The age old story of two best friends falling in love...
... Only, one's a lab experiment with an entire Upside Down hunting her down, and the other won't leave her side, no matter how hard she tries.
steve harrington x fem oc / season 2 o...
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chapter seventeen ruby in wonderland
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THIS IS THE WORST DAYOF RUBY'S LIFE, she decides as she speeds down the roads, behind the wheel of her ex-boyfriend's car. Her current boyfriend (... apparently?) is in the backseat, a bag of frozen peas attached to his... well, being draped across his entire face, because the whole fucking thing is swollen. Ruby's got Max sitting shotgun, and the others crammed in the back. This is going terribly, but at least they managed to find a car. Twenty minutes ago, they would've been walking.
"Ruby?" Steve's voice croaks out. "Rubes...?"
"Hey, Steve, I'm a little busy right now," she says, trying to concentrate on the road.
Here's the thing: Ruby is a terrible driver. She's got her own car, sure, but if it wasn't for her powers she'd be in a ditch by now. She just can't do it. One time, she just didn't see a truck when she was pulling out, and Steve threw up the handbrake before she could drive them into their deaths. That was the last time they took it in turns to carpool, and instead, Steve drove her to school everyday. Steve knows she's the worst driver — Max would drive better than her.
So it's only understandable that Steve lets out a cry of absolute terror.
"Ruby, stop! You can't drive, you can't—!"
"I need to concentrate!" she says, just as she swerves to miss a roar sign.
"I'm going to die!"
"You are not going to die," she says, matter-of-factly.
But, of course, Steve announcing that she 'can't drive' throws the kids into a panicked frenzy.
"What does he mean, you can't drive?"
"You look like you can drive?"
"I can!" she shouts.
"She drives like shit!" is what Steve says as a response.
"Well who else is gonna drive?" she asks. "You?"
"I could be dead and I'd still drive better than you!"
And he said he loved her, like, forty-five minutes ago? Where's that energy now?
"Shut up!" she shouts back at him. She is struggling to concentrate, and the streetlights are nonexistent since they're out of town. She's anxiously waiting for the headlights to catch the sign for the farm she found her dad on, and pray she can figure the rest out from there. But none of this is possible if Steve doesn't let her think!
This is going to be fine. She can already feel her body jittering to life, sensing where she's about to go. The thought of being in the Upside Down again makes her feel ill, but she has to. One day, she'll move away from Hawkins and never come back. She'll never have to see the lab, or the reminders of the creature over the years. Because to her, every street has a memory. Maple Street is nice and all, but it's where she saw her monster, the demogorgon, on Halloween when she was five. She cannot count the amount of times she's been nervous about school and flickered between dimensions. Or, better yet, when she was younger and her grandpa would take her out for food after she went to the lab for testing. Everything makes her feel ill, everything has a bad memory attached to it — and she can try all she'd like to erase those, to cover them up with nicer, happier memories, but deep down, she'll always have the lingering feeling of fear, of sadness, when she's in those spaces... But, this is her responsibility, and the idea of leaving it for someone else to deal with — for El to deal with — isn't right.
