Time After Time (a Stranger Things fanfiction)

If You Could Read My Mind

"If You Could Read My Mind"

If you could read my mind, love,

What a tale my thoughts could tell

- Gordon Lightfoot

Jonathan carried his little brother, still drugged into unconsciousness, into the shed, and Will's best friends tied him to a chair. Everything around them had been taped up, covered in plastic and cardboard, hidden in any way they could.

Hopper wondered if it would still be enough. Smell, the feel of the place, the very air made somewhere familiar to you. But that only mattered if Will was still in there. Everyone else seemed to think he was—but they had to. They couldn't imagine he might really be gone. Hopper knew better. He knew that it was completely possible to stand by and watch while something took your child, took them from the inside out, and not be able to stop it.

At last it was done. Hopper and Joyce had sent most of the kids inside and they stood there with Jonathan and Mike looking at Will, limp and silent in the middle of a circle of lights, as bright as they could get them. Hopper looked at Joyce. "All right. You ready?"

"Yeah."

He hoped she meant it. Taking a bottle of ammonia, he poured some out onto a cotton ball and held it under Will's nose.

It worked faster than he had expected it to, Will's eyes opening wide and his head snapping back as he gasped loudly with the shock of returning consciousness.

It took him a minute to orient himself, looking around at the lights and tugging at the ropes that held him. He squinted at Hopper, at the edge of the shadows. "What is this?" Then, with rising distress, "What is this? Why am I tied up?"

Joyce went to him. If he was still in there, if anyone could reach him, it would be her. "Will," she whispered, "we just want to talk to you. We're not gonna hurt you."

"Where am I?" Will demanded.

Hopper leaned in toward him, holding the picture of the monster thing, the Mind-Flayer. "Do you recognize this? Do you recognize this?"

Will shook his head.

"Hey," Joyce said. "We want to help you. But to do that, we have to understand how to kill it."

"Why am I tied up? Why am I tied up? Why am I tied up?" Will screamed the question into his mother's face over and over, the lights flickering as he wriggled in his bonds, his voice rising and rising.

Hopper held him down as best he could while Joyce repeated his name, trying to get through.

As Will switched to screaming "Let me go!" his voice changed, no longer that of a scared little boy, but something else, speaking through him. Or, at least, it seemed that way to Hopper, who held him as he fought against his bonds.

Joyce put her hand over her face. It was too much for her, Hopper thought. After Bob, after this whole year, it was too much. But this had been her idea, and it was the only one they had.

Will's screams faded into tired words, "Let me go," repeated again and again, as Hopper held the small body close and tried not to remember the last time he had had to hold a small body down as a child fought to get free of a tangle of wires.

When Will was quiet, too exhausted to go on, Hopper stepped back, and Joyce sat on the chair opposite her son, her face set and determined. She had wells of strength she didn't know she had, Hopper remembered. She'd always had them.