As the only member of the party who doesn't have his parents meet him at the school or accompany him to the Hospital, Dustin is given strict instructions from Hopper. Call your mother to tell her where you are and that you're safe. No I don't care that she's at work and you think there is no reason to worry her. You call her, or I will.
Too concerned about seeing Will, and convinced he knows best, Dustin ignores this instruction. After they get booted back out of Will's room for what they assume will only be a couple of minutes, Hopper finds them fighting with a vending machine that won't take Lucas's crumpled dollar. (Dustin has been blaming him for it not working. Should have stored it better and not in his pockets to forget and wash.)
Hopper knows Dustin never called his mother because neither of them ever left the waiting room. No escaping this time. Even hands him a quarter to make the call with, although Dustin attempts to give it back because he has his own emergency phone quarter. Congratulations, now you have two, and points him in the direction of the payphones.
Son of a bitch.
He makes the call hoping his mother (night shift nurse at the local nursing home/hospice center) would be too busy to come to the phone. (Even though her being busy would mean Bad News for someone else). But nope, she's right there. Happy but confused to learn that Will is alive, devastated that she can't be with him like Ted and Karen are, and insisting that he come home so she knows exactly where he is and that he'll be there when she gets home. She even full (first) names him to make it VERY clear that there is no other option for him, but promises she'll take him back to see Will tomorrow.
Son of a bitch. If that doesn't ruin all his plans for the night.
Even worse, who will take him? The Wheelers have a full car with Lucas, plus he's out of their way. There's no way Joyce is leaving. Jonathan doesn't have his car. Hopper maybe, but does he want to ask him? Absolutely not. (Plus Hopper just went downstairs to get surprised picked up by Owen.)
As he's considering his options, Steve shows up, ducking into the nearby bathroom.
Steve has a car. Steve lives somewhere near his house. That'll work.
Ambushes him the moment he comes back out and fast talks his way into getting a ride. Has a counter for all of Steve's protests. Knows his house is on the way becasue he's seen Steve drive past his house on the way to school. Lies about already telling his mom that Steve would drive him, so the alternative would be him walking- Steve wouldn't want that, would he? And the real kicker- It would impress Nancy.
...probably could have lead with that one, honestly.
And of course the real reason he wants Steve to drive him is he heard the *barest* of what went down at the Byer's and is dying to know more about it. So, as soon as they all find out they are NOT going to be allowed back in to see Will again, Dustin all but orders him down to the parking lot
(There's a scene that may or may not be shown where Steve tries and fails to finds Nancy, instead asking Mike to tell her he was leaving and that she should call him when she gets home. Mike doesn't pass this message along out of spite, which in turn pushes Nancy to wait a month for Jonathan instead of immediately going back to Steve. Among other reasons)
In the car there's a whole bunch of questions about the demogorgan. A little 'yeah, well, I weakened it' that gets quickly dropped after Dustin explains that El... disappeared? Worse?? After killing the demo. Yeah, no need to brag about hitting it with a bat (even though Dustin thinks that is badass). Dustin asking to see the bat, but no it's in the trunk dammit. Also asking if he really lost a fight with Jonathan- becasue he heard about that one too and kinda can't believe it. Will's brother? The one who hangs out with them all the time and is super chill? That Jonathan?
(Steve very much does not like this question)
Dustin's directions were 'drive to your house and mine will be right there', but eventually they get to Steve's road and Dustin is still in the car. Where do you LIVE.
"I said you drive past my house to get to school, which is not the way to the hospital. I don't know where you live."
Fair enough. Steve points out his house as they go by- Dustin knows it, of course. They give out the full sized candy bars on Halloween. He just never knew Steve was the one who lived there.
He also notices that there's NO lights on. Not even one at the front door, left on until everyone got home for the night. Just the streetlights. Dustin finds this a little odd, and asks if anyone is even home. Steve gets oddly prickly about the question- of course they're home. It's 2am. They're asleep so the lights are off.
(Dustin POV se we don't have access to Steve's internal monologue. He's mostly just annoyed because his late and he's had a LONG day. But also a little worried to see the light off. Oh, shit. Somehow his parents found out about the fight and the spray paint. He's fucked.)
