- GIRLS ON FILM -

Chapter Eight: The Upside Down

---------------------------------------------------

The car crunched on the gravel as the teenagers pulled into Jonathan Byers' driveway. Nerves twisted up in Jane's stomach making her close her eyes and take a few breaths. In and out, breathing slowly as she sat in the backseat of the boy's car.

This is really happening.

The monster that had found residency under Hawkins terrified Jane to her very core. The human-like creature that held both she and Nancy in its grasp as it tried to pull them to their demise. But it was time, the hour was upon for this thing to die.

"You know," Nancy took a quivering breath before shoving her worries down her throat. "Mike calls it the Demogorgon."

"From Dungeons and Dragons?" Jonathan asked, he had overheard his brother use the same name just a few weeks ago in talking about his new campaign.

"I guess,"

"I don't care what it is, it's gonna die." Jane snapped as she kicked open the back door and exited the car. Nancy and Jonathan glanced back at her reaction before shaking their heads. With her father being the Chief of Police they can't imagine that Jane feels afraid often. Knowing that all her problems can be solved by the man sitting in her kitchen would be comforting. At least that's how Nancy put it.

Jane was mean when she was scared. She wasn't quiet or reserved, there were no shaking breaths and nervous bounces with her. Jane Hopper was just plain old mean and Nancy had only seen her like this one other time. Five years and three months earlier when she woke up to an empty household for the first time ever.

The day Diane Hopper abandoned her husband and daughter was the second worst day in the brunette's life. The first clearly was when she witnessed her little sister's heart monitor fall flat, only for her dad to perform endless bouts of chest compressions. Finally stopping when Sara's frail, chemo-ridden body was bruised black and the electronic monitoring her vitals timed out. The black screen flashed Jane's reflection right back at her, silent tears streaming down her face before her stomach flipped in nauseousness. A twelve-year-old Jane was quick to grab the garbage can at the nurses' station before the contents of her stomach spilled out. Tears flowed down her cheeks freely as the vomit burned up her throat and out her nose.

Jim jumped up from his daughter's lifeless body when he realized what his oldest was battling. He made his way across the hospital room in long strides before sliding onto the floor next to Jane. Rubbing her back as she sobbed, not being able to scrub the image of Sara's last breath from her mind.

"Oh Janey," Jim would sigh, leaning his body against the wall. "It's all gonna be okay."

"Don't lie! Go away!" The twelve-year-old would shriek, clawing at her father's arms when they began to wrap around her. Pushing him away because for the first time in her life Jane Hopper was terrified.

Since that fateful day in 1978 whenever that feeling of uneasiness would rise up from the bottom of her body, Jane bit it back with hateful words or cruel remarks. She was never going to let that feeling invade her mind again. The Hopper girl didn't care who she hurt or who she pushed away, she was never ever going to feel like she did that day.

Somewhere in her reflection that was in the rear windshield of Jonathan's car Jane saw her twelve-year-old self. In the way her blue eyes were alive with fear or the teardrop that had trickled from her eye. Jane recognized the look in her eyes, the same one she had seen in the bathroom mirror and blackened heart monitor five years ago.

"No," Jane growled under her breath before wiping the tear away with an unmatched amount of aggression. Just rough enough to cause her bruised cheekbone to light up with pain, but the hurt was welcome. It reminded her that she was standing on Joyce Byers' driveway, whining about a bruise that Steve Harrington had caused. She was not stuck in a sickening white hospital room or staring at her reflection in her household bathroom when no one else was home.