Risky Business ｡ Stranger Things

9 : Close Encounters of the Third Kind

Prue Owens remembered her first impression of Hawkins, Indiana with striking clarity. It was a bleak and overcast day, the cloud cover so thick that the sun couldn't find a way to shine. Driving through the town was perhaps a touch less bleak, but considerably more boring. The buildings weren't tall or colourful but short and consisted of wash-outed colours. There wasn't a single thing that stood out amongst the town's landscape that consisted of more wooded areas than any other town the Owens family had relocated to before. Prue came to describe Hawkins as bleak and boring; a bleak and boring suburbia and paradise to none. She spent the first four weekends in Hawkins at the Hawk, the only cinema in town with Grey before the new school year started. But there was an unvoiced strangeness that wandered through the town, that was rooted into the thick woods that bordered the town. Will Byers was at the centre of this strangeness and a peculiar young girl with cropped hair that people whispered was a Russian threat. Of course, the facts of the usual events of last year varied from person to person, mouth to mouth. Nonetheless, two months into living in Hawkins, Prue believed the town was much more interesting than she could have ever imagined. But falling into a mundane routine bled out that eagerness to find out what, in fact, was so strange about the little town of Hawkins, and she definitely never would've thought her father had something to do with that very same strangeness. But her father was becoming unhinged and a terrible burden was starting to slip into his personal life, and Prue couldn't kick how unsettled she felt or the bud of curiosity that was growing inside of her like a weed. 

After stopping by the cafeteria to purchase a pair of tuna sandwiches, juice boxes and green apples, Prue drove across town towards the Hawkins National Laboratory, which backed up onto Kerley and Cornwallis. The scents of Fall rushed in through the open windows and her speeding tires scattered orange and brown leaves across the asphalt. While Prue was worried and curious about the work her father was doing, she knew that this little lunchtime trip was also a distraction. A distraction from Billy Hargrove and what Prue was now calling 'The Incident of Halloween'. She didn't know what to do, how to act around Billy Hargrove or how to handle the possible and unavoidable repercussions of The Incident of Halloween. She had barely scraped through gym and left in a flurry of blushed cheeks and a swell in her abdomen from Billy's eyes meeting hers as they crossed paths on the way to the locker rooms. Her breath had gotten lost in her throat and her knees wanted to buckle. Her lips wanted the pressure of his and her skin almost screamed to be graced by his skin golden from the Californian sun and shining with sweat.

Prue's knuckles tightened on the steering wheel. She felt ridiculous and guilty and shameful. So, going to see her father was a wonderful and well-needed distraction from school, her mind and of course, Billy fucking Hargrove. She slowed down as the tall, grey building consumed the horizon and the view out of her windshield. Prue had never actually been to the Hawkins Lab before, and the building was rather ominous and eerie; like it just looked like shady strange shit went on behind the thick stone walls and multiple floors. Inside the building wasn't any better. The halls were dull and grey; the soles of her kicks squeaked against the waxed, shiny floors. There were hardly any sounds, save for the buzz of the overhead lights and the casual sweeping of a door moving open and closed. Prue's approach was slow and mediated as her eyes scanned her surroundings for anything unusual or abnormal, but the problem was this whole place seemed unusual and abnormal. She was delighted when she found the reception desk and a mosey brunette with a headset perched on top off her stiff curls.

Life or death, that's what her mother had muttered about Sam Owens's work. Surely, they were both being dramatic and exaggerating the truth. Surely, right? Prue stepped up to the reception desk, her throat tight as the receptionist's hard eyes landed on her.

"Can I help you with something, miss?" While her eyes stayed hard and cold, her voice was shockingly pleasant.

"Uh... yes. I'm here to see Dr Sam Owens." The mosey receptionist gave her a pointed look like she needed more details than that. "I'm his daughter, Prue Owens." A smile pulled at the receptionist's painted lips.

"Ah, you're Prue." Her eyes softened, the hardness melting away like snow in sunlight. "You must be bringing him lunch?" Prue nodded, holding up her cafeteria haul higher. "Unfortunately, he's out of the office." Prue's heart dropped and her face followed. There was a stretch of silence as the receptionist took pity on Prue. "But, I can give you the address to the farm he's at."

Prue's brows drew together. "Farm?"

The receptionist nodded as she jotted down an address in neat writing on her notepad. "A pumpkin farm, actually. It's not too far from here, and I'm sure the good doctor would love a lunch date with his daughter." She ripped out the page and handed it over to Prue, who took it eagerly.

Once skimming the address, Prue looked back to the mosey receptionist with an overly bright smile, her cheeks almost straining with the effort. "Thank you so much!" Prue quickly turned on her heels and escaped the building haunted by shadows and God only knows what else. The drive wasn't long to the pumpkin farm, but the closer Prue got to the address, the more the wind that rushed into the car from the open windows became putrid and horribly gross; like something was dead and rotting out in the farmlands not too far from the Hawkins National Laboratory. After winding up the windows, she took a turn and slowed down as pumpkins filled her sight on all sides. But something was wrong with the pumpkins; their earthy orange hues were being consumed with black, their insides turning sour. Something was killing the pumpkins, hundreds and hundreds of pumpkins.

Prue parked her car when she spotted her father and Chief Jim Hopper standing amongst the dead pumpkins, both looking a little disturbed and troubled with the November sun beating down on them. The second she exited her car she was hit with a stench so bad her stomach rolled. She covered her offended nose with the sleeve of her baby blue sweater. Her car door closing captured the pair's attention. With food gathered in her arms, she gave a lame wave. Her father returned the wave with a flash of fingers and Chief Hopper tilted his brimmed hat in her general direction before finishing off his conversation with Sam. Prue's stomach was still rolling and dread was leaving a bad taste in her mouth at the sight of the dead and decaying produce around her. This was definitely unusual and abnormal, right? Sam Owens manoeuvred his way through the lines of pumpkins with rotting flesh towards his daughter, his shoulders tense with mild anger.

"What're you doing here, Prudence?" Dr Sam Owens demanded, lowering his voice to a dangerous level, guiding her back to her car.

"I brought you lunch," she said, holding up the cheap cafeteria food as proof. "What's going on here? Are you doing tests? What are you testing for?" Her eyes studied all the men in white plastic hazmat suits collecting and gathering samples from the decaying pumpkins.

"It's nothing. All just routine."

"Seriously? This does not look like nothing. What happened here, Dad?" Pure asked a little more forcefully, still covering her nose with the sleeve of her sweater.

"Curiosity killed the cat, Prue." 

"Good thing I have nine lives then."

"Now's not the time for your sarcasm. You shouldn't be here."

"Why is Chief Hopper here, if this is all just routine?" Her voice was sharp, her eyes sharper as she noticed the decaying and dead crops went far beyond her line of sight. Sam Owens lifted the food from Prue's arms before opening her car door.

"Thank you for bringing me lunch, honey. But you should really be getting back to school now," he commanded, his voice flat but his eyes were pleading. Prue slowly nodded, sliding back into her car. "I'll see you at home later."

"Yeah," she agreed while twisting the key in the ignition before pulling away from the pumpkin farm in a rotten ruin. Prue's curiosity was tenfold now, just as her dread and unsettledness were too. But she was determined as hell to find out what was really happening in the not-so bleak and boring town of Hawkins.