Sticking Around // Steve Harrington x Reader *On-Going*

𝙾𝚑, 𝚂𝚑𝚒𝚝 (𝟶𝟷𝟷)

"Hargrove? As in Max's sister?" The curly-haired kid asked in shock.

"You know Max?" You turned around to face him. Now, you were shocked too.

"Well, yeah. Sort of," He mumbled. You glanced back at Steve, who was looking back. He flashed an apologetic look at you.

"Wait, what's your name again?" You asked. You felt bad referring to him as the curly-haired kid.

"Dustin," He answered quickly. "So, are you like Steve's girlfriend?" The two of you froze. You didn't look back at Steve, afraid of how he was going to respond.

"Uh, no." Steve said sternly, "What makes you say that?" Your heart sank.

"You guys were eating each other's faces off." This kid was starting to get on your nerves. You just wanted to have a few more minutes alone with Steve. Is that too much to ask for?

"Look... never mind. No more questions, okay?" Steve moved his hands as he talked. "What's this emergency about again?" His hand rubbed his forehead.

"It's kind of a long story..." The boy let out an exhausted sigh. Steve glared at him annoyed through the rearview mirror which seemed to frighten him. "Okay, so basically, I found this slug thing in the garbage, and now it's a baby Demogorgon and it ate my cat-" he rambled.

"Woah Woah, Dustin. Careful." Steve said to Dustin sternly. You could see panic start to grow on the boy's face.

"I'm sorry, what? Demogorgon? What the hell is that?" You pressed for answers. The boys hung their heads low and ignored you. "What the fuck is going on, guys?" You raised your voice. Dustin hopelessly looked toward Steve, waiting for him to speak up first.

"I'll let Dustin explain it all to you, but it is going to sound crazy. Trust me, it's all true, y/n." The way Steve was looking at you made you know you could trust him. You turned around to face Dustin, waiting for an explanation.

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"Hold on, wait a second. So there's a whole alternate universe called the Upside Down and it has these things called Demogorgons. Steve has fought one before with that bat and we are going to get one right now? A-and it killed your cat?!?" You felt a bit pale. This sounded like a sci-fi horror story, not reality.

"Yes, that's all correct," Dustin confirmed. You put your hands over your face in distraught.

"H-how is this all real?" You said to the boys. Your face was still buried.

"Some lab experiment gone wrong." It was going to take a while to process everything you were just told. You still weren't 100% convinced. But then you remembered something.

"Wait, the thing that ate your cat. You said that its face opened up like a flower, right?" You tried to recall that horrific night and the memories you buried deep down. Dustin nodded in response. "Okay, was it about the size of a dog and super boney? Like it looked like it was being starved to death?"

"Uh yeah, I guess you could say that," Dustin replied as he tilted his head. You knew that he could tell something was up.

"Well, one of the first nights I moved here I went on a late walk and I saw something very strange. It was inhuman. I remember hearing something in the woods so I went to go check it out. I ended up running away from it because it lunged at me. Honestly, I thought it was all a dream so I tried to forget about it. But uh, I guess I wasn't crazy after all." You let out a nervous laugh while trying to clear up some of the heavy tension.

"Wait, so are you saying you saw whatever Dustin hid in his house?" Steve exclaimed.

"I don't think so. When I found Dart he was a slug. When did you see the thing in the forest, y/n?" Dustin chimed in. You used your fingers to help you count back the days. one, two, three...