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007. 𝘄𝗮𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗱 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝘀𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗿𝗲 𝗹𝗶𝗯𝗮𝗿𝘆 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗳𝘁 𝗮𝗻𝗱
𝗽𝗿𝗼𝗯𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗰𝘂𝗿𝗶𝗼𝘀𝗶𝘁𝘆.
“𝐈𝐒 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐖𝐄𝐀𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐑 𝑨𝑳𝑾𝑨𝒀𝑺 𝐒𝐇𝐈𝐓𝐓𝐘 𝐈𝐍 𝐓𝐇𝐈𝐒 𝐏𝐋𝐀𝐂𝐄?” Lori asked, annoyed.
Her hands were gripped around the steering wheel, while she tapped one finger against the edge of it impatiently — her chunky rings indenting the leather only slightly. Her eyes were focused on the road ahead, and occasionally they darted to the light grey clouds in which she based her question upon, her mind scattering with unwanted thoughts about the gloominess. It seemed to always be like that— gloomy, dull, and just… grey.
Dustin was sitting in the passenger seat, with a blue and white cap shoving down his curly head of hair, and his backpack half-open on his lap. He, too, was looking at the road through the front window, but his leg was bobbing up and down against his backpack, and his hands were tangled together at his knees.
“Yeah, pretty much,” he answered, speaking slowly.
There should’ve been an awkwardness floating around in the air of the vehicle, or at least an uncomfortable silence or stale mood— because, really, Dustin and Lori didn’t know one another all that well, and tight spaces like a car usually don’t help mend staleness between two practical strangers. But the only person who was feeling the slightest bit of awkwardness was Dustin, mostly because his mom had made him agree to letting Lori drive him to school, and that automatically would cause a bit of unpleasantness.
But Lori didn’t get awkward. If there was nothing to say, there was always something to think. And thinking is just silent communication.
The only reason why Dustin felt the smallest pang of awkwardness in his chest was because of the fact that Lori was completely, and absolutely unbothered. Like, she was so casual— with her usual pissed off undertone— and he just didn’t know how she did it.
Maybe there was a hidden platonic connection between the two of them, one of those things where someone meets someone, and there’s a hidden click without realization or acknowledgment at all. It’s just there from the beginning. Maybe it was because they were simply cousins, and that was supposed to automatically make them friends. Or maybe it was just Lori’s weird ability to stand completely untroubled about everything and everyone that made it easy for Dustin to remain calm. There really was no way to explain it.
The radio was playing softly in the car, spilling through the speakers around them.
“Hey, so,” Lori said, her voice remaining irritated. “Thanks for agreeing to, y’know let me drive you to school— and for not letting my mom badger me, I guess.” there was the slightest hint of sincerity in her voice, only a little bit like she always tended to give. “She thinks we’re getting along great.”
She turned her head to the side, to glance quickly at Dustin, before looking back to the road and tightening her grip on the steering wheel.
“Yeah, no problem,” Dustin said, casually. He formed his lips into a tight line, looking down at his backpack.
Maureen had been asleep when Lori had slammed their front door the night prior, but she’d heard the pounding footsteps up the staircase. In the morning, Lori, who was still entirely pissed off about Steve Harrington and her stupid Hawkins curse, had grumbled out of bed to face her mother, dressed in her skirt and business shirt, asking about why she was so horribly angry. The conversation was short, with the mention of the cassette tape and, according to Lori, their need to move to a different neighborhood because the neighbors were shitheads— hence, Steve.
Lori ate breakfast with her mom, at their kitchen peninsula that morning. You’d think that Lori was so pissed off that she wouldn’t even bother to sit and eat eggs with her mother, just the day after her Hawkins Curse worsened exceptionally— but she did it anyway.
When Maureen had kissed her daughter on the cheek goodbye, Lori had set off for the car and reared out the driveway, skirting past the Harrington house as fast as she could. Steve had just been getting into his own car at that time, and he watched the jet black vehicle speed past his house, his eyes squinting and his hand running through his hair— knowing that, without a doubt, Lori Philbin was vexed. More than usual, and at his expense. But he didn’t care. Not that much.
