“Do you think we’ll ever be warm again?”
Hopper huffs a laugh and shakes his head at Joyce’s question. He sits a soda and a pack of gum onto the counter, gestures to a pack of cigarettes as he answers, “No.”
“How old are we, a hundred? Two?” She muses. “You’d think we’d get use to it.”
“You don’t look a day over ninety-nine, Joyce.”
She laughs and rings him up. Shes about to tell him his total when the door is pushed open. The chill and a five year old barrel in, “Mr Hopper, I’ve been looking for you everywhere!”
“Hi, Miss Joyce,” Steve says out of breath, unwinding his scarf. “It’s me, Steve. It’s hard to tell ‘cause I’m wearing a hat.”
“I’ll always recognize you, honey.”
Steve beams at that and then gets very serious, “Mr Hopper, I got something for you. For Christmas.”
“Shhh,” Steve shushes as he opens his backpack and starts digging inside. “I was worried that Santa won’t bring you anything- you’re kinda grouchy - so I got you a present.”
Hopper is about to tell this kid that he didn’t have to do that and it’s completely unnecessary when he is presented with, “It’s a candy cane. It’s blue so I think it tastes blue.”
“I got this too,” Steve says, handing him another candy cane tied with a bow. “That’s for Miss Diane.”
“Babies can’t have candy canes,” Steve tells him, digging around some more in his backpack. “They don’t have any teeth and candy canes can get real sharp sometimes so I got Baby Sara a regular sucker.”
He locates and then hands Hopper the sucker, “It’s strawberry. That’s my favorite one.”
It’s thoughtful in a way that Hopper doesn’t really know what to do with. He feels awkward when he pats the kid on the shoulder, “I’ll make sure Sara gets it. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome!” Steve smiles. “…Can you tell Santa if you see him?”
Hopper finishes paying and hears as he leaves, “Miss Joyce, I got a present for you and Jonathan but babies can’t have candy canes so Will…”
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