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006. 𝗹𝘂𝗿𝗸𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗶𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗱𝗮𝗿𝗸 𝗹𝗶𝗸𝗲
𝗮 𝗳𝘂𝗰𝗸𝗶𝗻’ 𝗹𝘂𝗻𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗰.
𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐓𝐈𝐑𝐄𝐒 𝐎𝐅 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐉𝐄𝐓 𝐁𝐋𝐀𝐂𝐊 𝐁𝐌𝐖 crushed a crumpled Reese’s Pieces candy wrapper as it rolled up in the empty driveway. The night was dark, and there were no stars peaking through the eerie, ghostly assemble of clouds in the sky, only rays of moonlight on certain parts of the street. There was a full moon somewhere beneath those sinister clouds, almost as if it was waiting to come out at the right time and at the right place.
At one in the morning, there were no more kids roaming the streets for candy. But there were remnants of candy wrappers on the road, and some of the Halloween decorations had fallen away and were swept onto the street. Red and orange leaves lay everywhere, causing the branches of the trees to straggle in the soft wind.
Lori pulled the key out of ignition when the car stopped in front of the garage door.
Biting down hard on her bottom lip, she stared forward at the black garage door, with her fists still clenched. She didn’t know how fast she’d driven home, but she suspected that it was fast enough to get her a ticket if the cops actually did their job. There was still a certain anger coursing through her veins, at a rapid pace.
With a long breath leaving through her nose, she rose her fingers up to her neck, tore off the headphones and let them fall into the passenger seat with the Walkman from her pocket, and wrapped her fingers around the bandanna. Roughly, she ripped it right off, and let it fall somewhere in the car. Her pink blazer lay on the backseats. So much for Joan Jett.
Angry, she pushed open the car door.
Her dagget boots landed hard on the pavement, similar to when she’d arrived at the party earlier, but last time she wasn’t so utterly indignant. She slammed the door, hard, not caring if her neighbors would wake up from the noise. Her boots pounded on the ground, and she was walking fast down the driveway, her bare arms prickled by the cold October wind. Her hair blew behind her.
She had this sort of madwoman ambiance to her, as she stepped hard in her black boots with a straight face, and her eyes pinned forward at the dark road, not moving an inch. There really was no way to explain the type of anger pounding in her chest. It could be explained as the simple fact that, unhappily, someone had taken her favorite cassette tape — that was a reasonable reason to be pissed off. But it was Steve Harrington.
And so, with that deeper meaning behind her great pervasive hatred towards Steve Harrington and his miserable King of Adolescence aura, she pounded her feet on the slick pavement of the street around the tall shrub separating their two homes. Within moments of arriving home from Tina’s rager, she found herself facing the grey paneled house. And the burgundy car parked in the driveway.
What Lori didn’t know, was that Steve had thrown the unknown— and practically useless —cassette tape that someone had passed to him earlier, in the glove compartment of his car. He didn’t care about it, it was barely a thought in his mind. Once he stepped out of his vehicle in the driveway of his home, only ten minutes prior to now, he’d had no reconnaissance of the damn tape whatsoever— and so it sat in his glove compartment, completely un-thought about. He was too mentally preoccupied with other things to even think about anything else at all, since only minutes before, Nancy Wheeler had drunkenly admitted that she was not in love with him anymore. Putting things simply would be saying Steve was heartbroken, angry and preoccupied, all because of it.
But Lori knew none of this. And quite frankly, she wouldn’t care until her favorite cassette tape was back in her own possession. Most of that was true.
Lori walked up to the burgundy BMW, the only car in the lane-way. It was horribly dark for a Halloween night, making it hard for her to even see the vehicle other than its outline from far. It would have been wise to bring a flashlight.
She stopped stomping on the ground when she arrived at the driver’s side of the car. Crouching down slightly, she cupped her hands around her eyes and leaned into the barely tinted window, her eyes searching. If she could just find the cassette tape sitting in his car— like when she’d seen him drop it into his passenger seat back at the party— she could test to see if the doors were unlocked, and if the alarm happened to set off, she’d be left with a valid reason as to why breaking into Steve’s car at one in the morning was a good idea.
