She was keeping hope. Painfully, but hope was hope. She wasn't sure what had changed things; the kiss, or the fact that they hashed out what was lying beneath the surface. She didn't really care to know the answer either. What she did know was that the last seven days, a week after his arrest, he seemed... different.

A good different. 

It was an oddly appealing feeling for someone who hated change as much as she did. Much like a scalding hot bath against frigid skin. A comfort that came with the pain of hoping it would remain just as good. Just as warm. 

Sitting around the dining room table the following morning, everyone diving into their breakfast, it was like being immersed in domestic bliss. Hard to believe it could even be real and not just a figment of her grief-stricken psyche. The sound of El spraying whipped cream on her Eggos, Will squeezing what was left of the maple syrup, and Hopper quietly laughing under his breath. God, it was a sound she never thought she'd hear. 

She forced herself to stand in the kitchen and just watch; just for a few moments. She needed something to soak up, something to fuel the hope she so desperately wanted to cling to. With her coffee mug in one hand and a cigarette in the other, she watched them be a family. 

But the real world didn't pause for her, and she soon had to return to society and do what she did best: her job. She wasn't complaining... well, only a little bit. She had started off by counting down the minutes until she could return, but then, just like that, she couldn't ever imagine stepping away from the sight in front of her. She had wanted to return to work so she could avoid the stress at home, but her home didn't feel like a battlefield for seven glorious days. 

He was smiling more. Spending more time with El and just being present. El was happier, she was happier, it was what they needed. She could still see the parts of him that were clammed up and shut off from everyone else, but she would take whatever she could get from him. Whatever he had to give, she was ready to open her arms to it. 

The moment she had stepped foot into the precinct, she already felt homesick. It was odd since usually, the only place she felt homesick for was the precinct itself. That didn't diminish the sense of happiness she still had for returning. Her job was never really a job to her. Not like Melvald's. She didn't drag her feet and dread going in every single day. Instead, she found true happiness in doing what she felt was right for herself. She had once dreamt of who she would be once she could conquer her anxiety, and now, she was becoming that person. 

As she made her way to her desk, she glanced around, taking in the sight of what finally felt like returning for good. Ackerman was sitting at their adjoined desks, his feet propped up as he scrubbed the barrel of his gun with a bristle brush. She smiled and rolled her eyes, smacking down a pile of paperwork as she crashed down into her chair. 

"Look who's back. You're late. Miss me?" he asked, cracking a Cheshire grin as he watched her assort the files on her desk. 

"Not even a little bit," she smirked, swatting at his work boots so his legs fell off of the surface. "And the Captain insisted that I took a half-day today, it's only noon so stop complaining. Catch any cases while I was gone or did you just sit around on your lazy ass the whole time?"

He barked out a laugh before taking a sip from his coffee mug. "Yeah. While you were busy flying off the grid I finally caught the son of a bitch who was stealing Sudafed from the local pharmacies. 'Had to hand the case over to narcotics but it was worth it to see the smug bastard's face when I slapped the bracelets on him."

Joyce raised her eyebrows as she chuckled. "I'm surprised you let them take the collar for that one. You've been hellbent on that case for weeks now."

He rolled his eyes, not bothering to wipe the cheesy grin off of his face. "Yeah, well, those jackholes can handle the meth labs, I'm not trying to get my face blown off. That, and I owed a favor to a buddy of mine over in the unit. His stats are dropping a little too low and he needed the win. And before you have the opportunity to rub it in my face, I'll 'fess up and admit that it wasn't just me who caught him. Marshall helped me put together the pattern." 

Joyce looked up and over towards the other side of the room at one of the detectives pouring himself a cup of coffee. "Marshall! What the hell, man? Are you trying to steal my partner?" 

Ackerman cackled as the other detective swatted his hand in the air. "Nah, you can keep him. He's a pain in my ass. You're a saint for putting up with that one, Byers." Joyce laughed and Ackerman glared at the man across the room.

