SWEET DREAMS - STRANGER THINGS SEASON 1

PROLOGUE

The girl lay on her stomach between a vast amount of pillows on her bed, the purple pen between her fingers gliding across the notepad, swirling cursive writing as she continuously wrote down notes for the chem test she had in two days; chemistry wasn't Mary Hoppers favourite subject in school, but still, she was pretty good at it and wanted to pass her test.

From beside her, on her bedside drawer lay a record player, playing another one bites the dust by Queen. She bopped her head along to the rhythm, tutting her tongue along to the background sounds.

She tucked a golden brown strand of hair behind her ear as she continued to write all over the paper, her writing much more neater than the majority of teenagers at her school. A trait she had gotten from her mother whom had lovely handwriting.

Her head perked up at the sound of the TV from the living room; it had gotten louder within the last couple of seconds and she sighed loudly — she had told her dad many times that night to keep the volume down; the gunshots and explosions of his never ending action movies threw off her concentration. Plus, she couldn't hear Queen over the sound of it.

"Dad!" She called out in annoyance, shaking her hair from her face but she was met with no reply. So she tried again, "Dad!" She yelled, her voice breaking with irritation but yet again, her father didn't reply.

Groaning, she slammed her notebook shut and threw her pen onto the bed, making it get lost amongst the hoard of fluffy purple pillows as she got to her bare feet.

She stormed into the living room of their trailer, hands on her hips and ready to give her dad and earful but he was sound asleep on the torn up sofa; his head tilted back, mouth wide open, snores escaping his lips and an half-full beer bottle between his fingers and ash from cigarettes on his lap.

She stared at him for a moment and to the litter of cigarettes and empty beer bottles on the table before her attention turned to the TV behind her, that had been driving her crazy all night.

Some black and white Cowboy vs Indians movie was playing, but the sound wasn't coming out clear anymore, instead it was fuzzy and disorientated, making her sigh yet again. The least they needed was for the TV to break for the fourth time. There was only so much hot wiring her dad could do to keep it going.

She picked up the remote, switching it off before tossing it onto the couch and heading back to her room at the end of he hall. But the sound of gunshots and yelling made her stop in her tracks and she looked over her shoulder, seeing the TV was back on.

She threw her hands up, an irritated groan escaping her lips as she grabbed the remote and aggressively pushed down on the off button and the screen finally went black, only a small dying hum coming from it.

A clap of thunder sounded the air and she peaked out of the window blinds, seeing that the rain was lashing down from the sky, creating mist throughout the trees around their trailer. Which used to scare little Mary, when she had first moved to the woods with her father as a child. But over the years, she had grown fond of the woodlands around their spacious trailer.

Jim Hopper's loud snoring from the couch made her look back over at him, her hands on her hips and a tired look on her face as if her dad could see the stern and annoyed glare. But yet, she found herself sighing and picking up the blanket from the arm chair and placing it over her dads chest.

She looked down at the rubbish lying on the table before she grabbed a spare plastic bag that lay on the floor and shoved everything inside. The clank of the glass bottles hitting against each other didn't even phase her father and he remained sound asleep. Although that weren't unusual, when consumed with enough alcohol Jim Hopper could sleep through a war — actually, Mary wondered if that had ever occurred whilst he served in the army.

She picked the half-full bottle from his hand and trod towards the front door, yanking it up with a forceful tug — something you had to do in order to actually open the jammed door, she took a swig of the beer before dumping it in the recycling bin along with all the other rubbish.

She pulled her hoodie close to her, the wind from the storm making her hair whip around widely as she stood on the small front wooden porch. Her bare feet were a little wet due to the puddles the porch had collected; the rain had been falling from the gutter above.

She was ready to head back inside when the sound of a twig snapping near her made her stop and look out into the distance.

She furrowed her brows, searching to see if it were an animal — most likely a deer; there were a lot of them always trotting around their part of the woods. But she couldn't see a thing due to the harsh weather of the storm.

Sighing, she turned to head back inside when a hand grasped her arm and she squealed in fright. A hand clamped over her mouth, silencing her startled yelp as she was shoved up against the trailer wall.

She looked up into the persons familiar eyes whom held his finger at his lips, telling her to be quiet and she let out a chuckle, smacking the boy in the chest as he removed his hand, "You scared me half to death, Charlie!" She exclaimed in a hushed whisper, though there were a smile on her pretty face. One Charlie had been dying to see for hours.

Her boyfriend leaned against her, enclosing her body with his own and the wall behind her as his hand went through the side of her hair, "Sorry, but I needed to see you." He said, leaning around to place a kiss on her neck and she grinned, pushing him away.

"You saw me four hours ago." She told him and she watched as his lips twitched into a grin, but his eyes never once left her lips.

"Yeah, but we were with Steve and the others," He said, his voice low and husky before his eyes flickered up to hers, "And besides, this storm is pretty bad — even worse all the way out here. I wanted to check if you were alright." He mumbled into her neck as he placed several kisses there.

She shrugged lightly, "I'm fine — asides from the fact that I feel like this trailer is going to be blown away in the storm and I'm going to wake up in Oz." She told him, knocking the sturdy wood of her house — knowing it was as old as the town they lived in, but still the strong winds were worrying.

Charlie pulled back, stroking her hair, "How about I come inside for a bit? Help you with your studying?" He suggested and she mulled it over, thinking about the absolute mess of the trailer, that consisted of; dirty washing all over the floor, plates mounted up in the sink, the never ending smell of nicotine.

She scrunched her nose, shaking her head, "You should get home before this storm gets worse." She told him and he nodded, taking a small step backwards and only then had she actually noticed his car parked a little down the way of the trailer.

"Alright, but only because your dads got a gun and I don't think he likes me very much." He said, raising his eyebrows teasingly and Mary pursed her lips together.

"Well, that is true." She agreed chirpily, tilting her head and Charlie scoffed under his breath, smiling at her; she and Charlie had been together for a year, but ever since the first silent and awkward dinner at the Hopper Trailer, her father had very quickly decided he didn't like Charlie and so it were usually late night visits and sneaking into the trailer when Jim wasn't around or was passed out.

"Mmm, okay," Charlie mumbled as he pressed his lips back against hers in a quick kiss, "See you at school." He said after pulling back, already walking down the wooden steps and pulling a cigarette packet from his jacket pocket.

Mary watched him light the cig as he got in his car that the rain battered off of. He honked the horn as he reversed, mud flying off the tires of the car and Mary held her hand up in goodbye. But still, after Charlie's car was gone she stood on the front porch.

She shivered, looking out at the darkness, trees swaying heavily in the wind and the downpour splashing off the mucky ground. In that moment, Mary Hopper had no idea that the storm wouldn't end there, for it would only get worse when a certain little boy goes missing.