𝐎𝐍𝐄𝐒𝐇𝐎𝐓 𝐓𝐄𝐍 - to hop, love scar

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 "𝐘𝐎𝐔 𝐊𝐍𝐎𝐖... 𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐑𝐘𝐎𝐍𝐄 kept telling me that they were sorry for my loss. They'd clap me on the shoulder and tell me that time heals all wounds. They said it would get easier to wake up each day without you there to greet me. They were wrong. They were really, really wrong.

 I thought it was getting better, at first. It hurt until I thought I'd stop breathing when I found out you wouldn't be coming home to us. It felt like somebody had taken a crowbar to my chest, taking each and every rib until they burrowed into my heart. I felt sick, all the time.

 Then it all stopped. It was like I had become stone. I let myself smile and laugh because I pretended as though the pain didn't exist. I buried it for safekeeping, and then, when I was alone, I'd dig it back up.

 It exploded in my face each time. I'd smother my own mouth, hoping that the people in the dorms beside me wouldn't hear. I'd slather on make-up beneath my eyes to cover up the purple skin.

 When we went back to Joyce, and had Steve by my side every night... I had to take a time out. Like clockwork, I'd leave the house for a drive around town. That was my excuse anyway... But that wasn't it. I had to let everything out before I popped.

 I'd scream in my car until my face was red. I'd cry until I had to pull over and empty my own stomach. It took everything I had to drive back. To make sure that I came home... and I only did it because I knew how it felt to watch that front door remain shut. To never see the person you loved ever again.

 I wish I'd done more for you. I threatened you that day, I told you I'd keep you right by my side... but in the end, I let you leave and you never came back. I know you did it for us, so that we were safe, and so that Hawkins was safe. But I wish you'd been selfish.

 I wish you hadn't left. I wish you'd chosen to stay with us. I wish you were here.

 Everything's going wrong. Eleven won't even look at me; I don't know if it's because every time she see's me, she thinks of you. I don't know if she's finally realised how much of a monster her sister is... I don't know if it's because I have everything she doesn't. She doesn't have Mike or Max with her anymore. She doesn't have her powers... It's eating away at her, and she won't let me help.

 It's been six months now, Hop, and I don't know what to do. I'm here, at college. I'm painting and sculpting... I've even taken up writing. I want to write stories so that people can read about the things we've actually lived through, and learn to not be afraid because there'll always be a hero like you to save the day. But I want to write about the heartbreak that comes with sacrifice, to prepare people.

 Because It's hard, and I'm not sure how to cope.

 I've... in those times where a take a drive, I pull over to the woods, and there's a broken cabin about thirty minutes in. Everyone says it's haunted... and it is. Because of me.

 I walk through those woods as nettles cut my legs, as mud cloaks my poor old shoes... and I walk inside the cabin. It looks a little like ours, which makes everything just that much easier for me to conjure.

 I bring you back to life.

 My powers have grown, more than anybody knows. I think the grief spurs them on, I think the hole in my heart tells them what to do.

 The first time was about a month ago. Eleven had screamed at me... I can't even remember why now, but It broke me in two. Steve and Joyce tried to get me to stay. Will had reached for my hands... Hell, even Jonathan called my name in desperation.

 I slammed the door shut behind me. I just had to get away.

 I found the woods, staring at them from my car for a while. Most people would be terrified to walk alone while the sun drifted lower and lower... When I found the cabin and walked inside... it all just... Spilled out of me.

 I like to think that I've always maintained some modicum of control, but right then and there, I couldn't keep it together.

 I was grieving alone, not letting anybody see it. Eleven didn't want me. Max wasn't right around the corner... she was suffering at home with nobody to help her. The thought that my family had broken apart and left me behind was...

 I don't know how it happened that first time, it all started in the blink of an eye. Everything was red.

 I was screaming with nobody around to hear me, letting loose all of the pain I'd kept bottling up. But my powers seemed to have seized their chance to comfort me in a way nobody else could. Through the maroon haze, I could see the cabin changing around me.

 The damp wood covered in mould soon changed to pristine oak. The kitchen with a smashed sink and dripping refrigeration was suddenly spotless... and when it all stopped and my eyes were closed... I heard a voice.

 It was you.

 You said my name in the way you always did. Like I was a star in the sky you were reaching for... when I opened my eyes, there you were. You wavered like television static. Your movements were strange, like a machine malfunctioning. But you were there.

