So," Steve began, clearing his throat awkwardly and looking at the blond, "What's your deal with the ring?"

At first, Scout didn't realize he was talking to him until he felt a sharp elbow in his side, jerking his head to find Steve peering at him with an expectant look, clearing his own throat and digging his hands deeper into his pocket. "Sorry, what?"

"I said, why do you care about the ring," he repeated, raising his hand and waving his ring finger to emphasize his point, "I mean, you're going to Night Vale of all places to find out about this shit, you gotta have a reason."

For a moment, Scout was tempted to play dumb, divert the conversation elsewhere so he didn't have to voice his concerns about the whole situation. Hell, it would have been more than easy to point out Steve's grades or his personality or his superiority complex to call him out and keep his intentions from the light even for a moment. But he couldn't bring himself to do it when he glanced at him, a genuine look of what would have been interest had the situation been different, as if he really did wonder what Scout was doing joining him to Night Vale.

His best reply is one that does the job poorly, his attempt to change the subject off of him caused Letitia to share a look with Steve this time, before he answered. "You're kidding, right? A lady in Night Vale has the exact same ring my dad treats like it's the goddamn Mona Lisa and she's murdered, and you're wondering why I wanna know why?"

When you put it like that... "Well, I could say the same thing about you," Scout said almost defensibly, holding back a weak snicker when Letitia began to casually whistle in the lull, "Why does "King Steve" care if someone in the next town over has a knockoff of your dad's ring, huh? Why's it so special?"

Scout counted twenty seconds before Steve stopped sighing and replied. "My dad's a grade-A asshole. I have to look for a job because he didn't like my grades last semester and he won't just let me work at his company like everyone else, he already thinks I'm some alcoholic crackhead and that me being there'll "bring down the standards" or whatever."

Well. Neither of them knew how to respond to that. It was as if the air between all three of them disappeared, leaving them to stare with widened eyes until someone decided to take a chance and break the ice, Steve reading the silence and continuing, seemingly unfazed.

"He's had the thing for as long as I can remember-before I was even born, probably-and my mom won't even say anything when I ask her about it, she just keeps saying "the past is in the past '' or some kind of philosophical bullshit. And I had this thought, what if my dad's shady or something, it wouldn't even be surprising, so I wanna know-if he's doing something dirty, then I wanna find out."

Scout made a mental note of the boy's words, wondering if Steve's daddy issues had been there all along or if he'd simply been too caught up in himself to notice. All he knew-all anyone knew, really, it wasn't as if King Steve went around bragging about his family life-was that his father was the head of a successful marketing company, some name that might have been thrown around at some point but, again, he couldn't remember, and they were wealthy in the way men who work for the government and have paychecks larger than their egos wealthy. The only time the blond had ever been to his house was for that one Halloween party he regretted attending, leaving early and going home to pound on his drums as if he was beating his feelings into submission.

After inhaling a deep breath, Scout opened his mouth, unsure of what he wanted to say until he heard the words himself. "I get it. I mean, I get why you wanna know what happened. Parents shouldn't keep secrets from their kids unless...unless it's something important."

"Maybe that's what happening now," Letitia suggested, her voice more light and casual than normal.

Steve scoffed and shook his head indignantly. "My dad doesn't care about anyone but himself; the only thing that's important to him is his bank account."

"What about your mom?" Scout asked stupidly, only realizing the implication after the words were out of his mouth, opening his mouth to take it back, but he didn't get the chance to apologize, because Steve waved it off, giving a small bitter laugh.

"She goes on business trips with him because she doesn't trust him," was all he said, and the blond cursed himself, nodding sympathetically.

"I'm sorry, man," Scout offered, because there was little else he could say to that, "That, um...that sucks."

"Yeah." Steve agreed, running a hand through his hair as if sharing his sob story was a good idea, and he did a double take, remembering that the blond stil hadn't explained himself, "So, what about you?"

"Um, what about me?" he asked as if he didn't know what he was talking about, avoiding both of their eyes in lieu of avoiding the question.

"Come on, man," Steve coaxed, twitching his elbow as if he wanted to nudge the blond into sharing, "I told you my sob story, it's only fair that you say yours."

If Scout didn't know better, he would have thought Steve was almost teasing him, his tone far more light than his could ever be at the moment, and he wondered if it was intentional; after all, he wasn't a stranger to using humor to cope, it might have been almost second nature had there been something actually traumatic to cope with.

"My mom," he said finally, kicking up a clump of dirt and watching it land a few feet to his right, "She left when I was a kid. She stayed for a while, though, I have to hand it to her, but when I was like, a year old, she just...decided she didn't want to do this anymore," he motioned to himself, "So she left. The only reason I even know what she looks like is 'cause my dad has this picture of them in high school that he keeps hidden, he doesn't even know that I saw it.

