Royal Pain || Stranger Things

five || what gave it away?

"Don't forget to mail your university applications or you'll miss the deadlines!"

Nursing a coffee in the elaborate kitchen, Tatum's ears perked at her father's voice. "Already in my bag!" she called, her stuffed canvas backpack donning multiple large envelopes with material that she had spent several days filling out. Downing the rest of her drink and running the mug under water in the sink, she snagged her bike keys off the counter. "Writing day?"

"You know it," Jordan replied, voice distant from the cracked door of the library. "It's always a writing day."

Tatum, dressed as sleek as ever in tight jeans, a fraying AC/DC shirt and her favorite leather jacket, zipped up her backpack before throwing it over her shoulder and wandering down the large hallway. She knocked lightly on the library door, poking her head in ever so slightly. "Did Elena already leave?"

Jordan was quick to stand, as if guarding his work while attempting to play it off as normal. "Yeah, yeah she did. She wanted to get to the middle school early. I guess she's lucky that one of the English teachers went on maternity leave early."

Tatum offered a light smile, able to smell the hostility in the air as her eyes flickered about the room.

An unassuming, bare corkboard sat in the back corner of the library, seemingly untouched.

"I'll stop by and say hi, then," she said. "Have a good day."

"You too, love."

Tatum's brows furrowed as soon as she was out of his sight, shutting the library door behind her and heading for her bike.

Never had one of his novels been so secretive. Not a single one of the seventeen he'd published. So why was this one so different?

Tatum rode at top speed to the middle school, intent on getting a peek at Elena's set up in her new classroom.

It had been weeks on weeks since Elena had started subbing, taking any open spot at the school for sick days and family emergencies, and she was beyond ready to get a solid room and schedule to follow. When she had gotten the phone call the weekend before that Mrs. Jamison had gone into labor two weeks early, Elena was ecstatic, and so were all of the students that had fallen in love with the new foreign substitute.

More likely than not, she was the only teacher that kept her class' attention the entire period. She wished it was for their interest in what she was teaching, but she knew it was more of the enchantment of an English accent on Midwest American children that hadn't met anyone who wasn't from Indiana in their lifetime.

The student that had flocked to her the most was none other than Mike Wheeler.

Not only had Mike lost his mind the first day that Elena subbed for his class, but he nearly had a stroke when she came over with Jordan and Tatum for dinner at their house. Nancy had never seen him fawn over someone, but there he was, asking Elena and Tatum a million questions just to hear them talk for two hours straight.

Tatum, parking her bike in the teacher's lot with hopes that she would be in and out in a flash, stood a foot above the rest of the students running around the building and absolutely drew their attention. Mentally following the directions that Elena had given her, she finally found the right classroom.

Elena perked at the knock on the door, willing to stop grading poorly written essays for anything. "Tate, hi love. You're sweet to stop by."

"I know it's not technically your first day, but I thought I'd wish you a good first real day," Tatum said with a grin, walking into the small classroom. "What do you have planned for the little scamps?" she asked, sitting on the edge of her desk.