The only thing Steve cared about that morning was Nancy Wheeler, and their whole, messy, drunk, heartbreaking breakup. The only thing that Lori cared about that morning was driving her cousin to school, and thinking of a plan on how to get her Bowie cassette tape back in her hands. The two teenagers were more similar than either of them would ever care to believe— because, to the gods, they were both completely dead-set on getting back things they so desperately thought they needed.
Maureen and Claudia seemed to be putting their brains together, because the night before, despite Lori’s horrible events, they’d both arranged for her to drive Dustin to and from school once every week, in hopes of making them bond as family. Lori didn’t care, she didn’t mind Dustin and his curly head— he was also a person to tease for jokes— and he didn’t bother her. They sort of shared that mutual comfortability. So, she was going to drive him to and from school once every week.
Lori would’ve wanted to drive by the rotting pumpkin patch again, but she saved her unusual curiosity for another day— as she was too irked and bothered about last night’s failures to occupy her mind on anything other than her cassette tape. So, she took the only other route she knew, which was driving straight through town.
The car was quiet, but nothing uncomfortable, as she turned the BMW onto Main Street. Dustin had his eyes searching around the buildings with a hushed and calm panic, looking for where he needed to go. Lori let her eyes trail around the stores and buildings on the main street, briefly watching the people who would walk in and out, and the things behind the glass windows.
“Wait, wait, stop here, at the big building with the vote sign,” Dustin suddenly said. He was leaning off the passenger seat chair, his voice urgent.
“What?” Lori narrowed her eyebrows, looking over at him as they neared said-building, driving in the middle of the road.
“Pull over here, please— I’ll only take a minute,” he unclasped his seat-belt.
Lori slowed her driving, and with curious eyes she looked to the sign out front, reading the Hawkins Public Library written on it. She turned the wheel, approaching the back end of a beige SUV to park behind it.
“Woah, woah, hold on there, Sammy Hagar,” she furrowed her eyebrows even more, a look of disapproval over her face – her eyes glancing accusingly at his unclasped seatbelt – as she pulled over beside the sidewalk. “Why the hell are we at the library— you know school starts in, like, fifteen minutes,”
Dustin was already opening the car door, “I know you don’t care about school, Lor,” he said while pulling the straps of his backpack over his shoulders, speaking through his fast motions. “I’ll be back in a sec, I swear, just stay here. I am on a curiosity voyage.” he shut the passenger door quickly.
“Hey— what if I just drove away!” she shouted through the open window.
While pulling open the large doors of the library, Dustin turned his head around and twisted his face at her, emitting that her suggestion would be entirely ridiculous. His curly head disappeared behind the doors quicker than he’d left the car.
Lori let out a small sigh, and looked forward, shaking her head slightly from side to side. She was wondering what the hell his curiosity voyage even was. She stared at the cars driving by, while her ring-cluttered fingers tapped on the bottom of the steering wheel impatiently. The denim jacket over her black turtle neck was pulling at her wrists.
Even though she was lost in her own thoughts, she still noticed the Hawkins Chief SUV whizzing past her little black car, driving at a speed that was probably over the limit. She watched as it cruised over into the police department just at the end of the street. She focused on Jim Hopper getting out of his car, just a small blurb in the distance, as a gust of November wind blew through the trees, ruffled the hair of women walking on the sidewalks, and sent the tiniest chill down the very back of Lori’s spine.
As she tucked both sides of her hair behind her ears, a sudden growl was heard from the seat beside hers.
It wasn’t really a growl, more like a squish or a deep slurp. But it was definitely quick, and it was weird and time-stopping enough to tear her eyes away and look down at the passenger seat. Lori turned her head abruptly, milliseconds after the noise registered in her eardrums, and narrowed her eyebrows slightly at first, as she looked with hard eyes at the extra bag Dustin had left under the bottom of the seat. Her eyes drilled right into it, burning metaphorical holes right through the front pocket and tearing away at the rough grey material to get a glimpse at where the sound had come from.
