Driving back home to Hawkins, emanated in a content quiet Melissa and Hopper instigated, had proving amicably with no troubles. Minus her snivels, clearing mucus out of her nose, congested from her weeping. It, the sound alone, made hopper's soul chip little each time.

He decided on bringing Milly to his lake side trailer home, that had a view of an area in 'lovers lake' locals named it. It is a well known territory for teens use to hang out after school in summer and fall.

Jim switches off his wagons high beams, his trailer in sight.

" it's real late, Mills. I don't want to go and wake Jo.. your mom, and Jonathan so I.."

'She's sleeping. Shit. I should be quiet.' Hopper doesn't speak a single phrase of word exiting his police car.

Wary, as to not bring her out of her slumber, Jim partially extends one arm to click her seats safety belt out of its socket. Hopper then steadied his legs, hauling Milly out of the car carrying her body, using one as to slam it close. Melissa ensconces her face in his collar bone, curling up basking in his warm embrace.

He felt conditioned to keep her in place. It felt... right. There's nothing he wouldn't do to keep her out of harms way. In the end it would lead him in to damnation but he's on his way out to hell. He truely believed to be cursed and Melissa Byers is a pinnacle god sent wanting to discipline, test, him.

He swore, not too loud, forgetting how supposedly Sandra is meant to be on her way over to his trailer. 'She won't mind. It's not as if there is anything goin' on a deep emotional level, anyway. I can just turn her away.'

Jim is distracted from his internal issues when Milly stirs in her sleep. Thankfully not awakening to hear him. 'I gotta get out of these. I stink like absolute trash and need a real clean. Can't have mills smelling this.' Jim sighs moving him self where his bathroom is.

Freshening his appearance, he now wore a chequered shawl plaid shirt matching those with a pair of loose fitting trousers, Hopper goes out to stand on the terrace. Common house crickets cheep signalling fall had arrived and he uses an old, silver, lighter to kindle a cigarette. Cupping a hand to keep smoke in.

" Smoking is one of the main causes for early on set cancer. You know? You're slowly killing your self, there, Jim. It's scientifically proven." Melissa assess, waving a hand around tensing her nose, repugnance shown in her choice of tone.

" I see you came out of your beauty sleep. You weren't out for long. Would have thought I had to wait 'til the morning to see your face 'gain." Replies Jim, using his lips to move the lit cigarette, glancing in the corner of his eye and quite quick to put a discrete hand on her lower back, as she joins his side.

" And for your in-formation I am healthy as a horse. Still kicking life in the ass."

Melissa does a quiet laugh, his shit-eating grin made her move her head in a constrained shake to hide how her cheeks are redden. To Hoppers touch. Heart beating fast.

" Why, in the world, did you go to that son of a bitches house alone?"

Hopper wasn't irritated. It was more concern, for the fact Lonnie was an idiotic man whose short temper could turn him violent in a second. Melissa was made an exemplification of his ease to anger. " I swear to god. if I could've shot that Vulture..  I would've done it. No problem."

Steam could be prominent and seen out of Jim's ears if he was in a cartoon.

Milly, down-casting her eyes in shame, starts to tug on fragments to her fingernails. It's an idiosyncratic habit she uses for her anxiety built from childhood.

" I thought I could bring Will home. If.. If he was there, which I know now he never was. I wanted the first kind face he sees to be me. He's just a boy, Hop. Will.. he wrote a letter, when he first began school term, recounting how much he wishes there was a way for him to move to New York. Mom had found printed applications for local schools in the city I was. Manhattan."

Cicadas shrills echo and gentle waves of water break the surface to the lake. Jim, solicitous, does a low grunting noise.

" That kid. He looks up to you, you are a great sister. Don't let that afterthought of a guy say otherwise." Melissa, putting her chin on her chest, facing the wood boards smiles; Shy.

" You're cold, here, have this. I don't need it." Giving Milly his flannel plaid sweat shirt, he adjusted each button brushing his rugged, soil encrusted, fingers on her halter tops thin fabric and hid a duplicitous smirk to her reaction. 'Knock it off man. You can't do this, to yourself, or her. It's not far on Milly, stop it.'

His mental conflict of wanting to be close and get to know Melissa to a greater, personal, level made it impossible for hopper to keep her at arms length. She had enough experience of having a man, in her life, hurt her. however he proceed to graze his fingertips, brushing hair behind the space of her ear. Milly flickers her eyes shut at his touch. 'What am I doing. No.'

" Get some sleep."

Milly frowns, internally, at Jim's mood switching. First— he is attentive, receptive. For a moment she thought he might absolve those mental barricades he has create. Now he leaves her questioning his sudden mood change. Hopper, staying stoic, cracks a culpable short and dejected smile.

Milly walks back inside his trailer.

'This is for you. I can't have you hurt, again. I'm sorry it has to be this way, Mills.' They were oceans a part, currents of riptides dragging them down further away, but so close together just out of hands reach. ' I am sorry.'

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Morning had rolled around. Hopper had returned Melissa home, just before Joyce could question where she had gone. Jonathan slept restless, wondering when Milly would be home, as he had prior to before paid Lonnie a house visit. His dad admitting to slapping her around made Jonathan seethe. Calling Melissa a 'Slut'. Speaking of which Jonathan sees Milly enter through the door, removing her ballet flats. " Good. You're here. It's mom, Quick. I have to show you what she's doing right now." Not time wasting, he is quick at making a grab for milly's wrist tugging her to wills bed room.

