Shadows and Monsters- A Jonathan Byers/Stranger Things fanfiction

Chapter 13: The Funeral

"Come in." I moved out of the doorway and let Jonathan into my home. I wasn't expecting him, but I was glad that he came. Really, I was really glad.

"You look beautiful." He told me. I could feel my makeup smeared and sticking in the wrong places, but he meant it. I wiped my eyes, trying to fix my messy eye makeup.

"I just wanted to look nice for my mom, but I think I just look a mess now." I tried to laugh it off, but an awkwardness hung over the room.

"What happened with Will's body?" I settled on asking. I needed to know what had happened while I was away.

"I went to the morgue with my mom this morning to identify the body. They found him at the bottom of the quarry. My mom is convinced that it's not Will's body, but it was." Jonathan sat down on my couch, burying his head into his folded hands. I sat next to him.

"How do you feel? What do you think?" I asked.

"I don't know Julia. Of course I don't want it to be his body, but it's him." I studied Jonathan's face as he said this. I believed, personally that the monster killed Will. If that's his body, I knew that the monster did this. Will was a smart boy, who wouldn't run away and go to the quarry.

"Please come to the funeral tomorrow, Julia. I need you there." Jonathan requested.

"Of course." I nodded my head.

"How's your mom?" Jonathan changed the subject entirely.

"She's doing better." I told him what I wanted to think was the truth.

"You never got to tell me about her." He was right, and I wished he wasn't. Jonathan looked at me with a face that made me feel safe. With everything going on, he made me feel safe.

"When I was about twelve or thirteen, my mother became depressed. She never left the house, and she would go weeks without speaking a word to anyone. My dad and I didn't know why. She started using drugs, heavily, that same year. I never thought she would ever do that, and I had no idea how she was getting them. It ruined my family. One night, she got really high and started becoming aggressive. She hit me and my dad, threw glass plates at us, and then she fell really hard. She hit her head on my kitchen counter. Blood was everywhere, but we didn't take her to the hospital because my dad didn't want social services to take me away. When she came down from the high, she didn't remember anything. She didn't remember that night, or who my dad and I were. We tried to tell her that we were her family, but she wasn't remembering and we didn't know what to do. So we called around and found a hospital in Indianapolis for her to stay at and get treatment, and that's where she is now. She's clean from drugs, but I found out that she has retrograde amnesia and now psychosis from the drugs."

I felt the rate of my speech to be fast, but I never told anyone this amount of information about my life to anyone before. I could feel my body tightening and my face started to feel hot. I took a deep breath and could feel my eyes starting to fill with water, but I didn't want to cry anymore. I closed my eyes and sat there, waiting for Jonathan to say something.

"I'm so sorry." Jonathan said to me, pulling me into a hug. I laid my cheek on his shoulder, needing to be held. Jonathan moved my hair out of my face, as I sat up directly facing him.

"I have to go, but I wanted to check up on you." Jonathan started to get up. "Will you stop by my house tomorrow at nine, before the funeral?" I nodded and got up, pulling Jonathan into a big hug as he left.

The next morning I woke up at eight. I heard my dad home, which was nice. I tried again to put on some makeup and look presentable this morning. I went through my closet and found the only black dress I had. I pulled it on, forgetting that I had it and remembering how it looked on me. It landed on my knee and came in at my waist. It had long, bell sleeves and had a v neck. I felt self conscious in it, but today wasn't about me or this stupid dress anyways. I just wanted to go to the funeral and be there for the Byers. I put on my black ballet flats and came downstairs.