𝐖𝐎𝐕𝐄𝐍. ˢᵗᵉᵛᵉ ʰᵃʳʳⁱⁿᵍᵗᵒⁿ ¹

002

002. 𝘆𝗼𝘂'𝗿𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝗵𝗼𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗮𝗱, 𝗿𝗶𝗴𝗵𝘁?

𝐀 𝐆𝐎𝐋𝐃𝐄𝐍 𝐋𝐀𝐘𝐄𝐑 𝐂𝐀𝐒𝐂𝐀𝐃𝐄𝐃 𝐎𝐕𝐄𝐑 𝐇𝐄𝐑 𝐂𝐋𝐎𝐒𝐄𝐃 𝐄𝐘𝐄𝐋𝐈𝐃𝐒, as she stood in the middle of the empty driveway. Her neck was craned back and her face was against the few sun rays that poked through the clouds, a bleak, yellow gleam painting over her face. Her hands were latched onto the handle of Aunt Claudia's old beige bicycle, her chunky rings clinking on the metal bars when she tapped them to an untethered melody, while standing with her shoes glued on the pavement.

The golden umbrage behind her eyes felt like a dream, as if she wasn't really there at all. But she was, she was there standing in her empty driveway with her face towards the sun, on her second day in Hawkins— also the day before Halloween.

The night before, she'd slept on a mattress in her empty room. The moving truck wasn't going to be coming for a few more days, neither was their car. Lori sort of felt like she was cursed— her parents divorce, moving to this shit-hole, and now having to bike to school in the middle of a semester— she was definitely cursed in some way. For what? Who knows, maybe the gods just hated girls who hated them.

So, there she was, standing in her driveway, debating whether she should hop on the bike or not and whether she was cursed or just hilariously unlucky in life. She figured the line between the two of those things was very thin, to begin with.

The sun only lasted for a few more moments anyways. Lori opened her eyes to see the outline of it hiding underneath the thick, grey cloud overhead.

The front door latched open. "Lorraine! What the hell are you doing!" Maureen scoffed, eyes pinning on her daughter standing in her new laneway— wasting the time she had before school.

Lori closed her eyes again, this time in a tight blink, a small hum emitting from the back of her throat.

"Claudia didn't just give you that bike for nothing," Maureen commented. She was a governed woman, who lost her temper at the simple things rather than the big.

"This is a perfect town for Halloween, huh," The teenage girl said, more to herself.

"You're going to be late!" Her mother scolded.

Lori swung one leg over the bike, and hopped on.

Maureen sighed, and Lori could just tell that she was rubbing her forehead. The woman was stressed— maybe it was hard to tell because she was in her pyjamas, with curlers in her hair, standing on the front steps of her rich home, with her coffee in hand and the newspaper under her arm.

"At least try to have a good day?" The woman was saying, as her daughter began to pedal. "I've put everything in your bag! Do you have the binders!"

Lori turned her head as she made it to the end of the driveway, "No!" She called back, and then a smile of amusement slid onto her lips when Maureen's face twisted into a panic, and when she waved the newspaper frantically.

"Turn left, Lori! Turn left!" Maureen was shouting— and the neighbours probably thought they were on one by now— but it was no use.

Lori was pedalling away from the house. The wheels of the bicycle were rusty and dangerously close to flat, and the chain was painfully slow. So she pushed harder and cussed under her breath at the speed she was forced to drive at. Soon, she was rolling away from her new house, Maureen fading in the distance of their front porch with her curlers in her hair. She didn't really have a plan of action, although it would've been a good idea.