Risky Business ｡ Stranger Things

26 : Girls Just Want to Have Fun

The sun had baked the earth, dry and cracked. The air was thick with summer's heat. So heavy that any resident in Hawkins could see it on the horizon, blurry and sizzling. So thick that any resident of the once quiet town could often feel the heat getting stuck in their lungs, causing sweat to gather between their shoulder blades. The sunshine was relentless and thankless, burning skin and frying asphalt. No fall leaves to blow across the ground, no smell of nature herself in the air. Only sweat, chlorine and melting ice blocks sticky on sun-flushed flesh. And no nipping chill, only longer days and even longer nights.

Prudence Owens missed the fall and the winter. She especially missed the whiteness that floated in the air, delicate and soft, and missed her baby blue sweater that covered so much. She missed winter more than ever now as she tugging at the modest neckline of her full-piece swimming suit, pulling the black material higher, readjusting it to conceal the scars that littered her torso. The brunette teenager still had nightmares about that night, only days after Halloween. The night she had gotten those scars while saving her younger brother, Grey. She remembered the demodog's gross breath and its weight on her bones, mouth snapping and talons digging, ripping. Prue wanted to be proud of her scars, for they spoke of her survival, but as she looked around Hawkins's Community Pool at all the girls wearing binkies (Selena was wearing a tiny two-piece of pink and white), her skin was screaming with insecurity and embarrassment.

"Why do we have to come here?" Prue asked, pushing her white framed cat-eye sunglasses into her hair as she looked to Selena—one of her best friends—sitting beside her, rubbing tanning lotion onto her legs. The two girls had arrived extra early to the pool that day to snatch the best pool chairs: partly shaded (not that the shade stopped the power of the sun), equal distance from the bathroom and the canteen and the full view of the pool, glittering surface and all. And of course, these seats were the best spot for spying on the lifeguard tower too. "I have a pool at home," Prue added, her voice sour and riddled with her discomfort.

Selena Moreno replied instantly, flipping her mane of hair over one shoulder, so smoothly that she dripped with coolness. This girl was bigger than this town, and Prue believed Selena Moreno belonged in New York City or Los Angeles. "Because your pool doesn't have Ronnie." That much was true: Veronica Marra had gotten a summer job as a lifeguard, alongside Patrick Turner and Billy Hargrove (to the delight of all mothers and daughters). "Or a view that fuels summer dreams when the air is too hot for sleeping," she added wickedly, jerking her chin out. Prue followed her friend's gaze all the way to Patrick Turner across the pool. Even at a distance, Prue could see the gloss of sweat on his skin which was burning, his freckled skin screaming. Patrick was taller, his shoulders thicker and even Prue had to admit that her ex-boyfriend looked good, despite the sunburn. "You have to tell him to remove the tank top, it's concealing his abs," Selena drawled out, dramatically fanning herself. While Prue and Patrick had broken up last year under messy circumstances, the two had remained friendly.

"What I need to tell him is to use more sunscreen," Prue remarked, catching the cherry-red hue crawling across his shoulders and arms.

Selena shrugged her shoulders as she continued to massage tanning lotion into her legs, leaving them glossy and almost blinding in the harsh sunlight. "Some sunburn ain't a deal-breaker."

"You're terrible!" Prue laughed, the bright sound bubbling up her throat.

"No, it's summer break. The air is hot, I'm hot and I deserve some hot boy to get hot with," Selena rebutted, her tone serious despite the way she flicked her hands coated in lotion around.

Prue laughed some more, bringing her legs up to her chest as two girls from school padded by in itty-bitty bikinis, showing off their stomachs of clear, smooth and scarless skin. "I can't fault your logic," she hummed out.