"If she had stuff she did in Night Vale or something, stuff that might prove there's something else...I dunno. Maybe it had something to do with why she left-maybe...maybe then it wouldn't be my fault that she left."

He inhaled a deep breath after saying all this, his immediate thought being that while he wouldn't have minded sharing his fears with Tisha, he hadn't intended to do so with the third-wheel of the group, shoving his hands in his pockets and anxiously waiting to hear what Steve had to say in response. But he didn't expect the reply he got.

"To fucked-up families," Steve announced as if they were having a house party and they were toasting to long age and good health, "Hopefully they'll be a little less fucked-up when we get the answers we need."

"Hear, hear," Letitia chimed in, shooting her friend a sympathetic look before giving Steve a quick nod of some sort, one that must have meant something to both of them because Steve returned it as if it was second nature. Were Tisha and Steve friends? Since when?

A beat passes before it's the brown-skinned girl's turn, Steve turning to Letitia and asking, "So what about you? Your mom and dad just as shitty?"

"They're pretty great, actually, I'm here for moral support," she replied, and he would have mistaken her cool tone to mean something else if he didn't know her, "But Night Vale is creepy as fuck, so as much as I want you guys to get answers I kinda hope this is all a big coincidence. Or even a cruel joke."

Steve nodded, apparently agreeing, gesturing a figure in her direction. "You know what? That's fair."

With that, the three continued to walk in silence, most likely contemplating what the other said in their mind as they neared closer and closer to their destination. At least, that was what Scout was doing, running the conversation over and over in his mind as if it was taped reruns of old cartoons and thinking about how Mr. Harrington very well might be shady like his son thought. It didn't seem realistic for him to have climbed his way up to the top so quickly in his opinion; maybe there was more to the story than they thought.

Soon, their dragging feet came to a halting stop as they collectively looked up at another sign, this one a far cry from the shiny one in Hawkins. No, the sign welcoming them to Night Vale was far more derelict than he would have thought-it looked like a belonged to a ghost town-rather, the rust so cleverly spreading at the edge of the one in their hometown nothing like this one, where the reddish-brown tarnish was slapped directly in the middle for the most inconvenience. Wear and tear from what easily could have been decades was evident in the faded lettering and brush curling around the steel poles, giving Scout an unfamiliar pang in his chest as he looked at it.

"Welcome to Night Vale," Letitia muttered, reading off her best guess of what the sign said, turning to peer at the boys, "Last chance, boys."

"Last chance for what?" he asked, his eyes still on the sign, and he could almost hear the girl roll her eyes.

"Last chance to leave," she repeated, "Last chance to drop this and just go home. The police'll figure everything out if you told them, it's their job, we don't have to go to Night Vale to find out why your dad's shady and your mom left. We can just...forget about it. Hell, we don't even know if they didn't just like, buy the ring from the same place or something."

It wasn't hard to understand which of her words were aimed at who, and Scout had to admit, they hurt. Didn't she see how important this was to him? Didn't she see he had to take the opportunity to find out, really find out about his mother? Part of him wanted to saying something and defend his and Steve's decision, but another part of him couldn't help but wonder why she was so against it-they had a chance to find answers, and that was exactly what they were going to do.

"We're doing this," Steve told her firmly, nodding his head as if convincing both them and himself, "No one's making you come, you can go back if you want. This isn't your shit to deal with."

"And leave Scout alone with Steve "The Hair" Harrington?" she responded with a scoff, "I don't think so. Besides," she continued with a single shiver, looking up at the welcome sign and back at the blond, "I wouldn't forgive myself if something happened to you-I'm coming."

A little bit of walking later, they finally stood on the edge of Night Vale, and Scout's first thought was that the town reminded him of children's toys. Every color seemed to be the exact same shade-the reds of the fire station a brilliant cherry scarlet, the blues a royal hue that were neither dark nor light-with the street lamps giving off a faint canary yellow despite it being noon. He couldn't help but pick up on other things as they began to make their way into town, and he could tell Steve and Letitia were as well. It reminded him of a toy chest-seemingly neat and ordinary until a person took a good look and started to notice the dysfunctional chaos hidden beneath a few neatly stacked toys.

A gust of dry wind seemed to nudge them forward, Letitia's hand silently slipping into his, her grip so tight that when he glanced down her knuckles had turned white. If Steve saw, he didn't say anything to his credit, instead focusing on the people of Night Vale, whose eyes seemed to follow their every move as they went.

