Daisies || Max Mayfield

40: Cabin

"We were just joking around."

"Wouldn't it have been so funny if I was taking a massive shit or something?!" He shouted.

"You weren't!"

"But what if I was?!"

"The gross!"

"Seriously Mike?" Nancy groaned.

"I'm just trying to demonstrate how careless Max is with Eleven's powers! In fact, how careless all of you are. You're treating her like some kind of machine when she's not a machine, and I don't want her to die looking for the flayed when they've obviously vanished off the face of the earth. So can we please just come up with a new plan because I love her and I can't lose her again!"

Everyone went quiet.

I turned around when the door opened, and Eleven walked into the room.

"What's going on?" She asked.

"Nothing, Nothing!" Mike's voice was higher than normal. "Just a family discussion."

"Oh." She glanced down. "I found him."

"Found who?" Nancy asked.

She stared at us, panting, a bit of blood still falling from her nose.

We sat around her in the living room, her sitting in front of the tv with the static buzzing loudly in the background.

"What is this even for, I thought you found him?" Lucas asked.

El was panting, her breaths getting shorter and shorter until she ripped the blindfold off.

"What was he doing?" Max asked, leaning forward.

Mike handed El a glass of water.

"He is in his room." She whispered.

"Really?" She frowned.

"And that's not normal?" Nancy asked.

"Billy sitting in his room on the fourth fo july?" Max asked. "No, that's not normal."

"He wants us to find him." Will said.

"Yeah, that's what I'm afraid of." Nancy continued, shifting her stance. "If we go to Billy, then the rest of the flayed will know we're there."

"It's a trap, I agree." Mike added. "We'll be ambushed."

"We won't be surprised! We'll know that they're coming and we'll kick their flayed butts!" Lucas protested.  

"You mean El will kick their flayed butts." Max muttered.

"Yeah."

"It's too risky." Mike said.

"Yeah, and unnecessary." Nancy finished. "Killing the flayed won't stop the mind flayer. We have to find out where it's spreading from. We have to find the source."

"Billy knows it." El entered from the kitchen. "Billy's been there. To the source."

"Yeah, but-"

"It's a trap, I know. We can't go to Billy, but I think there is another way." She took a deep breath. "A way for me to see where he's been."

"What?" I asked, leaning back on the couch. "How?"

She simply turned the tv back on and sat in front of it.

"Okay-" I shrugged, glancing at Max. She was staring at something on the other side of the room. Her eyes were kind of glazed over, like she was in deep thought.

"Look, El, I know you think you have to do this but you don't." Mike said, crouching next to El. "It's just, you've only don this before once. And your mom, she loved you, and wanted you to know what happened. And Billy's mind is-is sick, diseased. The mind flayer is in him."

"He can't hurt me. Not in there."

 "We don't know that."

"Mike. I need you to trust me." She whispered.

Max scoffed.

"Yeah, just be careful." He leaned back, sitting next to her. 

She nodded, tying the blindfold back around her eyes.

I glanced at Max again. She met my eyes, smiling a bit. I smiled back.

She leaned back on the couch with me, her shoulder toughing mine. Just that left butterflies in my stomach. And holy shit butterflies from shoulders? Wow.

She grinned, laughing softly under her breath as I copied her, not wanting to mess up. She looked down at our hands, hers resting on top of mine. I stared at it.

And then I think I surprised both of us, by flipping my hand over and holding hers. And she-

"El! El! Are you okay?"