PHOTOGRAPHS▷ J. Byers [ Stranger Things ]

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"NO WAY, YOU TOTALLY CHEATED!"

The sounds of game obsessed twelve year old boys rattled through the Wheeler house like an earthquake. Alycia couldn't help but smile to herself as she sat on her friend Nancy Wheeler's bed, looking at the chemistry flash cards they had made up.

Looking at Alycia, Nancy rolled her eyes. "Could they be any more obnoxious?" Alycia didn't say anything back. Obnoxious as they were, they were probably having way more fun than the two girls were and Alycia couldn't help but be a tiny bit jealous.

Whenever she went over to the Wheeler house, it was usually to see one of her good friend's Nancy. But sometimes, when Alycia was bored, she often found herself in the basement of the Wheeler's, playing Dungeons and Dragon's with Nancy's younger brother Mike, and his friends Dustin, Will, and Lucas. She loved Nancy with all her heart but she was too focused on the future and was sometimes no fun (not that focusing on the future is a bad thing, Alycia just sometimes wished she could be twelve again). Being with the boys was fun, it was so carefree and Alycia could just be her regular nerd self.

The only other person that Alycia felt she could be her nerd self around was none other than Jonathan Byers, Will's older brother. The two had become fast friends back in Kindergarten and had been an inseparable pair ever since. As they got older, they had grown a bit apart - Alycia becoming pretty well known and Jonathan staying invisible - but they always came back to each other.

Alycia considered the Byers like her family. In fact, Alycia liked the Byers more than her own family. Her dad was a lazy jackass who didn't get off the damn couch and could almost always be seen with stains of chicken wing sauce on his shirt and her mom was a whiny, two-faced workaholic who was rarely at home because of all her 'business trips' (but in reality, Alycia so knew her mom was having an affair with a way younger man). Alycia's parents could honestly care less about her. They didn't care where she went and they certainly didn't care about what she did. Her mother had never wanted more than one kid and Alycia was the accident baby after her older sister Lori.

Lori was the only person in her immediate family that Alycia actually liked. When they were younger, Lori would always take care of Alycia - making sure she was fed and entertained. Lori was more than a mom than a sister to Alycia. But as they got older, Lori went off to college, leaving Alycia all by herself. Luckily, she was old enough to take care of herself and she had Jonathan, who would give the world to her.

"And fireball!" the voices from the basement were heard again and Alycia watched Nancy's face turn to annoyance. The boys were being really loud and they had been really loud ever since Alycia had gotten to the Wheeler's - and that was over four hours ago.

"I'm going to kill them," spat Nancy, letting out a huff of annoyance as she turned over a flashcard. "They've been at that damn Dungeons and Dragons game all frickin' day and I'm tired of hearing fireball! and bullshit! every twenty minutes."

"Why don't I go down and talk to them?" offered Alycia, but in reality she just wanted to take a break from studying. "You know, tell them to keep it down." she added, shuffling the flashcards before placing them neatly in a stack next to Nancy's bed on her nightstand.

Nancy nodded, her eyes widening as she shrugged her pale, bony shoulders. "I guess, if you want." she said, pursing her lips slightly. With that, Alycia offered a quick smile before standing up from Nancy's bed and brushing off her bell bottomed jeans.

She turned and left Nancy's room, going down the stairs and passing Mrs. Wheeler in the kitchen. She gave a small smile and a polite hello before finding the door to the basement and heading downstairs.