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Harold S. Harrington left his wife and son in January of 1983. Steve was a sophomore trying to establish a name for himself as the keg king of Hawkins, not the sad loser whose daddy didn't love him. He broke his own keg stand record twice, and then broke the state's 500 yard butterfly record and could barely stand up straight at the after party let alone do a keg stand, but it still put him on top of the world; he would do and give too much else for anyone to bother thinking about what he was missing.
Evie Harrington rebuilt much the same, but by systematically destroying the house they shared rather than her liver. One day she threw their wedding china at every picture on the wall, and another she brought a contractor in to convert her ex-husband's home office into a gym. Something mother and son could both enjoy, she promised, but in the meantime Steve spent most nights passed out on teammates' couches and in classmates' beds rather than the ruins of his house.
When it was done, it was kind of nice to have a whole set of weights to himself, and his mom was actually a pretty good spotter. Way better than the uncomfortable chair he always sat in when his dad brought him into the office for a lecture.
Spring Break was something else his mom decided they should enjoy together, so instead of being able to get drunk with his friends, Steve found himself sharing a hotel room in Los Angeles with his mother while she shopped for clothes and art for days on end.
Being so close to the coast was nice though, especially when they went to an artsy street festival close enough to the beach that he could split off and still be able to carry the bags back to whichever restaurant they were meeting that night's sorority sisters for dinner.
Steve ran toward the water the second he saw it, and immediately ate shit when he reached the sand. He had to stomp with high knees between families and their big towels and then use his own sandy shoes to weigh down his shirt. The water was cold as Lover's Lake was when he left it, still half iced, but Steve stepped out until it was chest high and bent forward into a perfect dive.
The tide pushed him back. The salted water blinded him - of course it was salty, what else was he expecting.
Best swimmer in Indiana (between the ages of 15 and 18), and he hocked mouthfuls of water down his chest before giving up to lay flat on the hard packed sand as foam pushed up and down his chest.
"Shit," he coughed up into the sky.
A few feet to the side a bunch of little kids were building a sand castle, and the same tide that poured into his mouth toppled a tower.
"Shit!" one of them shouted.
Steve crawled on his hands and knees out of the water, and shook his whole body like a dog. The kids shouted and laughed, and he smirked back at them before taking another shot at swimming in the ocean. Second time was the charm, right?
His third try he learned to dive under the waves, and made it to the end of the pier before tapping out from exhaustion. He dried himself next to his shoes, the hot sand surprisingly soft under his back, and almost fell asleep.
He was burned something fierce by the time he got up, and his hair was tangled with salt and grit, but Steve grinned as he walked back up the sidewalk with his shoes and shirt held over his shoulder.
Barely anyone was wearing a shirt, and the sidewalks were smooth after walking barefoot over the beach. Steve felt like a mess, but no one gave him a second look as they roller bladed past him or stumbled around blinded by their own surfboards. Everyone was followed around by their own weirdly aggressive seagull, and Steve found himself following the bigger packs to food carts selling cuisines Hawkins never heard of.
Half a mile later he'd put his shoes back on, but had tied his shirt around his shoulders instead of putting it all the way on. His hair was mostly dry as he meandered the artsy fartsy street fair looking for his mom's dark hair in the sea of sunny blondes.
He found her in a maze of iron statues, and she jumped as if he snuck up on her.
"Jesus Christ Stevie. What have you been doing?"
"Swimming," he shrugged. "Can I have some money for a burrito? One of the carts had cheesy corn, too."
"Put your shirt on, for goodness sake you're as red as a lobster."
He did so slowly, feeling his skin pull where the sun had singed it.
"Darling, come see this piece I just bought for the entryway, right under the light between all the windows, won't it look so fantastic?"
The stature she pointed to was dark metal, shaped like a birdcage knocked on its side, broken tines promising that he'd have to lock it up when people came over otherwise they'd stab themselves after visiting the bar.
"Yeah, it's cool. I like the wing bits. Hope it'll fit in the cab." He wasn't sure how it would fit in the hotel.
