Chapter Text
A lamp hummed softly, buzzing like a bee. The light was warm, saturated with a loud yellow that misted the air like dust. A moth fluttered around it, wings batting the swelling bulb with intoxicated interest.
There was a window below it, cracked open as a warm gust of wind struggled to lurch into the room. It got trapped by the thick curtains spilling behind the glass. A sliver of light peaked from the small gap between the fabric dividing the dark room with a golden line.
Outside, the morning air was damp and cool, the sun already peaking over the tree tops painting the small town in a sweet hue. In the driveway, a car groaned, coughing until the engine startled alive. Vehicles slipped onto the road, the sound of tires rolling over gravel sitting heavy in the morning draft like two packets of sugar in a warm cup of tea.
A tall, grouchy woman walked through her yard, a bag full of bottles clinging to her back. She slung the trash over her shoulder and chucked it into a waste bin. The grass below her was green and long, crashing like waves against her old brown boots. The exhaustion in her eyes was evident, even though the day had only just begun.
With the back of her hand, she smeared off the sweat on her brow. Her appearance wasn’t pretty but instead simple. Her hair was messily pulled out of her face, some old wiry strands tickling her forehead. A cigarette laid limply between her lips, a subtle trail of smoke leaking from the end.
She marched back towards her house, the thick wooden door, left open, causing the bolts to bulge from their metal prison. The screen door, however, was still shut, letting the cool morning breeze drift inside. The woman was hoping to air out the thick dry heat before noon rolled around and the house would once again be filled with the humid air.
Fall typically wasn't warm, but this one was, which had the better half of town pulling out their hair, wondering what had changed.
The steps creaked beneath her shoes and the screen door gave way from a gentle push, quietly bouncing shut behind her. The house wasn’t much but it was rooted to the ground, had decent plumbing, and a roof over her head. Her and her kids' heads.
Walking into the house brought an odd sense of silence, not unwelcome, but it merrily emphasized the quiet ticking of the clock hanging on the wall. She glanced at it, eyes shifting below her hooded lids.
She took the cigarette from her mouth, cradling it between two fingers, “Maxine!” she called. She waited for a moment, but heard no response.
With heavy feet, she made her way to her daughter’s room. It was adjacent to the living area, just down the hall from the front door. “Maxine?” She knocked once before cracking the door open. She peered her head into the room letting the door slowly swing open.
Her daughter was still asleep, covers pulled up so far that the only thing she could see was the red mop of hair pouring out from underneath the blankets.
With an irritated sigh, the mother rested a hand on the crook of her waist, taking a quick drag from her cigarette.
“Maxine,” she said sternly, exhaling smoke. Her daughter groaned and rolled under the sheets.
“W-What…” she mumbled, her voice distorted by morning grogginess.
“Up now or your brother will leave you.”
“What?” she asked again, slowly dragging her head from beneath the covers to be met with the dark room, lowly lit by the sun just barely peeking in through the window.
“School,” her mother dragged. “First day…” She leaned on the door frame, a bony shoulder rough against the wallpaper. “Ringing any bells?”
“Oh…” Max breathed out, although her voice came out quieter than before. She sat up, the blankets pooling onto her lap as a small beam of light tangles itself into her red hair. “Today’s the first day of school...” she repeated, causing her mother to furrow her brow.
“Yes, so up. Now, or you’ll be stuck walking to school.” She fell back, her feet catching her as she left, leaving the door open.
Max blinked. Once, twice, then thrice, trying to rid them of sleep, trying to get the cogs to turn.
School? Her mind slowly drew out, because that…didn’t seem right.
She drowsily looked at her calendar, the one nailed into the wall, crooked and off center. In big bold red letters, OCTOBER looked back at her, a cartoon pumpkin was drawn above it with a glowing face.
…October?
Then all at once, everything came rushing back so quickly she stopped breathing.
Memories, years worth of memories slammed into her like a tidal wave crashing into a city.
Everything, everyone, Halloween, Lucas, Mike, Dustin, Will, El, Monsters, Demo Dogs, the Demogorgon, the Upside Down, July 4th, Death, Billy, Grief, Guilt, Loneliness, Vecna, Death, Death, Death.
Death.
She sat in stunned silence, a shaky hand lifting to sit below her collarbone, just above her heart. Urging it to slow down.
She forces out small breaths, trying to focus solely on the expansion of her lungs. Max exhales, and yet she still struggles to truly breathe. They’re shaky and come out all at once.
