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018. 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗼𝗹𝗱 𝗷𝘂𝗻𝗸𝘆𝗮𝗿𝗱 𝗮𝘁 𝘀𝘂𝗻𝘀𝗲𝘁.
𝐃𝐔𝐒𝐓𝐈𝐍 𝐓𝐔𝐑𝐍𝐄𝐃 𝐇𝐈𝐒 𝐇𝐄𝐀𝐃 𝐓𝐎 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐒𝐈𝐃𝐄, and caught Steve’s eye. Steve shrugged in response and let out a stressed breath of air as consolation, emitting that ‘it is what it is’. But then he looked at the back of Lori’s head and thought quietly to himself about what she said, as they started walking again.
“Yeah— okay,” Dustin nodded slowly.
They caught up within a few seconds, taken aback, and joined Lori at her sides. The three of them resumed their walking on the tracks, a foot separating each of them.
Lori was trailing her eyes around the trees, her arms crossed and mind boggled with everything. Her mind was racing with a thousand different things, and she desperately tried to tame it and focus on the nature. She couldn’t stop thinking about the stories, the painful truth about Hawkins, about the fact that she was existing while all of it happened at the same time.
There was minute or two more before anyone spoke again. It was Dustin, and his voice spoke out quiet and honest.
“This girl is different, y’know, there’s just somethin’ about her,” he said, looking at the ground.
“Woah, woah, woah, hey,” Steve suddenly put his arm out, extending it over Lori to stop Dustin from walking. “You’re not fallin’ in love with this girl, are you?” he asked, seriously.
“Harrington,” Lori squinted her eyes at him, “He’s, like, twelve,”
It took Dustin a moment to think, and then he shook his head. “Uh… no. No,”
Steve stared at him. “Okay, good.” he said, and slowly turned away to keep walking. “Don’t.” he said, strongly.
“I won’t,” Dustin said, and then looked to Lori.
“She’s only gonna break your heart and you’re way too young for that shit,” Steve said, bitterly.
“Love doesn’t even exist.” Lori told him, half-meaning it and half-not.
Steve rolled his eyes and shook his head, knowing that was something Lori Philbin would say. He didn’t have the energy or capacity for feelings to argue on such a topic right then, though.
Then, it was quiet again. The three of them walked in silence, dropping meat and listening to the still noise around them.
After a few minutes of quietness, Steve turned to look at Dustin because he wasn’t non-stop talking like he always did. Lori followed his gaze.
They both noticed the glum look on his face as he thought to himself. The two of them made eye contact, and Steve pressed his lips together and widened his eyes a bit — emitting with an obvious expression that her pessimistic “love doesn’t exist” attitude got him down. She scoffed, and protested, pointing to his hair.
“Tell him,” she whispered-scolded, as quietly as she could. She glanced to his hair.
Steve let out a sigh, and then thought to himself as he looked away.
After a moment, he spoke, very reluctantly. “Faberge,” he announced.
“What?” Dustin looked up from the ground.
Steve pointed to his hair. “It’s Faberge Organics,” he said.
Lori’s lips formed into a small smile, at the reality of Steve stepping off his high horse— and giving out, probably, one of his most prized secrets. All to help the poor kid.
“Use the shampoo and the conditioner, and when your hair’s damp,” he paused, stressing it. “When it’s damp, not wet,” he said. “Damp,”
He suddenly stopped walking and stared at Lori. Dustin stopped.
“What?” she said, narrowing her eyes at him.
“Cover your ears.” he told her, seriously.
“Why?” she protested, twisting her face. “Why do I have t—”
“Just cover your ears, Philbs,” he said, sounding desperate. “Please.”
She rolled her eyes and rose her yellow gloved hands to her ears. She pressed down and stared at his mouth. She was going to try and read his lips, for whatever he was about to say, but he swiveled his shoulders to face the direction they were going in, turning Dustin with him. Lori rubbed the sole of her sneaker on the wooden track, annoyed and confused. But she stayed in place as they took a few steps away.
