YOUR SONG | steve harrington

026

It was finally the summer of '85.

And to start off the summer, Beverly Crawford thought it would be nice to pay her father a visit.

At Roane Hill Cemetery.

She rarely ever visited her father's grave since it would be too emotional for her, but when she did, she stayed for a while.

Sometimes she would just sit there, thinking; other times she would talk out loud to herself and to her dead father since she would speak to no one else about it. Not even her two closest friends: Carmen Flores and Alicia Sinclair.

The subject was hard for her to talk about, which was why she never did. Most people didn't even know her father had died. And honestly, she didn't really mind it since she didn't want people to feel bad for her. And she also hated feeling bad for herself.

She always tried to remove the thoughts of her late father from out of her head. And that did start to happen when all the monster shit started happening in Hawkins, so, in a way, she was sort of...grateful for the Upside Down.

Not that grateful, though.

She had prayed that this summer would be a good one, without any horrible tragedies like the last two years had seen. She didn't want more people dying, and she didn't want to die herself. There had been too many close calls.

After feeling her own deep sadness from her father's death years ago, she had always hoped no one else would feel that way. So when unnatural deaths started occurring, she could empathize with the people that were involved, although she didn't want to.

She just didn't want anyone to experience the pain she had felt after a death. Especially a death of a loved one.

"So, I just wanted to say that I love you and miss you, Dad. I really, really miss you," she finished speaking, wiping her tears away, before she got up from where she was sitting, walking over to her car so she could drive to her summer job.

✦ ✧ ✦

Beverly walked around the new clothing store she worked at in Starcourt Mall, Beck's Boutique, seeing if anyone needed any help finding anything. Alicia did the same since they managed to work at the same place for the summer.

Even though Alicia had ended up getting into the college in Kokomo, she still wanted to earn some money before attending once fall came around.

Beverly's mother had ended up divorcing Dave since his business wasn't making the same money it used to, trying to find another guy to help pay the bills. Since she was having no luck, it seemed like she would have to choose between paying Beverly's college, or keeping their large home.

She chose the latter.

So, Beverly decided to just get a job at the mall, in hopes of hopefully making enough money that she could keep earning to use when she got older since college was out of the picture. But, she was honestly kind of relieved at the same time since she didn't even know what she had wanted to do for a living.

She had liked multiple things and just couldn't pick one. So, at least she didn't have to feel the stress of picking a major and going through with it, only to change her mind last second.

Carmen, on the other hand, had gotten into her dream school: Purdue in Indiana. She entered into the medical program they had and she got in, practically making her heart explode since she was so happy. And while Alicia and Beverly worked at the mall, she worked at Hawkins Memorial Hospital as sort of like an intern, watching over the receptionist and some other doctors that worked there.