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• f i f t y • f o u r •

Finn's POV:

Millie and I were lying down on our respective sides of my bed.  

Something was off, though.

"Millie?" I whispered into the dark room.

"Mhm?" she hummed in reply.

"What are you thinking about?" I asked, turning on my side to face her.

"My dad," Millie answered, still laying on her back, eyes fixated on the ceiling. I watched her face change constantly, moving through emotions fluidly as moonbeams danced about her cheekbones.

"What about him?" I asked cautiously, not knowing how she would respond.

"Everything," she whispered lightly, but there was a darkly heavy force behind it.

"Do you want to talk about it?" I questioned after about a moment.

"Sure," she nodded, shifting her body to sit against the headboard, and I did the same. I reached over to the lamp on my beside table, and turned it on.

"Back when I was younger, before the days of Stranger Things, my dad was like my best friend. We did everything together; play in the puddles under the gray London sky, stay up late reading my favourite books, sing songs together in the car," Millie told me, her eyes lighting up.

"And then?" I asked quietly, watching her expression sadden.

"And then...and then..." Millie paused.

"Hey," I whispered, reaching over to squeeze her hand gently, "You don't have to talk about it anymore if you don't want to."

"No, it's okay," she responded with a sad smile.

"You sure?" I asked.

"I promise," she said, squeezing my hand once before returning hers to her lap.

"And then," Millie sighed, "I got casted for the show, which he didn't even want me to audition for in the first place. He thought I had so much more potential than two middle aged directors on a Netflix original."

"Oh," I sighed, offering for her to continue.

"He was just so angry, all the time. He was mainly mad with my mom, because she was the one who arranged the audition. So when he tried to hurt my mom, Charlie or Paige stepped in, and he hurt them. And then one night," Millie said, then paused.

It was quiet for a minute, while she tried to find her next words.

"And then one night," Millie's lip trembled, "He tried to hurt me. And even though Charlie jumped between us, my dad succeeded, and now I have this."

Millie raised her forearm, revealing a prominent scar that had once been a deep gash in her flesh.

"Oh my God," I whispered in disbelief, "How have I not noticed this before?"

"I always cover it up with makeup," Millie explained, returning her forearm to rest in her lap, "It brings back too many bad memories, ones I don't want to deal with on a day-to-day basis."

"I understand," I empathized, looking her trustingly in the eye.

"He cut me with his pocket knife, and he was out of the house that night. My mom thought it was from shame that he hurt his own daughter. I agreed with her, but I think it's also from the fighting," Millie went on.

"But then what happened with your mom?" I asked, knowing the awful state of her and her mother's relationship.

"Right. Well, after a couple days, when I was obviously still upset about my dad leaving, as any eleven year old girl would be, my mom started to get annoyed. Whenever she saw me crying or upset, she would go off about how it was all my fault. How I ruined our family by 'chasing my pathetic little acting dreams,'" Millie explained.