"Don't be silly, Sam will ship it back to Hawkins for us." Mom looped her arm with Steve's once his shirt was on, and pet down his arm wearing a deep pout. "My poor baby. I hope you can still enjoy the spa day tomorrow."
"Aw drat, maybe I'll have to stay inside," he said without conviction. "Just go to the movies or something."
"The movies! Here we are all the way in California and you want to go to the movies." She led them through different market squares with long steps, and Steve never had a hard time following her even before he'd caught up to her height.
"Feels kind of like the best place to watch movies, this is where they came from right? They'll be fresher."
Steve's arm pulled and his mom squinted up at him with a crooked smile. He winked at her and she squeezed his nose and then hugged his arm closer to her.
"Cute. Well sure, we'll find you some art house so you pick out homegrown movies while I get a massage. Oh look!" Mom gasped and hugged Steve's arm again, which made him jump next to her. Others passed them on the sidewalk, but she threw her free hand up to wave at a tall man at the edge of a bunch of skateboarders. "There's Sam. Bye Sam!"
Sam wore wore an unbuttoned collared shirt over a t-shirt with a cartoon character on it, and held one hand over his eyes and waved with the other. He tipped his hatless head - his light hair was long enough to be tied back with a tiny pony tail - to both of them, even though Steve had never met the guy, or even seen his mother talk to anyone who looked like him.
"Who was that?"
"Sam, the artist of that piece I showed you, for the foyer. A Junkyard artist, isn't that interesting? He says it's a hobby, but I find his work so enchanting don't you?"
"I guess...Like an actual junkyard?"
His mother had more to say about Sam Mayfield the backyard welder or whatever, as well as a few other pieces she'd picked up and craft-people she'd met during the day. He heard more about Sam the next day, when the other man met his mom for a lunch Steve missed for a movie marathon, and even more over the next few months as she took more and more trips to California.
-
Evie Harrington came to visit the Mayfield's once a month, and it was never the worst. It was just weird.
It wasn't like Max had meet all her dad's customers, she just knew that when Ms. Harrington was in town her dad would go out with her to a fancy restaurant and bring back the best leftovers. Then she started tagging along to their family shopping trips at the salvage yard; but Ms. Harrington liked her dad's art. She picked out some furniture for herself and bought Max a backpack like a New York newsie would have worn.
Then they went out to the movies, and then had dinner all together. And then Ms. Harrington came back home with them, and the grown ups were still laughing and opening up a fresh bottle of wine when Max was sent to bed.
And then Max started waking up to Ms. Harrington at the breakfast table; she made Max mochas and told her she could call her Miss Evie and played footsie with her dad under the table.
"Morning, Evelyn," Max said on the second morning of her third overnight visit. The older woman was wearing bright red lipstick, and she opened her mouth as though to say that she didn't like being called Evelyn actually, but then she sighed and smiled brighter than a Barbie.
"Good morning, Max," Evelyn stressed. "You look beautiful today, that blouse makes your eyes sparkle."
"Thanks." Max threw her backpack against a wall and zipped her hoodie up to her chin as she sat in her normal seat. "Are those scrambled eggs?"
"They are. I was never much of a baker, but breakfast foods are definitely are my specialty."
"Good for you." Max's dad made killer eggs benedict, but it was only worth saying so when he was around to hear the implied question of why he wasn't making breakfast, and instead letting his 'special lady friend' make herself at home in their kitchen.
The eggs were wet, and needed salt. Max chewed loudly, taking quick and heaping bites while Evie picked at her plate like a bird. The phone rang in the other room and then cut off before Max could jump up to escape the table.
Sam Mayfield leaned through the door a moment later, just his shoulders peeking into the room. Max twisted in her seat, trying to shoot lasers at him, but his eyes were focused on his little girlfriend.
"Hey Evie, phone for you."
"For her?" Max dropped her fork and her jaw. "How? Why?" Her dad stepped fully into the room and smiled crookedly, his tense eyes showing how fake it was, like he was trying to comfort a crying baby (it made Max's blood boil even further).