Joyce smiled as she leaned back in her chair, lighting up a cigarette between her lips. As she took a puff and exhaled the long string of smoke, she grabbed a file and flipped through the paperwork. "Jesus, Danny. Your handwriting is awful. You really need to work on that." 

"How 'come you're always ripping on me? Can't you find something to compliment me on for once?" he laughed, grabbing his own pack of cigarettes and lighting one as well. 

"Fine," she paused, rolling her eyes. "I guess your driving skills don't suck as bad as they used to." 

Others around the room snickered as they heard the banter between the two. Ackerman let out another throaty laugh. "Alright, I'll take what I can get. We're short on Uni's today so Cap' is sending us out to patrol for the rest of our shift. Morning crowd clocks out in a half-hour or so. Hit the road in fifteen?"

"Sure," she chirped, taking another long drag from the smoke. When she looked up from her paperwork, she noticed that her partner was staring quizzingly across the room. His eyes were narrowed as he watched a familiar face wander into the squad room. 

"Uh, Joyce? I think you have a visitor."

Joyce knit her brows together for a split second in confusion. She kicked off the floor to spin her chair around. Across the room, she saw as Hopper spotted her face. He was dressed in his work uniform. A solid black long sleeve turtle neck with camouflage cargo pants tucked into combat boots. As soon as he recognized her, he made his way closer to her. 

"What's wrong?" she asked, her heart dropping into her stomach as she stood up. She couldn't help but feel an instant worry as her first instinct. 

"Nothing. You uh– you forgot your house keys. I went home for my lunch break and I found them sitting on the counter." he chuckled almost silently, placing the keys in her palm. "You were still sleeping when I left this morning but I didn't want you to get locked out." 

Her worry faded and a smile grew in its place. "Thank you. So, day four of being a mercenary. You seem to be enjoying it." she laughed as her eyes sparkled. She was noticing another small change in him since his job had started; he felt a purpose when it came to his line of work. He hadn't said that directly, but she could tell that the moment his uniform was on, he was a happy man. 

"I'm not a mercenary." he laughed a little louder. She had spent the past few days calling him that, each time he just rolled his eyes and smiled. "My official title is a 'private security agent',  if I were a mercenary, I'd be making a lot more money."

"Well, thank you for my keys, Mr. Private Security Agent. Thanks to you, I won't freeze my feet off while trying to remember where I hid the spare. Here, let me grab you a cup of coffee before you have to go back." she patted his chest with her palm before running over to the coffee maker.

Ackerman tried not to eavesdrop on the conversation, but as soon as Joyce had her back turned, he watched as Hopper picked up a photo frame off of Joyce's desk. She had added another one since he had been to her precinct for the first time. This one didn't have a thick layer of dust covering it. He hadn't had any time to look the last time since it was when he was being bailed out, but it was new. He stared at the photo as he felt his stomach drop. Hawkins Snowball of '84. El was standing next to Hopper in her pretty pink and grey dress. It was a polaroid snap courtesy of Jonathan. They were both smiling, happy and nervous for her to capture another moment in society. 

He had spent the previous week battling off what felt like a wave of sadness. It was cresting, yet he continued to fight it, push it away with all of his force. He was running as fast as he could away from it. He wanted to turn over a new leaf, he really did. It was hard when the shadow of the oncoming tsunami was casting over everything good in his life; creating a reminder of what he had missed. He wanted this to be over, for life to return to its normal status and to no longer feel the crushing pain of a gaping hole of missing memories.

Normal was over, he had told himself that a hundred times. He could fight tooth and nail for what he had, but he would still be haunted by what he had lost. For the longest time, when El had first gone under his wing, he refused to let himself say it was a second chance. He had told Joyce just how badly he wanted a second chance, but admitting that he had one meant admitting what he had to lose. The moment he had taken it all for granted, the world had taken it away.

