04.

"ᵈᵃʳᵏ ᵃˢ ᵐⁱᵈⁿⁱᵍʰᵗ ˢᵘⁿ.
ˢᵐᵒᵏᵉ ᵃˢ ᵇˡᵃᶜᵏ ᵃˢ ᶜʰᵃʳᶜᵒᵃˡ ᶠⁱˡˡ ⁱⁿᵗᵒ ᵒᵘʳ ᶠʳᵃᵍⁱˡᵉ ˡᵘⁿᵍˢ."
—ᵉᵐᵖᵗʸ ᵍᵒˡᵈ ᵇʸ ᴴᵃˡˢᵉʸ

   Amber had been nursing a hangover headache once she had woken up from her not-so-pleasant slumber. She had begrudgingly gotten out of bed to shower before she had to be at the library before school started. Since she had left early yesterday she had promised to return early before school to finish putting the rest of the pile of books away that were returned. She kept making small quiet groans whenever her head began to ache as she walked down each aisle. The girl kept debating if she should just skip school today but she had already been out of the house for a half an hour and figured she might as well just toughen it out so then she could get to bed early that night.

    Amber was rolling the empty cart back to the front desk when she saw a familiar head of curly hair peeking out from a ball cap. She couldn't help but smile as she made her way over to Mary, the head librarian and middle schooler.

"Mr. Henderson, you know the rules. Five at a time." Mary told him as he began to count the books on the counter.

"Yep. One, two, three, four and five."

"Ten." Mary corrected as she flashed him the library card with his other checked out books.

"You already have five books checked out." Mary informed him.

"My mistake. However... I am on a curiosity voyage and I need my paddles to travel. These books... These books are my paddles." Dustin tried to sweet talk.

"Five at a time." Mary reiterated. Amber laughed before she walked to stand next to Dustin.

"It's alright, Mary. I'll check these books out. And..." she turned to peer down at Dustin, "I'll be sure to return them." Amber told her as Mary sighed. Grabbing a card to write down the titles and Amber's name. Once it was all written down, Amber had said her 'goodbyes' to Mary before taking the books and walking out with Dustin Henderson.

"I really don't want to know why you need all of these books, but I know for a fact that you were going to try and steal them if I didn't step in." Amber said. Dustin slightly scoffed which caused Amber to give him a knowing look before he sighed in defeat. She did know him too well.

"Here." She handed the books to Dustin before she looked around and saw his bike.

"Grab your bike and we'll stuff it in my backseat. I'll give you a ride to the school." Amber told him as the younger boy smiled up at her before rushing to his bike. He had knelt slightly in front of his bag, mumbling to himself that caused Amber to raise her eyebrow a bit confused but didn't question it. He placed a few of the books carefully into his bag before taking the two remaining ones to carry himself. Then he walked the bike over to Amber's car. He opened the backseat door to try and put the bike in to only fail miserably as he kept ramming it into the seat.

"God dammit. Shit." He kept cursing causing Amber to flick him on the ear.

"Stop with the cursing. You're like six." She scolded him.

"I'm not six. I'm thirteen. I'm a man." Dustin stated, Amber looked at him before she let out a laugh.

"Yeah, and I'm dating Rob Lowe." Amber said before taking Dustin's bike and putting it into the car with no problem.

"Alright, kid. Let's go before I'm late." Amber ushered him into the car before she rushed to the driver's side.

*

Amber had yet to see Jonathan before the first period which was more strange for her than anything. But she had simply brushed it off as he was probably just developing some photos or simply running late. What had surprised her though was when she went into Ms. Click's class, Steve Harrington had seemed more happy to see her as he sent her genuine smile which had left her slightly confused. Last night had been a little blurry to her but she had briefly remembered her slight conversation with him before he had dropped her off at home.  

She was slightly grateful for him bringing her home because like this morning, Jonathan had ended up being MIA at the party. Steve had ushered to his hand as she saw him holding up a wrapped sandwich. She furrowed her eyebrows and tilted her head.

"Hey. I figured you were probably going to have a bit of a hangover today and were going to be behind this morning so I got you a breakfast sandwich and water." He told her as she tried to cover up the ghost of a smile that began to appear on her face.