Her eyes bounded from item to item in the car, hoping to see her tape. It was dark, very dark outside, and even darker in the car, but she knew she’d be able to spot the red ribbon in any setting. With a groan, not having found anything in the driver’s seat surroundings, she removed her cupped hands from around her eyes and stood up straight. For a second, she contemplated whether he brought the cassette inside with him— and whether she would have to knock on his door and ask for it, which, nobody in their right mind would ever want to do at one in the morning on Halloween.
She trudged around to the passenger side of the car, her boots hard on the pavement. Once again, she cupped her cold hands around her eyes to shield out the dim light from the lampposts, and bent down to reach the level of the window. She searched with her eyes, over and over the same spots, even on the floor and on the space below the windshield and the center console. She noticed useless things like the black shades of his Halloween costume thrown onto the center console and his leather glove compartment being open only a tad, but no cassette tape whatsoever. She let out a long, irritated sigh, and bit onto the inside of her lip.
“Come on, where is it,” she whispered to herself, impatiently. The toe of her dagget boot tapped the ground repeatedly.
She was so occupied with searching for this tape that she didn’t even hear the front door of the grey paneled house being opened. The big red door was slowly opening, but she was too busy looking at every part of the vehicle from the outside, wondering where the hell her cassette tape was and if Steve had it in his own hands right then.
But Steve did not have the cassette tape in his hands right then, because he was pushing open his front door, with his hand tightly gripped onto another item at his side, and his eyes on the silhouette in his own dark driveway, the silhouette with a crouched back looking into his car.
While scanning her eyes over the space underneath the windshield, she caught sight of something unusual. It was a shadow, but through the window. The shadow of, as she stared she realized, a long, round baseball bat-like object, with spikes darting out from every angle. In a matter of seconds, her eyes were dashing to the bigger shadow approaching, through the glass, one that occupied the bat with spikes.
And finally, she tore herself away from the window to land her eyes on a recognizable head of hair, stopping in his tracks at the hood of the car, holding a fucking bat of nails in his hand.
Lori jumped off her feet.
Steve looked at her for only a moment, and then it was as if a huge wave of relief washed over his shoulders, the pounding behind his ribcage subsided, and he could breathe again— because she wasn’t what he thought she was. But not quite breathe relaxed, though. Because he had just gotten dumped, and now he had to deal with a familiar face for god knows what at one in the morning— a familiar face that, knowingly, was always up to ruin a mood even further. Lori standing in his driveway was just the icing on the fucking cake.
But Lori’s heart was beating hard against her sternum, bouncing off the walls of her ribs. Her lungs had suddenly stopped working when she’d jumped, frightened, but when she let it sink in that it was only— lightly on the only — Steve Harrington, obviously standing in his own driveway, she breathed out sharply. Lori wasn’t really afraid of the typical scary things, like ghosts and monsters, although she’d never experienced those things other than in a simple prank or a joke. She didn’t like to be scared, or let fear take over her own face.
“Jesus, Philbin,” he finally said, his voice somewhat quiet. “What the hell are you doing here?” His words came out harsh, and annoyed, but through a long breath of air. He placed his hand on his hip.
Lori was still catching her own breath. As she placed a hand on her heart, her eyes suddenly darted to the bat of nails in Steve’s hand, now that she could see the whole thing in the dim glow of the lamppost lighting.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa — what the HELL is that!” she whispered shouted, with an utterly outraged tone. She had a finger pointed roughly at the bat— but more specifically the nails that reminded her of the thumbtacks. And they were sticking out at absolutely every angle.
Steve ran a hand through his hair, annoyed, “Oh— my god—okay, listen, it’s not what it looks li—”
“What is that!” She took a few small steps back, keeping her voice in a hush but still outraged. “Why do you have that!”
Steve pinched the corners of his eyes together, “What do you want?” he said, annoyed.
“Did you make that thing!” she gawked. Lori was never one to be taken aback— but this bat of nails spiraled all kinds of emotions in her stomach.