She was looking down into the cup she was stirring when he set the photo down, turning towards the sound of her footsteps. Her face dropped when she saw him turn around, his skin going pale as he fought off the oncoming nausea. "You okay, Hop?"

"Yeah," he said breathlessly, taking the coffee that she was holding out for him. "Thank you," he murmured, nearly pushing past her on his way for the door. 

"Wait," she called out, spinning on her heels to face him. "I'll uh— I'll see you for dinner, right?" she felt the overwhelming urge to be cautious around him again. In the split-second that she had left him, she had returned to find him looking as if he had just seen a ghost. 

He was looking over his shoulder, only turning to face her a few degrees from his destination. She watched him flex his jaw, an ordinary tic that she had recognized as a reflex to consideration. "Yeah," he replied, trying to sound the slightest bit confident in his words. "See you then."

"Okay... have a good rest of the day," her words were weak but it didn't matter since he was already gone before she had said them. When she turned back around, Ackerman was clearly pretending not to be listening. She would've bought his bogus act at first if it weren't for the fact that the file he was nose deep into was upside down. She rolled her eyes, snatching the file out of his hands and turning it right side up before charging away. "Eavesdropper."

On the east side of the city's outskirts, Joyce and her partner sat cooped up in the cab of the squad car. It was ironic to her, really, how she could feel nostalgic for a time that wasn't too long ago. On the days when this would be a normal occurrence, day to day life on patrol duty. Not the rarity it was now that she was a detective. Actually, not rare, more like unheard of. Part of her wondered if they were actually short on uniformed officers or if her Captain just didn't want her right back into the swing of things yet. 

Either way, it didn't really matter. Instead, she was soaking up the moment that brought her back to her first year as a beat cop. She still wore the uniform sometimes, especially when she needed the mirror to remind her of who she started off as in this new life. It already seemed as if it were lifetimes ago. Now, she was right back in the passenger seat of the squad car, sipping burnt coffee and casually watching the roads. 

She had finally found a job that wasn't really that much of a job to her. She didn't dread waking up every morning, not even when she was just a basic desk jockey. She adored her job, right down to the lowest rank she could be. In some ways, the fact that she loved her job made her a better person. Being a better person made her a better mother, and being a better mother made her family's grief a little easier. 

She needed her job just as much as she needed oxygen. 

Ackerman had been surprisingly quiet while they sat parked in a wooded area. She couldn't help but feel a little bit concerned because usually, he didn't know when the shut the fuck up. Instead, he sat so quietly that she almost forgot he was there. 

She sighed, exhaling a deep breath before braving herself into a conversation she wasn't sure she wanted to have. "Alright, spit it out. Why aren't you talking my ear off? We've been sitting here for an eternity and you've said approximately six words to me. " she asked, setting her lit cigarette down in their make-shift ashtray which was really just an empty cup-holder. 

He flinched when she spoke, doing a double-take to look at her before turning his attention back out through the window. "Back when you and I were riding the desks, two beat cops in a busy city," he chuckled, "I asked you why you joined the academy. I remember you told me that you were looking for a change because you had just lost someone important to you. You didn't say their name, and I didn't ask..."

Joyce felt herself beginning to cower as she looked at him through the corner of her eye.

 "It was Jim, wasn't it?" he asked, sounding more like a statement than a question. 

She knew she was wading into dangerous territory by letting this conversation carry on any further. Yet, she felt somewhat allured by the fact that he was paying attention to her life. That and the fact that she desperately wanted to confide in someone didn't help the urge to fight it back. 

"Yeah," she breathed, keeping her eyes glued to the yellow lines painted into the roads. 

"You thought that he had died?" he asked, losing his breath as he did so. She could hear the assumption of pain in his voice — like he was trying to put himself into her shoes for a moment before realizing how excruciating that would be. 

"I spent almost three whole years thinking that, yes."