Get to Dustin's house and sure enough, it's on the way to school. Not even that far away, maybe a half mile from the end of Steve's road. Pull up to the front door where there's no cars in the driveway and only the porch light on, and now Steve is the one asking if anyone is home. Sounding genuinely concerned about it, the way everyone does when they first find out he's alone most nights.
Now it's Dustin's turn to be annoyed. They'd already discussed that his mom was working- obviously no one would be home. Not everyone has both parents. He's 12, not two, he's perfectly capable of being alone overnight. Does NOT need a babysitter, thank you very much, you can leave now.
Steve clearly isn't convinced, which is a little surprising, actually. He might have won cool points by fighting the demogorgan, but that doesn't erase his old douchbag reputation. Dustin was more expecting him to leave the moment he was out of the car, not sit around borderline offering to stay until morning. Like. Just go home? I'm fine I just needed a ride, thanks goodbye.
(Steve is mostly concerned because he's assumed that Dustin is growing up like him, alone a lot of the time, learning to be self sufficient a little too young, and lonely. He doesn't know that Claudia is The Best™ and went to great lengths to be present in her son's life, even while working nights. Sure she can't do everything, but she's there where it counts and the house is filled with love and home cooked meals.)
In general it's just an odd sort of interaction for both of them, even if neither of them understand it. Dustin goes inside, switches the porch light for a lamp in the living room (his 'I made it home' signal) and it's only then that Steve drives away.
Odd ending to an absolutely wild day. It's time to SLEEP.
Hello my loves and welcome to this new project of mine!🫶🏻
Here I will be giving you some insights on finished stories: how I came up with certain ideas, the meanings behind song recs and titles etc.
I hope my train of thought is interesting for you :)
Episode 1: "The Line" Series - Logan Sargeant
Title:
The title was the last thing I added when the story was already finished and I knew I was going to split it into 3 parts. Since I suck at coming up with titles I wanted to do something creative where the 3 titles have a continuous theme kind of like the „You“ series with Dennis Hauger.
Now I was on the search for a connecting theme and the only thing I could come up with was a line since I kept thinking about a finish line bc Logan and y/n are both racing drivers.
So what can you do with a line? Cross it.
Whether it‘s the finish line in a race or the line between being friends and lovers/ the line between a friendship and a relationship.
But before you cross that line, it usually gets a bit blurry until you don‘t know what side you‘re on anymore. That‘s what happens in Part 1 (blur the line): the line between them gets increasingly blurry as they grow closer.
Ultimately in Part 2 (across the line), the inevitable happens and they cross the line: The morning after their drunk night, they are across the line, but they have not made it yet. It is not: When you're across the line the race is over. No, it is: When you're across the line, everything gets harder (bc I'm a dramatic writer lol)
Once you‘ve crossed the line there‘s no turning back. You can't exactly go back to just being friends, and the future is very fucking scary, especially when you're two young, up and coming F2 drivers.
It‘s all or nothing so Logan puts it all on the line (Part 3) when he finally confronts y/n in Spa.
Storyline / Plot ideas / Process of Writing:
At first you must know that I primarily started writing this fic bc someone requested a Logan fic. It was literally never my plan to write such a huge Logan story but it kind of evolved on its own 😂
„Keep talking, y/n. I‘m listening.“ // „At least he listens to me when I talk.“
I started with a „prompt“ I saw on TikTok where a girl was counting down things guys do that are attractive and this was one of them: Listening to you when you think nobody's listening.
Originally this fic was supposed to be way shorter than it turned out to be and I thought I’d only be writing that one scene (of them in the restaurant) + maybe a scene before and after that.
Idk if you noticed but I like adding little things like taglines and callbacks, so I added the "See you when I overtake you" in the beginning and wanted to kind of make it Logan and y/n's thing.
They also make 2 deals in the story:
The first deal is made in part 2, where they kiss for the first time to determine Logan's drunk talent. It sparks their relationship/ makes them cross the line and kicks off their relationship as lovers.
The second deal is made at the very end of part 3, where they decide to forgive each other for their wrong doings. This deal also sort of kicks off their relationship, but in a healthy, communicative way. It resolves the last issues between them.