She watched as Steve seemed to say something, and then Dustin’s eyes got wide and a childish smile rose to his lips.
Lori took her hands away from her ears, a little too early.
“Farrah Fawcett spray?” Dustin said, slowly, with a rising giggle.
“Dude!” Steve exclaimed, noticing with panic that Lori had clearly heard. “I just told you to not repeat it!” he shoved his hand in Lori’s direction.
Now, by some force of— well, Steve’s humiliation— Lori let out the loudest cackle since sitting on that dock when she lied about her parents.
“Oh yeah,” Steve nodded, approvingly, and skimmed his tongue over his bottom lip. “Yeah this’ll do.”
“Would you take off those stupid glasses,” Lori grumbled, as she finally got to the top of the hill. She bent over and placed her hands above her knees.
He slid the glasses off the perch of his nose, and half-smiled. “This’ll do just fine,” he said, sounding confident.
Lori looked up as he began to step away, her chest letting out a few pants. Her back slightly straightened when she laid eyes on the junkyard in front of them— the wide, open junkyard filled with old metal pieces, ladders, old cars, a fucking school bus, and multiple barrels. There was some sort of clearing in the middle, a circular patch of grass, where she noticed Steve was heading to.
Her legs were only slightly aching, mostly from the inclined hill they’d just walked up, but also from the two mile-long train track walk they’d just endured. Their buckets were almost empty of raw meat, her shoes had more dirt on them, and the sun was taking its place lower in the sky.
Lori swiveled her neck around, tilting it up to look at Dustin, who was standing beside her with his bucket. He had a wide smile on his lips from the approval, and there was excitement on his face. Or something close to that. She rolled her eyes.
“Good call, dude,” Steve said, his voice casual. He slid the glasses back on his face, and reached into his bucket to grab more meat and continue the trail.
“This is it?” Lori asked, sounding slightly breathless. She squinted her eyes and trailed them around the decaying junkyard.
“Yep,” Dustin said, proudly, and hopped on his foot to continue walking. “Here she is, the old junkyard.”
“And you seriously think that your pet is gonna follow all of this bait?” Lori said, removing her hands from her legs and following him slowly. “He’s gonna trot his grimy ass from wherever he is, all the way down the tracks, to this junkyard.”
“I’d like to think,” Dustin answered, casually. “He followed the bait all the way to the cellar, so if all goes to plan, he’ll wind up here, yeah.” he said, with a glance back at her.
She was leaning back, her steps heavy on the grass because of the small declining hill. “And what if he doesn’t.” Lori said, swallowing at the thought of that.
“Then…” Dustin stopped walking, his eyes trailing around the ground as if searching for an answer. Then, he looked up at Lori, who was only a step higher behind him, a painfully honest look on his face. “I don’t know.”
“That’s reassuring,” she scoffed.
He shrugged it off and turned away to keep walking, but genuinely took her question to mind. She could tell that he was thinking about it, thinking about if the plan went awry.
She shifted her eyes up to Steve, who was down the line in the clearing of the junkyard, standing in the patch of grass and looking around. Figuring he was distracted, she took this as her opportunity to speak.
“Hey— look, Hagar,” Lori said, the back of her gloved hand tapping the side of Dustin’s arm, to stop his walking. “Remember how I said I was grounded?”
He looked up from his bucket and narrowed his eyebrows slightly. “Yeah,”
She pressed her lips together and looked to the sky, before looking back down to her cousin. “I didn’t mention something,” she admitted, slowly. He nodded, for her to continue. “My mom said the only exception was family.”
“Oh,” he said, with a grave look. But he realized that meant she was technically allowed to be helping them. “Wait, so that means you’re allowed to be here— cool,” he smiled, broadly.
“Not cool,” she shook her head, her lips in a tight lined grimace. “But I just wanna clarify with you. When I go home tonight, or tomorrow— that is, if we even live through this— my mom is gonna be royally pissed off. And I mean, like, genuinely-disown-me kind of pissed off,”
He pressed his lips together, and nodded, understanding.
