Work Text:
Ever since the night at the Byers’ place, Neil has kept Billy on a tighter leash than usual.
He made him get a job at Bradley’s Big Buy, saying it would do him some good, teach him some responsibility - since he’s clearly failing to teach it to him.
And it wouldn’t it be so bad.
It wouldn’t be so bad, except that Neil got him the job, and Neil made sure Billy’s shift starts an hour after his last class - or basketball practice, depending on the day - and ends at 8 pm. On the weekends he works from 9 am to 5 pm.
Susan always has dinner ready at 6 pm sharp. There’s usually a plate of cold leftovers for him in the fridge, but Billy’s taking AP classes, and some evenings he has so much homework he doesn’t have the time to eat.
It wouldn’t be so bad, except that even on nights when he’s eaten he ends up lying in bed, staring up at his ceiling or the shadows around his room, with a stomachache and feeling of choking that comes from the stress of it all, the thought at having to get up and do it all again the next day, the panic that worsens the longer he lies there silently crying and unable to sleep.
The lack of sleep makes his head hurt. There’s a perpetual lump in Billy’s throat and a tightness in his chest and dark bags below his bloodshot eyes.
He makes it worse for himself, finding himself daydreaming during his classes, thinking about getting in his Camaro and just. Running away.
Because almost all of Billy’s usual outlets have been taken away. He doesn’t have the time to go to parties, or go for long, fast drives, and there’s no ocean for him to surf or swim in here. He’s not even letting out his pent up frustrations during arguments with Max in his car. He’s reluctant to admit it, even to himself, but he’s a scared of her. For her, too, for what she’s gotten involved in. But she’s also made it clear that she can hurt him now, and Billy doesn’t think he’d be able to deal with it if he upset her and she went running to tattle to his dad.
He’s gotten meaner in basketball instead. To everyone except for Harrington, who he avoids like the plague. He’s been such a prick he’s even managed to drive away Tommy, although he comes crawling back every so often when he gets bored of everyone else.
He’s so tired .
Sometimes Neil or Susan ask him to pick something up after work, from Melvald’s rather than Bradley’s, usually, because it’s cheaper. Several times now Billy’s found himself zoning out and staring at a line of products.
He’s still expected to drop Max off wherever she wants to go after school, in the hour before his shift. Most days Harrington picks her up along with the rest of the bratpack and drives them home, but some days she eats dinner at one of her little friend’s places and Billy comes to get her after work.
Today is one such day. She’s at the Byers’, which always makes Billy feel slight on edge, because he never knows what to expect. It’s the same feeling he gets whenever Ms. Byers is his cashier at Melvald’s. At first he’d thought she must’ve be a drug addict, because why else would she have syringes with unknown substances lying around in her house, but he’s met actual drug addicts in Cali, and Ms. Byers isn’t like them.
Which means that there must be something else, something weirder, going on in her house. That, or one of Max’ friends brought the syringe.
Hell, for all Billy knows about them it wouldn’t surprise him if they made the contents themselves in chemistry or something, without knowing what they were doing.
Max could’ve killed him.
It’s one of the thoughts that keep him up at night.
She could’ve killed him, and then she left him there alone and stole his car.
Billy parks his car outside the house and rubs at his eyes with trembling hands. His stomach’s gnawing at his insides, and he wants Max to hurry up so they can leave and he can get home and eat.
But for nought, he thinks, when he knocks on the door and a smiling Ms. Byers opens. The smile falls a little at the sight of him, which, yeah, understandable, but she still greets him warmly. Then proceeds to let him know that there’s still twenty minutes left of the movie the kids are watching.
Which is. Fine. He’ll still be able to get them home before Max’ curfew.
It’s just that he’s been hoping to get home, and eat, and study for the test he’s got on Monday.
But it’s whatever. Whatever. He doesn’t want an angry Max, aware that he’ll be able to get them home before curfew even if he lets her finish the movie, going complaining to her mum or his dad.
Billy tells Ms. Byers that he’ll wait for her in the car. She closes the door, Billy goes back and climbs into the driver’s seat, fully intending to grab his messenger bag from where he’s thrown it in the backseat and use the time to study. Twenty minutes is plenty of time to get some reading in.
Except. Except he sits there, in the driver’s seat, and he finds that he can’t. He can’t bring himself to turn around, reach for his bag and get out his schoolwork. He can’t.
Before he knows it, he’s started crying. Loudly. Sobbing, really. And he realises that while it sneaked up on him and he’d rather have this breakdown almost anywhere else, it has been building for a while.