She tries again, but her heartbeat only stutters as a lone thought gets caught inside her mind. Like a fly caught in a spider’s web.
The words replay over and over and over.
I should be dead
I should be dead
I should be dead
I…
I should…
I should be…
I should be dead…
And then.
I am dead.
Those three simple words sit like a weighted anvil, crashing through her thoughts, her feelings tumbling over every memory as it shone like a spotlight directed right at it.
I should be dead.
Letting out another shaky breath, she searched for the calendar once again, her eyes slowly tracing the room with more purpose than before.
Her old room.
Slowly, her eyes creep up the wall until the old crinkled pages engulf her focus, silently rolling over the days, numbers spilling over the page. They keep traveling until they latch onto the month again.
OCTOBER stared back at her menacingly.
It…was March. She could have sworn it was.
But when her eyes slide over to the number beside it, her steadying breaths nearly stop for a second time. The bold numbers written beside it feel like they're spitting at her.
1984. It’s red just like the month.
It bled onto the page like a foreshadowing of death and pain. All she could do was curl her fingers into her rumpled sleep shirt, close her eyes, and take a deep breath.
When she opened them again, she was still staring at the year. And the crashing realization spilled over her, signaling just how utterly insane this was.
It felt like a dream, a vivid, tangible dream, and yet...
She could feel the roughness of her old shirt, the fabric prickly and frazzled with fuzz. She could feel the blanket resting in her lap, heavy on her knees. She could feel the slight chill from the morning air weaving its way into the room, feeling it roll over her skin.
It was all too vivid to be a dream.
From another room, the echo of her mother’s voice calling her name sent a shiver down her spine. Her words pour over her again like a bucket of ice-cold water, wetting her hair and soaking her clothes. Trapping her in the fabric, trapping her in her skin.
It couldn’t be real, but it couldn’t be fake. The reality, the details of it all were too surreal to be anything but true. Her mother’s voice chimed in her ears once again.
It was her first day of school.
It meant something she was all too afraid to admit to herself.
Max took a deep breath, because whatever this was, whatever was happening, she had to stay calm. It wasn’t like Vecna. There was no chill, nothing like that, nothing like the overwhelming fear of his curse.
No, this was something different. Her gut was swooning in unease as she untangled herself from the bed sheets, sliding her legs over the side of the mattress.
This was something different, so new and undiscovered she can barely see it, let alone wrap her mind around it. Her hands fell into her lap, leaving her heart with a gaping hole.
For the first time in her life, Max got up, stood on wobbly legs, and relived a day she’d already spent.
ꕤ
He called her Maxine.
Max had left the house in a hurry, pushing the screen door open as it cried loud despite its light frame. Her mother was still in the kitchen, smoking with a hot pan over the stove. Max didn’t say anything but a quick farewell as she trampled through the door. A comfortable mask of annoyance fell over her features, like an old sneaker that slipped on without a struggle.
Feeling his stare, she ignored him, gripping her skateboard a little tighter. Even as a sick swirl tanged her stomach, she couldn’t help but look up underneath her lashes.
He’s just standing there cockily, the front door wide open and an arm slung over the car's roof. His hair’s tied back, a curly soft shade of strawberry falling to his shoulders. Her gaze sunk and accidentally met his beady, shark-like eyes.
She dipped her head immediately.
It amazed her, the composure she’s able to keep. It’s hard to maintain steady breaths with his stare lingering over her. She felt smaller, always smaller around Billy.
To see him alive and breathing was weird, especially when she had watched him die. Like a ghost, a vibrant ghost that didn’t just haunt her, but the whole world. The idea made her cringe, and she can't help but think of herself as a ghost too.
A vibrant ghost who had a world to reckon with and no consequences to follow.
“Maxine,” he called. His voice was short and rough. She hated how familiar it was to her ears. Like an alarm clock ringing at an odd hour. She ignored him, afraid of what she would say, afraid of what she would do, afraid her eyes would say a lot more than her mouth.
She walked through the yard, small droplets of morning dew sticking to her jeans, her skateboard resting at her side, tapping against her hip. She narrowed her gaze onto Billy’s car, keeping her eyes focused on anything but him.
When she reached the passenger door, her fingers curled like claws around the handle.
But the moment she tugged, the door didn’t open.
“Maxine.”
Billy’s voice lingered in her ears, cold and thick.
She’s afraid.
She’s afraid to look up.
She’s afraid of a lot of things, so many things she couldn’t list them all on her fingers.
And yet, despite this, something about the shiver of fright ignited something beneath her skin.