“So, I need you to back me up…” she said, as if that was a really big ask. “I’m gonna be under major fire, and I’ll need your help to get me out of a possible death sentence,”
He nodded, a casual look on his face like it was no big deal. “Yeah, okay,” he said, popping his bottom lip out, nonchalantly.
“Really?” she said, her eyes growing wide. She noticed her wide eyes and stopped. “Okay,”
“We are family, right?” He smiled, his cheeks creasing and his teeth showing.
“Yeah, but don’t push it,” she said, her voice neutral. She placed her hand on top of his cap, wiggled it and jokingly pushed him away lightly so that he stumbled a bit on his feet.
She didn’t really know it, but there was a small smile on her lips, even if it was just a tiny one. Dustin let out a chuckle as he straightened his cap and walked on down the hill, with her following behind.
Steve noticed this from far, as he waited for them to join him in the clearing. The side of his mouth pulled up in a small grin at the sight. As his eyes trailed, they caught onto Lori’s.
“Alright, Henderson,” Steve announced when they got close enough, looking away from her. “What’s your plan?”
“You got the gasoline?” Dustin asked, stopping a few feet away from him. Lori stopped walking beside him and crossed her arms over her chest.
“Gasoline?” Lori questioned, her eyebrows narrowing.
Steve looked at her. “It’s the only way to, uh,” he cut an eye to Dustin, who was looking around the junkyard, away from them. He looked back to Lori, and mouthed the words, “kill it.” and then he said out loud, “Trust me, I know.”
Her face struck with an expression of shock, mixed with disgust. “You got a lighter?” she tilted her chin to him.
He reached his hand in his pocket and pulled it out.
“Alright, so, let’s empty all this shit right here,” Dustin said, finally seeming to come to a decision. He bent over and reached for his bucket.
Lori put her hand out, and Steve casually tossed her the lighter before he, too, bent down for his bucket. Lori caught the lighter, flicked it open and tested the flame, before clicking it closed.
She grimaced when they grabbed their buckets and overturned them, letting the remaining meat splatter on the grass with a gross squelching sound. She tiptoed her eyes from the splotch of meat in the clearing, trailing them across the trail they made up the hill, and remembered what the rest of it looked like down the tracks. As her eyes wandered up the top of the hill, she caught sight of a bicycle, and then two feet, and then two more feet.
“I said medium-well!” the bicycle-owner called out.
She realized quickly that it was Lucas, one of Dustin’s friends. And at first, when she looked to his counterpart, a shiny redhead standing beside him— she didn’t know who the hell that was. She knew Dustin’s friends, he only had three. She didn’t remember the ginger.
And then as Steve and Dustin looked to see where the voice came from, she narrowed her eyebrows.
“Who’s that,” Steve asked with a calm voice, clearly referring to the girl. He glanced to Dustin.
Lori glanced to Dustin as well, and it only took a moment for them to register the look on his face. She shifted her eyes to Steve, both looking for answers in each other but finding none.
“Yeah, who is that, Hagar?” Lori said, squinting her eyes as she shifted them between Dustin and the two kids who were slowly approaching.
They watched for a minute, the two older teenagers, as familiar Lucas smiled and walked his bike down the hill— alongside the redhead. There was a small, tight smile on her lips, her arms were crossed, and she shifted sort of uncomfortably as she followed.
At the same time, they looked to Dustin as he watched the girl, not Lucas, but the girl. He hand fell and his shoulders slumped, his lip twitching up in a dreadful manner. He let out the smallest, barely audible sigh.
The more she shifted her eyes between her cousin and his friends, the more she realized it. She placed her hand on Steve’s arm, the back of her gloved hand against his jacket.
“That’s her,” she whispered lowly, only to him, with certainty. She kept her hand on his arm and stared forward to keep her decision straight. “Her, her,” she said. “The girl.”