He gave a shocked huff as he shook his head in disbelief. She was trying to refuse to look at him. If she did, she'd see the effect that the smallest amount of information had on someone who hadn't witnessed what she had. She'd be forced to recognize that it was traumatic to even think about, let alone live through. "Jesus..." he muttered, pinching the bridge of his nose. "How the hell'd you get through that?"

That was enough for her to finally turn her head and face him. Her shoulders shrunk as if she were retracting back into her shell. The fact of the matter was that she wasn't 'through' it just yet. But she knew what he meant. He was talking about the raw and rough beginning of grief. She didn't talk much about those days, so entirely ashamed of herself for how she had handled it. Yet, despite the self-loathing attitude towards her actions, she could hear herself as she began to answer his question. 

"The first few weeks were the hardest." she started off with a whisper. "I couldn't sleep. I'd go days and days without sleep, just staring off into space." A million deep breaths couldn't take away the pit in her stomach that grew as she brought herself back to those moments. "For a while, I just didn't move. I'd count the stripes in the wood paneling on my walls until I lost count, and then I'd start doing it again."

"Then what happened?" Ackerman asked, staring at her with a hurt in his eyes that she wished she couldn't see. He was meeting a new side of his partner for the first time. 

"I started to hate myself. No matter how badly my kids needed me, I just couldn't move. Two weeks after everything and I had only slept a few hours in total. Eventually, my oldest son couldn't handle it anymore, he saw just how tired I was..." she paused, swallowing the guilt that rose in her throat. "He gave me a sleeping pill, and everything just sunk. I could close my eyes again, I could breathe again, I could sleep again."

The pain in his eyes only intensified as she continued, and she hated herself for allowing another innocent person into the world she had lived in, even if it was just for a sliver of the story. 

"Just like that, I remembered how incredible it felt to sleep. All I wanted to do was sleep," her eyes clamped shut, her head slightly shaking as she remembered what it felt like to roll around on rock bottom. "So, I did... One pill became two and two became four and eventually, I was emptying those bottles faster than I could buy them. Over time, they stopped working and I was right back to square one. I was chasing numbness, a life where I didn't have to be awake anymore or feel anything anymore. In some weird, fucked up way, I finally understood why Hopper couldn't set down the pill bottle after his first daughter died."

"You were trying to keep him alive through yourself," Ackerman said, catching her completely off guard. She turned her head to stare at him, her jaw falling ever so slightly. 

"Yeah," she whispered, followed by a breathy sarcastic laugh. "I guess so."

"Then what happened?"

Tears began to brim in her eyes. She squeezed them shut, hoping to evade the feeling of weakness for shedding her sadness. "I realized that I was hurting my kids because I was mad at the world. El, she had lost everyone already, I didn't wanna do that to her or my boys. If I didn't stop, the next person to end up in a grave would be me. It took me a while to admit it, but I knew that Hop wouldn't want that for me or for the kids. Subconsciously, I knew that already. I just couldn't let the thought cross my mind without becoming angry or depressed. So, I sent the kids to their friends' houses for the weekend, locked myself in my house and forced myself to detox."

"Is that why you became a cop?" he asked quietly. 

"Yeah," she finally cracked a soft smile. "I realized that if I wanted to keep some part of him alive through myself, he deserved to be a better memory than the bottom of a pill bottle. He offered me a job at the station back home, I was gonna take him up on it before... y'know. The thing is, after I became a cop, I realized that I wasn't just doing it for him. I was doing it for me too. That's what he really would've wanted."

Ackerman glanced at her out of the corner of his eye. "He's lucky to have you in his life," he whispered, almost as if he wasn't quite sure if he wanted her to hear him. 

As she felt herself growing uncomfortable with the situation, she teasingly punched him in the arm. "Alright, alright. Don't get sappy on me," she laughed, watching him recoil from her jab with a giggle. 