"That is odd, who is it?" Evie said mildly. "I only gave your number to my son, but he's at that age where he doesn't want anything to do with me."
Max knew how the guy felt.
"Oh it's Steve all right," Max's dad said. "I was pretty intimidated, I gotta admit, it's tough to meet the other man in your life."
"Trust, me, I know how you feel." Evie's chair scraped as she stood, and she and Sam shared a chuckle as they traded places, and Max's dad took his place at the head of the table.
"So when do I get to know Steve?" Max stabbed an egg so hard it fell apart under the tines, and she shoved just a small chunks into her mouth. "That's the next big step according to the divorce books right?"
"Sweetheart, you don't have to read my parenting books."
Max rolled her eyes. "I don't," she stressed. "I'm making fun of you. I can't believe you actually read those things. Like, what, you have to take a test just to talk to me now? Was there a scantron to figure out the every-other-weekend schedule?" She stabbed down a few more bare forkfulls between her words, and felt vindicated by the end when her dad salted his bland runny eggs.
"It was an essay, actually. Two pages due to the judge, but see I write really big, so it was probably only a page and half. Don't tell on me, okay?"
He slurped at his mug for a long moment, his eyebrows sliding up as he chugged, and Max fought a smile.
"That's not even a good tip, I've done that forever."
"I'll pretend I didn't hear that."
"I'll pretend your girlfriend isn't a terrible cook."
"Max!" Her dad shrank as he hissed at her, lowering over his his plate. "Not when she can hear you, please."
"She's on the phone. Are you even sure she has a son. Maybe Steve is her other boyfriend."
"Okay, none of that. Steve was definitely a teenage boy, he sounded pretty nervous himself even. It's not like he was calling for me, but he had to talk to his mom, and I was in the way. I understand it can be hard for young people when their family changes, and maybe it feels like it's all focused on one person."
"Maybe he got arrested."
Max looked down for just a second, and her dad took the chance to throw a piece of egg at her. It plopped in her hair and then down onto her own plate. She shrieked and scooted back, patting desperately for gooey yolk.
"Hey! What, come on, I was joking."
"Yeah so was I, it was funny, huh?" He chewed with his mouth open, wet and smacking and Max's face scrunched up in disgust.
"You're so gross."
"Me? Gross? How?" He managed a proper heaping fork and shoved it in his mouth, dropping his jaw as he gnawed.
"I hope Evelyn comes back right now, and sees this. She's gonna dump you so fast."
To her dismay, that worked and he shut his mouth just in time for Evie to come back in the room.
Her steps were quick, the heels she was already wearing click-clacking on the linoleum. The chair squealed as she plopped into her seat, immediately taking a bite and chewing hurriedly.
"Sorry about that. Little...just a little emergency. Small emergency. Not an emergency. Never mind. What did I miss?" She looked up and smiled tightly at them both, covering her mouth with a napkin as she spoke. Immediately after she shoved in another bite. There was a wrinkle between her brow that almost made Max think she had heard what Max said and now she was offended, but it's not like what she said was that bad, really.
Unless it was true.
"Just joking around. Like, I said something totally bogus about like, if your kid was calling from jail. But obviously that's, like, totally silly. Right?"
"Max, come on keep it light. It's breakfast." Her dad rolled his eyes, being bored of her attitude usually more effective than anything as mundane as scolding, but Max wasn't 'acting out', she was investigating.
"Right, which is why I'm totally joking. Right Miss Evie?"
Evie took a third bite before swallowing, overstuffing her mouth and smiling tightly, forcing out a muffled laugh.
"It's...funny," she said, talking with her mouth full.
Max's jaw dropped, because her son had totally been arrested.
Her dad must have thought so too, because he straightened up in his chair and shot her a genuinely scolding look.
"Hey, Max you've got school soon. Let's drop this, whatever it is."