Night Vale was a town of winding streets, as complex as the heart. The roads were the veins, paved with dark red stones, and the people were the blood, the sounds of activity and interaction and the occasional car horn a consistent and dull pounding reminder that the town was alive, instead of becoming the ghost town many people of Hawkins expected it to become when the suspicions became one too many, when it was only a matter of time when things were looked into and the skeletons all began to tumble out, one by one.

"It doesn't look all that different from Hawkins," Scout observed, looking at a mother exit a music store with her daughter traipsing beside her, their laughter high and loud and infectious, "It looks...well, it looks normal, really."

"Doesn't seem like the kind of place a woman would be murdered, huh?" Letitia said, taking in the clustered neighborhood up ahead, where it seemed like every child in town was out and about playing jacks or hopscotch or jumping rope, screams of laughter and the occasional burst of cheers echoing down the street, "What are we supposed to do now?"

"Let's ask someone," Steve suggested, already running a hand through his hair and making his way to an older couple coming out of a grocery store, "Uh, ma'am...sir? Can we-can we ask you about the lady that died here a couple days ago?"

Unfortunately, his tactics were less than effective, his words causing the woman to gasp and make the sign of the cross before clutching tightly to her husband and striding away, the man shooting Steve a dark look over his shoulder. "Christ, I just asked if-"

"What can I do for you kids on this fine day?"

If it was possible to jump twenty-five feet in the air, Scout would have. Startled, the three of them whipped around to find a man wearing a three-piece purple velvet suit standing behind them with an amused smile, and it took the blond a moment to realize he was once again clutching tightly to Letitia shoulder, HIM most likely leaving a mark this time instead of the other way around.

Letitia didn't get out more than a nervous stuttering explanation of "Um-We were just leaving-" before Steve shushed her, earning himself a dark look in response. But before the boy could say anything further, the man's words made the cold sweat slowly dripping on Scout's forehead immediately freeze.

"Leaving so soon?" the man said disappointedly, sweeping off his top hat and gesturing to the town around them, "It isn't often our little town has visitors from Hawkins, I must insist you stay!"

"Wha-how-how did you know we're from Hawkins?" Steve asked, and his eyes would have narrowed if they weren't wide with caution and fright, his hand twitching as if he too wanted to join in the tight grip Scout and Letitia had on each other.

The man laughed. "Oh, I make it my business to know who comes into my town. What brings you to Night Vale?"

As fearful as he was, something about the man struck Scout as trustworthy, safe. He was just about to open his mouth to say why they were there, why they were really there when Letitia beat him to it, her grip on his wrist tightening even more. "We wanted to pay our respects," she said, her chin jutted upward at just the tiniest angle, "To Dawn. We heard what happened in the paper..."

And as if her confidence was dwindling from just the few words she'd spoken, Letitia trailed off, maybe in hopes the man would understand what she was implying without her having to state it directly. It would have been a fairly good lie too, had they actually had a reason to pay their respects, but if the man thought it odd, he didn't say so, only nodding gravely in understanding.

"Allow me to escort you, then," the man offered, "Dawn and I were very close, it's the least I can do to help her...friends, when she isn't around to do it herself, may she rest in peace." He began walking toward them, and they cleared a path as if he were Moses, simply watching him walk away. He seemed to notice that they still stood riveted in their spots, despite not turning around, and he called, "How do you know Dawn, by the way, if you don't mind my asking?"

The question momentarily stumped all of them, and in the back of Scout's mind he thought it only seemed fit for Letitia to answer, seeing as how she came up with the lie in the first place. But it seemed she too was just as speechless, opening and closing her mouth like a fish out of water, until it was Steve who came to the rescue.

"She, uh, she used to know Scout's mom. In high school." Steve explained, jabbing a thumb in the blond's direction even though the man's back was still to them and he shot him a look that was both fearful and angry. Why couldn't he have just mentioned his own father? Did it even make a difference?
"Interesting..." the man remarked in a voice so quiet he almost didn't catch what he said, now several yards away, raising a hand and motioning for them to follow without looking back.

The trio shared a collective look and each gave their own version of a small shrug, jogging to catch up with him, yet still wordlessly agreeing to keep a few paces behind, easily matching the man's stride if only a few feet behind. With no choice but to follow, Scout found his eyes drawn to the domesticity of the town, the casual friendliness the people treat each other, from a man helping a teenage girl with her bundles of groceries to a woman comforting an elderly gentleman sitting on a bench. He got the feeling that none of them knew each other, that they were merely connected in their shared experiences as human beings, and it was this thought that almost made him miss two muscular hands slip together. But by the time he'd quickly turned his head to investigate, they were gone, only scuff marks left in their place as evidence they had ever existed.

