*ᴜɴᴇᴅɪᴛᴇᴅ ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ*

I groan as I begin to stir awake, my eyes cracking open before I slam them shut due to the light streaming through the window. Ow... I rub my face with my hands feeling nauseous from the throbbing pain coming from my brain.

I let out another groan as I roll over away from the window, shoving my face into the pillow before breathing in the scent. Wait... I inhale realizing the familiar smell was Jonathan and I pop my eyes open to take in my surroundings.

I'm in Jonathan's room. Oh, whew, I'm in his room. My eyes move over to find him asleep on the floor on my mattress... he let me sleep in his bed.

I don't remember hanging out with him last night though, and try to pick through my brain to- oh shit.

My head lowers back onto the pillow once again as my throat feels like it's closing up and I can't breathe. Everything from last night comes flooding in at once, Steve's house, Nancy, Barb cutting her hand and then leaving, me in Steve's room... talking to him, drinking beer after beer, trying to walk home, falling-

I lift the sheet to see several band-aids covering the entirety of my knees. Oh. Right.

"Will? Will?" Joyce's hoarse voice snaps me out of last nights memories. "Sweetheart, can you hear me? Will..."

Suddenly Jonathan shoots up, quickly grabbing a t-shirt before hurrying out of the room.

"Mom?" I hear him speak. I slowly move myself out of bed, ignoring the headache that's slowly subsiding and follow where Jonny went.

I find Will's door open and stop in the doorway as Joyce grabs Jonathan's hand. My brows furrow at all the lamps "It's Will. It's Will, he's... he's trying to talk to me." WhAT? Am I still drunk?

"He's trying to talk to you?" Jonathan asks, just as confused as I am.

Joyce's breathing falters. "Yes, through... through the lights." I look around the room curiously. Slowly.

"Mom--" Jonny shakes his head.

"I know. I know." Joyce stresses. "Just... just watch." She looks up, noticing me. "Oh, Toni, come... come here."

Jonathan's head shoots over to me, eyes wide with embarrassment that I'm out of bed.

"No- No mom, let her-" He tries but I drag my feet over.

"It's fine, Jonny." I mumble. I stand beside Jonathan, numbly hugging my body. I can't believe I even went to the stupid thing last night when Will's still missing. But it was for Barb... I hope her hands ok.

"Will... your brother and Toni are here." Joyce starts, voice trembling. "Can you show the what you showed me, baby?" I stare at the light bulb intently. I don't know how Will could be talking through the lights, but I do know one thing, I believe Mama Joyce.

I jolt as the bulb flashes, Joyce gasping, "Did you see that!"

"It's the electricity, Mom." Jonathan turns to her. "It's acting up." He stammers.

"No."

"It's the same thing that fried the phone." Jonathan continues.

The phone thing was weird.

What if that was Will? Somehow, someway...

"No! It is not the electricity, Jonathan!" Joyce yells, causing my eyes to widen and jerk back in surprise. "Something is going on here!"

Everything has seemed weird since Will went missing, wrong.

"Yesterday, the wall-" Joyce throws her hand out.

"What? What about the wall?" Jonathan shouts back at her, completely fed up. I take a step back, feeling uneasy and wishing I hadn't got out of bed. I need a smoke.

"I don't know. I don't know." Joyce shouts.

"Mom, first the lights, then the wall?"

"I just know that Will is here." Joyce tells him. I believe her. I do. I really do. Will is somewhere. If we could just find him.

"No, Mom." Jonathan whines, suddenly their voices are drowned out by the deaf ringing sound.

I rub my arms as I like I'm breaking out into hives and I can't breathe... What if we can't find Will? What if we can't find him?

"And in front of Toni?" The mention of my name dulls the ringing. I snap my head up. Jonathan and Joyce are now standing, and he's holding her. "He's just lost. People are looking for him, and they're going to find him." Jonathan insists. But what if they can't?

"Okay." Joyce nods softly as Jonathan helps her sit back down.

"This isn't helping."

I claw at my chest. I can't breathe.

"Okay, okay." She whispers, sniffling. "Okay, I'm sorry." She turns to look back at me. "I'm sorry, Toni. I'm sorry."

I try to form some type of words, something to say to her, but nothing comes out, so I just nod.

"Can you do me a favor, Mom?" Jonathan asks her. "Can you just try and get some sleep?"

"Yeah."

"Huh? Can you do that for me?"

I take a deep breath, watching Jonathan slowly calm her down.

"I promise. I will."

"Yeah?"

I know Jonathan holds everything together here, he has ever since Joyce and Lonnie's divorce. It's one of the reasons I like being over here. He just takes care of everybody. And me.

"I just need to sit here for a minute." Joyce tells him.

"All right, Toni and I will go make breakfast." He says, though we both know I'll just hand him things. He stands motioning his head towards the door and we leave.

"I am so sorry about that, Ton." He shakes his head, embarrassed. "I don't know what's going on with her."

"Don't worry about it." I shake my head. "I understand."

He leads us to the kitchen, pulling out a chair for me and then grabs bacon out of the freezer.

"Are we gonna talk about last night?" He asks gently, reaching for a knife.

"No." I mumble and go to pull my knees up to my chest before cringing at the sting and immediately regretting that. Pretty much how I feel about the entire night.

"Well, I'm just glad I found you." He says, not pressing which I appreciate. He never does.

Oh, right. "How did you? Find me." I wonder, not really giving that any thought with everything that's happened this morning.

"I was on the way back from Lonnie's." He pauses grabbing eggs out of the fridge. "I-" He takes a deep breath. "I decided to look in the woods and I heard a scream." I listen, intently staring at the floor as I do. I was right. Staying at Lonnie's was a waste. "I thought someone was in danger but I came across, uh, you." He shakes his head. "Nancy, Steve, Barb." Oh, right. The idiots screamed when everyone was thrown and shoved into the pool.

"What were you doing there, Toni?" He asks, pulling me back. I look up to see his grip on the counter tighten. "At Steve's?"

I sigh. "I went with Barb." I hold my hands up. "I went for Barb."

Johnny spins around to face me, but I can't look him in the eye. "Toni-"

"I know." I swallow. "I know. She begged me to go with her because Nancy invited her. I didn't want to be a bad friend." I mumble.

Jonny rushes up to me, kneeling down til he's eye level. "You, Toni Henderson, are not bad friend." I look up meeting his eyes which are dead serious. "I don't want to see you get hurt again. And not over that douche."

I shake my head. "You won't." He tilts his head. "You won't." I lie through my teeth.

❁ ❁ ❁

𝟶ʙᴜᴛᴛᴇʀʙɪsᴄᴜɪᴛ𝟽 sᴘᴇᴀᴋs!

Hello, hello <3

Welcome back Toni Henderson & Rightside Up!! I wish I updated this book more often than once a year lmao, I NEED to get better at that lol.

Anyways, HAPPY 2 YEAR ANNIVERSARY TO STRANGER THINGS S4 and to republishing this book!! I cannot believe season 4 was two years ago already... when I literally feel like we just had the one year mark, where does the time go???

I hope y'all enjoyed this chapter, hopefully (fingers crossed) I can finish the rest of this episode before S4 PT.2 anniversary, which is in about a month haha. Also, this chapter is unedited fyi, so ignore any missing words or sentences that don't make sense lol, I am SO tired and just finished up this chapter lmao.

Don't be afraid to comment your thoughts, questions, and reactions and hope to see y'all July 1st! Stay tuned ;)