"No no no rush. It's nothing, really." Evie waved around her napkin like white flag, her eyes squinted and tense. "Steven wasn't calling from jail, he just...he did let me know the police might reach out. He threw a party while I was gone. That's all. We'll...be talking when I get home, but don't you worry." Her eyes squinted with a tight smile, straining enough a tear smudged her mascara and stained a crack of crow's feet.
"Cool," Max decided.
"Max, shoes, now."
"What, that was a compliment!"
Max threw herself out of her chair and stomped to the front hall. She and Steve Harrington were mostly going through the same thing, but if he got to throw parties on weeknights and she got breakfasts like that, he was definitely getting the better end of the deal.
-
It had been months since Steve came home to an empty house, but it was the perfect night for it. He couldn't stomach any more parties, or people, especially not his newly extended family. He didn't even care that he was home before his little sister on Halloween of all nights.
Screw Halloween. It was all bullshit anyway.
He dragged his feet from the door to the living room, stood at the edge of the couch, and fell over the arm to land face first in the cushions. The lights were all off around him, so for the most part the noise of revelry and children's laughter passed far down the driveway, but twice someone rang the doorbell before eventually giving up and moving on.
Steve didn't move for either of them. It's not like there was candy in the house.
He didn't know how long he'd been there wallowing before the front door opened and then slammed shut. Then a 13 year old girl screamed.
Steve jolted where he lay, craning his head up. He hadn't had a sister for all that long, but Max Mayfield was pretty dramatic. Who was he to say what was normal?
"Are you dying?" he yelled out.
She yelped again, and he could hear the difference now that she was actually scared.
"Shit! Steve?" Max stomped into the living room, her big rubber mask flopping over her arms as she crossed them and glared down at him. "What are you even doing here? Wasn't there a big party?" She looked him up and down, and the costume he was still wearing. Sans sunglasses though because they'd fallen to the foot of his car when he'd cradled his head in his hands and cried outside Tina's house before he could drive.
"It sucked." he said, and shoved his head back in the couch.
"What, someone beat your keg stand record?"
"Sure."
A bony finger poked at his ankle and he kicked out at it.
"Leave me alone."
"You're being weird and hogging the couch."
"You're the weird one," he hissed, and decided to curl his legs up to get back to his peace and quiet. "Why'd you scream at an empty house?"
The couch bounced as Max fell back, her arms slamming against his back even though he made plenty of room for her. They shoved back and forth until the distribution was better, and it was only fair that Steve was still laying down because he had his heart broken and also he was older.
"I didn't invite you to sit with me, you know," he complained, settling his head up on the arm to lay on his side. "You could have a whole room all to yourself."
"It's the living room, buttwad, and I live here too, remember." She hugged a plastic candy bucket to her chest, looking own to inspect her haul. She muttered her last directly the candy: "Whether I like it or not."
Steve had never lived anywhere but Hawkins, anywhere but this house. He liked it a whole lot more before it became the hunting grounds for a monster, but even before he though maybe picking up and moving to California would have been appealing. Hawkins was home, but it was small, and he'd burned a lot of bridges in his short bullshit life.
It probably sucked even more to have to muscle your way in.
"So you screamed at the house because you hate it here?"
"The house is fine. The house is kind of awesome. It's just..." Max wouldn't meet his eye, talking more like she should be alone up in her room, but for some reason wanted to sit with him.
"Nothing but raisins out there?"
"Dude, no, they were giving out full size all down the street!" Max held up a Snickers, and then a Butterfingers, a bright smile flashing for a moment before she dimmed. "I probably woulda got more alone, you know, moved faster, but no, I was invited into a group."
"Oh," Steve said sagely, not sure if he was up to helping someone else with friend drama. If she just didn't want to be alone...well Steve could at least do that.
"But Mike acted like I was stalking them, when like, they're the stalkers."
"Mike's an asshole," he said easily, the younger Wheeler at least an easy target right now.
"He is! And are Dustin and Lucas really worth dealing with it, what just because they asked? Like they're so cool," she snorted.