A pressure formed in Scout's forehead, thick and solid and pulsing against his skull. He would have closed his eyes in order to bear the brunt of it if not only for the blur of white that came skidding toward them. To his dismay, it was accompanied by an even higher voice, and he widened his eyes in an attempt not to pass out, taking in the blur.

It was not, in fact, a blur, but a person. A girl, maybe about his age-although it was hard to tell from her short stature-clutching a sealed manila envelope, a navy blue beanie covering most of her bleached white hair, her red lips pulled into a smile aimed at their escort.

"Here's the paperwork you asked for, Mr. Macaulay," she said, pushing strands of white hair away from her face and holding out the thick envelope. Had Scout not been occupied by the pain in his head, he would have noticed the short nod she gave in their direction before hurriedly walking away, her hands shoved in her pockets.

Mr. Macaulay pocketed the envelope inside his suit without looking at it-a feat Scout wouldn't have thought possible, what with the density of the envelope and the lack of space inside the suit-as he watched the girl rejoin her friends, a boy wearing almost an identical outfit as her, down to the beanie and jacket, and a girl dressed in a turtleneck with eyes that might have stared into his soul had the blond been looking back. Instead, he closed his eyes against the strength of the pain behind his eyes, witnessing what might have been a spasm of memories had they not been so quick, flashing before him like movie reels flickering at the end of a show.

"A bright young woman, that girl is," Mr. Macaulay commented, his gaze still focused on the direction she'd run off in, as if expecting the three of them to agree. Instead, they shared an awkward nod that seemed to satisfy, turning one more corner and following him towards a small building that could only be his office.

Scout's first thought was that the building looked normal. Normal compared to the rest of the town, that is, for if a large godly hand were to pick it up and settle it in the middle of Hawkins, it would have blended right in and no one would have been the wiser. His first impression was only strengthened when they walked in and made their way past bustling secretaries and cold-blooded officers; the room was painted a nice pebble-grey, with a single floor-to-ceiling window facing a parking lot, two overstuffed armchairs positioned to face the polished mahogany desk. In a corner stood an air-conditioner, weighted with dust from not being in use for several months, and a bookshelf, neatly lined with hardcover books.

Mr. Macaulay strode to sit at the desk, gesturing them to take a seat across from him. There was a brief moment of hesitation after the went to do so, not only because of the strangeness of the whole thing, but because there were only two seats, leaving the three of them to look at each other awkwardly. Realizing the predicament, the man held up a finger and fetched a hard metal chair from behind the door, offering it to Letitia expectantly, the girl staring at him for a good few seconds before he cleared his throat with an amused smile and pushed it into her hands, leaving the boys to settle in the comfortable armchairs.

"So," Mr. Macaulay began, folding his fingers into a steeple as he leaned back in his chair, surveying them one at a time, "What are you doing here?"

The question made Scout pause as if it were the first time he asked. They'd already gave him an answer, a lie they thought he had bought until this very moment when the man studied with such an intensity that it made Scout want to get up and run away-run away to where, he didn't know, but the easiness he'd felt when he first the man was now beginning to fade, leaving him without the sauntering confidence he'd felt a touch of less than an hour before.

"We already told you why we're here," Letitia claimed, leaning forward in her own, far less comfortable seating, a painful screech emitting from the contact between chair leg and floor when she tried schooching it forward, "We wanted to pay our respects...to Dawn."

The man hummed. "But That's not why you're really here, is it?" the looks on their faces might have been comical had they not been so afraid, and it caused him to laugh. "Oh, no need to look so afraid! We're all friends here, I'd be more than happy to help you with whatever you need if you'd only be truthful...it is my job, after all."

The trio's eyes were drawn in unison to the golden name plate perched on the edge of the desk, taking in the tiny white lettering that proclaimed the man in front of them to be the mayor of Night Vale, raising their eyes to look back at him. All of a sudden, the pain in his forehead diminished, leaving him with only a pleasant numb feeling where it used to be, a sense of calm replacing a portion of his anxiety.

"My mom has the same ring Dawn has-had." Scout blurted, earning exclamations of "Dude!" from Tisha and Steve, but he couldn't help himself, and he continued, jerking his head in the latter's direction, "And Steve's dad does too, so were just, you know...we just want to know if she has any family around her that we can talk to-a-and pay our respects, of co-"

"I'm afraid that simply isn't possible," Mr. Macaulay interrupted, "Dawn doesn't have any family here, she moved here from New York a bit ago and came to work for me until...her unfortunate passing. She was friendly with everyone, of course, we all consider each other family here in Night Vale, but if it's family you're looking for, I'm afraid you simply aren't in luck."