He feels ill, and he hasn’t started hyperventilating but it feels like he’s about to. He’s dizzy, despite sitting down, and somehow both numb and shaky and his head aches and his stomach hurts and his eyes are burning and he just-
He just.
He wants to sleep. He wants to go to bed, and he doesn’t want to have to leave it for a hundred years.
His mum used to read him fairy-tales, and right now he feels so jealous of Sleeping Beauty because at least she got to rest .
Billy’s car door opens and he startles so hard he’s about to knock into the gearshift.
Ms. Byers stands right outside his car, and she looks horrified.
He hadn’t noticed her coming out. That scares him, makes him realise how fucking out of it he is. He wonders how long she’s stood there, watching him break down.
“What’s going on, Billy?” she asks, voice soft and soothing but still with that note of horror. “What’s wrong?”
Maybe it’s the fucking novelty of the question, but Billy finds himself answering. “I don’t- I don’t want to do this anymore.”
“Do what?”
“This,” he cries. “This. School, work, fucking- Fucking life, all of it. It’s too much.”
Ms. Byers’ eyes soften. “Do you feel like you’ve got too much on your plate?”
That’s a funny expression. He broke one of her plates.
He nods. “Yeah. Yeah, I- He made me get a job, and it’s- It’s too much, I barely have time to study or- or eat, but I can’t let my grades fall, I can’t drop my classes, I need them, I need- I need to get to college, and my- My head hurts. And my stomach. All the time. I can’t sleep .”
He turned away from Ms. Byers halfway through that bout of word vomit, because he doesn’t want to see what expression is on his face. His cheeks are heating up from embarrassment.
“Who made you?”
“My dad. He- He thought it’d teach me responsibility, because I didn’t- I didn’t watch Max and I let her sneak out and I didn’t come home with her when she went here, but it’s not,” he shakes his head, “It’s not fair, because I tried. I tried, but Harrington wouldn’t let me, and Max, she…” He trails off, squeezing his eyes shut at the blurry memory.
“I didn’t know you were here that night,” Ms. Byers tells him. Which Billy guesses checks out, he doubts anyone would’ve told her, and she wasn’t there when Billy came and no one was there when he left and hours later it was the Chief of Police who came home with Max but Billy didn’t find that out until the morning because he was already a heap on the floor by then. “Is that why you’ve been acting so odd around me?”
Billy winces.
“I’ve seen you in Melvald’s. Staring off into space. You look like you’re a million miles away. Billy.” She puts her hand down on his knee and Billy has to dig his nails into his arm to keep from jumping at the contact. “I think you have to talk to your school counsellor.”
Billy shakes his head. “I don’t want to.” He doesn’t do that, he doesn’t talk about his problems, it’s too risky to have people go prodding in his business, too easy to have something slip out that shouldn’t.
But he has to admit that the weight boring down on hai shoulders already feels a little lighter after having told Ms. Byers how he’s been feeling for weeks now.
“I think you have to.”
Billy sniffles. Twice. He’s had a runny nose for a few days now. He hates how cold Hawkins is.
Ms. Byers’ hand moves from his knee up to his forehead and this time he can’t suppress a small flinch. “Oh, sweetheart, I think you’ve got a fever. Did you know you were sick?”
Billy shakes his head. He’s been feeling like shit for weeks, and whenever he started shivering he thought it was because of the weather. “I just thought it was cold out.”
“Oh, I’m sure that’s part of it. Do you have work on the weekends, too?”
“Yeah.”
“Call in sick tomorrow.”
Billy shakes his head. “I cant. I have to go to work. It’s my- It’s my responsibility.”
“It wouldn’t be very responsible to go to work, or to school, sick and make everyone else sick, though, now would it?”
Billy slowly shakes his head. “But he won’t listen,” he whispers. “He’ll think I’m faking it to get out of punishment.”
And Billy knows he’s said too much. Because Ms. Byers’ eyes grow wide with something like understanding. She schools her expression quickly, but Billy saw it.
“I’ll call your house. Tell your parents you’re sick. And you’ll come in and sit in the warmth, okay? That’s why I came out originally, to get you and tell you to wait inside.”
She waits for him to climb out, and Billy does so, slowly, closing and locking the Camaro. He follows her up to the house.
“Did you come straight from work?”
“Yeah.”
“I guess you haven’t had time to eat them. I ordered pizza for the kids, but there’s some left. Come on. Let’s get some food in you. And I’d like to check that fever, and we’ve got Tylenol that you can take. You’ll be alright, Billy.”
For the first time in weeks, Billy thinks that he might be.