Story For the Kids | Steve Harrington

t h i r t y - s i x

"You there? Dustin can you hear me?" Ronnie hears faintly, stirring around. 

"Dustin?" She hears again, jolting up feeling Steve's arm wrapped around her, and slowly prying it off of her waist. 

"Earth to Dustin." The walkie goes off again. 

Ronnie turns, falling off of the couch groaning, which woke Nancy up and they both crawled the walkie, to answer. Nancy pulling out the antenna to its full length, and clearing her throat. 

"Hey, it's Nancy and Ronnie." Nancy greets him.

"Wheeler, Covey! Hey. Um, I'm gonna need a food delivery, like, really soon, unless you want me going out into the world." 

"No. No, no,no. Don't do that." Nancy replies. 

"Okay, can you, uh, get me a six-pack? I know, it's stupid as shit, drinking right now, but a cold beer would really calm my jangled nerves." Eddie pleads, Nancy looks over at the empty couch and motions her head for Ronnie to look. 

"Stay where you are, and we'll be there as soon as we can." Ronnie adds, grabbing the walkie from Nancy then ending the transmission quickly. 

They both crawl over to Dustin, who has fallen asleep against a media center, drooling all over himself. 

"Dustin!" Ronnie whisper shouts at him, pushing him to wake him up. 

Dustin stirs, blinking to regain consciousness. 

"Wake up." Nancy adds.

 "What?" Dustin replies groggily. 

"Aren't you supposed to be on Max watch?" Ronnie lectures her cousin, smacking him on the leg. 

"Yep. Yep, yep, yep." Dustin answers more awake, rubbing his eyes. 

"Okay, then where is she?" Nancy fires, looking at the empty couch. 

"She's right there. A second ago." Dustin answers, pointing at the couch. 

"I swear, I just dozed off for... an hour." Dustin answers, looking at his watch, then back up at Nancy and Ronnie with guilty eyes. 

"Damn it, Dustin." Ronnie groans, picking herself up off the ground and going up the stairs with Nancy, Dustin following close behind, rushing into the kitchen when they spot Max at the table, letting out a sigh of relief. 

"Morning guys! Everything okay?" Nancy's mother, Karen, greeted. 

Nancy inhales, nodding her head at her mom. "Yeah, everything's uh, great." 

"I think it's so sweet that you guys are sticking together like this." Karen compliments.

Ronnie gives her a weak smile, nodding, then looking over at Ted.

"Could try sticking together at a different house for a change." Ted mentions sarcastically. 

"You know you're welcome here anytime." Karen insists, smiling at Dustin and Ronnie.