Then there are little things like the special coffee blend, the champagne scene, drunk Dennis etc. I can't really explain where they came from. They only came along as I was writing and I went with the flow and my imagination :)
Onto the crash in part 3. I feel like I have to explain it a bit further bc I feel like I cannot for the life of me describe/ come up with realistic crashes. This crash was 100% inspired by/ copied from the collision of Hamilton and Alonso at Spa I think it was, where Hamilton's whole rear end of the car went up in the air. Maybe this helps your imagination a little bit 😅
Song recs:
Song recs, my favorite part of writing stories lol
To be honest with you, I wrote almost the whole thing listening to "The Monster" over and over again, but the other songs fit the vibe of the parts better.
Part 1: blur the line
Electric Love - BØRNS
This song is the definition of young, easy love for me. It's so upbeat and makes you feel like nothing can go wrong. It's the excitement of falling in love, the feeling of your heart beating faster whenever you see that one specific person. This is exactly what Part 1 is all about: pure fluff and crushing on each other 🥰
Part 2: across the line
High For This - The Weeknd
Who writes better songs to set the mood for smut than The Weeknd??? The build of tension, the chorus, the lyrics, everything just fits so well ugh 😫 No further explanation needed tbh
The Monster - Eminem feat. Rihanna
Literally none of the message of the song has anything to do with this story I guess, I just like the way it makes me think of a couple kind of singing to each other. Crisis, drama, tension, uneasiness.
Also look at this phrase in the song: "Well that's not fair."
- Both Y/n and Logan have a moment where they've probably thought: That's not fair.
For y/n it was directly after their night together where Logan asks her to forget about it. For Logan it was at breakfast when y/n tells Dennis that Logan's not her type. They're both disappointed in the other and don't think it's fair that they're being treated that way but they don't realize how much they've hurt the other.
Part 3: all on the line
The Heart Wants What It Wants - Selena Gomez
Logan and y/n in this story are the DEFINITION of "the heart wants what it wants"! This is also almost all part 3 is about: That they're trying to go against their hearts, trying to do the rational thing and move on.... but their hearts won't stop beating for the other ;)
Also this is a very modern fairytale... at least kind of... these two kids get a happy ending lol 🤭
Pictures of You - The Last Goodnight
Again, the message of this song doesn't technically fit with the story but I like this song a lot and it's just such an "ending the story" kind of song for me? Like, good vibes, everything has turned out good?
This song is also talking about pictures a lot (I know, in a different sense but still, pictures are pictures), and I can only imagine how many pictures were made when Logan and y/n kissed on the track in the end :)
Also just imagine them staring at each other, then they crash into each other as the chorus starts, oml
-------------------
I guess in the end this whole story was simply all about letting yourself fall in love. About taking the risk of following your heart. 🫶🏻
I hope you liked the story and this very first episode of Work in Progress :)
Episode 2 will hopefully be all about how the "You" series (Dennis Hauger) was created, I'll see you guys soon and stay healthy❤️
GENRE: adult/new adult fantasy; dark fantasy; romance; lgbtq+
STATUS: worldbuilding; outlining
POV: third person limited; switching
MAIN CHARACTERS:
> peitho ] the siren
> iris ] the oracle
MAIN THEMES:
> the power of deities
> the individual vs society
> misuse of religion
> government practices / methods
> beauty as a means of concealment
> ambiguous morality
BLURB:
a long-exiled goddess is rising once again, and with her are two girls whose destinies are interlinked in more ways than one.
peitho is a siren, vicious and dead set on revenge, and iris is an oracle, her entire life having been devoted to a government that she’d betray in a hearbeat. just as the exiled goddess sends peitho ashore to aid a merchant family in finally crushing the barriers between the divine and mortal realms, the connection between the rest gods and the oracles is severed, and peitho and iris must commandeer the growing war between mortals and their beloved gods.
TEASER QUOTE:
“ for a moment peitho stopped and sighed, admiring the way the man’s blood mixed with the fountain’s water, blossoming from his wounds in beautiful, soothing ribbons and infecting every inch of the fountain. “
congrats on the progress for your wip! c: do you mind telling what it's about? (since you said talking about it keeps you motivated to write more :D)
Thanks so much darling! I would love to! I’ve been working with the idea of this WIP for a while and have recently rehashed it with a lot of new ideas! I’ve been talking mostly to Krissy ( @it-begins-with-rain ) about it as well as Linda ( @howtotameyourillyrian ) because it keeps me excited and I’m eager to see where it goes!
