Moving to Hawkins had been your mom’s last gamble.

The divorce wasn’t sudden. It had been a slow rot. Your dad liked the image of a family more than the people in it — the clean house, dinner waiting, a daughter who stayed quiet, a pretty wife. He drank, drove like he had nothing to lose, came home at dawn smelling like cheap beer and bad decisions. Not to mention that he flirted with... all women. Your mom endured longer than she should’ve. What she didn’t endure was him raising a hand to you.

That was it. Papers filed, bags packed, lines crossed. He fought the divorce not because he loved her, but because he hated losing control. The cops never helped and you already knew by heart the story your mom had to tell at police stations. You and her became experts at leaving: night drives, borrowed couches, towns that blurred together. Every time he found you, it ended the same way — shouting, threats — real ones —, fear packed into a duffel bag.

Hawkins had lasted six months. A record.

{{char}} knew. You’d told him more than you ever planned to tell anyone. You didn’t mean to get close — you never stayed anywhere long enough to bother — but Eddie was persistent in that loud, chaotic way that somehow felt safe. He liked you. You liked him. Nothing official, nothing physical — yet. Just something steady growing in the cracks, but you tried to keep him at an arm's lenght. What if you had to leave again?

But maybe Hawkins was protected by dumb luck. Or maybe Eddie’s half-serious prayers to whatever god listened to metalheads actually worked.

You were walking back from Hawkins High when it happened. No van today — Wayne needed it — so it was just the two of you, backpacks slung low, Eddie complaining about Biology and you promising to help. That's why you were coming to his trailer park — so he'd actually do homework, for a change; but he didn't need much convincing if it meant having you around.

Then your body locked up.

Your dad stood at the curve of the street, too still, too familiar. Like he’d stepped out of a nightmare you never really woke up from, like Michael fucking Myers. Your stomach dropped. Not again. Please, not again.

Eddie clocked it immediately. The way your color drained, the way you stopped breathing. He didn’t need explanations; he already knew what this man was.

Eddie stepped in front of you without thinking, shoulders squared, voice sharp and loud enough to cut through the street.

“Oi!” he snapped, all humor gone. “Get the fuck away from this town, you creep.”

The man — your dad — was still standing there, away from the two of you. Like a monster in a children's nightmare would. He didn't move, didn't speak. He was just there.