" Johnny first of all, ow. Second what do you want to show me.. oh. My. Gosh. Mom? What.. what is all of this?" Every electrical appliance, down to new bought light bulbs, are spaced out in corners— even on wills bed. " B.. Baby. Baby come here. It's will, its will, he's trying to.. he's trying to talk through the lights."

Melissa somehow believes that. It was a nagging feeling in the back of her thoughts. She sat close to her mom, Jonathan put his hands on his sister's shoulders. She exchange a glance of concern, for her mom, which he does back. " I know how this must sound. But please Just watch. Just... watch." Joyce held her girls thumb, squeezing it for reassurance.

" Will.. will.. h-honey, your sister. She's here, so is.. so is your brother. Can you show them what you showed me, baby?"

Milly focuses on one light bulb and it glows for a brief time then sparkles.

" See. See." Joyce, desperate, says hoping she had convinced her kids will is there. " Mom, m..mom. It's just electricity, okay. It's acting up. That is probably the same thing that fried the phone." Jonathan, even though he wants to believe his mom, points out. " No! It is not the electricity, Jonathan. Something is going on h.. here."

Melissa felt an elusive sense of needing to stand up, allowing that instinct, feeling a force wanting her to examine wills bedroom walls.

'Milly. Are you really there? I'm here! I'm here! But I don't know where I am. Please. please, help me Minnie.'

Joyce, now noticing Milly in a hypnotised trance hand hovering on the exact spot that thing tried reaching for her, breathes in laboriously. 'Why are her eyes W...White. they are Normal again now. but they were, just for a second and moment there, pure white.'

" Melissa. Baby. You okay?" Asks Joyce, uncertain of what exactly she had seen.

" Huh. Oh, yeah, I feel fine. Why do you ask, m.. mom?" Milly, confused, questioned. It was her mother she is worried for not herself. " it's just.. you know what, it's probably nothing. So ignore me, sweetie. Go.. go and have breakfast with Jonathan. I will be out in a second." Joyce manages to show an unconvincing image of a smile. Putting on a plastered calm expression. " O..Okay, mom. If you are sure." Milly left a kiss on the crown of Joyce's head. " I love you."

Joyce furrows her brows, as she caught a little sight of an aggressive bruise forming under her girls eye socket, which leaves her wondering. It would be a topic to discuss but goes back to the task at hand. Reaching her little boy, her Will.

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" I am just shocked at how much you have grown, in to such a gorgeous young woman six years later, Melissa. I remember having you 'round here, seeing the girl that my 'manda wouldn't stop talking bout, running around." Sue Sinclair, quite the beautiful woman in her early forties, states.

" It's good to have my baby back home too. I missed her. The last she was here, it had to have been thanksgiving day of last year. But she is a graduate, now. Which means she can be home again."

Sue had completed washing dishes in the kitchen sink and Amanda groans out loud. At her mother's ebulliently obvious delight of her return. " Mom. Stop it. You do know I am grown ass woman, I don't need to be babied no more. It's bad, enough, Lucas is coddled by you and dad. Don't even get me goin' on how 'Rica is now. She's a brat." Melissa knew how siblings could be. Though Will is susceptible to regulations, rules and discipline. Jonathan was an easy going child but definitely broke rules.

" Amanda Susanne Sinclair, you don't talk about your sister like you just did now. You are not too old for a whooping, young lady. Hear me?" Sue aims her spatula to Mandy. 'Watch your tone' written in her eyes. Milly cringes. 'The full government name. Ouch.' Mandy all but rolls her eyes, in secret, nodding her head to Melissa as an indication to follow her. Sue was placing utensils in their correct place. " I swear. One of these days Erica is gonna say some things to the wrong guy, or girl, and Im going to have to be there incase shit happens."

Melissa was there, in the emergency room, at Erica's birth. It was no question Erica had liked her as she grew up in infancy. Milly often offering care and childminding, baby sitting, But had left Hawkins for her career in fashion studies. Now Erica is an intelligent, sarcastic, girl according to Amanda. Seven years old. " I don't know, Mandy' she still sounds like the same sweet little girl as when I left." Amanda produce a forced, great exaggerating laugh, at her best friend.

" Sweet? Oh hell no." She scoffs.

Stepping in the lounge room 'Cinderella' blasts on full volume. Erica, absent from school have come down sick, turns her head just when fairy god mother transforms Ella's rags in a magical dress. " I don't think you remember. But this is Milly, she use to live here in Hawkins. She went to school with me."

Mandy slouches on her dad's lazy boy recliner, each parent in Hawkins paid half the usual amount and pricing on them. " Hi, What are you working on there, can I see..?" Milly smiles softly, while speaking to Erica. Knowing it was good for a child's developing brain to talk calmly. " Sure. At least someone, ahem Amanda ahem, wants to see my art work. Here. Look, I did this to put on the Christmas tree. it's an Angel. I can draw you one, for yours, if you would like."

Happy she is interested in her drawings, Erica parades the stencilled yellow and white 'Angel' decoration.

" I would love that." Milly giggles when Erica pokes out her tongue, to Amanda, and it is reciprocated. Mandy put her middle finger in the air.

Melissa's mouth hung open. " Mandy!"

" It isn't like the little shit hasn't seen it before. I've done it so many times, to her, growing up. She's 'right."

Milly shook her head.

JASMINE SPEAKS;

Jim being closed off with Melissa wasn't entirely a surprise. Seeing how he is, in show, during season one made it's not at all out of his character.

He will begin to change though. As you can see his way of thinking is conflicting.

I like to see what you thought about this chapter and your theory on why Milly's eyes going to a blank white colouring? Amanda? Tell me in comments what you think is going on. I wish to see each and every input.

®️ Written By Jasmine.