Chapter Five
🎲
Under Pressure

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       "Dusty, baby, you're sure she's not in your room?" Claudia Henderson asks again the next morning. Dustin holds up his hand signaling that he's on the phone. The siblings had lied to their mother that they were looking for Mews. It broke Olivia's heart to lie to her mom, she had never lied to her before. Her mom looked so heartbroken about Mews, Olivia got up from the living room couch and pulled her into a hug.

"Uh-huh, uh-huh, thank you so much Mr. McCorkle. Thank you so much. You are a true life saver," Dustin said, pretending to be talking on the phone. Olivia shook her head and stared down at her feet, not liking this at all. "Alright, bye bye now. Have a good one. Alright, you too." He hung up the phone, and turned back around to face them. "Alright, great news." He smiled.

"They found her?" Claudia asked hopefully, which only made Olivia feel worse. She was not looking forward to when Claudia was going to find out eventually that Mews was gone.

No," Dustin answered and started walking forward. "But they saw her wandering around Loch Nora."

How did the poor baby get all the way down there?" Claudia cried. Olivia held her hand to calm her down.

"I don't know. Lost, I guess." Dustin answered, taking both of his hands in hers. "But they're gonna find her. And Liv and I will stay here, just in case they call again. And you're gonna go help look? Yeah?"

"Yeah," Claudia sniffed, embracing both of her children into a hug.

"I love you," Olivia expressed, and gave her mom a kiss on the cheek.

"I love the both of you so much," Claudia cried as she fetched her coat.

"I love you," Dustin blew her a kiss.

When Claudia finally left, Olivia quickly turned to her side to face Dustin. "Alright, so, what's the plan?" 

"I was thinking we could lure him into the shed," Dustin proposed. "But, we're going to need to gear up for safety."

Olivia immediately walked over to the closet, and grabbed orange body armor, a helmet, and oven mittens for Dustin. Dustin was able to find some salami from the fridge to use as bait. He opened his bedroom door to let Dart out and they sped over to their shed outside leaving the salami behind them.

They both peek out of the shed to see if Dart had followed them. Olivia jumped and held onto Dustin when Dart opened his face like a flower and screeched at them.

"Stay. Back," Olivia demanded, snatching the hockey stick that he was holding.

"Liv, what are you doing? Are you crazy?" Dustin hissed. Olivia ignored him, held her breath, and ran out to chase after Dart with the Hockey stick, hoping that it would scare him. When Dart scurried into their other shed on the ground, she closed the doors swiftly, trapping him successfully.

"I'm sorry," She panted, leaning over the red doors so it wouldn't burst open. "But you ate my Mew-mews."

After Dustin tried to clean the stains Dart had left back inside, Olivia made a little grave for mews. Both of them are now sitting on the couch. Dustin is trying to call everyone through his walkie talkie and Olivia tries to call Joyce, Jonathan, and Nancy on the telephone, but none of them have picked up. Where was everyone and why weren't they picking up? She was beginning to spiral with worry.

"Any luck?" Dustin asked hopefully.

"No," Olivia sighed. "No one's picking up."

Dustin groaned and tried talking through his walkie again. "Alright, it's Dustin again. Seriously, I have a code red."

"Could you please shut up?" Olivia's eyes lit up when she heard the all to familiar voice of Lucas' little sister, Erica.

Dustin stood up from the couch. "Erica? Erica, is Lucas there?"

"Don't know, don't care." Erica sassed. Olivia let out a small giggle. She was Erica's babysitter so she was used to her spunky personality. She was always quick with a remark.

Olivia walked closer to Dustin's side, so that she could talk to Erica to. "Erica, it's me, Liv."

"Oh hey girl, what's up?" Erica's tone instantly changed to a friendly one, which made Dustin throw an annoyed look at Olivia.

"Hey girl," Olivia laughed. "Look, it's really important that we know where Lucas is. Do you have any idea where he could be?"

"Like I said, don't know, don't care," Erica responded.

"Well, when you see him, can you please tell him that it's super important?"

"Of course Liv," Erica said sweetly.

"And please tell him that it's a code red," Dustin added in.

