Steve's Girl

Chapter 24 : Always With Those Losers

"Why didn't you tell me?"

Jonathan and I were sitting at the police station desk in the back waiting for someone to get in contact with our Mom. 

"I knew you wouldn't let Nancy help us, if you'd known what happened."

I stayed silent. Everything that had happened in the las 30 minutes was replaying in my head like a broken record. 

You were just a bet

That house is full of screw-ups

Your sister is a whore

My train of thoughts was broken by the sound of a scraping chair. 

"Sofie, can I talk to you?" It was Nancy. 

I sighed and then hesitantly nodded my head. 

She was silent for a little bit. I turned my head to look at her and she was holding an icepack. 

"I'm sorry, Sofie."

"Nancy, it's fine."

"No, Sofie. It's not. But I promise you. We didn't do anything."

"Nancy, I'm not mad at you. I'm mad at myself for being so naïve. I'm mad at Steve for being such a shithead. But I'm not mad at you. I just, why did you go to his house?"

"He invited me over for the party. It was just me, him, Barb, Tommy and Carol. We all started playing around and then we fell in the pool. I went upstairs with Steve so that I could change my clothes. Nothing more happened I promise. He wasn't even in the room when I was changing." 

I thought about what she said. I trusted Nancy. She was sort of like my best friend. If she said nothing happened, then I believed her.

"Thank you, Nancy." 

"You don't need to thank me for being a decent friend." She laughed as she put the ice pack on my bruised knuckles. 

Nancy and I kept making small talk and eventually we moved to go sit with Jonathan. We were all talking when we heard a door slam open. 

I watched Mom walk through the entrance leading into where we were sitting. 

"Jesus! Sofie, Jonathan? What happened? Why are my kids in cuffs?"

"Because they assaulted police officers." Callahan answered simply. 

"Take them off." Mom said calmy. 

"I'm afraid we can't do that."

"Take them off!" 

"You heard her, take them off." Hopper stepped in. 

"Chief, I get everyone's emotional here but there's something you need to see." Officer Powell explained. All three men walked out to the parking lot and Mom went to talk to Flo about what she knew about our situation. 

Hopper walked back in with our box of stuff we had gotten at the army and hunting surplus earlier. Mom leaned over and looked into the box. 

"What is all this stuff?" Mom asked, confused. 

"Why don't you ask your children. We found it in Jonathan's car." Hopper replied. 

"What?"

"Why are you going through my car?" Jonathan burst out. 

"Is that really the question you should be asking right now? I wanna see you three in my office."

"You won't believe us." Jonathan replied.