The Showman [Jopper fanfic] |•|FINISHED|•|

Part 1

It was night and Joyce was sitting in library. She was nearly asleep in her chair, her head resting on her desk, relaxing. She loved being the secretary of this little library, because not much people walked there and she mostly didn't do anything, just sleeping. She wasn't a fan of wild things anyway, she just loved quiet and boring stuff, like books.
'That's maybe the reason why no one ever date me', she thought, sighing under her breathe.
Yeah, Joyce never got a boyfriend, or a male friend. They all were just into wild stuff, and she was the one who said "no" to everything. It always pissed them off, so she rather stopped trying.
Joyce was pretty glad that she had Karen, her only true friend. Karen was a little bit wild for her age, Joyce supposed, but she was still fine. Unlike Joyce, Karen's job was...well, unpredictable. Karen was changing jobs too quicky, Joyce would even swear that it was every single day that Karen had new job. On the other side, it was pretty interesting to learn a little bit about other jobs, too.
Karen also had a lot of friends from different specialization, which makes everything in her life easier. Because if she needs something, she just calls her friend and they do everything for her.
But unlike her friends, Joyce was special, as Karen always said. She was her best friend, and that made them the best duo in the whole world.
Suddenly, someone burst into the doors, making Joyce startling.
"Hey, be quiet there. Please-", she looked up annoyed, but then she releazed that it was Karen.
"Hey girl!", Karen said loudly, "do you have anyone there?"
"No,..I am alone right now", Joyce sighed. She hated being in society, but she hated being by herself, too.
"Well, not for long!", Karen laughed and pulled Joyce up, leading her away from her library.
"W-what are y-"
"C'mon! It'll be fun!"
"Karen I have my shift!", Joyce said, standing against Karen with surprised look.
Karen just blinked and sighed.
"I talked to your manager. I forced him to give you some hours off, so I could take you to an amazing bar tonight!", Karen said, taking Joyce by hand, "C'mon Joyce!"
"You did- what?", Joyce asked in disbelief.
"Let's say I paid him for it", Karen whispered in pure happiness, making Joyce even more frustrated.
"I- I don't want to go and ruin my life", Joyce protested, but she knew that there was no way how to stop her now.
"C'mon! I also have an amazing friend there! He will make this day interesting", she said, already locking the doors of Library with Joyce's keys and walking to her car.
"Karen, I told you I am not comfortable with stupid boys", Joyce sighed, walking by herself now.
"Don't worry! He is innocent guy, trust me", Karen said, laughing.