"Wow, Harrington. You didn't have to do all that for simple old me. But I appreciate it." Amber thanked, taking the wrapped sandwich and the bottle of water. "Also, thanks again for bringing me home. I'm afraid I wouldn't have made it far if I walked home." Steve nodded his head.

"It was no problem really. I was going to head home anyway." He shrugged. The girl rolled her eyes at him trying to brush it all off.

The door had bursted open as a girl stumbled over her own two feet. Apologizing repeatedly to Ms. Click before she found her seat. Her instrument case clacking onto the floor besides her before she began to rummage through her bag. Taking out her notebook and pen. Her water bottle already placed on her her desk as she still moved things around in her bag.

"Where is it? Where is it?" She mumbled as she looked frantically.

"Buckley? Are you alright?" Amber asked which caused the younger girl to look around wide eyed.

"Umm. Yea—yeah. I just... don't know where my breakfast bar went. I had band practice so I couldn't eat breakfast and now I can't find my breakfast bar. So I won't be able to eat till lunch time and that means I'm not going to be prepared for Mr. Thompson's math class." The girl rambled on. Amber began to rip her breakfast sandwich in half before handing part of it to the girl.

"Here, I probably won't be able to finish all of this anyway." Amber told Robin who smiled gratefully.

"Thank you... Amber." Amber smiled back at the girl before she went back to eating her breakfast. For the rest of their first period Steve and Amber had continued on with some small talk when Click was distracted by her own voice. Once the class had ended, Steve and Amber had made their way down the hall which had gained some people's attention by seeing the two actually laughing with each other. One always seemed annoyed with the other so it was a different change to many.

"Well, I'll see you later, Hayes. I got p.e. to get to." Steve went to depart from her before she spoke up out of curiosity.

"What is the class doing today?"

"Uh, I think it's basketball." Steve said a little unsure.

"Hmm. Maybe, I'll drop by. Mr. Martin loves me anyway with my feedback on how you guys suck." Amber told him as he gave her a fake hurt look.

"We don't suck." Steve tried to defend but Amber gave him a look.

"Alright. But we aren't terrible. It's not like we're actually playing a real game vs. another school. It's just the class split in two." Steve said.

"Whatever, Harrington. All I'm saying is I could probably play better than most of you and I'm being serious." Amber stated.

"Sure. I'll catch you later." Steve chuckled before the two departed in separate directions.

Amber had snuck out of class early to go chill out in the gym. Slipping in through the doorway, she watched the two teams running back and forth. She saw how Steve and Billy kept going head to head which made her internally roll her eyes at how much they seemed to want to one up the other.

"Hey, Harrington! Plant your feet better!" Amber yelled which gained his attention and everyone else's. He sent her a 'really' look before she shrugged with a sheepish smile.

"Hayes! What are you doing in my gym?" Mr. Martin questioned.

"Simply trying to coach these fellows to improve on their performance." She responded, the annoyed man turned away from her. She got to witness one of Steve and Billy's little spats as she watched Billy knock Steve down and steal the ball. She shook her head, since Steve hadn't listened to what she had told him to do. But she watched as Billy had tried to make a lay-up but she frowned at him traveling with the ball. Everyone cheered as they gave him the point but Amber stood there with her hands on her hips.

"Hargrove. That was a travel." Amber spoke up as the blue-eyed boy turned to look at her. He gave her a confused look. Walking over towards her to hear what she had to say. If that was the only way she was going to interact with him to call him out on what he did, he would take what he could get.

"How so?" He raised his eyebrow in a questioning manner.

"What do you mean, 'how so?' You know what traveling is. You held the ball and moved your feet without dribbling it." Amber told him.

"Well, they still gave me the point. So I guess it didn't matter." Billy shrugged.

"I guess that just shows that you can't properly win without cheating." Amber looked at him with narrow eyes.

"Steve?" Amber heard as she turned to look in the direction of the voice to see Nancy Wheeler standing in the doorway. Steve had turned to see her with a plain look on his face before she nodded in the direction to outside. Steve then looked at Amber to see her already looking at him before he sighed and headed off with the Wheeler girl. Billy turned to look back at the girl once he watched Steve and Nancy disappear.

"So, have you seen Maxine at all?" Billy questioned.

"Max," Amber corrected before looking at him, "no, I haven't seen her yet. I would much rather see her than you right now." Amber said as Billy clicked his tongue and shook his head.

"I don't know what I've done to you to get your panties in such a twist..."