Something aggressive.
She felt her lips curl in irritation, her brows straight and heavy over her eyes, a comforting sense of snarkiness revving in her throat. She looked up with a snap of her neck, her gaze, fiery like her hair, locking with her step-brother’s.
He was peering back at her with a similar expression. Maybe they were more similar than she’d like to admit.
“I’m not waiting for you again,” he spits, tongue hissing like a snake.
“Yeah, I know.” The words slip through her teeth like a sharp whistle. Max tugged the handle again, and still, it doesn’t open. “Come on, open the door.”
He stared at her for a moment, a bored expression consuming his features. She stared back, a silent challenge in her eyes.
It doesn’t last long, though, before he’s swinging into the front seat, the door thumping shut behind him. The car clicked, letting Max open the door and slide in.
She laid her skateboard across her lap and let her backpack fall to the floor.
The car was already on, its loud rumble tainting her ears clogging them like she was under water, bubbles spilling from her nose and the feeling of the walls closing in around her.
She wished she had her walkman. Maybe then she’d at least enjoy the sensation of drowning, suffocating in noise.
Putting the car in drive, it startled forward like a horse out of the gate, the tires crunching loudly against the gravel road, engulfing the engine's hum and every thought that dared to cross Max’s mind.
It didn’t bother her much.
Nothing was better than everything.
ꕤ
She’d almost forgotten how terrifying her brother was.
Everything about him had her on edge, skin jittery and heart pulsing irregularly. However, what he said wasn’t what scared her the most, but rather what he did that really itched her nerves.
He always acted as if he was one straw away from exploding. Constantly.
He’d always been this way, so she’s not sure why she’s so surprised to come face to face with it again. Everything about his demeanor felt off, although she knew perfectly well he’d always been this way.
Maybe it’s in death that memories become distorted, twisted, and manipulated to favor the dead. It corrupted her perception of Billy. He wasn’t some innocent guy who died in a tragedy.
No, he was an asshole.
It stung a little when she thought about it.
The guilt that still hung around the late afternoon of her thoughts. It wasn’t going to go away, not even in the face of whatever the hell was happening to her.
But, this Billy didn’t deserve her pity. He hadn’t done anything yet, he hadn’t sacrificed himself for El, he hadn't saved them.
No, this was Billy, her brother.
Her sad excuse for a brother.
Not to mention, he was a shit driver too.
She’d forgotten how horrible he was.
Her heart nearly lurched into her throat every time the car rattled over a bump, every time he took a sharp turn. His unfamiliarity with the roads exaggerated his blatantly inept ability to drive safely.
Max clenched her eyes and grounded her teeth as the car jostled with each turn. It felt as though the vehicle was about to fall apart.
When he pulled into the school parking lot, relief flooded her body like a dam breaking, the tension tightly wound up her muscles relaxed instantly.
Billy pulled into a spot, shifting the car into park and then twisting the keys in the ignition, killing the engine.
Max had not wasted a second jumping out of the car, throwing her backpack over her shoulder, and sliding her skateboard onto the ground. The door slammed shut behind her, which had her brother sneering something inaudible.
She ignored the sound and found herself more focused on putting distance between them as she stepped onto her board. Balancing her weight, she kicked off, rolling down the length of the lot towards the front entrance.
The day was dreary, the sky completely covered by grey clouds. It was the kind that barked but didn't bite. The kind that no matter how sad they looked never rained; that was the only nice thing about them.
As Max approached the front door, she swerved around a pair of girls walking beside each other. Stepping off her board, she slammed her foot onto the back, stopping it in its tracks and letting the top fly into her palm.
With a startled gasp, the girls flinch and scurry away from her, their quiet voices whispering to one another.
Max’s skateboard found itself comfortably back into the groove of her waist, the wheels still spinning as if they were flying. She tried to ignore the eyes that followed her because a small town is a small town.
A small town meant everyone knew everybody. So when you're new, you're destined for stares. The eyes weren’t all that bad though, because the rumors were far, far worse.
With her free hand, she opened the door, pushing it ajar to allow the people behind her to follow inside. She dragged her feet forward into the halls of the middle school.
The floor was tiled, greasy, and glossed. Above her, the lights were still yellow and irritatingly bright.
Despite the familiarity of everything, anxiety twisted in her stomach.
Everything was too much.
This school. This school was where everything began. Where her life went from shitty to something else, to something so much better.
Right now, she could only think and ponder on whether all of this was true.
