Wendy Walter isn't one to trust easily. The walls she surrounds herself with tower into the skies and don't open up for just anyone, but maybe, just maybe, Steve Harrington has cracked the code.
STEVE HARRINGTON
STRANGER THINGS
DEATHLIES 2019
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four ! 'wendy wants to be friends with steve but he ain't too sure' - iv. watch out; the polar boys -
On the following Friday, Wendy's father finally returns home to his family after his business trip back to England. He'd been surveying the branches there. The company was flourishing. The first success in his adult life, besides his trophy wife.
Wendy pushes the peas around her plate, uninterested. When her father speaks, she lifts her head to listen. Mr Walter is not someone to ignore, no matter how badly Wendy wants to.
"So, how have you found working at Walter's?" He asks, following the question by shovelling a mouthful of chicken, peas, and carrots into his mouth.
"It's... good," Wendy replies, unsure what else she can say. If she seems to eager, her parents will be smug that they set her up with the job. If she complains, they'll call her ungrateful. So, she treads carefully. Weaving her way through the minefield, which, unsurprisingly, is something she's almost perfected at this point.
Her father, Winslow, seems to accept this answer. He hums a note of approval, swallows his mouthful, and says, "Well, I suppose you will be saving your pay checks for your university funds?"
"That's the plan," She lies, averting her eyes and corralling her remaining peas onto her fork. The sooner this dinner, this conversation, is over with, the better.
"And you still want to study to become a lawyer, isn't that right, honey?" Wilma nudges, looking between her husband and remaining daughter, eager to knit them together. She'd have more chance teaching a cat to sit.
"Sure," Wendy says through a mouthful of peas. She swallows, remembering her manners, and continues, "I don't mean to be rude, but Billy is gonna be here soon to chill before later, so—"
"I thought you said he was just picking you up?" Wilma frowns, knife and fork still in hand hovering above the china plate. The less time her daughter spent with that boy the better. In her eyes, even an extra hour was too much. The only reason he is even allowed in the house is because Wendy would just sneak him in anyway.
"We changed our minds," Wendy explains, already standing from the grand dinner table, hollowed in its purpose by its lack of guests. A table made for eight occupied by three. "We decided we want to be fashionably late."
The doorbell rings shrill through the indecision simmering between her parents. Wendy takes that as her cue to make an escape before they can protest further.
She pulls the door open and surveys Billy's outfit before he can so much as mutter a hello in greeting. His usual outfit was good enough for her. Jeans, denim jacket, white t-shirt. It screams 'Billy Hargrove' and that, in her eyes, is his best look.
"Your outfit's acceptable," She admits, stepping back from the door. "You're allowed in."
"Hello to you too," Billy grumbles, coming in and shutting the door behind him.
