Kate Hopper thought she'd finally had everything taken from her.
With her father gone and her sister all the way across the country, she truly didn't have anything left. Since her father's death eight months before, she'd broken up with her boyfrien...
When he'd walked into his room that night, he remembered finding Kate sitting on the corner of his bed, her back facing the door. She hadn't said anything, only staring at the window. Whenever he'd walked around to her, finally seeing her face, she'd looked so empty. She'd looked so lost, defeated.
It had absolutely broken his heart.
She'd acted so much different whenever Sara died. Granted, that had been whenever she was eleven years old, but she'd still acted so different. Whenever her sister had died, her biological sister, she'd cried so much that by the time the funeral rolled around, she'd only been able to stare off into space.
He hadn't known what to expect, really, but he hadn't expected her to be so quiet.
"Hey," he'd said, trying to grab her attention. "Hey, Kathy."
She shook herself out of her stare, turning to look at him. Her eyes were glazed over. "Yeah?"
"Hey," he'd said, sitting next to her and putting his hand on her arm. "I've got to take a shower, but I... I didn't know if you wanted to go first or not."
After a moment or two of staring at him, she'd sighed, nodding her head as she'd wiped her face and sniffled. She'd taken herself to the bathroom after going through one of the drawers in Steve's dresser, specifically the one she'd claimed a long time ago, and took a change of clothes with her.
Whenever she'd walked out, not even bothering to close the door behind her, he'd only sighed.
Back then, things had been so different. If he would've known that she was still as heartbroken as she was back then, he wouldn't have let her go to New York City by herself. He wouldn't have let her bear all of it by herself, even if she absolutely refused the hell she needed sometimes. He wouldn't have let her push him away, wouldn't have let himself get with those other girls.
He didn't know if he could ever forgive himself for what he'd done.
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Nancy and Robin had gone to work on the next part of their plan, leaving Kate, Dustin, Lucas, and Steve to read all of the newspaper articles they could find about Victor Creel and the murders of his family.
Kate, who currently sat on a box next to the television, could only watch Steve carefully as he paced around the room.
"Okay, be honest. Uh... You guys understand any of this?" he finally asked, still pacing as he stared at the article in his hand.
"No," Lucas said.
"Pretty straightforward," Dustin said.
"Oh, straightforward, really?" Steve said sarcastically, giving him an annoyed look.
"What's confusing to you?" Kate asked, her eyebrows furrowing together. She knew that his dyslexia must've been kicking his ass right now.
Before Steve could answer her, however, Dustin started to explain things more thoroughly. "So far, everyone Vecna has cursed has died, except for this old Victor Creel dude Nancy found. He's the only known survivor. If anyone knows how to beat this curse, it's him."
