What is Normal?

Are We Always Desperate?

Author's note: Trigger warning for sh. There are a few inaccurate cultural references in here, I know that some of the bands I name didn't exist at the time of the story, but they've helped me through some difficult things so here they are. Thank you so much for reading! I'd love any feedback or comments.
-Inspired by "Burning Vs. Drowning," by McCafferty

     The cicadas chirped along like a metronome as El tuned her guitar. She was happy her various found family dispersed across the cabin didn't mind her picking at all hours of the night.
In the time she had to spend at the cabin (basically all the time) she'd gotten pretty good at shredding. "Shredding" was an overstatement, she wished she could shred, she loved metal. Specifically Eddie's old records, but all El had was an acoustic.
She started softly plucking the riff from "Unsainted," by Slipknot and grinned to her self as she thought about how different it sounded on an acoustic, almost like a lullaby. She hoped one day she'd get an electric.
El looked up to see Will's bowl cut emerge from the pile of blankets across the room from her. She was relieved that he chose to stay with her in her room instead of with Jonathan in the living room. She figured he probably just didn't want a contact high, but she was still glad she wasn't alone with her thoughts at night.
"I'm sorry if I woke you up, I was trying to be quiet," El mumbled apologetically.
Will yawned, "no, it's fine, I wasn't really asleep anyway. What are you playing?"
"It's Slipknot, you won't know it," El grinned at her brother.
"I like your versions of their songs better, they're pretty. Do you wanna go sit outside? I don't really think I'm going back to sleep anytime soon." Will asked.
"Sure," El liked the idea, and the two of them padded out into the night. They sat down in front of the line of flowers that the upsidown had claimed. The angry red from the rift between worlds illuminated their broken town like a magnifying glass on an ant. Sometimes at night, El felt like she could feel the rift breathing.
"Do you ever think things will be normal again?" Will finally spoke up, "it's been so long I'm not sure I remember what normal even is. I don't think I'd know how to be without all this chaos."
El knew the feeling. Better than anyone. "Lenora was normal. If that's what normal is I don't think I'll ever make it," El sighed, she'd rather just sit in the cabin and pluck her guitar than go back to being bullied.
"You probably won't have to, I mean look at this, we're all so fucked," Will said, gesturing at the rift. When Will cursed it meant something was really bad, and honestly what could be worse that this.
"Here's to being fucked," El raised her fist to make a toast. She wished they had alcohol. She'd never had it but it was supposed to numb pain.
Will bumped her fist and she let her thoughts drift to Max. Max who taught her that gesture. Max who cared about her for more than just her powers. Max who was almost legally blind and having to learn to walk again because of her carelessness.
It was thoughts like these that drove sharp ideas into her head. Ideas that kept her in long sleeves in the heat.
Will seemed to notice the change in her mood because he nudged her shoulder, giving her the same doe eyed stare he'd given her on his deathbed in the Upsidown almost four years ago.
"Are you alright, I mean, I know none of us are alright, but are you? You just seem so forlorn, you know, like-"
"I know what forlorn means." She cut Will off. He was so used to explaining what words meant to her that he did it unconsciously now.
He smiled at El, "sorry. Habit. But anyway, how are you," he asked with a sincerity that only Will could have.
"Numb," El answered, because it was the only word that came to mind when she asked herself that question. After everything, how could she be anything else without going insane?
"I understand. Trust me, I do, but in my experience it doesn't feel good for very long. Just do things that make you happy, like playing guitar! You're getting so good you could give Jimmy Page a run for his money," Will said.
El grinned at the compliment, "I wish I was that good. It does make me feel less numb," she answered. It was true.
"See, just keep that up. You'll be ok, I'm sure of it," Will said with a yawn, and pretty soon both of them headed back inside, brushing the grass off their butts. Will passed out basically as soon as his head hit the pillow, El could hear his heavy breathy from her bed across the room.
She wasn't tired, and she didn't want to wake Will up again with her playing, so she found herself creeping around the cabin like a shadow. In the year she had been stuck their with nothing but Network tv and the chirping of the birds, she had memorized which boards creaked and which didn't, which slowed her to slink along without a sound.
She felt like a Stalker doing this, but it was strangely calming to see her loved ones asleep. Not fighting for their lives, or struggling with normal, everyday life.
Are we always desperate? El thought to herself. Yes. Yes they were. But not like this. Jonathan was passed out in the half collapsed couch, with an arm around Nancy who was nearly falling off.
Eddie was in the laundry room, passed out cold. He usually was. When he was first brought to the Cabin, badly injured, to be kept out of site from the residents of Hawkins who thought he was dead, El was scared of him. He was so loud.
One evening, after a relatively audible sob coming from the bathroom during one of El's episodes, Eddie had knocked on the door and handed her a cassette tape that he said changed his life when he was in a rough spot. It was Snuff. She had liked him since then.
She didn't go into Hop and Joyce's room. She'd heard strange noises coming from their one night, and decided it would be best to leave them alone.
The only thing missing was Max. El missed her like a phantom limb. She was the only one who really understood El. She wished she could crawl into bed with her like one of their sleepovers and sob, and tell her how sorry she was that she couldn't save her. But Max was at the hospital.
It was her fault. If she hadn't had these powers everyone would be fine. El couldn't stand it. She couldn't stand the number in her arm. She knew she had to stop. If she kept thinking like this, she knew where it would lead. It just kept spiraling.
My fault. My fault. My Fault. My failure. El slumped against the bathroom floor with her head between her knees. Her hands were shaking as she clicked open her pocket knife. It was Jonathan's. He told her it would help her be safe. He would be so disappointed if he knew what she did with it.
El rolled up her sleeve to reveal the scared, but still faded, number eleven she had been branded with. The death of her individuality. She tried, as she had many nights now, to cut off the number. To rid herself of what she had turned into.
She sliced into the ink, but just as it always had, it proved deeper than she could cut. The blood stained but the Ink stayed. Her mind reeling with regret, she wrapped her wrist in an old shirt and sauntered back to her room.