He looked over at her, his teeth biting on the inside of his lip in understanding. “You sure?” he asked, lowly.
“Look at the way he’s looking at her,” Lori said, breaking her eyes from the two kids and tilting her chin in Dustin’s direction. “That’s definitely Billy’s sister— I’ve seen her skateboarding down the school lot,”
“Damn,” Steve said as he looked away from Dustin, nodding as it clicked.
At this point, they were down the hill and making their way towards the group of three. Lori let her hand fall from Steve as they composed their gossiping-selves, their eyes still always remaining narrowed as the two kids finally stopped walking.
“Hey, guys,” Lucas said, with a broad smile. He was still holding his bike.
The redhead was staring at all of them individually, her hands shoved into the pockets of her sweater. Lori was staring at her.
“Who’s this,” Steve said, his voice natural as he lowly pointed to the girl.
“This is Max,” Lucas answered, glancing to her standing there. “She’s new in town.”
Lori still had her eyes pinned on her, thinking of the times she’d seen her skateboarding and the times she’d seen her slam Billy’s car door.
“Hi,” The girl, Max, sort of shifted uncomfortably, and said the word quietly with a small laugh.
Still, Dustin wasn’t saying anything.
“Just like Lori,” Lucas turned his attention to her, referring to new in town part. “I didn’t know… you were going to be here,” he said, with a tight expression and smile. He shifted his eyes to Dustin, reproachfully.
Before she could say anything, Dustin took a step forward and glared at Lucas. “I need to speak with you. Right now.” he said, coldly. “In private.” he said, with a glance to Max, as if she clearly was the issue.
Lucas let out a sigh, like he already knew this was coming. But he didn’t get to say anything before Dustin reached forward and grabbed his arm, pulling him away as they both erupted in outraged whispers. They walked away, whisper-shouting at one another until they were out of sight behind an old car.
Lori heard the words, “Your cousin? Seriously?” and then Dustin said something along the lines of, “Max? Seriously?” As rebuttal.
Then there was the three of them: Lori, standing close beside Steve, and this girl in front of them.
Nobody said anything for a second, and Steve sort of looked down at Lori, expecting her to start off since they were both girls. As if that ever works, ever. All Lori was doing, was staring at the redhead.
“I’m Max,” she said, awkwardly. “And you’re Lori? I just heard,” she said, her voice soft.
Steve looked at Lori, realized she wasn’t going to say anything, and rolled his eyes at that. “Yeah, this is Lori— Dustin’s cousin from Michigan,” he said, his voice neutral. “I’m Steve,”
“Cool,” she said with a small laugh, casually. She shifted on her feet and darted her eyes to Lori. The girl swallowed. “I’m sorry, did I do something? I’m kinda already getting the feeling that you don’t like me, or something,” she said, cautiously.
Steve sighed. “Sorry, kid. It’s just her general disposition to be completely unbothered and, like, pissed off,” he said, calmly.
Lori looked away from Max and hit the side of Steve’s arm. “Shut up.” she scolded him. “I’m just having trouble finding the resemblance between you and your shithead of a brother,” she said, referring to Billy.
“Oh,” the girl said, looking kind of shocked. “Billy? Well, he’s my step brother— so,”
“I see,” Lori nodded, her voice monotone. She bit down on the inside of her cheek.
After doing a silent evaluation of this middle schooled, redheaded girl who’s related to Billy Hargrove solely by matrimony— Lori decided that she was nothing like her stepbrother. And so, she lowered her chin, let her eyes relax, and pulled her lips up in the tiniest smile.
“And you know… everything?” Lori said, slowly. She was referring to the truth about Hawkins. “Lucas told you everything?”
Max slowly nodded, her lips in a tight line.
“Okay.” And before thinking of it too much, Lori struck her hand out towards the younger girl. And sort of hesitantly, Max rose her hand and took Lori’s— shaking it once.
Steve’s lip was pulled up in a small smile, though he tried to hide it.