"They're nerds," Steve could say with confidence.
"Exactly! Half the jokes Dustin made tonight were about science. Like, 'what's a bird's favorite type of math'?"
Steve waited for her to finish, and then shifted to look at her across the couch. She was curled up against the opposite arm, chewing on the Snickers with her eyebrows raised.
"What?" He rolled his eyes.
"'Owl-gebra.' I mean how dumb is that?" She shook her head, wearing a wide grin, and then said it quietly again before taking a big bite.
"Yeah, I can tell you really hated it," Steve raised an eyebrow. Middle school friend drama.
"It was so lame," Max mumbled, and looked back down to her haul. "Sometimes fun, a little. It was getting there, but then Will ran off, and he and Mike ditched us, and then Lucas and Dustin acted like there weren't ditching me but still left way earlier than they said. Whatever, see if I eat lunch with them tomorrow."
"You can always eat in the library. The librarian goes to the deli for hers, so it's always empty. Great time to nap, too."
Max's head jerked away from her bucket to eye him skeptically. Then she threw the Butterfingers at his head.
"Sounds nerdy," she accused, and smirked. "But smart."
"Nerds are smart," Steve muttered, squeezing his arms up to unwrap the candy and shove it in his mouth before he could say anything about flashcards or study dates. Didn't stop him from thinking it.
"So you admit you're a nerd? Nancy really has done a number on you."
Something stabbed in his chest. The little twerp didn't know the half of it. As if to remind himself that he'd been hydrating hard for hours to wash down the half a beer he and Nancy had split at the beginning of the night - when they were happy and in love - tears started burning his eyes, so he twisted back into the arm of the couch.
"Wait, is that why you were trying to chase me upstairs? Oh my god, did I interrupt something."
She sounded so happy, bouncing in her seat so her legs knocked his feet, like she'd finally found something funnier than an owl joke, and Steve almost felt satisfied taking that away from her.
"No," he snapped, and curled his legs under him.
"Okaaaaaaaaaay," Max said after a long moment. "Geez, did you get in a fight or something."
He didn't have to fucking answer that. She was a child who was complaining about her friends ditching her. His girlfriend had accused him of killing her best friend and said she didn't love him. Of course she didn't, how could she, when apparently he'd killed her best friend.
"Or something," he muttered.
"Oh my god," she said again, in a much more horrified voice that Steve couldn't help but appreciate. "Did you break up?"
He didn't even know how to answer that, was the worst thing. Nancy was barely coherent, but the words she had said... he had always heard that drunken words were sober thoughts. Steve wasn't gonna stay with someone who didn't love him as much as he loved them - he knew where that led, and so did his mom. Hell, so did Max.
She proved it a moment later, when she got off the couch.
Good, leave him to his misery. Alone alone alone in his bullshit bullshit bullshit.
The couch bounced when Max sat back down and touched something cold to his socked foot.
"Jesus!" he shrieked, and tried to curl up like a turtle. "What the hell?" The edge of the couch arm was sharp as he craned his head to glower at the little brat.
Max held up a carton of chocolate ice cream, and two full size candy bars.
"Have you ever used a Snickers as a spoon? I bet I have enough to get through half the carton."
-
Max didn't know what to expect from the junkyard where Steve was apparently hanging out with Dustin.
Break-ups were hard, she guessed, but she hoped he wasn't gullible enough to fall for Lucas' stupid story.
Dustin saw them first - saw Lucas first, and then froze when he saw her with him, like she was still some interloper even though he was with her step-brother. Asshole. He looked back forth between them and directly behind him, spoiling where Steve was coming from before he rounded a corner of debris. The older boy held a hand over his eyes to block the sun, and in the other was a baseball bat studded through with nails.
That was...commitment to the bit. Was Steve in on this?
"Seriously Sinclair? Did you guys just not get the same paperwork as me or something, what the hell is going on?" Steve threw his arms up - swinging the bat with him - and turned his back on all of them.
"Yeah, asshole," Max called, stomping up the hill and windmilling her arms for balance. "What the hell is going on?"