Now it was Steve's turn to spout, "A-are you sure? Not even like, cousins or something? Second cousins twice removed, or whatever?"

Mr. Macaulay chuckled at that, shaking his head. "No, none of that, I'm afraid. As far as I know, the only living family she had was an estranged sister, but Dawn never mentioned her if she could help it-I always just...assumed they were on bad terms."

"Is her sister in New York?" Letitia asked, sharing a glance with Scout before turning back to the mayor.

Whatever the reason, the man didn't answer her, only peering at her with a strange look of something he couldn't place. A beat passed and he finally held up a finger and pushed himself up, striding around the desk to a purple painting behind them, and he heard him say, "This is a completely solvable problem."

The painting struck him as odd, only now noticing it for the first time. The only colors on the canvas were similar shades of purple and black, save for a dash of white paint that resembled a moon in the corner. It wasn't anything special, really, just a black water tower in the foreground and what might have been tiny black dwellings at its feet had the artist employed more detail. Or maybe it's supposed to be like that, Scout thought, focusing on the purple swirls that covered the rest of the painting, reminding him of Van Gogh's Starry Night. By some trick of the lines, his eyes got lost in the swirls so that he had to keep refocusing on individual small sections. It didn't feel like something he was looking at so much as something he was part of. He felt, then dismissed, an urge to grab the painting off the wall and run away with it.

It would have been impossible to take the painting off the wall anyway, he discovered momentarily, for Mr. Macaulay curled his fingers around the edge of the frame and swung it open, revealing a stout silver safe behind it. If Scout had any extra breath left in him he would have gasped, but now he only stared alongside Steve and Letitia, his back twisted in the chair. They couldn't quite see what the combination was from where they were sitting, nor could they see the full contents of the safe when it swung open, the mayor's body intentionally positioned just so as he reached inside and pulled out handfuls of something.

It was only until he closed both the safe and the painting that the object-or rather, objects-came into view. A bundle of bills banded with a strip of paper sat on top of several others in the mayor's hands, and Scout leaned forward and saw that the wrapping read "$10,000," which seemed impossible, because the stack was so small-a quarter-inch high at the most. The entire stack fit in one hand.

"A hundred thousand dollars," Mr. Macaulay declared, presenting them with the money, and all three of them recoiled, although the blond couldn't help but notice Steve ogling the bills.

"What-what are you doing?"

"Just a little something to help you through your troubles," he claimed, offering them the money again, "I can assure you, I'm working as hard as I can with the proper authorities to bring whoever killed Dawn to justice. I won't rest until that happens."

"No way, mister, we can't take this-"

"Please, I insist," Mr. Macaulay said firmly, "Think of it as an investment from someone who knows how hard it is to get what you want, even in small towns like ours." he turned to Scout and Letitia. "I understand you two are musicians, yes?" their shared look of fright didn't seem to faze him, and he turned to address Steve. "And you might be in need of some money soon too, isn't that right, son?"

Despite their evident fright, the mayor chose not to comment on it, only clicking his tongue and reaching for a duffel bag at his feet, opening it and stuffing the money inside, and placing it on the desk beside a stack of paperwork, their contents concealed by a large bronze and black paperweight in the shape of a spider. He stood, and the kids followed suit, but they weren't prepared for the man to seize the polyester handles, twisting them into his grip and pressing them firmly into Scout's hand, who was still gawking in surprise.

With that, Mr. Macaulay ushered them out of his office, shushing their stutters of protest and shutting the door behind them. There was little they could doubt walk out of the building, down the streets of Night Vale, and back to Hawkins, the day's events spiraling in their minds.

As they walked home, each of them took a turn holding the duffel bag in disbelief. When it was Scout's turn, he swung the bag in his hand as he walked, reveling at how it weighed almost nothing.

𝐀𝐔𝐓𝐇𝐎𝐑'𝐒 𝐍𝐎𝐓𝐄

Me, writing this scene and imagining a musical number starring Cheyenne Jackson as the kids walk through Night Vale: 👁👄👁

All things considered though, I'm pretty surprised that I've actually been fairly consistent with updating this fic? Like a lot of the time I'll drop a fic before I finish ten chapters and won't touch it for months but rewatching Stranger Things and Julie and the Phantoms really has me wanting to write for this, let's hope it lasts lmao

But yeah, this chapter was the first planned right when I was coming up with this fic (this and another very important chapter towards the very end...) and it's nearly 6k words and pretty crucial to the plot so I hope y'all enjoyed it, I know I did

Thanks for reading!