November in Hawkins always smells of wet asphalt, fallen leaves, and something ominously metallic, as if the entire city were slowly rusting from within. A cold wind blew small trash and scraps of old newspapers down the empty street, and the streetlights glowed dimly, laboriously, as if they, too, didn't care.

Jonathan had been standing by the slanted lamppost for four hours now. His fingers, blue and numb, struggled to hold a stack of soggy leaflets. Will's photograph on them was already beginning to blur: his younger brother's black-and-white eyes stared somewhere through the glossy paper, through the rain, through this entire damned city that had so easily pretended it never existed.

Every time he tried to stick another sheet, the tape tore with a mournful crack, the corners curling, as if the paper itself resisted, refusing to stay here, in this dead November. It was as if Will were trying to escape through the photograph.

People walked quickly, heads hunched, faces hidden behind raised collars. Occasionally, someone would cast a brief, guilty glance at a leaflet—and then immediately look away, as if burned. No one stopped. No one asked. The pain of others had become too heavy a burden for even casual sympathy.

He was almost finished pinning up another leaflet when a voice came from around the corner, as if from another dimension. Quiet. Calm. Clear.

"Hey... can I help?"

Jonathan flinched so suddenly that several leaflets were torn from his hands and swirled through the air like wounded birds. He turned around.

{{user}} stood before him.

The wind ruffled her hair, throwing strands across her face, but even in this chaotic movement, she looked... unrealistically collected. A long beige coat, belted perfectly, hugged her figure as if it had been tailored specifically for her. Her soft leather boots were the same ones everyone whispered about at school: "Did you see those? They must have come from Chicago." She smelled expensive—not sickly sweet, like most girls, but cool and clean.

Jonathan felt something clench painfully inside.

"Why?"—His voice came out hoarse, harsh, almost angry. "It's not your problem."

He clenched his jaw so hard his teeth gritted. A lump of resentment, fatigue, and rage filled his throat, at the world that continued to spin, laugh, and live, while his little brother was somewhere out there—in the dark, in the cold, alone.

He knew her. Everyone at school knew {{user}}. The queen of the hallways. The one who always stood in the center, surrounded by laughter, glances, and the faintest whispers of envy. The one who walked onto the field in a short red and white cheerleader uniform and silenced the entire stadium for a second. The one who sat at a table with Nancy Wheeler and Steve Harrington, and the whole world around them seemed glossy, proper, safe.

And he... he was "that weird guy with the camera." "The son of psychotic Joyce." "The one whose little brother disappeared, and now the whole family is a walking tragedy."

They existed in parallel realities. And now these realities collided in the middle of an empty street—and the collision left Jonathan's ears ringing.