"What about you?" Dustin sputtered, glaring at her as bad as Mike. "You shouldn't be here!" Great, so she lost him too. Then he rounded on Lucas, and Max was left alone in the middle, free to chase the guy who was supposed to be her family - not just her dad's wife's son.
"Hey, I'm still talking to you asshole!" she shouted after him.
Steve spun in place, his shoulders back and caught off guard.
"Wow, what's your issue?"
"You are! And Lucas, who's clearly full of shit, and whatever crawled up Dustin's butt. What are we even doing out here?"
Steve heaved a sigh and dropped the bat to the side of a nearby pile and squatted, resting his elbows on his knees.
"Yeah we're all full of shit okay. So if the guys are annoying you, you should just go, 'cuz it's not gonna get better."
"Fine, then drive me home." She crossed her arms.
"You biked here, you can bike back." With an easy fling, he threw a toaster over the hill and picked through more of the pile. Some cables, a holey milk carton - he examined an oil canister before throwing it as well.
Really committed to the bit.
"What are you doing?" He should be wearing gloves - her dad always wore gloves when he scavenged. Max had a pair at home, but she'd been planning on hanging at the arcade all day.
"Laying out a trap for a fake monster. If you're leaving, head out before sundown or your dad'll have my ass."
Max rolled her eyes, like her dad was any kind of hardass. Evie was the high maintenance one, and she'd have a fit if Steve got tetanus out here.
"For D'Aart the demogorgon, right? Because those are so real." But Zoomers weren't. She crossed her arms and watched as he kept digging (poorly), then huffed and joined him.
He froze for a moment - while she carefully pulled smaller trash away from a big piece of a car. She didn't stop moving even as she caught his eye and raised an eyebrow waiting for an answer.
"Maybe," Steve allowed after long silence, and then they were working together. "The thing is still growing from whatever Dustin showed you before. I found some skin that was like dog sized, which is way smaller than the last one."
"According to Dustin."
They both had their hands on a wide flat sheet - probably a car door but bent far out of shape - but Steve made no move to lift it.
"Max, I'm not kidding, if you think this is all bogus then leave. Now, alright."
"You're not kidding?" It was quiet out - like it never was in the apartment she shared with her dad in Los Angeles, or even the house they'd lived in with her mom in San Diego. In Hawkins, traffic wasn't a thing anywhere but the school parking lot in the morning, and even the birds that chirped incessantly in the woods around Evie and Steve's house didn't seem to see the point in visiting a junkyard.
Steve opened and closed his mouth twice before sound finally came out.
"I'm not kidding about you getting out of here."
"Oh my god seriously?" Max didn't even need Steve's help lifting the door. She got it upright and dragged it away, no direction but away from stupid boys in mind. "Fine, I totally believe that a monster kidnapped Will last year and now its babies are back to get us, or whatever. I heard the lore, I'm playing the game, stop trying to make me leave."
"It's not a game, Max! If it were, I'd kick those twerps' asses for messing with you. It's..." He sighed and dug his fingers through his hair - and then cringed because he'd been digging in a junk pile without gloves like an idiot.
"It's, what, real?" She leaned on the metal she still didn't know where to put. For the trap, that...that Steve had no reason to keep working on. To have ever started, really. It shook under her arm, and she pushed down harder.
"Max..." Steve grabbed the other end of the sheet, not pulling it away from her.
"Steve," she repeated back, grinding her teeth and staring him down until he stomped his foot and growled.
"Yeah, you brat, it's real. I'm not going off what Dustin says about the monster from last year, I'm going off what I saw. It was taller than any person, with huge claws, and a face that opened up to show nothing but teeth. It killed people, Max. It..." he trailed off again, less annoying in the face of his wide eyes, looking lost down at their rusted metal.
She almost wanted to bolt when he finally met her eyes. Too serious and too scared, and too far from the flighty gaze she'd gotten used to the past few months.
"You're like, a hundred percent sure it wasn't a bear?"