“Yeah, alright! It’s a bat of nails, Lori, want me to explain the entire fuckin’ anatomy of it?” he said, angry.
“Who just— has one of those!” she could only think about the bat of nails swinging at his side, not even on the fact that he’d caught her searching his car through the windows.
He let out a groan, “Would you relax? God, you wouldn’t understand,” he simply said, “Why the hell are you even he— I mean, do you even know what time it is?”
“You just keep that thing lying around in your house?” she said, her chest rising and falling rapidly. “What happened to having regular weapons, like a, like a, knife— or something? Hell, don’t your parents have a gun somewhere!”
“It’s supposed to be in my car—”
“You can’t just sneak up in the dark flaring one of those things at someone!” She whisper-shouted, angrily. “Mon dieu!“
“You can’t just show up, in the dark past midnight, on Halloween! Lurking around my car for god’s sake,” he whisper-shouted back, equally as angry. He let out a long breath, and ran another hand through his hair, “God, Philbin, I thought you were one of those fuckin’ dem-“
Suddenly, the words got caught in his throat, and he stopped abruptly.
“A what?” Lori crossed her arms as a small gust of wind blew past them. She breathed out heavily.
“Whatever, you just— it comes in handy, okay?” he corrected himself. “Especially in a town like this,” he swung the bat around in his grasp once, and then looked around, as if reflecting on something in retrospect. “And especially when people like you do things like this,” he motioned to her and referred to her sneaking.
“What the hell is that supposed to mean,” Lori’s eyebrows narrowed, hard. A small spike of curiosity peaked in the center of her chest.
“Forget it, alright? You just scared me half to death,” he said. He let out a sigh, a sigh that held exhaustion and baggage, one that could let anyone know that something was wrong. “Seriously, what the hell are you doing here, Philbin? What do you want with my car,”
Lori crossed her arms harder, and tried not to stare at the bat of nails, and rather at the outlines of his facial features in the dark. He was standing at the front of the car, and she was at the passenger side door.
“Oh shit,” Steve’s face twisted with a realization, “Oh shit— are you coming to key my car!”
Lori blinked, and Steve bent down slightly, as if he couldn’t believe it.
He let out an appalled scoff. “Jesus, I didn’t think you could get any worse after tonight! Are you seriously coming to key my c—”
“I’m not gonna key your car, dipshit!” she scowled.
“Then what the hell are you doing here in the dark, lurking around it!” Steve put his hand out, outraged. “Y’know, I already have to take this shit to the garage anyways, if you keyed it, man, I—”
“What is with you and keying cars,” Lori squinted. “Now would you relax?”
Steve rubbed a hand over his face, accepting the fact that she was probably serious. “Just tell me why you’re here, alright, I have — I have better things to be doing.” He put his hand on his hip.
There was a long pause, and Steve tilted his head forward, nudging for an answer and wondering why she wasn’t doing so. She tapped her foot on the pavement repeatedly.
“You have something of mine that I want back,” she simply said.
“Huh?” his eyebrows sharply furrowed over his eyes.
“You have my cassette tape, and I need it back,” she stared at him strongly, “Right now.”
He let out a scoff, “Hold on, lemme get this straight.” he paused. “You snuck up to my car, in the middle of the night, just to try and find a damn cassette tape?” he questioned, emitting that he thought she wasn’t being serious, “You scared the shit out of me, all for a tape,”
“Yes, you’re a complete wimp, Harrington, it doesn’t take much to understand that,” she rolled her eyes, “This tape is just special to me, alright? I need it back, like, right now. Right now.”
“What ever happened to, like, making conversation? You could’ve knocked on my door and asked for help like any normal person would do—” He used his hands as gestures, “but you had to loiter around my car in the dark like a fuckin’ lunatic, scare the shit out of me.” He rolled his eyes and placed one hand on the hood of his car. “And I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Are you kidding?” Lori uncrossed her arms, and held them out at her sides, outraged. “You had my cassette tape in your hands when you left the party! I saw it!”
He narrowed his eyebrows even more, while lazily swinging the bat. Lori looked down at it, and felt a wave of emotion rise to her veins again, wanting to send steam out her ears.
