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 thirty-one california, here we come
🖤
RUBY BRENNER HAS HAD MANY, many moments and hours and days and weeks and months in her life. Take the day her died died (because of her, she'd like to add.) Or, the day she became possessed by a monster from another dimension. Or, the day all of this started, when some dickhead force decided to grant her powers. The thing is, Ruby's had a tumultuous life. And, whilst this once left her jaded, she now takes this all in her step.
Blame it on the California air, the fresh sea breeze mixed with the LA smog, but Ruby feels reborn. Because yes, these many, many terrible moments happened, but you know what that means? There's a decreasing list of events that could be worse than what she's already experienced.
Dead parent? Done and dusted, twice! Being possessed? Again, did it twice! Or how about sacrificing your life to save a shitty town? She can't even count the amount of times that's happened! She's got dead parents, a dead aunt, a dead relationship with the love of her life, all under her belt, at just nineteen! You may think she's struggling, but if anything, this makes her invincible. What else are you gonna do to her? What else is left?
She feels free. She feels at peace. She goes to her modelling jobs with a spring in her step, she goes to her and her grandpa's secret project with glee, she goes to restaurants with cute actor boys and doesn't even worry about all of the many, many things that could go wrong! She doesn't even think about the beautiful boy back in Hawkins that she broke up with...
So, things are great. Ruby loves her life.
And, as she stands in front of her spring boyfriend, she feels unbothered by the whole conversation, because this doesn't even scrape the surface of bad things that have happened to her.
Since moving to LA, Ruby's had a new boyfriend every season. Her fall boyfriend, a cute guy on a new sitcom, was there for Halloween parties. Her winter boyfriend, a rugged drum player, was there for Christmas cuddling. And, finally, her spring boyfriend — some actor in a popular movie, it's too ET for her to care — was there for ice cream, days in Malibu...
... And, finally, this.
"Look, you're a great girl," he tells her, and Ruby thinks, yes, yes I am. "But..." He pauses. Ruby raises an eyebrow. "Don't take this the wrong way, but I don't think you're over your last boyfriend."
Ruby crosses her arms. Winter Boyfriend? She was over that the second she caught him talking to his... little man.
"... What?"
"That guy from your hometown."
Ruby's jaw hits the ground.
"STEVE?" she says. "You think I'm not over Steve?"
