Ghost of You // Vance Hopper

IX

Sunday 1978. 5:04PM
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    Your mom had gotten home just minutes ago, already passed out on the couch as soon as you heated up dinner for her. She mumbled a small 'thank you' and pecked you on your forehead lightly before going to sleep. Multiple blankets lay untouched in a basket across the room, and it was cold in the house, giving it was mid October, so you unfolded your favorite blanket and draped it over your mom. You were careful not to wake her up, settling the floppy plate of uneaten slices of pizza onto the coffee table near the couch. Before heading to the door to grab your shoes and sweater, you gave your mom a small kiss.

    You needed alone time, not cooped up in a small space like your room, or your house in general. You also didn't want to risk running into anyone outside in the front yard, so you ultimately set on going behind the Grab N' Go to think more thoroughly about how you felt. Not just about Vance, but about everything else. Should you really have talked to Robin more about what happened on Wednesday? You felt extremely guilty and couldn't get the images of him crying out of your head no matter how hard you tried. It just broke your heart seeing him sob over something he couldn't control, something that wasn't even his fault. You felt so bad that he blamed himself for what Moose and his friends did, though he couldn't have stopped it since he wasn't there. He didn't know that it would happen, it wasn't his fault.

After minutes of walking, you ended up at the Grab N' Go, which was entirely packed. Kids from school sat on the curb eating candy and other snacks from the store, and others just lingered around, talking with their friends, or—

    Watching Vance Hopper play pinball.

    There was a small crowd gathered around him as he attempted to beat his previous high score, deep in focus. He ignored his friends cheering for him, or the girls that were trying to flirt by saying they could never get a score that high and that he was talented. You found yourself staring at him, full on taking in his features. He wore a simple white tank top with dirt and grass stains, most likely from fights, and light wash bell-bottom jeans. His eyes darted all around the game and the store went quiet. Vance was just 100 points away from beating his score.

    You didn't want to be there when people were leaving, including Vance, so you trudged over across the parking lot and sat down in the boy's usual spot when talking to you, since that's what you do now, apparently. What you wanted more than anything was to bottle up your growing feelings for the stupid boy and throw them away, go on with your life and never talk to his dumb ass again. Why did he have to make you feel this way? He hasn't been nice to you once, why did you like him? Everything was so frustrating, and it made you want everything to go back to normal, when you didn't ever talk to Vance, when Wednesday didn't happen, when Robin didn't feel responsible for what happened, when Griffin and Billy weren't missing and you didn't have a strong feeling that something bad was going to happen sometime soon that would affect you.

    "God, when is this gonna end.." you ran your fingers through your hair and brought your legs to your chest, tears already beginning to form in your eyes.

You were beyond disappointed in yourself. You had failed your best friend, and developed a crush on someone that didn't like you back.

"Hey." You heard a raspy voice greet from your right. You didn't bother to look up, because you already knew who it was. Vance stood in front of you now, trying to find the right words to say.
"Are you crying?" The tone of his voice, it sounded like he was trying his hardest not to sound rude. The boy was doing a pretty good job, but you wondered why he didn't want to sound rude when he already was during all of your previous interactions.
"No," you hated when others saw you cry, but Vance had seen you do it before. He could deal with it again.