 You were in your ugly uniform, that shining sheriff's badge gleaming on your chest with pride.

 I had made you. I made what I craved, what I wanted more than anything else.

 I brought you back to life. It was all an illusion, I know that... but I can't help it anymore. It's like... It's like an addiction now. I can't go a day without expelling every inch of my power to bring your face to life once more.

 I haven't told anyone, they'd only frown with the utmost pity and tell me about those stupid stages of grief. They'd tell me I'm in denial. I'm not. I know you're — I know that you're dead.

 But that doesn't matter anymore, does it? I can see you. I can speak to you. I have my dad back... I'm not ready to let you go..."

 Scarlet peered upwards, finally forcing herself to stare at the man — the illusion — she'd managed to create. It brought a smile to her face. She brushed away the twinge of guilt for keeping such a secret from everybody she cared about.

 Steve didn't know. Joyce hadn't a clue. Will and Jonathan were none the wiser... and Eleven... She'd have killed to see Hopper again; but if Scarlet was going to descend into madness, she wasn't dragging anybody down with her.

 "I'm not ready to let you go," Scarlet repeated as she heaved herself from the plush couch she'd slumped upon. In reality... It was nothing more than a stack of old crates struggling to hold her weight with rotten wooden slats.

 Hopper smiled just in the way she puppeteered him to. The strings were invisible. Hundreds of thousands of them attached to his features, his arms and legs... she controlled what he did and what he said. She was talking to herself.

 "What are you talking about?" Hopper scoffed with an edge of amusement. He acted the very way her real father would have. He acted completely oblivious to the happenings around him, of what he really was... "You don't have to let me go. I'm not going anywhere, I'm your dad, you're stuck with me."

 Those were the words she wish she'd heard back in the mall all those months ago.

 I'm not going anywhere... she wished he hadn't.

 Everything looked so real. After weeks of perfecting her craft, days of narrating each piece of his dialogue and crafting their surroundings so very meticulously... it would have been easy to forget it wasn't real.

 From peach and yellow paint splatters by the false sink to the light chime of Madonna flitting from Eleven's fake bedroom. Everything was there. Wrappers left behind by Eleven munching at the sweets Steve had brought her. Scarlet's muddied shoes left by the door after hours of trudging through the woods...

 It was picture-perfect. A painting worth the title of a masterpiece.

 But it was all fake, a cheap knockoff... sometimes, however, even a fake could be far more beautiful compared to the real thing. Things could be tweaked and changed. Things that one wished didn't exist could be wiped away with a precise stroke of a brush.

 Scarlet was an artist, a writer... and now she was a puppet master.

 "I don't know why you're saying weird things — Probably been around the brats too long, especially that Henderson kid..." Hopper sprouted, swiping a hand over his face, "But I'm pretty sure if you don't hurry up for Harrington, he might just cry in his car." he jutted his stubble-glazed chin towards the door... the very door that separated two worlds.

 "Go on," As ever, even in a false reality Jim Hopper was the father that would lower his voice and scowl down his nose at the mere prospect of a boy being near their dear little girl, "He better have you home by ten."

 Scarlet smiled, it wobbled and threatened to topple completely. She hated when she remembered everything around her was nothing more than her dreams coming to life. That it would all disappear the second she left... "He always does."

 "I know."

 "I love you."

 Unlike their old and real relationship... The false Scarlet and Jim Hopper would throw those words at one another like a dodgeball. Neither of them moved, and neither cared to duck out of the way, instead, they caught the ball and tossed it back with ease.

 Hopper used a single hand to bring her closer... he even felt real, "I love you too, kid."

 Scarlet stepped away, and even the thought of bringing her illusion down made Jim Hopper waver and flicker right before her very eyes.

 In a flash... he was gone once more, and Scarlet could finally register the warm tears dribbling down her cheeks.

 "I love you." She said one more time with nobody around to hear, "I miss you."

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DATE: 25/12/2022

:·ﾟ★ WOAH. I'm SORRY.

so, yes. This is the last oneshot for this act, what a place to leave off on, huh? sets up the mood for next season, the things scar will be working through... I hope you're all excited! 

There will be a wait, as I'm going to finish off the Avengers: Endgame part of my Stephen Strange fic, and I'm working on my Kaz Brekker one... but Scar and Stevie will be back and better than ever for season 4! <3

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