When they got there, Joyce already felt uncomfortable. There was a lot of weird men that looked already drunk enough to hurt her, people screamed and shout at each other and stuff. Joyce put her hands to her coat, hoping that nothing bad would happen to her. Karen was dragging her somewhere deep inside the place, and Joyce was getting more afraid of their safety. Just when she wanted to turn around and walk away, Karen pushed her in a wooden chair and she sat in front of her, a round table was in front of them.
Karen called the waitress and asked for two glasses of wine, not caring for Joyce's angry faces, and when the waitress went away, Karen just simply put a finger on Joyce's mouth.
"Listen lady, this night is our night, understand? So now stop acting like a coward and take what I get you", she said, then a soft smile appeared on her face.
Joyce just looked down, already tired of everything. Was she going to take drugs or drink too much? What if someone takes her to bed? What if she will have horrible affection by that?
Before she releazed that she lost herself in thoughts, the lights went out. She just blinked and looked around, noticing that Karen was looking behind Joyce. So she turned herself around, spotting something she missed there before. A little stage was there, and now at the moment, two big lights were shining on this place.
Joyce heard people clapping their hands and whistle, but she had no idea what was going on, so she just kept being silent like a mouse.
Then, to her surprise, steam appeared on the stage, and a guy popped up there.
Joyce looked around confusingly, seeing everyone looking right on the stage, even Karen did. She just sighed and turned her chair that way, preparing to try and enjoy whatever was going to happen.
When the steam was gone, she could finally see the man.
This man had a bright red cylindr on his head. He had dark brown hair. His eyes seemed blue from Joyce's perspective, but she wasn't 100% sure. He also had a beard. He was wearing red and yellow coat and white shirt. He also has black trousers and red and white boots. He was holding a stick in his hand.
"Greetings ladies and gentlemen! And welcome to todays show! I wouldn't call it show by the way-", he said, jumping on the stage. He walked away and grabbed a chair and walked back. He put the chair right in the middle of his stage and jumped on it.
"Today! I didn't had time to prepare myseld for this role", he said so unprepared, that it was actually funny.
Joyce giggled quietly and to her surprise, others were laughing too.
"But I am glad it makes you laugh there", the man said, being clearly happy with what he just did. He clapped his hands and another chair appeared, now from the ceiling, falling right on him. He got hit in head and fell down with thumb.
People laughed to it, but Joyce didn't. She was worried if the man didn't hurt himself badly, and she turned to see Karen, just shaking her head and laughing.
"Dumbass", she whispered.
Joyce blinked and looked back at the man.
"This! Clearly wasn't supposed to happen- but that's just a way how world works! Letting us fall down, and it's just on us if we stand up", he said, getting himself up and taking the second chair, gently putting it right on the first one. He then jumped on them, getting his balance under the control and continuing.
"And as you may know, I am a guy called "Fally". I always fall right on my ass", he said jumping and sitting on the chair he was on.
Joyce gasped and when others started clapping their hands, she did too.
"So now tell me, why did you all came there just to see me fall?", the man asked, crossing his hands and looking at his little audience.
"To see you getting fall again!", Someone screamed.
"Because I have nothing to do", another man shouted.
"Because we love you Jim!", a woman said.
To Joyce's surprise, the man, Jim, just shivered when he heard that.
"A lovely things, I see", Jim said, playing with his balance. It seemed like he tried to get back on his feet, but the second chair wasn't prepared for this and also he didn't want to fall down. But it didn't work out, and he fell. To his luck, he fell right on his feet and didn't hurt himself any way.
He then searched in his pocket and took two really strong strings. He walked to the two chair, and forcefully took two of one chairs legs.
He pulled them down and stepped on them, focusing hardly to tie his legs to the wooden legs. When he did, he turned around and jumped few times.
People clapped his hands again and whistled, and Joyce didn't stop wondering about it. It wasn't so bad, she needed to admit it.
She had been surprised for whole hour of Jim's interesting and sometimes dangerous ideas, and whenever he hurt himself she gasped in worry. She wondered why he was doing all these stuff just to make people laugh to him, it wasn't nice.
When his show ended and he left, Joyce turned at Karen again.
"So? Whatcha think?", Karen asked and sipped from her drink.
"It was...interesting", Joyce whispered, sipping from her own wine too. She made a weird face but didn't said anything.
"Jim is always such a dumbass. Bur he has a warm heart, no way about it", Karen sighed, like if some weird flashbacks appeared in her head.
Joyce raised an eyebrow but didn't said anything.
"Wanna meet him?"Karen suddenly said, quickly throwing her wine inside her and energeticaly getting on her legs.
"H-huh? Like- uh- no thank you", Jiyce murmured, but was already dragged by Karen through a hall.
"C'mon! Jim Hopper is my friend, he will let us talk to him", Karen said full of excitement.
"Well I don't know! I would rather leave him alone! He had suffered a lot on the sta-"
Suddenly, Joyce stopped, because Karen bumped to a very tall and fat guy in black shirt and trousers. He had black glasses and didn't seem friendly at all. Joyce gulped and tried to get away, but before she could push Karen away, the man suddenly littened up.
"Karen! Nice to see you again", the man said, giving her his hand and shaking with her.
"Same goes to you Tom, we are actually there to meet Jim.", Karen said, pointing on the doors behind the man.
"Oh? Well- I don't think he wants to talk right now", Tom said, but he walked away from the doors.
"See Karen? We should go-", Joyce tried, pushing Karen away, bur her friend didn't stop.
She got closer to the doors and knocked on them, waiting.
There was heard a chair falling on the floor and someone grunting, and then footsteps that were getting closer to the door. When the doors opened, there was Jim, looking pretty tiredly and worse than Joyce saw him on the stage.
"Uh- hello?", he said, his eyes landing only on Joyce. There was weird silence for a minute.
"Hey dumbass", Karen said finally, crossing her hands.
Jim blinked ans looked at Karen, then smiling.
"Didn't expect you coming", he said, opening his doors a bit more, showing them that they can come in.
"I haven't seen you falling for months I needed to give it a try", Karen joked and grabbed Joyce's wrist, pushing her to Jim's room.
"So, who's your friend there?", Jim asked carefuly, raising his eyebrow.
"This? Oh! This is Joyce! A very booring girl by the way", Karen said, laughing at her friends face.
"Excuse me?!", Joyce said, her angry eyes laying on Karen, "just because I love silent and books it doesn't mean I am no fun!", she said, holding her anger painfully.
Jim laughed quietly and took her hand to shake with her.
"Jim Hopper", he said.
"Joyce Maldonado", she murmured.
She felt embarassed by what Karen said altrough it was truth.
"I like your name", Jim smiled and turned around, picking up his hat and throwing it away, sadly it bounced back and hitted him right into his face. He grunted angrily and Karen couldn't stop laughing.
"Oh my god- are you ok?", Joyce said and hurried towards him, putting his hands down and look at his face. It was pretty red, but there wasn't blood, so she suggested he was alright.
Jim didn't said anything, he just had his eyes closed.
"Is it bad?", He asked after a while.
Joyce chuckled and shook her head.
"You are not"
"Because you are dumbass", Karen said, walking to them.
Jim looked at both of them, rubbing his nose a bit.
"It's nor my fault I never had a luck", he said after a while, annoyed.
"You never had-?", Joyce asked surprisingly.
"Well. If I had luck, I wouldn't live in this small place with a very low payment for hurting myseld every friday.", he said, sighing.
Joyce felt that, and it hit her. She felr really sorry for this guy.
"Well be glad I helped you to get this work", Karen said, clearly hurt.
"I- sorry Kar-", Jim said, patting Karen.
"No, you hurted me. We are leaving Joyce c'mon", Karen said, smiling weirdly.
Jim's eyes widened and he wanted to say something, like Joyce, but Karen was quicker. She grabbed Joyce and pushed her to the doors.
"W- Wait!", Jim said, walking behind them.
"I didn't get to chance to talk to your frie-"
"You will see her soon", Karen said, closing doors behind them. They walked quietly few steps, before she burst into laugh. Joyce looked at her with surprised look.
"What was that?", she asked.
When Karen calmed down, she giggled and looked right in the eyes of Joyce.
"You didn't noticed girl? He totally got interested in your ass."
Joyce widened and looked around.
"A what-?"
"OH C'MON MALDONADO! ARE YOU BLIND OR SOMETHING?", Karen raised her voice in joke.
"I- ai am not! But we all know that boys just aren't into me", Joyce murmured.
"Well maybe it's your way of looking", Karen said carefuly, leading Joyce away from this horrible place.