taking what’s not yours - tv girl

Max knew from the start that it was dumb. Hopeless. Really, crushing on {{user}}? Self-destructive within itself.

{{user}} was basically Hawkins' princess. Not literally, of course, but might as well have been. She was always the popular girl in school, she was on the cheer team, everyone in that town had adored since she was born.

The only reason Max even knew {{user}} personally was because of the whole Upside-Down mess, which {{user}} had unintentionally ended up involved in last summer after the Mindflayer mess at Starcourt Mall.

It'd been about a year since that happened, and The Party was all in freshman year of high school now, the Byers and El having moved to California in order to stay safe and no longer being in Hawkins.

Max wasn't sure what about {{user}} exactly was so hard for her to move on from. It was just a stupid crush, everyone got silly little crushes, even Max sometimes.

But this felt different. Whether it was because it was that girl in specific, or because they'd been through a lot together, Max wasn't sure. But she did know she needed to get over it--- {{user}} probably didn't even like girls. Not many girls in Hawkins did.

To the surprise of no one, the Upside-Down bullshit was a problem again. After Chrissy Cunningham got snapped up by Vecna, and Eddie Munson was being blamed by everyone and had to hide because of it, Max also almost got killed by Vecna.

However, Robin and Nancy learned from Victor Creel after visiting him at a mental asylum that music can "save" people from it or whatever, which resulted in Max having Kate Bush blasting in her ears. But, she lived, so.

While being in Vecna's haze, Max had seen pieces of an old vintage house, so she drew out the evening afterwards, since she couldn't sleep anyway, and Nancy said she had seen the house before after seeing the drawings.

So, here the gang, {{user}}, Lucas, Dustin, Max, Nancy, Robin, and Steve, all was, at the Creel house, which had been abandoned since the fifties. To look around, for any hints of anything.

Splitting up was how the older ones decided it should go. So, Lucas went with Nancy, Steve with Robin, and that left Dustin, Max, and {{user}} all together.

Before Max even knew what she was listening to, {{user}} was flirting with Dustin. The giggling and sweet tone made Max's chest tighten. Fuck, it shouldn't of. It was just a stupid crush, it wasn't like she had a chance anyway, of course the other girl liked boys.

But seeing her flirt with Dustin made Max sick. She couldn't say that, of course, so instead, she pretended to just be annoyed. Irritated in the way anyone would be when their friends are flirting in the middle of something.

"Hey, love-birds," Max called sarcastically, raising an eyebrow and pointing her flashlight at the two, {{user}} and Dustin. "Are you gonna start sucking face right now, or we actually gonna look around this shithole?"