Halley's comet | Steve Harrington

ii.ii new kid on the block

"𝑶𝒉 𝒎𝒚 𝑮𝒐𝒅, 𝑰 𝒌𝒏𝒐𝒘!"

⇜☾✩☽⇝

Sitting in the passenger side, Halley blew smoke out the window as Jonathan turned into the parking lot for Hawkins High. They had dropped Will off at the middle school only moments prior, and as soon as he had gotten out of the car, Halley had whipped out a cigarette. Jonathan had stopped trying to get her to quit at that point.

The two got out of the old car, but neither made any move to go into the building. Halley had her Walkman attached to the waist of her jeans, and her headphones sitting around her neck, waiting for the appropriate time to turn on the hodgepodge of songs she had been gifted last Christmas.

"Are you going to the station after school?" Jonathan asked. He had come around to her side of the car, leaning on the backdoor.

She nodded, refraining herself from rolling her eyes. "Yeah. Gonna spend four hours bringing coffee to jackasses that barely acknowledge my existence."

"I thought Hopper had you working on a report?"

She snorted, "A report on a broken shop window. Not even vandalism, just a branch after last week's windstorm. And I finished that last Thursday." She had expected so much more. She was worth so much more. After all, she had played a big role in finding her brother last year. But all she was being used for were faux crimes and snack runs.

"Oh," Jonathan said, not bothering to try and lift her spirits. She had tried to stay optimistic, but that positivity had dwindled months ago.

Halley shrugged, taking another drag from her cigarette. "It's whatever. I just have to survive the rest of the school year, then I can go back to making actual money over the summer."

Their conversation was cut short by a revving engine. The two turned to find a pristine, blue Camero screeching through the parking lot. It was going way too fast for a school zone, but that didn't seem to even pass through the driver's mind.

It was about the third time Halley had seen the car, the other two when it had dropped off and picked up from the arcade over the weekend. Still, she admired the way it shined in the vague light the sun was giving off.

"Shit, that's a nice car," she muttered. It was blasting Scorpions' Rock You Like A Hurricane, a song that was on the tape her hands were currently wrapped around. She had never really liked the band until she listened to Steve's gift, and she had a sneaking suspicion, it was a bit of a throwaway attempt to figure out her taste. Nonetheless, it had left a bug in her ear, and more often than not she had been humming the melody to herself.

A familiar redhead slammed the passenger door closed as she got out. Almost immediately dropping a skateboard and taking off to middle school. Now for the interesting part; Halley had met the girl a few times at the arcade, but this would be the first time she ever saw who was behind the wheel.

The music shut off, but the reminisce still filled the air. The driver's side produced a tall, denim clad, blond with hair to rival Steve's. It was painfully obvious that he was aware of the attention, as his calculated steps kept out of direct eye contact with every girl ogling over him. Halley couldn't blame them. He was hot. Like, really hot.

"You still with me, Halle?" Jonathan laughed, shoving her shoulder. She averted her gaze back to her brother, pushing his hand away.

"Shut up." she shouldered her backpack, and gestured to the school. "We're gonna be late."

The two split up when they got in the building; Jonathan left to meet up with Nancy, and Halley caught up with Caroline, who was just finishing the combination for her locker.

"Hey, Carrie," Halley said, leaning against the locker beside the ginger. The two had become closer after the events of last year. Sure, Caroline didn't know about the Upside Down, or Eleven, or why her brother really disappeared, but she was still there for Halley when her life was going downhill. And that was more than she could say for a considerable amount of others.

Caroline shut her locker, scrunching her nose at the unmistakable stench of cigarette smoke from Halley. "Jesus, You smell like one of my dad's poker games." her eyebrows scrunched, noticing the back remains of the ash on Halley's fingers. "More headaches?"

"Yeah, but it's fine. I just need more sleep." She was getting good at lying—or Caroline was getting tired of fighting with her—because instead of the usual importance of sleep speech Caroline would usually give her, the topic was promptly changed.

"Did you see the new guy?" she asked, starting off to their first period. The two shared it again, but unlike math, as it was last year, they were stuck starting their day off with AP Bio.

Halley nodded, following after her, "Oh my God, I know! I didn't expect someone like that to come here."

"If you call him hot—" Caroline warned, wagging her finger at Halley. "I mean he's so obviously some conceited dick who wants everyone at the school to fall at his feet. It's written all over his face."

Rolling her eyes, Halley nudged Caroline's shoulder with her own, "yeah, but he's a conceited dick who's hot." Unamused, the younger girl scoffed. "Oh, relax. I'm just joking." She paused for a moment, thinking back to the mysterious new boy, "you know, I think I had that same haircut when my hair was shorter."

"It probably looked a lot better on you," Caroline said, turning the corner to cut through the cafeteria.

Tina was standing at the corner handing out small orange papers to each person that passed. As the two got closer, the girl smiled. "Byers! Wanna actually come to a party?" She handed them each a piece of paper. It was aggressively neon, complete with a poorly drawn ghost and bottle, 'come and get sheet faced'.

They were out of earshot when both Tina's invitation and the paper's words registered, but that didn't stop her from turning to Caroline with a wide smile. "We should go."

"What?" Caroline asked, shocked. Halley was never one to willingly go to parties.

"Yeah, it could be fun. Besides, I have to go to one halloween party before I graduate, right?" Her once 'Bitchy Byers' alias was not as widely used as it once was. After word got out that Steve and Nancy were friends with her, she gained some credit at school. It wasn't like Tommy and Carol were suddenly her biggest fans, but there was a significant change in the way people saw her. Sure, Tina still didn't like her, Halley was sure of this after the way she was forced to do all the work for their English project last week, but it was a big difference than her first two and half years at Hawkins High.

Caroline looked at her skeptically, it was most definitely a change of character for Halley to actually want to go to something like that, with all the people she hated from school, but she was right, it might be fun. "I guess. I mean, how bad could it be?"

"That's the spirit!" Halley cried, smiling as she opened the door to Mr. Baron's room.

Mr. Baron was older fashioned. His room was divided by long black tables that sat each pair of lab partners—partners determined by your last name. That was where Halley and Caroline had lucked out: Byers and Cae; they were destined to be partnered for nearly any and all group projects. However Baron was strict, and reminded Halley of her father more often than not. He was a no-nonsense kind of man, and was absolutely one hundred percent against PDA. There were multiple rumors about the many detentions Carol and Tommy had received from their regular Bio class with him.

"Miss Byers, you know my rules. Headphones away." He pointed at the object in question, still sitting around her neck.

"Right. Sorry, Mr. Baron." she coiled the wire around her tape and tucked it into her jacket pocket.

Caroline and Halley took their seats, speaking quietly until the bell rang, signaling the beginning of the undoubtedly slowest hour of the day.