As she studied the front of the bag with all her eye’s power could do, the contents within it suddenly shook. A little rough shake, one that could only be made by something small. What the hell was it?
Lori formed her lips into a downwards curve, her eyebrows scrunched together as she took in the smallest gasp, that really was just a small, sharp intake of air in the quick moment. She wasn’t scared, her heart wasn’t beating any faster, but she did grip her hands tighter around the steering wheel out of probing curiosity and impatience. Her teeth bit down on the inside of her lip, chewing momentarily. She could not keep her eyes off of the bag that had growled and juddered.
She slid one hand off the wheel, before slowly letting it travel towards the floor of the passenger seat, floating in the air for a moment over the center console. She was slowly bending over, stretching the seatbelt on her chest. The tips of her fingers grazed the zipper of Dustin’s bag sitting on the floor, trailing around for the clasp and smoothing the metal beneath her skin in a series of grooves. She latched her fingers around the pull tab.
“Okay— let’s hit the road, go, go,” Dustin’s voice came from the sidewalk, urgent.
Lori shot her head up to see him scurrying from the library, with a stack of books cradled in his arms. His feet were moving fast, and his cap was bouncing slightly as he rushed for the car, urgently fleeing from where he had come from. Evidently, more time had passed then she’d thought.
She didn’t instantly tear her hand away like a guilty culprit, instead she glanced quickly at the bag with only her eyes and then slowly returned to her original seating position— all while Dustin ripped open the side door and threw himself in, occupied within his own needs.
“Whoa, what’s the rush now?” Lori let out a small chuckle between her words, as she watched her cousin heave in the passenger seat. She gripped both hands at the top of the wheel, half-turning her chest towards him.
“Just drive, Lori, any second we waste outside here I could be charged with an infraction for severe library theft,” Dustin had the stack of books on his lap, and his backpack thrown onto the floor of the car mindlessly. He was staring out at the car parked in front of them, then he quickly looked to the library doors to see if anyone was watching them, his eyes squinting along with his lips as he tilted his head to the side— as if weighing his options. “Maybe not, cause she’s a bit slow, y’know—”
“Now that’s something only a nerd would get on their criminal record,” Lori said, not harmfully— Dustin understood her sarcasm and cheap comments pretty well.
Lori pressed her foot on the gas and turned the car onto the street, turning slightly to see out the mirrors. When she rested her back against the seat, she saw Dustin peeling open one of the books on his lap, looking at it intently. She only glanced at the bag on the floor for less than a second.
They turned out of town, and onto the road at lead to school. Lori’s fingers tapped the wheel again, in rhythm of the tune playing in her head, and her hair blew slightly in the wind from Dustin’s window being closed. The car was silent when the window fully shut, and the only sound they could both hear was the very faint noise of the radio and the of the car tires driving fast on the road beneath them.
Moments passed where they were quiet like that.
Until curiosity was eating at the edges of Lori’s brain— the familiar and dreadful feeling of interest— and her teeth were, all of a sudden, biting so hard onto the inside of her lip that she just had to stop. So instead she departed her lips, and drew in a small breath, before glancing to her cousin once more.
“So, did you and Claudia carve any pumpkins this year?” Lori asked, her voice casual but filled with the usual monotone sound.
There she was again, thinking about the dying pumpkin patch as if it was the most important thing in her life. It certainly wasn’t – getting her tape back from Steve was, at the moment— but she still couldn’t shake it from her mind.
Dustin hummed, his gaze transfixed on the open book on his lap. “Yeah, I think so,” he said, sort of distractedly.
Lori hummed too, “Really? Cause I heard all the pumpkin patches around her were— if I do say, poisoned.” she said, her voice perking up slightly with hidden interrogation.
Dustin flipped a page of the library book.
“I saw one of the fields myself. Had all this gross goop shit on em’, and they were rotting like crazy.” Lori spoke, her mouth frowning slightly.