Lori let go of her hand and let her arm fall, nodding once as she turned away. She kept her eyes on the school bus, and twirled the lighter around in her hand as she walked towards it.
Steve cleared his throat. “So, uh,” he rubbed his hands along his jeans and looked to Max. “Do you wanna start gathering some of the metal pieces? We’ll put em’ in a pile over by the bus,” he instructed.
Max nodded, and took her hands out of her pockets.
“I’ll be a minute,” he said, but Max wasn’t really listening.
With his hands on his hips, Steve adverted his eyes to Lori— who was further away, climbing into the broken-down school bus. He was biting on the inside of his cheek as he started walking for it, and Max departed in the opposite direction to gather the pieces like he instructed. All while Dustin and Lucas scolded one another and argued behind the old car.
The bus creaked uncomfortably when Steve stepped onto the first step, and creaked some more when he got to the top. Lori was walking down the aisle, flicking the lighter open repeatedly.
“Well that was nice of you, Lori Philbin.” he said, sort of humorously. “I’m sure the girl feels more comfortable with you here, or something. I mean, you guys are kinda in the same situation.”
“So this is where we’re gonna hide?” Lori said instead of replying to his comment, her voice coarse against the quietness in the bus. It smelled old, and she grimaced.
“Yeah.” Steve said, realizing she wasn’t in the joking mood— of course. He was wondering how she knew it was him that followed her. “We’ll barricade the door, get some metal pieces for the windows, all that,” he switched his voice.
She turned around when she got to the end of the aisle, stopping at the disheveled seats. Her eyes found his. “Think it’ll work,” she said, and that question seemed so heavy as it lingered in the stale air.
Steve was at the front, his hand on the top of a decaying seat. “Hard to say.” he said, his voice deepening.
Lori pressed her lips into a tight line and nodded slowly, looking away with a grave expression. She flicked the lighter.
“Look— Philbs,” he said, taking a step. Ah, there it was: the ever present ‘look, Philbs,’. “If you wanna leave, you can go now.” he said, as if sensing that something was wrong. He wasn’t saying it to get rid of her, not at all, and she knew that was deep certainty. He just knew she didn’t like the situation.
Sure, she did want to leave. But there was a reason why, after every time they told her it was her chance to back out, she never did. And she didn’t know that reason now, but she was going to figure it out.
She flicked the lighter open, and bit hard onto her cheek.
“You can sneak out the back of the bus, and I’ll cover for you, if you want,” Steve said, sounding so painfully honest. He was in the middle of the aisle now.
“It’s alright,” she said, and looked up. “There’s definitely some fucked up reason I’m supposed to be here. Might as well stick around.”
He nodded, a very small nod.
“And besides, I can’t leave my cousin.” she said, and then started taking steps down the aisle. “Then I’d have no one to cover for me sneaking out, right?”
They were a few feet away from one another, in the middle of the bus. “Right,” he said, and ran a hand through his hair. He knew it wasn’t just because of that, but he didn’t dare say that out loud.
“And you put your own stuff on hold to help him, so I can at least do the same.” she said. And they both knew she meant Nancy— and the plan that he had to ditch because Lori was in need. “I’m supposed to do that cause’ we’re related, or whatever.”
“You’re a good cousin,” Steve said, honestly.
“And I guess you’re an okay babysitter,” she replied referring to how he’d helped Dustin every time she was away. “Thanks for helping him— Dustin, I mean. With Dart, and the semi-acceptable girl advice. He looks up to you, you know.”
“Yeah,” Steve said, but his voice sort of fell short in a whisper.
Then it went sort of quiet, other than the sound of Max chucking tin pieces into a pile outside on the grass.
Lori stopped flicking the lighter. They were staring at each other.
And just when the silence became unbearable, Steve cleared his throat to distract himself from the color of Lori’s eyes. “Uh— we lose light in forty minutes. So should we get to it?”
𝙅𝙐𝙇𝙄
i have like 4 chapters queued. prewritten.
so be ready 😚
lori and max: my girlboss! duo
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