"I think you should go home," he said quietly. "Seriously. I'm pissed at Lucas for bringing you."
"Are you gonna drive me home?"
"What? No, I'm making the trap."
"Are you sending Lucas and Dustin home?"
"Well- no- but-" Steve sputtered as resolved hardened in Max's chest.
"I accepted the risk." She lifted her chin, and then shook the sheet between them. "And that was before I even knew you were in on it. Don't act like you're not glad I'm here, the dumbasses aren't even helping."
Steve jerked at that, looking around to see they were practically alone - Dustin and Lucas had never made it past the first junk pile.
"Goddamn kids," Steve muttered, and Max shook the metal between them until it knocked into him.
"I'm not a kid, I'm your sister, remember?"
"My kid step-sister," Steve shot back quickly, pouting like a baby. "And you know what, I don't want you going home, actually, because we don't know where D'Art is, so you're probably safer here anyway. On the bus, by the way. That's where we gotta put this, to barricade it, since you've just been standing with no idea what's going on."
"Oh screw you!"
He took off toward the bus with their sheet, dragging Max along by the corner she still held onto.
"I'm in charge here, alright? So you're doing what I say, or you're going home."
"Oh get off your power trip, loser."
"And Sinclair better have told you to keep your mouth shut! We're not just talking some isolated evil scientists okay, Hawkins Lab is part of the government."
"'The government'," Max mocked, punctuated by the clang of metal against metal when they reached the bus.
"I'm not kidding, Max. I...my mom doesn't know about any of this, and neither can your dad."
Before Halloween, Max and Steve had never actually been alone together longer than the 7 minutes it took to drive from their house to the Wheeler's to pick up Nancy for school. They'd sat next to each throughout their parent's wedding, even learned a dance that "complimented" theirs. Their parents were really the only thing that did tie them together. He was her step-brother, not her brother.
But she still kind of liked him. He rolled his eyes when his mom got pushy about dressing them all up for family photos, and made faces at her dad's bad jokes, and their movie night had been pretty fun, actually. There weren't many smiles the last few days driving to and from school alone, but Max had kind of tried, because seeing him so miserable had been a bummer. She liked seeing him smile, and...well maybe she liked the idea of sharing something big like this.
"I'm not a snitch," Max declared, and held out a hand to make it official.
Steve almost crossed his eyes to look blankly at the hand before he took it slowly.
"Well, welcome to the club, I guess. It mostly sucks."
"I figured, I mean I've seen the membership roster."
"They're your friends, dumbass."
"I haven't seen Dustin all day, he's officially your friend."
Steve cracked a smile, looking down in a futile attempt to hide that she was funny and that she won. He squinted back toward the road to town, where the party members that had dragged them both out here still hadn't even appeared.
"Not if he keeps being a lazy little jerk."
Max barked out a laugh, and shoved her way past Steve back toward the good pile he'd found by accident. They found another door, and then a great length of chain. Steve whooped when he found an oil can with some residue in it, excited for anything flammable, he said.
For some reason, that made things feel...realer. She believed that Lucas was affected by the story he told her, and she trusted Steve, but their growing haul made it undeniable that they were building something to fight a monster.
"Hey." Steve knocked her shoulder as she stood frozen in front of the bus. "Do you want to yell at the dorks for sticking us with all the work, or should I?"
Max had to crane her head up to look at Steve when he stood so close to her, and the sun was starting to dip behind his head. She squinted, and swallowed the fear that had tried to bubble up. Steve had seemed scared earlier, but less now that she really believed him and was taking it more seriously than their friends.
"Let's do it together. I mean honestly, what's the deal with them?"
"Middle school boys are morons," Steve said easily, and well, he would know since he used to be one. She hoped Lucas and Dustin would grow out of it like he mostly had.
She followed Steve to a rusty car right at the entrance and shared a grin in the second before he slapped down on the hood.
"Hey dickheads! How come my sister and I are the only ones doing anything? Come on are you helping or not, we lose daylight soon!"