✓ | 1. subject thirteen [STRANGER THINGS]

thirteen.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN:
GRIEF

[ THE UPSIDE DOWN PART II ]

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          When the four teenagers pulled up in Jonathan's car outside of Hawkins' Middle School, where they expected to find Mike, ELEVEN, Lucas and Dustin waiting for their return, they were greeted by the sight of red and blue lights reflecting in the puddle-spotted ground and yellow paint along the side of the building. Sirens. They flashed red to blue and back again from their places above cop cars, above ambulances. Parked in the corner, taking up two spaces with its haphazard parking, there was even a red fire truck surrounded by firemen, their jackets pulled off and overalls hanging down around their waists in a casual style. Police officers and ambulance workers crowded the parking lot, carrying notebooks and pens and murmuring in huddled groups together; three men stood by the open doors to the school beside two cones bridged by WARNING! CRIME SCENE! tape.

          With a screech, Jonathan pulled up with a lurch on the edge of the pavement at the side of the road, a little way up from the school, looking down at the scene from the slope of the school's front playing field. THIRTEEN was out of the car first, slamming the door behind him, and was around the back of the vehicle in a second to start jogging down the slope to find his friends.

          Only one thought ran through his mind. Only one person. ELEVEN.

For you, a thousand times over.

          Steve and then Nancy and Jonathan speeding along behind him, he reached the parking lot within mere moments and began pushing and dodging his way through the many strangers that paid him no attention; he was mistaken to be another witness, another member of Hawkins who wanted to see what was going on, another neighbour, another confused and frenzied parent.

          He spotted Dustin first, sat with a yellow blanket around his large shoulders on the back of an ambulance. Stood behind him, in the rear of the vehicle, two nurses muttered intensely over a small, scrappy notebook. Dustin had his head slightly tilted, trying to listen in, but once he saw THIRTEEN shoving through the crowd just a few metres away he gave up in his futile attempts to eavesdrop, brushed off the blanket, and quickly met THIRTEEN in a breathtakingly tight hug around his middle.

          "What's wrong?" THIRTEEN blurted, pushing Dustin back quickly. "What's happened?"

For you, a thousand times over.

          Hesitantly and reluctantly, Dustin tilted his head up to face THIRTEEN, teary, swollen eyes meeting his frenzied stare, and the older boy's heart of gold immediately plummeted down into his stomach. He could tell instantly that something had happened while he had been away, something terrible.