"Don't think for one minute you have any effect whatsoever on my panties." Amber scoffed.

"You don't seem like the caring and loving girl from the summer. You got more fire." Billy said.

"The guy I met in the summer vs the guy standing in front of me right now are two completely different people. The one in front of me is a total jerk being all high and mighty." Amber snapped.

"Sorry, that I ruined your expectations of me, Princess. We're not living in your fairytale." He said.

"Oh, trust me. I know we aren't in a fairytale. I can tell you one thing though. If this was the Billy I originally met in the summer I wouldn't have even wasted my time on him." Amber said with fire in her eyes before she felt a hand on her shoulder. She turned to see Steve who looked between the two of them.

"You all good here, Hayes?" Steve wondered as the girl nodded her head.

"Yeah. We're all good. I was just telling Hargrove to get off his high horse and play the game correctly." Amber said as Billy let out a deep chuckle and slowly backed away. Steve still continued to look between the two before settling his eyes back on Amber.

"So, how was your talk with Nancy?" Amber questioned.

"Well, she said she couldn't remember calling me bullshit and our relationship bullshit. And she couldn't say she loved me." Steve answered as Amber frowned.

"I'm sorry. That's really shitty. Not having them say it back." Amber said as Steve shrugged.

"I just don't know what to do now. Was I that terrible?" Steve asked as his hands slapped down to his side.

"Harrington, you weren't terrible. You changed for the better for her. You didn't want to be the douche anymore. You went out of your way to make her happy. Maybe she needs time alone. Or maybe she just isn't the one for you." Amber put her hand on his shoulder as he looked down at her.

"Wait. Was Hargrove the guy you had a thing with over the summer? That asshole? Were you feeling 'ok'?" Steve asked, completely getting distracted by the new thought in his head.

"Choke, Harrington." Amber groaned before dropping her hand from his shoulder and making her way to the door.

"Wha-what did I do now? Geez. I swear it's like she just flips a switch and then is back to hating me." Steve muttered as he shook his head and walked back onto the court.

*

Amber was pulling out of the parking lot. School had ended over a half an hour ago but she was finishing up a paper in the school library. While she was getting ready to pass the middle school, she felt a slight ache in her head. She had put her blinker on to pull over to the side, putting her car in park as she looked around. Her eyes landed on a small figure in the football field. Getting out of the car, the girl began to make her way down the hill. She started to jog once she realized who it was.

"Will!" She shouted as she knelt down in front of him. Seeing the boy spacing out with his eyes glossed over, she began to panic. Her hand settled on his shoulder before all of the sudden she saw everything turned dark. She began to see clouds of black mist pouring into Will which caused her to scream in fear. Trying to shake him but was thrown back by a force of the black smoke. She began to choke as it circled around her neck.

"Amber." A dark voice called out to her in the distance. Her eyes widened more in fear. She struggled more under the tight grip of the shadow. The haunting voice felt as if it was getting closer. Then
all of the sudden she woke up from the darkness gasping for air. She blinked as her eyes readjusted to everything being back to normal but Mike was standing there next to Will.

"Amber, are you okay?" Mike asked.

"I. I don't know. I don't know what I just saw. Everything was so dark." Amber mumbled, feeling like she was going crazy. Then all of the sudden, Joyce appeared with the rest of the kids.

"I just found him like this. I think he's having another episode. Amber was like that for a moment too but I was able to get her to let go of him." Mike told Joyce as the woman instantly knelt down next to her son, shaking him to wake up. The other kids began to circle around Amber to help her up. Amber's eyes fell onto the familiar redhead who looked at her with wide eyes.

"Amber. Are you okay?" Dustin asked and the older girl just nodded even if it was a lie. As everyone's attention had shifted back onto the boy having an episode, Max had attached herself to Amber with no hesitation.

"I didn't think I would see you again." Her voice was muffled into Amber's side. The older girl rubbed her back before sighing.

"Yeah. I guess somehow the universe didn't want you to let go of me quite yet, Max. The summer was too short of a time for us." Amber said. They all seemed to let out a breath of relief once Will had finally snapped out of it and Joyce embraced her son.

"Will, what did you see?" Mike had asked his friend.

"I don't know. I can't remember." Will lied as he then looked at Amber. She knew what he saw. The darkness was consuming him from all around.