If she was truly in 1984, before everything had happened, after everything she’s been through, everything she’s done…all evidence pointed to the fact that she had been hurtled back in time.
But it left a daunting question: What was she to do now? Because as much as she was afraid, as much as the guilt and grief haunted her at night, she knew. Deep down with everything that's ever happened, everything she’s done.
With absolutely every messed up thing that she’s ever done, she knew, she’d do it all over again in a heartbeat.
Whether that made her selfish or not, she didn’t care.
ꕤ
Science.
Her first class was science. Max tried to keep herself calm but it didn’t stop the small tremor from shaking her hands.
The door to Mr. Clarke’s room was brown. She stared at it, eyes burning holes along its length, trying to find something, anything, to ground herself.
At first, she was going to go in, quick and painless like ripping off a bandaid, but her hand stopped at the handle. Instead, it wandered, fingers gently following the streaks of color flowing down the wood like a river.
She traced it, eyes so focused on the lines that she didn’t feel the presence leering behind her. She knew he was there, he’d led her to this very door.
But with everything spinning around her head, he seemed to evaporate, to disappear.
Max jumped when his hand clasped around her shoulder, spinning on reflex and swatting the hand away.
The man behind her was well-dressed. Tall with broad shoulders. All she knew about him was that he was the principal.
That, and the fact that he had the jolly task of showing her to class. Granted, she’d already known the directions to the class, but there was no way he’d know that.
“Are you ready to go in?” he asked, voice calm and collected. It wasn’t rough like Billy’s and neither was it stern like her mother’s.
Max stared at him, the shift of fabric twitching her ear as she dug her nails into the strap hanging over her shoulder.
She’d left her skateboard in her locker, which she slightly regretted because she was heavily missing it now. Max imagined that if it were still at her side, maybe she could just ignore the world and play with its wheels instead.
But her board was in her locker, nowhere in sight, which left only one thing for her to do. She couldn’t run away, that wasn’t an option.
It’d never be an option for her.
Because the only thing that followed it was being found, and then what? Then you’re only two steps backward.
For the longest time after Billy's death, Max was a dead candle, sitting in a pile of what she used to be, wax molding her feet into the ground, keeping her from change.
But now, younger even by just a few years, she felt as though she’d earned some life back.
This passionate, indescribable feeling burned in her heart, only instead of it being like a dying candle, it was different now.
It felt like a candle lighting up the dark, leading her through the dark sewers of her mind.
She‘d forgotten how motivation grilled her body and pumped blood into her limbs. She’d forgotten the adrenaline and the rush of excitement that seeped well into her bones.
She had been so lost after Billy…
So lost, it seemed everything had slowed down.
Things started losing their meaning, life seeming to shrink into nothing. Her world had changed and she supposed she’d changed too.
But she was here now.
Standing before a door, with a suited man looming over her shoulder and a flame burning inside her.
She pulled her lips back as if she’d tasted something sour and nodded.
“Yeah.” Her hand fell to curl around the metal handle.
After a long breath, she opened the door and walked inside, the man trailing after her.
Mr. Clarke turned his head, swiveling in a fluid motion as if he were already turning toward the door. Below his mustache was a soft smile.
He was just as she remembered him, excitement flourishing from him like a blooming flower.
“-ah.” His teeth flash and his smile broadened. “This must be our new student.”
The principal nodded, his voice carrying a more superficial weight to it as he spoke.
“Indeed.” He glanced at Max once, but she didn’t fully realize it.
She didn’t fully realize anything right now, because she was looking at the floor, at the desks, at the ceiling, anywhere.
Anywhere but the four desks lined in the middle of the room.
She was trying to be braver, to face the fears that clashed against her breaths.
But she knew that the desks, those four desks harbored four students who were without a doubt staring bullets straight into her head.
“All good.” The suited man nodded and swiftly saw himself out, the door shutting quietly behind him.
Max couldn’t shake them from her head. She couldn’t shake the four students that had changed her life and flipped it right side up within a matter of days. She couldn’t shake the thought that they were sitting just in front of her.
Younger than the last time she'd seen them.
Max was standing there in front of the class. Her old and new class.
Her backpack was slung over her shoulder, her red hair spilling over her red jacket, and her blue eyes flickering around in anticipation. She didn’t try to sit down, not like the first time.
It's not because she’s frozen or because of the shock, though.
It’s because a part of her needed to stay up here in front. A part of her that needed to say something, needed to remind herself that although she was different, she was still Max.
She needed to stay there and just say her name. Every part of her needed to.