My original is a New Adult (NA) romance/fantasy that’s a little dark and twisty 😏 My main characters are Hasan and Nora and they are the loves of my life who nag me at 4am to write things haha. Hasan is a troubled Sultan of a kingdom called Dylal and Nora is a future Sultana of a kingdom called Niran. Childhood sweethearts turned enemies ;)
It’s Arab culture inspired!
I’ve taken it a new route than where I originally started last year but am pumped to keep talking about it and writing more. This is the year I really want to finish that first draft!
“When? Where? Why?” Bee demanded, louder than he’d meant to. His hands hit the granite counter and everyone flinched.
“Did he…” Peyton spoke gently, worry creasing her forehead, but Jazz quickly shook their head.
“No, I--” They reached out and took her hand, and whispered, “It wasn’t like that.” Peyton let out a long breath.
“Jay, what the fuck,” Bee said, still too loud. He waved his hands around in frustration, ignoring how they stung from slamming onto the hard surface. “He-- You-- Why?”
Andy’s mouth was dry, but Bee’s incoherent speech got his thoughts across pretty well. He didn’t know the right name for his feelings. Angry? No. Upset? Not exactly. Confused? Very. Jazz covered their face again, but they weren’t crying.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” they said. “Goddamnit, Bee, leave me alone.”
Bee looked at Andy, who placed a hand on his arm. His words weren’t going to come out right, Andy knew, so he tried to communicate through his expression. Let it go, man. Too much right now. To his relief, Bee understood, and simply picked up his mug and took a drink.
“I--” Peyton began hotly, but Andy reached out to her as well. He was good at nonverbal communication, but Bee was sometimes left wondering if it was Andy’s politeness or his looks that helped him get what he wanted. An inch of charm could bring him a mile, and Andy coasted. Peyton couldn’t resist anyone’s puppy-dog eyes, but Bee never gave in to them. Except for Andy. Had he ever tried it on Jazz? No, Andy never asked anything from them. At least, not that Bee knew of.
“Let’s go see a movie,” Andy said, gathering the now-empty mugs.
“We just got here,” Peyton said.
“You’re pouting,” Bee said to her coolly.
“I am not—”
“Go to your girlfriend and make up with her,” said Jazz, waving her away in a move reminiscent of Bee. “Don’t take it out on us.”
Peyton’s fair skin was rosy from the cold outside, but she flushed a deep pink at this. They were right. But she wouldn’t admit it. “Fine. See you later.” As she opened the door, she turned back to Andy. Her voice was quiet when she said, “Don’t let— Don’t let Jazz do anything stupid, Andy.”
“I don’t control them,” he said. But she was already gone.
They had spoken quietly, but Jazz and Bee could hear that Peyton had said something, and it wasn’t difficult to guess what. The music upstairs started back up. A girl— around thirteen, skinny, with straightened auburn hair— ran into the kitchen. Annie, Andy’s sister. She smiled at the two people she found in her kitchen as she gathered food for her friends upstairs, then awkwardly made her escape. They could hear her giggling with her friends hanging over the banister.
“Does she still like you?” Jazz said without real interest.
Bee rolled his brown eyes. “She’s a kid.”
“That’s not an exclusive statement,” Jazz said. “She is young, though— do you know why the gap between them is so big?”
“My parents had some issues after I was born,” Andy said, startling them. He’d come back in without them noticing, bringing a stream of cold air into the warm house. “They were thinking of adopting, actually, and then Annie happened.”
“Can I—” Jazz’s phone rang, interrupting them. Unknown caller— they declined the call. It rang again. And again.
“Might as well answer,” Andy said.
“I’m blocking whoever it is.”
But Jazz’s phone kept going off, enough that Bee pried it from their hands and answered the third strange number with a blunt “Hello.”
“Can I speak to, uh, Jazz?” A boy’s voice said.
“Who are you?”
“Uh— Sorry, wrong number,” the boy said, and hung up. Bee raised his eyes to heaven and blocked the boy from Jazz’s phone before handing it back to them. As he let go, though, a text showed up.
