The Neighbor's Cat (Billy Hargrove x OC // Stranger Things)

20. It's the Pine Sol

The drive back home was long and quiet, much longer than Billy remembered it being. Which seemed pretty damn petty of him. Given that they had just wandered in the woods for half the night, and the drive home — which was only about ten minutes — was the final, and shortest, stretch of the nightmare they had somehow managed to survive, he didn't think that he had much reason to complain. After outrunning a monster and barely escaping government workers, sitting in the safety and warmth of his Camero was the easiest thing he had done all night. Still, what should have felt like an easy ten minutes felt instead like an eternity.

Now that he thought about it, though, that was how the drive from California had been. The last twenty minutes to Hawkins had seemed like the longest part of the drive — just endless trees and fields, the horrible smell of cow shit, and the gnawing sensation that the next two years of his life were going to be the worst he had ever lived (and that was saying something). And hey, he hadn't been wrong. But at least back then he hadn't been looking forward to arriving. Now, tired, cold, and honestly quite unnerved, he couldn't wait to be home and in bed. The thought of his old man set ice in his stomach, sure, but even that wasn't enough to make him want to be back in the woods.

Billy shifted in his seat, resting his left elbow on the window and leaning his head against his hand as he watched the glowing yellow lines pass by one by one. Peters was eerily silent in her seat. He had half expected her to blabber on and on about the pumpkins and the lab and the monster, but he guessed she must have felt as exhausted as he did, because the moment she sat in the car she had slumped right down in her seat, cried "Finally!", and hadn't said a word since.

Which he was thankful for. He was just too damn tired to talk — or listen, for that matter. He really didn't want to hear another a word about anything that had happened. In fact, if he could forget the hellish nightmare entirely, it'd be great. A faceless monster and a corrupt government lab and a whole field of dead pumpkins? His Batshit Crazy scale had just reached its limit.

Peters definitely hadn't been wrong: Hawkins was a madhouse.

Glancing at her, he wondered if she had fallen asleep. She certainly hadn't moved, anyway, all huddled in her seat like she was worried something might grab her legs from underneath her chair. He had the heat blasted and Def Leppard's Too Late for Love drifted quietly over the radio, and every so often a streetlight would light up the car before they were bathed in darkness again. It was a perfect recipe for sleep.

Even beneath the tangled, frizzy mess that was her hair Billy could make out the edge of her jawline. Staring at it, he had the very sudden — and every intense — urge to reach over and touch her. It was unexpected, completely caught him of guard, and he found himself lifting his hand, reaching forward, and—

HOLY FUCK. NO.

He slammed both hands down onto the wheel and locked his fingers tight in panic. That was when he noticed he was veering off the road, and gave the car a jerk to bring it back into his lane with enough force to rock Peters in his seat.

She stirred, lifted her head from the window in alarm and looked around them as if expecting to see something chasing them.

"What was that?" she asked, voice hoarse from fatigue.

It took Billy a second to get a hold of himself. His hands were beginning to sweat and his heart was pounding again, just like when they had been stuck in the closet.

He swallowed the lump in his throat. "Nothing. Must've... dozed off."

She continued to stare around them for only a second longer, and then her head was back on the window. She was dead to the world once more.