"No but uh... really, Joyce." he looked at her, his expression turning more serious. "You're really fuckin' strong. He's lucky to have a woman like you."

Joyce froze for a moment before whipping her head around. "Oh— uh... no. No, he and I aren't... together." she chuckled awkwardly, her heart beginning to speed up as she sputtered the words out. 

"Oh! Oh shit, I just figured," he cut in as quickly as possible. "Y'know, because you're raising his kid and he's living with you and you kinda seemed lovey dovey at the station today. I'm sorry for assuming."

"Lovey dov— What?" she laughed in astonishment. 

"Oh come on," he laughed back, throwing his hands up as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. "You guys were flirting it up in the bullpen when he stopped by. You can't tell me that it's entirely platonic, Joyce." The accusatory look in his eyes was enough for her to know that she wasn't hiding it as well as she had hoped. 

"Uh... well," she pursed her lips, dropping her gaze down into her lap. 

"Oh my god," he choked out in a laugh. Suddenly, his voice dropped as if there were thirty other people around that he didn't want to hear "Did you guys sleep together?"

"Daniel Ackerman!" she shouted, "You can't just go around asking people that!" she knew if it were any other person, she'd give them a swift kick to the boys but he was more or less one of her best friends so she wasn't as entirely offended as she played it off to be. "No! We didn't sleep together... we just—"

"Just what?" he teased with a dopey smile, chuckling as she rolled her eyes at him. 

"We kissed," she answered hesitantly, shrinking down into her shoulders again. As soon as she looked for any reason to end the conversation, the alarm on her watch started to beep and a cool relief washed over her body. "Shift is over. Could you drop me off at the station so I can grab my car?" 

She couldn't shake the worry that came on as soon as Hopper had left the precinct earlier. The sudden shift from his new way of expressing happiness changing into his familiar grief. He couldn't seem to leave fast enough and she had only turned her back for a minute at most. The ghastly look on his face had sent a cold shiver into her bones, and no matter how hard she tried, there was no shaking the image out of her head. 

As she pulled out of the parking garage after her shift, she was overcome with the instinct to check on him. She had done her best to give him his space, but she knew that his shift wouldn't end for another two hours and she couldn't possibly wait that long to reassure herself that he was okay. 

On her way home, she found herself driving down the long gravel driveway that led to the Astor-Pruitt Private Security building. She tried to tell herself that it was probably nothing and that he was perfectly fine, but she knew well enough that trying to convince herself of that was pointless unless she had proof. 

As soon as she pushed past the glass door of the building, she spotted the owner. Mark Astor, her old precinct lieutenant. He had always been kind to her during her first few months on duty — a rare quality from a man of higher rank. Instantly, a smile blossomed on her face as she made her way to the front counter. 

"Joyce! It's good to see you again." he beamed, setting down the manila envelope he had in his hands as he walked over to greet her at the counter. 

"I saw you a less than a week ago, Lieutenant. Miss me already?" she chuckled warmly, setting down her purse and keys on the counter. 

"Oh, hush with the rankings there, detective. You should know damn well by now to call me Mark." he barked out a loud laugh that brought her back to old times. "I was just about to call you when you walked in the door."

Joyce's cheery demeanor dropped almost instantly. "Call me? Wh-why?" 

"Oh, well, Hopper never returned after his lunch break. I figured maybe he had gone to see you and got caught up. After a few hours, I started to worry." he answered, matching her suddenly concerned expression. 

"What do you mean he didn't come back after his lunch break? He was on his way back here last time I saw him." her blood was turning into ice as it pumped anxiously through her body. Her training instincts were beginning to kick in, causing her to think of every bad thing that could've happened between here and the precinct. Yet, she probably would've heard something on the radio. It was the fact that there was nothing at all about his whereabouts that worried her.

"You haven't seen him?" the older man asked. 

Joyce grit her teeth as she gulped. "No, but you can bet your ass I'm gonna go find him."