“God! Can you please but that thing away!” she shouted, motioning a hand towards the bat, as she had enough of seeing it in her view. “Just, like, put it somewhere else!”
Steve groaned, seeming like he had enough. “I don’t have time for this, okay? Look—” he took a step towards her, after placing the bat on the ground, “I just got dumped less than an hour ago, alright? Everything’s just not goin’ great, it’s not goin’ great. So if you could just please, go lurk in the dark somewhere else to find your damn cassette tape— because I don’t have it.”
By the time he finished speaking, they were a few feet apart, both angry and both irritated to their capacities.
Steve Harrington would have never, in a million years, admitted that he got dumped. But there he was, speaking to the girl who, probably, hated him the most in Hawkins, dishing about how he’d gotten dumped only an hour ago.
There was a moment where time stood still between both of them. Lori stared at Steve and his stupid hair, knowing exactly where her loathing for him came from— he’d stolen her favorite item ever. Steve stared at Lori, figuring if she had so many things to hate about him, he was going to find things to hate about her— and he already had a few in mind.
They both blinked, and their eyes sort of drilled into one another’s heads.
“Okay?” Steve said first, raising both eyebrows. His lips were in a tight line.
“So there really is trouble in paradise,” Lori kept her face the same, but absorbed the slipped-in information.
Steve looked away, and took a few steps back, avoiding eye contact. “Yeah.” he said, shortly.
“Right, then.” she said, and then her lips formed into a circle. “If you give me back my tape maybe I could spare some sympathy,”
“Like you can even produce sympathy,” he scoffed, squinting his eyes at her.
“Neither can you,” she spoke. “I mean, i’m only assuming, but, you know.”
“You don’t know one thing about me, alright?” He rebutted, with a certain undertone to his words.
“See, you are such a cliché,” Lori nearly let out a laugh. “That is exactly what anyone would expect a cliché to say.”
Steve tolled his eyes, practically to the back of his head. They truly had enough of one another.
Lori tilted her head back, having enough already of the small taunting. “Just give me back what I want.” she then said, returning back to her stern tone of voice— as if the joking was just a little break. “If you return it now, no harm will be done.”
“I said I don’t know what you’re talking about.” he replied, with the same tone of voice. “Did you not hear me— correctly? I don’t have it.” he said, with sarcasm.
Lori shifted her eyes down to the bat of nails on the pavement near their feet. Steve reached down and picked it up in his hand.
“Go home, Philbin,” He said, now tired. “I don’t know what else to tell you, okay, my head is buzzing.” he ran a hand through his hair, stressfully.
Lori shoved her foot hard on the ground, hearing the words ‘go home’ echo in her mind from Jim Hopper just the day before at the pumpkin patch, now hearing them again from Steve. It boiled her blood, to be told what to do. Maybe she just had a short fuse, but it was something in those words that rapidly elevated her anger levels.
“Take some fucking aspirin.” Lori spat, before she turned right on her heel and started walking away, furious.
She knew he had her favorite tape, he was just too stupidly preoccupied in his miserable downfall to think about anything else at all. But she was going to get back what she wanted, whether he liked it or not.
“And your trouble in paradise won’t stop me from getting what I want, chérie.” she called over her shoulder, angry.
Steve was standing there, with one hand on the hood of his car, and the other holding onto the bat of nails, watching her walk down his driveway in the dark. He had this peak in his chest that arose every time Lori Philbin finished a conversation with him, just a feeling of pure confusion mixed with intimidation and hesitancy. He tried to ignore it, because he had things to worry about. But he still watched her make it all the way to the end of his lane-way.
Lori turned around the corner of the shrub that separated the two homes, not looking back once. As her foot crushed a wandering candy wrapper on the ground, she thought of the bat with nails, the sudden pauses in his words where he’d almost let something slip, the words “go home” still echoing in her mind — and the fact that her favorite cassette tape was still in the hands of, probably, her least favorite person in the whole entirety of Hawkins, Indiana.
𝙅𝙐𝙇𝙄
we love enemies don’t we <3
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