Miss me?
Bee’s suspicions moved him before his conscious mind did— flipping the phone backwards in his hand, away from Jazz and closer to his own body.
“Hey!” Jazz complained, reaching for their phone.
“What is it?” Andy asked as Bee held the phone away from Jazz, pushing them back with one hand. “Dude, what’s going on?”
The text was from Albright.
“Give me back my phone, you— you— wasp,” Jazz said, infuriated. They crossed their arms as they sank back down on their heels. What was the point in wasting energy trying to get it back by force? Bee was at least half a foot taller than them, and Jazz was no athlete.
“Bee, give it back,” Andy said. He didn’t understand what was happening, but he suspected. Bee’s fingertips were tapping at the screen of Jazz’s phone, his other hand entwined in their purple hair. He looked up at Andy. A grin cut across his face.
“We’re all good, Andy-man,” he said. The stolen phone buzzed angrily, and he looked at the text as if it were his own correspondence. Taking his hand off of Jazz’s head as they swiped at his arm again, he said, “Relax, dude. No one you want to have to deal with.”
“Bee,” Andy said again, his voice rising, “Give it back.”
“Give it back!” Jazz said, their voice high with . That’s why they turned quiet when they fought, he realized. Rather than sputtering to a stop like Andy, Jazz chose to avoid hearing their voice become shrill. They hated having a higher pitched voice, although they’d never admit to disliking any part of themselves. “I can deal with whoever it is.”
“You can,” Bee said, smiling down at them. “But I do it better.” Jazz glared at him.
“Bee, don’t start fights on other people’s behalf,” Andy warned. He had risen from his seat. He no longer suspected— he knew. And whatever was between Bee and Albright, Jazz would get the worst of it.
Bee hit send for the final time, the nasty grin on his face fading away to his customary bored look. He gave the phone back to Jazz and they scrambled to read the exchange. It was mostly Bee and Albright telling each other to fuck off in various creative ways, and Jazz had no wish to read any more into it. The hostility between Bee and Albright was its own entity, like a poisonous snake snuck into a locker room. No, not a snake— a bear. An angry bear fighting a swarm of hornets. Between Jazz and Albright, though, they struggled to put a name to. Bullying sounded childish. Bickering made it seem harmless. Perhaps it could simply be called a struggle. A complex, regret-ridden, prejudice-driven struggle.
Andy was part of none of this.
__________
“You should get home soon,” Andy said as he watched the snow fall outside his window. He was speaking to Jazz, who was sat in the center of his bedroom, flipping through a stolen photo album and cooing at pictures of Andy as a ginger-haired toddler. Bee lay on Andy’s bed, shoes kicked off to reveal mismatched winter socks, headphones firmly blocking out any conversation. Andy suspected he wasn’t even playing music.
Jazz made no reply, then sighed. “Time?”
“Quarter to six.”
“Damn.”
“Bee? You coming?”
Dark lashes fluttered, but his eyes didn’t open. He could have been faking being asleep— actually, he probably was faking— but the message was clear. Bee would remain as he was. The others could go.
Jazz’s parents would be waiting. They had to go.
Andy put on a black jacket before leaving, having learnt his lesson from earlier, only to realize halfway down the stairs it was Bee’s. Whatever. He wouldn’t care. Andy wondered if Jazz would notice.
They did, but they wouldn't comment.
Left behind, Bee was deeply asleep— but he wasn’t. He was lying on his back underneath a set of gym bleachers. The linoleum was gravel, because he was on a road. No, in a car. A car driving down a bright white hospital hallway. Bee stopped trying to understand where he was when he comprehended the weight on his face, a weight that was his arm— his arm was over his eyes and he was in a bed Andy’s bed because he was in Andy’s room and what was he doing there?
Being left behind. He withdrew his arm from his face and propped himself up, elbows sinking into the mattress as he looked around the sparsely decorated room. Did he take my jacket? Fucker. The thought crossed his mind that Andy might not have a proper winter jacket, but a glance into the half-open closet revealed the dark blue sleeve of a parka. Dark blue was nice on Andy, with his fair skin and richly colored hair, but then again, most people look nice in blue. Bee’s vision blurred momentarily as streams of color began flowing from behind the door. Dark blues and purples swirled across the room, blending with shadows and becoming translucent as the streams crossed the light. Sometimes red orange danced with the darkness.