It wasn't a want. It was a need, an impulse, like spit dripping from a dog's muzzle.
With a calm breath, she finally looked up, eyes ghosting over her classmate’s faces, starting from the back of the room and slowly rolling to the front.
The moment she saw them, nothing changed. Nothing in her expression or body changed, because nothing on their faces changed either.
They stare and watch her with familiar, curious eyes, leaning forward on their desks like she was some kind of science experiment.
Despite being younger than what she knew, they all reeked of themselves. No matter how much they’ve all grown, a reminisce of their past selves always lingered with them. Only now she could truly see every aspect of that.
Will was quiet, which even showed through his body language as he was the only one who’d snuck a quick glance before staring at his hands folded in his lap.
Mike was curious, but he wasn’t eager either. His eyes didn’t hold distaste, but more so caution.
Dustin was gaping slightly, his eyelids peeled back to make his eyes seem wide and owl-like. His curly hair was tucked under his cap, which created a small shadow over his features. Yet, despite this shadow, his face was lit up like he was staring at something beyond his greatest belief.
They all looked like themselves. It scratched something in Max’s heart, stirring up a flurry of old memories.
Her eyes slowly drifted to the final member of the group.
Lucas.
Something inside her had shifted. Lucas. It was him, always him.
He made her breath catch, her heart stutter, and her nails curl into her palm.
His dark eyes stared back at her, washed in a thin film of gloss that reflected the light above him. He just barely leaned forward, his eyes exploring her foreign frame. A small questioning frown sat over his lips.
Everything about him was Lucas. The immediate warmth that filled her chest, the soft charm to his posture, the energy that floated around him like a sporadic cloud of colors waiting to explode.
Lucas held her gaze for a moment, a moment that felt like forever. Her mouth was dry, and her eyes glazed over making Max blink rapidly.
She wouldn’t cry, that wasn't like her at all. She was fine. She had to be fine. With each quick flutter of her lids, she refocused her view on something else.
Max could feel everyone's eyes on her. She could see them too, and it didn’t brush past her notice that Mr. Clarke had yet to tear his own eyes from her either.
“Dustin, drumroll please.”
A quiet thumping filled the quiet room like a sick snare drum.
“Class, please welcome.”
It was extremely off-putting how everything was happening all the same.
“All the way from sunny California.”
It was all the same.
Except for one thing.
Max let out a soft breath, tightly gripping the strap of her backpack.
She was back.
Everything else might have been the same…but she wasn’t.
She was in the past.
She could taste the salt of old tears on her tongue. The realization was really beginning to sink in, because…
She looked up at Mr. Clarke, her eyes twitching as they roll over his bright smile.
It was a second chance…
“The latest passenger to join us on our curiosity voyage-”
“Max.”
She interrupted, furrowing her lips, feeling her teeth dig into them. She didn’t wait for him to say anything else.
She suddenly felt cold, the warm weight of her name leaving her.
Then Max felt their eyes, their stares. They burn holes into her sides, nipping at her skin, peering inside her, looking through her.
All she wanted was for everyone to stop looking, stop staring.
She spotted the seat in the back of the room, the same seat she sat in the first time around.
“All aboard Max,” Mr. Clarke said, his voice still as chipper as ever.
She didn’t say anything else, silently brushing past him as she walked forward.
Her fingers tightened against her backpack once again as she hears Dustin’s awed whisper, his words tangling in her ears like a rabbit caught in a trap.
“Mad Max.”
They gossip as she walked between the rows of desks.
Internally, she smiled, because it was all the same.
It was the same and yet, there could be a change.
Max could change things. She could, she could do it right, do it better, even.
She reached her seat and throwing her backpack against the leg of the chair, she sat down.
Max sprawled her legs underneath the desk and crossed her arms over her chest. She tried not to look, tried not to smile, but it was hard when she could feel the ever-present stare of four boys turning in their seats, gaping listlessly at her.
Instead, she tried distracting herself. Max found the window beside her interesting enough, and looked out into the cloudy sky, seeing a half-formed reflection of her laid-back form staring back at her.
She wasn’t following a script. She could change things.
Maybe even help people. Help her friends. Help herself.
This opportunity, this second chance, fueled as much hope as it did fear. It was only a matter of how things unraveled, how she would craft a new, better reality than before.
At least, she hoped she could.
Max thought of change, staring out the classroom window, rolling ideas over in her mind. Amongst the sky, a small crack broke through the clouds, spewing light down over the town like a flashlight in the dark.
A small smile tugged her lips.
She liked the way that sounded.