He tore his eyes away from the book, looking up at her slowly. “What?” he said, trying not to sound so intent all of a sudden.
Surely, it couldn’t be what he was thinking about. The words certainly rang a bell in his mind— but jumping to conclusions just from a few small sentences of Lori’s statement wasn’t a good idea, because she probably didn’t know what she was talking about (in terms of everything that had happened the year before). But then again, he knew, already, that Lori wasn’t an idiot. She may not have known about the lab, or Will, but Dustin knew that she was probably smart enough to eventually put two and two together. And her tone of voice insinuated that she already knew something. But he was going to make sure she didn’t get to that point- because that, that would just be catastrophically foolish.
“Yeah. They were all rotting and decaying, and smelled like… well, death.” Lori nodded, her lips in a tight line. “But I’m sure Claudia picked yours up before some lunatic went around poisonin’ all the pumpkin patches in town, huh.”
“Probably,” Dustin said, and then he looked away from her and back down to his book, carefully not letting any hints of secrecy in his words.
But Lori knew what she was doing. She glanced down at his leg, with only her eyes, to see it bobbing up and down at a slight, but noticeable pace. His backpack was only moving a bit, from having it sitting on his lap.
Lori watched for just a second, seeing what she wanted to see, before turning her eyes back to the road. In her mind, something clicked. She half-knew what that click was. She knew for certain that no one had poisoned the pumpkin patches— but she didn’t now what else it could be.
Dustin let go of whatever Lori was trying to dig for, and looked at the time on his watch. “Oh shit,” he breathed, realizing something, “Oh shit! Press on the gas, Lori!” he said, loudly. “Shit, we’re gonna be so late-“
“Relax, Hagar, won’t you?” Lori scoffed, looking over at him, “It was your idea to pit-stop for books at the fuckin’ public library— which by the way, are you gonna tell me what they’re for?” She said, accusingly.
“Science project at school,” he said quickly, covering the lie pretty well as he scrambled for something in his schoolbag. “Shit— you think Mr. Clark is gonna be mad, I dunno, hurry up,”
“Why would I know anything about your elementary school teacher,” Lori scrunched her eyebrows together, twisting her face. “And no, before you say it again— I am not gonna drive Mach 4 down the road just to get to school. We’re almost there, anyways.”
Dustin was shoving the stack of books in his backpack, struggling.
“So, you stole those?” she asked, referring to the books. “Why the—”
“It’s for a project at school,” he said again, trying to get the books to fit between his lunch and school binder. “Just about some species we’re studying, okay?”
“Uh huh,” Lori glanced at him, then looked back to the road, clicking her tongue. She tilted her head to the side. “Then, is that was you got in that bag down there,” she said. “The new species?”
Dustin choked up, “What?”
“What the hell is in that bag, kid,” Lori made eye contact for only a second, looking over at him sternly. “I swear to god I saw it move,”
The red brick of Hawkins High was coming into view in front of them.
“Are you sure it’s not just the hangover from last night’s party,” he said, sarcastically, while zipping up his bag. “You might still be a little woozy, which would explain the road rage—”
“I wouldn’t be driving right now, smartass,” she shot back. She drove up the small hill to the parking lot. It was mostly empty, as they ten minutes past the first bell. Lori ran her hands on the wheel stressfully, “Your bag growled, and I know I’m not hearing things, so if you could just let—”
“I really gotta go, Lor,” Dustin said, and then he pushed open the door as soon as Lori stopped beside the curb, next to the entrance of the high school— before she could even lock the doors. “Thanks for the drive,” he said, while slinging his backpack over her shoulders and shutting the door with the black back in-hand.
Lori let out a groan, deciding to drop it for now. “I’ll be parked right here after school,” she shouted out her open window, her arm propped up on the rim. “Don’t be late, I wait for-“
“You wait for no one, I know!” Dustin looked back as he scurried on the road that lead to the elementary side.
Through a long sigh, Lori mumbled to herself. “You little shit.”
𝙅𝙐𝙇𝙄
a little dustin and lori content for u
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