“Monsters in the closet, or does my fashion sense offend you that much?”
Bee, sitting upright on Andy’s bed, scowled at him. He didn’t mind. Bee was usually scowling, when he wasn’t disinterested or smirking. “Both.” Andy shrugged off Bee’s jacket and tossed it at him from the doorway. There was melted snow on the shoulders. There were snowflakes in his hair. “Will you stay for dinner? My mom and dad are at some party with Annie, so I’ve got the house to myself.” The jacket fell to the floor.
“Let me check.” Bee texted his mother, knowing what the answer would be. Of course he would stay. Bee’s mother loved polite, put-together Andy, hoping he would be a good influence on her brusque, disheveled son. And if her reply was no, he would ignore it and stay anyway. “Yeah. Who’s cooking?”
“Like I’d trust you with a stove,” Andy said, rolling his eyes despite the smile tugging at his lips. “Chinese?”
“Fine,” said Bee. He looked out the window, only darkness behind the glass. His foot had fallen asleep, and he had to spend a minute getting it in working order before he could get up. Jogging downstairs, Bee cursed his foot, his missing foot, his prosthetic foot, his underlying fear of nerve damage, and the entire concept of ‘pins and needles’.
When he came into the kitchen muttering, Andy scowled at him, pointing to the phone pressed to his ear. Right. He had that thing about talking to strangers. Andy let out a breath after he hung up, hopping up from his chair to turn on the television. “You choose a movie, I’ll make the popcorn.” “Popcorn before dinner?” Bee raised an eyebrow at him, flipping on more lights in the kitchen before taking the remote. “Jazz is right, we are influencing you. What’s next, not brushing your teeth twice a day? Forgetting to study for a test? Oh, I know— you’ll get yourself involved in drama. Go sleep with three different people, Andromachus.”
“Shut up and press play,” Andy said. Did he make that name up? Probably. Andy stayed far away from the ‘drama’ Bee abhorred so much, having little real involvement in other people’s relationships. He had none of his own, despite a few people showing interest over the years. He’d once asked Bee what he thought would happen if Andy did start dating. Bee had looked at him, face perfectly blank, and said, Don’t you dare leave me, you pretty boy bastard.
“Speaking of all that, do you think Charlie and Peyton made up?” Andy risked asking.
Bee shrugged. “If she needs something Charlie can’t or won’t give her, then it’s not going to work out. But she can’t be a control freak about everything. Charlie will come out when she’s ready. It’s a personal thing, even if it’s— I don’t know, objectively reasonable.”
Andy was startled at Bee’s smooth, succinct reply. He’d expected him to be annoyed at Andy for bringing up someone else’s conflict. “So like, if you were gay, you wouldn’t necessarily be comfortable telling people, even if you know they’ll take it okay?”
Bee shrugged, something twitching. Maybe his eye. He wasn’t looking at Andy. “I mean, you can never really predict what somebody will say, even if you think you know.”
Andy opened his mouth to ask another question, then closed it and nodded. Usually, he was the one analyzing people’s actions. It’s kind of nice to have someone else explain people to you, he thought. God knows we don't make much sense.
The doorbell rang. He went to answer it, apologizing to the delivery man for making him come out in the snow. When he opened the door, outdoors was icy cold, the air was clear, and it appeared the last snowfall would not be so terrible after all. The man assured him it was alright.
Andy didn’t believe him, and guilt weighed him down as he brought the food to the living room. The boy already there had his hand on his leg, but shifted to sit normally when Andy came in. He sat down next to Bee, putting the bag on his lap and taking the remote to press Play. “Is your leg bothering you?” he said quietly. Facing forward, Bee shook his head. His face was half blue light, half shadow, the lashes framing his eyes and the curve of his nose and lips defined. His hair hung down, a spiral resting on his forehead like a jewel hanging from a diadem. Andy didn't believe him. Jazz, insisting they could handle Albright. The delivery man, ten feet away from his heated car. Andy never believed reassurances.