"Code red?" Erica repeated. Olivia sighed, knowing what was coming next.

"Yep, exactly, code red," Dustin nodded.

"Mmm-hmm. I have a code for you, of course not for you Liv, I mean for Dustin. It's called code shut-your-mouth." With that, Erica hung up, leaving only static on the other end of the line. Olivia sighed, having absolutely no clue what they should do.

"That's it, I'm going to the Wheeler's," Dustin informed, having had enough of no one answering their walkie.

Olivia was quick to grab her car keys. "I'll just take you. I've been worried about Nancy, she hasn't been answering any of my calls."

Once they arrived at the Wheeler's house, Dustin rang the doorbell repeatedly when finally the ever so tedious Ted Wheeler answered the door.

"Hi Mr. Wheeler-" Olivia greeted the man, but was interrupted by Dustin putting a hand in front of her face to stop talking.

"Your line has been busy for over two hours, Mr. Wheeler. Do you realize this?" Dustin noted.

"Oh, I do realize," Mr. Wheeler sneered in his usual monotone voice. Olivia sometimes wondered how the lovely Mrs. Wheeler put up with the man everyday.

Dustin rolled his eyes. "Is Mike home?"

"No," Mr. Wheeler responded.

"No?" Dustin scoffed. "Well, where the hell is he?"

Mr. Wheeler looked behind him. "Karen, where's our son?" He shouted. "Will's," He answered, looking back at them.

"No one's picking up there," Dustin muttered.

"Nancy!" Olivia spoke quickly before Mr. Wheeler could close the door on them. "What about Nancy?"

Mr. Wheeler narrowed her eyes at the girl. "Don't you two hang out all the time? Shouldn't you know where she is?" Olivia tried to not look too frustrated with the man, only shrugging her shoulders.

"Karen, where's Nancy?" Mr. Wheeler shouted again. "Ally's." He informed. "Our children don't live here anymore. You guys didn't know that?"

"Seriously?" Dustin groaned.

"Am I done here?" Mr. Wheeler asked firmly, nudging his glasses that were handing low on his nose

"Son of a bitch," Dustin barked. "You know you're really no help at all you know that?"

"Dusty, language!" Olivia scolded. "I'm really sorry, Mr. Wheeler. And sorry for wasting your time, um thank you for your help."

Even though you didn't help much at all, she wanted to say.

As they walked back to Olivia's car, Olivia noticed an all to familiar BMW pull up. Steve. Of course, why didn't she think to call Steve? "Wait here!" Olivia ordered Dustin. "Steve?" She called out as Steve climbed out of his car, holding a red bouquet of roses.

"I love you, I'm sorry. I'm sorry? What the hell am I sorry for?" Olivia heard him talking to himself, which made her frown. She was sure that this was about the Halloween party and that he was going to apologize to Nancy. But Olivia knew Steve had done nothing wrong. He did not need to be the one apologizing. Still, Olivia found Steve's gesture sweet.

"Steve!" She repeated louder this time.

"Olivia?" Steve froze. He hasn't been able to stop thinking about her since their talk on Halloween."What are you doing here?"

"Me and my brother Dustin kind of need some help," She answered. "But both Mike and Nancy aren't home."

"Where is Nancy?" Steve wondered.

Olivia shrugged her shoulders. "Mr. Wheeler said she was at Ally's."

"Steve!" Dustin called out, catching up to the two. "Are those for Mr. or Mrs. Wheeler?" Dustin questioned.

"No," Steve responded, caught off guard by the boy.

"Good," Dustin snatched the roses from Steve.

"Hey, what the hell?" Steve yelled, and started trotting behind him.

"Here you go, Liv," Dustin threw the bouquet to Olivia. She gave him a confused look and tossed them back in Steve's car, not sure what to do with them.

"We have bigger problems than your love life," Dustin snapped at Steve. "Do you still have that bat?"

"Bat?" Steve looks back and forth between the siblings. "What bat?"

"The one with the nails!" Dustin clarified, waving his hands in the air for emphasis.

"I'll explain it on the way,"Dustin said as he climbed in Steve's car and claimed the front seat.